#i was concerned lol (like oh no this show is good queer and animated sure it will be shortlived T.T)

[3gremlins]

no, you watched all of hazbin hotel season 1 in one sitting!!

...okay it was me. it was so good?!? def check out if you like cool animation, interesting designs, queer characters and musicals!

[paper-ish]

I also have the LottxAnden fever, but I suspect we’re both being delusional. Can you think of logical reason for why these two might get together in Jade Legacy? 🥺

Also, is there a group chat or discord for Green Bone saga?

ohoho mi amigo

“Heike was taller, had nicer arms, and was arguably the better-looking of the two, but there was something about Lott Jin that always drew Anden’s attention. A sulky but sensual curve to his bow-shaped mouth, slightly wavy hair that hung over unsmiling eyes hooded with long lashes. A sort of animal idleness in the movements of his well-proportioned body that made it seem as if he held everything in faint disdain.”

first, we have this part from jade city we’re anden describes lott. i think it speaks for itself 😳

“He did not personally know anyone else who was queer besides Master Teoh, the senior Perception instructor. Lott, he was not sure about.”

“Still, there were times when Anden thought he caught something from the other young man—a gaze held overlong, a quickness to be on the same side in a game of pick-up relayball, an interest glimpsed in an act as mundane as sharing the task of breaking up and clearing debris from a street.”

“In general, however, people were uncomfortable around misfortune and reluctant to admit to their own. He was certain that some people at the Academy tugged their right earlobes behind his back—but glancing at Lott again, watching him pause to draw a forearm over his sweaty brow and stretch his long spine before reaching for another branch, he felt a hurtful pang in his chest to imagine that Lott might be one of them.”

^and then we have all of these from the same scene.

[slightly more spoilery stuff for Jade City and Jade War under the cut]

and also, this after anden and lott get into a fight:

“It was the way Lott was talking, Hilo-jen. He was being disrespectful.”

Hilo nodded in understanding. “You were putting him in his place, then?”

“I …” Anden wasn’t sure. There was the faintest teasing suggestion in Hilo’s voice and in the curve of his eyebrow. Anden was appalled to think that his cousin might suspect some other reason for his emotional outburst at Lott. “I had to say something.”

Note that the only other time Hilo makes a guess like this concerning anden in with cory in the second book, and he’s right in that instance lol.

There are other little things here and there, but for the most part these are the main things in Jade City. Of course, in Jade War, Anden goes to Espenia and gets with Cory and Lott has a separate subplot in Janloon, and they don’t interact much for the book. However, i think it should be noted that a big theme of their relationship was specifically that Cory wasn’t clan and could not survive as a Fist in Janloon, Anden’s home where he wanted to return. It was the basically the big reason for the end of their relationship when push came to shove, which parallels with Lott quite nicely.

Further, in her Reddit AMA, Fonda Lee describes some of Anden’s sub-plot as him having his “first serious romantic relationship”. That’s not worthy of note by itself, but “first” is an interesting specification. 

And of course, after they break up and Anden goes on the Zapunyo mission and everything happen, in the very last chapter, Anden sees Lott again:

‘Juen Nu and Lott Jin paused when they saw him.

“Emery Anden,” Lott said after a moment. “Welcome back.”

Lott looked older; he was dressed in a collared shirt and smoke-gray jacket, talon knife sheathed at the hip, wavy hair cut short to show off the jade pierced through the tops of his ears. He didn’t smile, but the adolescent sulkiness that used to hang around his bow-shaped mouth was gone; he spoke slower and more seriously. Unmistakable as a Fist of No Peak.’

oh shit, he’s hot now

in summary, yeah i think there’s a pretty good chance for something lott-emery related in Book 3, considering where there character arcs are at this point (and how their arcs actually compliment each other’s..) and, well, i can’t think of a reason for all of these things if they weren’t going to have something.

Concerning if there’s a discord or a gc, the only discord i’m aware of is the Keeping Up with the Kauls read along one, but on twitter there’s one I could add you too if you dm. I also find the Green Bone fandom is more active on there lol :D

[krenbotvt]

What The Fans Of (Almost) Every Scarecrow Design Are Like Just by Surveying Rogue Tumblr for Approx: 5 Months. (Not in any particular order. Also this is a meme.)

Year One: You probably needed a childhood to relate to/needed a justifiable reason to stan one of Gotham’s biggest criminals. (but if your childhood involves being half-eaten by crows i am VERY concerned)  BTAS: The gateway drug Scarecrow. You’re probably a gremlin, and also really like the Dork Squad(tm)  TNBA: He’s under-appreciated, and you know this very well, but you’re also thankful that you get some of the coolest artwork of your favorite spooky boy. (Also the voice. 11/10 you want him to read sleepy hollow to you.) TAOB: You are one of the only 3 living fans of Adventures Of Batman Scarecrow, but you give absolutely no shit. You love that uncanny valley, near on clown-like scarecrow, and i feel bad for you, because you’ll probably never get art of them. Super Friends: I...Wow. Y’all really do exist... Galactic Guardians: YOU GUYS ACTUALLY EXIST TOO??? BATB: JAZZY. You like his hat, and his voice. You also probably enjoy a lot of older scarecrow designs as well. You get sad because you wish there were more content.  The Batman (TV series): PFFT HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA (But seriously though, you poor, poor things...There, There...) Assault On Arkham: AA Scarecrow in an otherwise good movie. Basically, you’re sad he didn’t get more screen-time. At this point, just stan: Arkham Asylum: ABSOLUTE GOBLIN OF A HUMAN. One of the gateway drug Scarecrows that lead you to The Rogues fanbase in the first place. You either love the serious artwork of him, love him drawn/written as a gremlin, or are STILL offended by his lack of footwear. Either way, you adore him and will remind everyone of it. Arkham Knight: OH FUCKING BOY. This can go one of two ways. 1.You love his writing (or don’t, but still stan), his poetic dialogue and his voice, and you also love how much he hams up the fear factor. You probably adore every artwork of him you see, and you REALLY love reading any fan-written material of him. You have many headcanons, and probably have googled A LOT of stuff to make them more genuine.  Or 2. You are very, VERY horny... (But as a good friend once said, “these are not mutually exclusive.”) Nightwing And Robin: Aw, y’all are so cute! Here, have some tea with the SF AND GG Fans, I think they have Earl Grey over in the CORNER OF IRRELEVANCY. (But I feel bad for y’all too.) Unlimited: BEEF BOY. You’re either in the group of people that love Scarecrow designs that use scythes, or you like how strange, yet fun his appearance is. Most art of him is super colorful too. There aren’t very many of you, but the amount of you that I’ve seen seem like super cool people. You all probably also enjoy the next one: Batman/TMNT: You knew the movie was a wild ride from start to finish, but you love it. You probably also like birds (I know, really obvious.) There aren’t many of you, but you like the idea of a corvid-like Scarecrow, and you wish for more. Or...You may be a furry that also likes DC stuff, and that’s ok too! We too also oddly love that weird ass cobra joker anyways.  Salecrow: You love his rhyming (which is arguably the best thing about him), but are also annoyed by the fact that most content of him use the same 3 images every time. You’re probably in the same boat as all the other scarecrow fans that genuinely want a proper medieval themed version of him. If you write/draw him, you’ve googled endless nursery rhymes. Its like Dr.Seuss up in this bitch. Also, them hands. Blackest Night: Chances are you’re still amazed that your favorite bag-headed master of fear even HAS that thing. You REALLY want him to wear that damn ring again, and will probably pay an arm and a leg to see it happen in a form of animated media. You also have very interesting artwork/writings of him. And your head canons are outlandish, but in the most fun way. (Seriously though, Hatter with a ring, huh...) Injustice: You either love the concept of The ScareBeast, or you’re here for the fact that hes voice by FREAKING ROBERT ENGLUND. Admittedly, you probably aren’t all too good at fighting games, but you still insta-lock him despite that.  The Dark Knight: Cillian Murphy portrays the character rather well, but you either are unnerved by his strangely dreamboyish face, or would wish for a slightly older actor. But!!! Despite all that!!! You love him, and probably still quote “WaNnA sEe My MaSK???” (Although I see some of you get absolutely tired of that lol) I don’t see any loyal fans of him, but everyone seems to agree that he’s not too shabby (heheh... shabby...) Gotham (Tv Series): ...Hello? Where are you guys? I KNOW you exist! Show yourselves! Jokes aside, you either love him or hate him. Live action scarecrows seem to be a hit or miss for some.  Harley Quinn (Tv Series): Softies. You adore everything about him. His dialogue, his humor, his very surprising accent, and his, albeit a stretch, questionable sexuality implications. Most art of him is very wholesome and good, probably because you’re STILL not over...Well... Maybe its better if I not mention it (all fans of him are the “If I see anything happen to them I’ll kill everyone in this room and then myself” meme.). Detective Comics: Hroo Hraa, my friends. Hroo Hraa. Whether it’s his “Queer grasshopper leaps” or his strange laughter onomatopoeia, you can’t get enough of his antics. Nothing beats a classic, and the fact that there are still many of you that are fans of him makes me smile. New 52/Prime Earth: One of the few scarecrows that greatly changes his childhood, but you welcome the idea of it. He’s a very unsettling looking guy, but you’ll remind everyone that his writing makes up for it. He’s mostly treated like a semi-C tier villain in the continuity, but every time you see him you’re like “!!!!!!!”.You most likely have a list of every issue he appears in so you don’t have to suffer, and your heart still breaks when you read the scene with him and that one girl. (He said he was sorry, guys.) Batman:Hush: 2 and a half sweet and savory minutes of this guy, only for him to get kicked in the face? Nay, Nay, you say! A crime, you holler! You go to your keyboard to tell your friend about how good his character design is, and how well animated he was, but alas they say “that’s nice, bud.” Blast it all... The Lego Batman Movie/Lego in general: Our boy at his most gremlin. Sure, you know this is a 99% children’s medium, but that doesn’t stop you from smiling like a dummy every time you see him. He’s funny, he’s delightful, and he has... a weird obsession with planes? What is it with them and putting him in planes? Maybe he got a pilot’s license before he attended university? What a smart little block person!  Obviously, I left out quite a few here, but these seem to be the most popular. There are SO many comic renditions of him, so It’d take my forever. (My poor fingies already hurt!) But please enjoy this silly little thing :’] 

[skylights422]

@ace-and-aro-wlw-positivity created a Q&A for aspec authors/writers, and as an aspec author, I am excited to participate and answer as many of their questions as I can. Under a cut since it became really outrageously long.

1. What was your inspiration for your character(s)? Are they modeled on yourself, a person that you know, or a character that’s already been established?

Typically I’d say my characters are a mix of general inspiration from other stories/characters and then bits and pieces taken from myself. I try not to make any of them like a clone of myself or another character, try to mix it up, possibly with mixed success but that is the goal.

2. How much, if any, has your character(s) changed since they were first created? What caused this change?

Oh wow, okay I have characters I still use from grade school and middle school, and those characters have changed/grown a lot. Most notoriously (to me) though are my two fellas Euphranor and Kadri. I created them while daydreaming in middle school while watching those science videos in class about how I could make a more parody-like version of said videos, Kadri being the energetic and comically sadistic teacher and Euphranor being the constantly irritated and foul-tempered student. The core of their designs and personalities haven’t totally changed (Euph is still a hot-head and Kadri still likes to troll him), but they’ve become far more nuanced as characters as their story become more involved and serious. They’ve also become softer characters, with Euph having a Heart of Gold and Kadri being a bit morally grey but generally compassionate and friendly. I think the cause of this change and others comes from a mix of things, for one I simply got older and what I wanted out my characters changed a bit. But also I think it’s because I spent so much time with those characters in my head that I couldn’t help but develop them more fully, which in turn made me want to give them a good story. Also, everyone is definitely more queer now then how they started, largely because I became more aware and comfortable with my own queer identity and spent more time in queer spaces (though with Euph I actually just realized he had to be gay because I every het relationship I envisioned for him fell totally flat and yet imagining him as having crushes on guys just seemed to work better/make more sense, and that was an earlier decision).

4. Do you intend on publishing your story one day? Why, or why not?

I definitely do! I have many, many stories I want to publish, as books or comics or tv shows or films. I’ve always wanted to publish some of writing since it’s one of my main passions and have always taken inspiration from the stories I consumed. I just love writing and would want to be able to do it as my main career, the key will just be figuring out how to focus on one project long enough to finish it. xD

5. Surprise fact! Give a random fact about your character(s), whether it’s their favorite color, food, or even song!

Euphranor loves to sing! He hums to calm himself down and even full on sings to vent his feelings sometimes. Kadri loves literature and video games, and blackberry pie is his favorite food.

6. Admit it, you have a folder on your computer of the various types of picrews you’ve created for your character(s). Would you mind posting a few (or five)?

*VIBRATES* MY TIME HAS COME. I absolutely have way too many picrews of my fellas so I won’t post them all, just two each for the core four of my main novel project. First, Euphranor:

(yes he is a Hufflepuff)

Kadri:

(also since I dragged the Hogwarts houses into this Kadri is Ravenclaw)

Ena:

(I put her in Gryffindor)

And finally, Fiera:

(Right now I have her in Slytherin. She could also be in Ravenclaw though)

7. Time to get serious for a bit. There’s been heavy debate on having non-human characters identify as ace, aro, non-binary, etc., but never actual humans. As someone who’s aspec, how would you explain to someone who’s allo why this can be and is seen as hurtful?

I mean, as a sci-fi fan I definitely love if the non-human characters are queer coded, but it’s definitely important to include human representation as well, and I think there are a few simple reasons for that. One is that queer people are, in fact, humans, and therefore our stories deserve to be told as they are in reality as well as how they could be in fiction. The other is only writing us as inhuman implies you consider our identities as fictitious or too strange for a human to have, and queer people already have to deal with other forms of erasure and invalidation in real life. (Also, not everyone is a fan of sci-fi/fantasy, and they should still be able to read stories where they can see themselves)

8. It’s a sad reality that many stories in mainstream media don’t have characters that are aspec, not to mention without resorting to harmful stereotypes. Besides there being nothing wrong with IDing as aspec, why did you choose to have your character ID as such? What would you tell other authors who’re interested in writing characters that are aspec, but are afraid of offending the community?

I have a huge list of aspec characters, which definitely started happening more once I was aware of my own asexuality (and later, aromanticism), since I realized that I could make my own aro and ace characters and then just went wild with it lol. It’s also easier for me to write since I can actually draw from personal experience somewhat for it. Beyond representation having aro and ace characters also allows you to explore more facets of human emotions/the human experience, so that’s always fun.

As for how I would advise allies looking to write a-spec characters, my main advice would be to remember that we are an incredibly diverse group of people, and so while no one a-spec character will resonate with every a-spec reader, an a-spec character written in good faith will definitely speak to some of us. Write them as an character first, and when it comes to things like how their attraction does or doesn’t work and what they want out of relationships, figure out what works best for them. Really, if you’re concerned your character would be offensive in some way you can always make a post asking about it, many of us are happy to offer constructive advice and appreciate that someone is wanting to put in the effort to write about our experiences. Reading or listening to anecdotes from an array of a-spec people is also a good way of getting ideas of how to portray us, and there are various resources for that (the tags, AUREA collects anecdotes from arospec individuals, and probably more than I can think of offhand)

9. If you’re comfortable with sharing, what is your characters’ identity? Do they use any microlabels? Does theirs reflect your own?

Unsurprisingly I have many characters who are aroace (Fiera is one of them), and Ena is bisexual and gray-aromantic. Kadri was originally supposed to just be bi/pan but has become increasingly aspec, will they end up gray-aro as well as grey-ace? Will they end up as a pan oriented aroace? I don’t know yet, but they sure are a pan a-spec. My most recent project has exclusively aro-spec protagonists, Valentine is aroace, Cedar is demiromantic, Raelene is cupioromantic, and then Clematis and Hadyn are presently just Aro and might stay that way. My aroace characters are often styled after my own aroace experiences, while other a-spec characters aren’t as much.

11. Why do you think that not just representation is important, but GOOD representation? Can you offer any examples?

Well, I think there are a few ways to make ‘good rep’. There is the ‘this character helps bring awareness/educate about the community’ and then there’s ‘this character just resonates with certain a-spec people a lot’, and the main reason I think it’s important is because rep should be for the people they’re representing. So if rep hurts the community or totally fails to be relatable to anyone who’s actually a-spec, then it missed the whole point and is doing just as much to leave the community feeling left in the dust as no rep. Of course things do get complicated when the community is divided on whether the rep is good or not, which I imagine will be a common occurrence, and many examples of rep probably fall into the grey area between Good and Bad, but generally people should aim to tell stories that will help more than hinder the people you are telling your story about. (Although I also think that the long term end goal is to get to the point where there is enough representation that it doesn’t matter if some of it is ‘bad’ or not, since I feel like that is the true state of normalization, but that is sadly not yet the case)

12. What’s the genre of your most recent story? Do you always write in this genre? If so, what other works do you have? If not, why did you pick it?

My most recent story (with Valentine) is fantasy, inspired by shoujo style anime series like Cardcaptor Sakura, while Euph’s story is more dystopian urban fantasy? His exact genre has shifted around a lot and will probably continue to do so. In general, most of my works are fantasy in some way or another. A few are more sci-fi or horror based, but definitely the majority are fantasy whether that be magical girl type stories, urban fantasy, superheroes, or dark fantasy.

14. What’s a brief biography of your character? Is their history, personality, and/or looks similar to your own?

I’m going to go with Fiera here. The short version of her backstory is that she and her older brother were born to neglectful parents, and while their grandmother was attentive emotionally she also lived far away. Her brother discovered magic, long thought forgotten, but killed himself shortly after, leaving Fiera alone and confused. She then made a point to dedicate herself to studying the theory and history of magic in the hope that she may someday understand why her brother would take his own life so suddenly like that. She has a down to earth personality and is very observant, and has a great deal of ambition and focus for tasks. She naturally has a more lighthearted and curious personality, but has become more somber since the death of her brother. While she always struggled with sustaining personal relationships, it’s only recently she started using her power of observation to be more manipulative and always keep a cool, pleasant demeanor. She has a love for fashion and sewing, as well as an interest in chemistry.

She isn’t really based on me at all backstory or appearance wise, and only slightly takes after me personality wise. Our main similarity is that we both can be quietly observant and don’t tend to get outwardly angry very often, and that we are both aroace. But I am nowhere near as focused as her, am terrible at lies/manipulation, and have different interests. I’m also way more prone to energetic rants and blunt statements than she is.

15. What are the themes of your story? Is it a lighthearted adventure, or are we talking deep, ocean-sized levels of angst? Why, or why not, did you choose them?

The tone of Euph’s story is kind of all over the place due to how often I’ve tweaked it, but there are certainly oceans of angst for all the protagonists. There’s just also decided remnants of the wacky humor from when the story was predominantly a comedy, and a lot more scenes of the characters just relaxing or goofing off than might be typical in a high tension drama adventure. My story with Valentine is generally much more lighthearted, though there will be some deeper moments for character development (and also because I want it to have a slightly gothic vibe, just Because)

16. How long have you been writing? Has your style changed from when you first began to now? What are some tips you’d give to those who’re interested in writing a story of their own, be it professionally or as a hobby?

I’ve been writing in some capacity just about as long as I can remember, and so my style has definitely taken various shifts depending on how old I was and what I was taking as my main inspiration at the time. Sometimes I went for more sarcastic and whimsical narration regardless of the events happening of the story, sometimes I went for a more quick modern-ish style, sometimes I would focus more or less on descriptions or dialogue. I don’t really know where I’m at right now though.

What I would advise to anyone wanting to sit down and write is to be patient and kind with yourself. Nine times out of ten what sounds epic in your head will come out at first as clunky and all over the place. But that is pretty much the whole purpose of first drafts; the clunky first draft crawls so the second draft may walk so the third draft may walk a little faster so the final draft may run. The other thing I would advise is to absolutely experiment, and see what works best for you. There is every kind of writing advice out there imaginable, much of it contradictory, so really you just have to mess around with styles and perspective and dialogue and see what happens, which stuff you liked and which stuff you didn’t.

17. What’s your process for writing? Do you plan your story out first, write whatever you want then edit later, or both? How might this help others?

My writing process is pretty much a mishmash of writing whatever comes to me, then planning, then writing, then using a bunch of character building exercises to have fun but make no progress in the plot, then neglect the project for months, then write some more or maybe plan. I don’t know how much this would help others, though I have found when I set goals with deadlines and some external pressure (nanowrimo, reward system implanted by friends, etc) I am far more productive, so perhaps that is something others could try if they struggle with staying on track?

18. Your book’s become quite popular, easily reaching the New York Times Bookseller list, and now, you’ve been picked to lead a writing workshop. It goes swimmingly, and afterward, someone comes and tells you that your book not only inspired them to write a story of their own, but also helped them discover and accept their identity. What’s your reaction?

Mostly I would just be flabbergasted, but also extremely pleased and honored to have been able to provide any kind of help or assistance to my readers.And I would feel very happy for the person, since that sort of inspiration is great to come by.

19. Are there any published stories out there that feature aspec characters that you also read? Do you have any suggestions?

Unfortunately not that I can think of! I am peripherally aware of some ace characters, but they aren’t in stories I personally consume. I hope to find more though!

20. Just for fun, write down a paragraph of your most recent writing. It can be an action-packed scene, some witty dialogue, or a colorful description that you really enjoyed. (Be sure to properly tag any possible triggers!)

Well, my most recent finished work would be the clunky first draft of my novel. So, here’s a silly conversation that entertained me to write:

Once they had bought the food, they went back to the park to eat. 

“You know, Fiera, I have come to a realization.” Kadri said.

“Oh? What’s that?” Fiera asked.

“Store snacks are not as filling as restaurant food, nor as refined, but they are decidedly addictive.” he said, munching on Twizzlers.

“Yep. That’s what makes them store snacks. Plus, I couldn’t get any really nice stuff. I’m not made of money.” Fiera explained.

“Which brings me to my next question, how exactly are you financing our meals? You don’t seem to work a job of any kind.” Kadri said. Fiera was almost surprised that he knew about jobs, but decided not to ask about it. 

“You’re right, I don’t. But my parents leave me about sixty bucks a week so that they can do what they want without me starving to death in their absence. After yesterday and just now, I’m down to like eight bucks, and the next payment comes in three days, so after this stash goes it's dollar store snacks only.” Fiera explained.

“I see. Fascinating. And these drinks you bought us, why are they vitamin drinks?” Kadri said,looking over a vitamin water curiously.

“Because we definitely aren’t going to get any vitamins from chips and candy.”  Fiera said simply.

“There is logic to that, I suppose.” he said. There was silence for a few moments.

“Um… Kadri?” Fiera said after a while.

“Yes, Fiera?” Kadri said.

“You know you can’t eat a whole bag of Twizzlers in one go, right?”  Fiera said.

“I don’t see why not. If it is not going to give me the nutrients I need, it may as well provide me with the maximum level of pleasure it is capable of.” Kadri said.

“Yeah, but you’ll get sick. And we have limited supplies.” Fiera countered. Kadri looked at the bag of Twizzlers in alarm.

“These are poisonous in large doses!?” he exclaimed.

“What? No, not poisonous, they just make you sick because they’re candy. All candy does that if you keep eating it.” Fiera said.

“Commoners lead dangerous lives, it would seem. I shall never forget this betrayal.” He said to the bag of Twizzlers, putting it down and taking the vitamin water instead. 

[dandelionpath]

while im still not fully convinced that the answer was legitimate, i do appreciate your thoughtful answer. ive just heard all that stuff about nb genders before. that they're uncommon, just a phase, hence why it's more common in youth. and i dont think OP being NB changes this. anyone can hold prejudice.

sorry anon, i’m going to lose my mind HSDHGJDSKL i wrote up a really good response to this but then i accidentally closed the tab I was writing it on LMAO!!! ANYWAYS LET’S TRY THIS AGAIN LOL.... (RIP to that half hour I spent writing.... UGH)

I dont know if I understand what you mean by legitimate in this case? From what I understand, Bear was speaking from her own experience, which is about as legitimate as one can get when working with spirits!

I do completely agree with you that one can still hold prejudice/be -phobic even when they’re part of the minority group in question! I just thought I’d mention that piece about her being enby, because it’s much different from a cishet person saying it than a queer person saying it. But yes! You are absolutely right with that!

I think that the issue here is that animals and humans probably have very different ideas of gender! 

Here's a couple snippets of msgs I sent to a friend when we were discussing this after your anon bc I'm really interested in this topic and wanted to hear my friend's thoughts and ideas on the topic

1. "i do not know that much actually and i dont think i really have An Answer to it all?? bc i'm still learning and i'd need to do some research and also ask like,, the spirits themselves LOL and even then it's all just MY experience and i think it'll be impossible to come to any actual conclusive fact-based answer tbh" 2. "i think [the animal kingdom is] mostly just concerned abt staying alive and furthering the species and making the animals around them happy and like,, fostering connections and care between each other if they're social animals!!! idk it's like,,, all A Lot and it also depends on the animal i think bc like... elephants have much different brains than birds for example LOL"

humans have very different brains than other animals! elephants and primates and dolphins and crows etc are some of the animals that have closest to where humans are at in terms of intelligence. this is not to say that other animals are not intelligent, just that they have DIFFERENT intelligence and very different brains! so i think perhaps gender is more of a human thing? I'm not entirely sure, though, and can only speak from my thoughts and what little research I've done. I think animals are mostly concerned with like... "do my sex organs match up right w this animal's sex organs so we can reproduce, and are they a suitable mate so our offspring will be strong and survive", but this doesn't explain homosexuality in animals, so thats INTERESTING and shows that animals are capable of far more thought and care than many humans give them credit for!

I keep catching myself talking in circles LOL because I'm not entirely sure on what my thoughts on the matter are yet, and I'm not sure if I'll have A Proper Answer (as i said in the first snippet of message I sent to a friend that I've shared here).

What i CAN say, though, is that there are most certainly nonbinary and trans animals out there, even if it's much different to how humans classify such gender experiences. Frogs (and certain insects i think?) are the one specific animal I can think of off the top of my head that shows cases of nonbinary gender. In the case of frogs, certain species will change their sex if they need more of the other sex for reproduction purposes. BUT THAT ONLY ADDRESSES REPRODUCTION, NOT GENDER! A good example of transness (and possible enby experience) in animals, is the trans lions! (I need to refresh myself on trans animals LOL, it's been a hot minute since I looked into it!) There was a case of a lion of one gender who acted as if they were of the "other" gender, but this does not do anything for reproduction or furthering the species so obviously there is more going on in animals minds than just reproduction when it comes to gender and gender expression! (though, this may have something to do with possibly being intersex and thus having both sex hormones? I'm not entirely sure, I'd have to look into it more!)

I do NOT think nonbinary genders are uncommon or just a phase/a fleeting experience. I've been nonbinary all my life, even if I didn't realize it yet. I know people who have been nonbinary all their life and had many "nonbinary experiences" throughout their life, and there are plenty of older (40+) nonbinary people who are of all ages!! Nonbinary identities have existed for centuries, since the beginning of it all, and we're not going anywhere soon LOL. I do think gender experiences change as one gets older, because of how our society works - puberty/sexual maturity changes things! all of a sudden girls and boys are treated differently and thus exacerbates the differences between genders and you realize that "oh gender is a thing actually and this kind of sucks". So it would make sense that this would be similar in the animal kingdom! But I do think there are definitely nonbinary and transgender animals out there, especially spirits since animals gain a newfound sense of awareness when they become spirits (though this may just be because we get to understand them better since communication barriers are broken).

OKAY SORRY I'VE SAID A LOT AND I HOPE THIS HELPS???? idk how it would at all LOL, but! TL;DR  animals and humans probably have different experiences of gender, and there are absolutely nonbinary and trans animals out there!

[timeisacephalopod]

Okay so after the invasion of New York The Avengers come to live together in the Tower, everything seems fine at first until Steve and the team are confronted with Tony's open sexuality as they watch him in a conflict with a man that he had brought home the night before but is having problems with (might I mention violently having problems with) after the fun. Tony tries to brush it off as nothing but if the way he is very slightly showing signs of pain is anyting he's not fine at all.

Alrighty! This is surprisingly Steve-centric, but I think it works well as a set up and also this is very stony. Don’t know how you feel about the pairing but that’s what came out lol. Warnings for references to abuse and sexual violence. Be prepared- this is a Long Boi.

(Side note: I do have your other prompt in my inbox- I’ll get to it at some point!)

Back in his day Steve knew about queer people, lived in a community close to where they all seemed to live too. But in his day that kind of thing was wrong and no one really talked about it, and when they did it wasn’t anything good. He’s always known about his uh… attractions and the serum, it was designed to make him perfection physically. Everything that had been wrong with him was cured- no heart murmur, no asthma, no more being hard of hearing. But his attractions never went away. It’d been the first time he’d ever truly considered that maybe people were wrong about how they viewed queer people. Maybe he didn’t agree with them before- no one he’d ever met seemed all that bad, but he’d thought he’d been giving himself an out. A way not to feel bad about what he is.

But the serum was supposed to get rid of the imperfections and it never got rid of that.

In the modern day he sort of learned that the serum must only work on physical things given how hard life seems to be, harder than it’d ever been in the war and then there’s the guilt he feels over that too. Who wishes for a war just so they can feel useful again? It’s messed up. But those attractions never really went anywhere and Steve hard started to wonder if maybe it’s a mental thing like people used to say. Serum wouldn’t cure that, he knows that now thanks to the shell shock. PTSD, they call it now.

That’s about when he’d moved into the Tower and, much to his surprise, discovered that Tony must have the same attractions he does but he’s shameless about it. Natasha had been the first to notice his surprise, obviously, but had explained some about modern movements for LGBT equality. On the side Steve did his own research and it turns out people still plenty hate gay people, but there’s a lot of pushback to it. It’d been the first time, really, that he’d considered that that was something about himself that he could take pride in. Before it’d been a source of shame.

It had been watching Tony’s easy flirtations that had made the transition easier, and maybe it was Clint’s teasing back that made Tony’s sexuality feel less out of place. Clint’s straight, they all know that, but he doesn’t seem to care that Tony hits on him and it ends up being a running joke. Now the string of one night stands? That’s unusual even for this time he’s learned but Tony is Tony and he does what he wants.

Steve keeps an eye on it though, not because he has a problem with it really even if he wonders why Tony feels the need for constant companionship with no real meaning, but because it’s new, someone embracing their sexuality in this way. Even those that accepted their gayness in his time kept things secret outside of the communities they were drawn to. He thinks all that time spent watching Tony, his investment in figuring out how exactly to hold pride in his sexuality, is why he noticed the pattern before anyone else.

Tony seems to disappear for a day or two after his encounters and its not all the time, and Steve notices a skew towards disappearances after men but women make Tony disappear too. Just a little less frequently. He brings his findings to Natasha but she brushes him off, telling him that maybe Tony likes his privacy but Steve knows he has no concept of privacy. Not after growing up a celebrity- people expect him to share in every aspect of his life all the time so he’s become an oversharer. So he goes back to watching Tony’s actions and trying to find patterns. There’s Avengers downtime at the moment anyways.

It takes time but Steve eventually learns how to intercept Tony’s one night stands leaving and it takes work to predict Tony’s paths out. Its like he’s planned for this, someone trying to confront the people leaving his bedroom and Steve finds that strange but he’s seen the press harass Tony. Maybe this is a symptom of that. Steve finds his latest conquest gripping Tony’s arm in a way that’s got Tony looking leery and combative, never a good combination in Steve’s experience with the man, so he speaks up. “Is there a problem?” he asks casually, leaning against the wall.

There is, he can see it on the guy’s face right away but he knows how apprehensive people are to confront him. Could be being Captain America, could be his physical presence, but he suspects its a healthy dose of both. “It’s fine Steve, leave it alone,” Tony says, voice tight and he looks pissed off for some reason.

His eyes flick back and forth between the two of them before he turns to leave because, strange situation that Steve is suspicious of or not, Tony can take care of himself. Steve has seen his competence in action on many occasions. “Nice of you to call your guard dog off,” the guy says and Steve doesn’t like the tone he’s got, makes the hairs on the back of his neck rise and he’s learned not to ignore his instincts.

The guys sounds, he realizes, like his father when he got drunk. Except this guy is sober. So Steve turns, “actually no, let go of Tony’s arm and get the hell out,” he says. Tony gives him a dirty look for it but Steve knows something is off here.

“The hell right do you have to tell me what to do?” the guy asks and Steve rolls his eyes.

“This isn’t a fucking negotiation- get your damn hands off Tony or I’ll pull them off myself and then I’ll toss your ass out the door. Take your pick,” he snaps, unsure why he’s so upset to begin with. It seems to surprise Tony too but the threat does its job and Tony’s companion skitters off, Steve glaring at him until he’s out of sight. When he turns back Tony looks annoyed.

“I don’t need you to play White Knight, Steve. I can take care of myself,” he snaps.

Steve shakes his head, “I’ve seen you do all kinds of impossible things- I know you can take care of yourself. Doesn’t mean you can’t use the backup,” he says.

Tony rolls his eyes, “I don’t need backup either Steve, I’m not some pet project and I’m not a zoo animal so if you can stop following me around like an anthropologist following some shiny new tribe.” He turns and stomps off after that and Steve frowns, unsure what the hell just happened on any level. He does, however, think that maybe Natasha won’t brush off his concerns this time.

When Natasha finally agrees to review the tapes she decides she doesn’t like the interaction Tony had had with the guy Steve intercepted but had been ready to leave it be. Steve tells her to do an actual investigation though and he’s sure she only does it because she likes him enough to listen. By the third encounter she’s searching harder for the small snatches of Tony’s encounters on tape- seems he removed them from his personal areas- and nothing looks good.

By the time they’ve gotten through three months of material Steve asks if its possible to make actual police reports about these people because Tony really can pick the worst of the worst. Steve isn’t sure he’s met anyone with that bad of luck. Natasha considers the footage for a long moment before shaking her head. “I don’t think we have enough evidence to make a case against any of these people. They’re all handsy and its inappropriate, but not enough to warrant an investigation and Tony won’t be cooperative,” she says.

Steve frowns, “why the hell not, he obviously doesn’t like being treated like this,” he says. They’ve watched, over and over, Tony trying to pull away, or stop the interaction, or some other thing consistently so what’s the problem?

“And yet he keeps bringing people like this home,” she says. He can feel the look he’s giving her and given the way people seem to crumple under any pressure he puts on them he’s surprised when she doesn’t. “Don’t look at me like that, this is what the courts will say. If he didn’t like it he wouldn’t find himself here so many times.”

He rolls his eyes, “so bad luck means you can get treated like shit now? Unbelievable.” He shakes his head and Natasha rolls her eyes.

“Oh lets not act like you came from the good old days where abuse was something people talked about and prosecuted. He’s a celebrity and he’s known for being experimental in everything he does, sex included. No one will take this seriously,” she tells him.

He looks at the screen- Tony is frozen on it, trying to pull his arm out of the grasp of some conquest’s grip and he’s clearly uninterested in whatever is happening. Natasha has a point though- in his time people treated this like it was normal, Steve has seen it happen to plenty of women. It wasn’t right then, and he doesn’t understand how this particular area of law hasn’t improved. Forcing people into situations they don’t want to be in isn’t ever okay, so how come this still happens seventy years later?

In the end Steve goes to Tony about all this because what else is he supposed to do? Natasha sits off to the side and Tony, for whatever reason, chooses to take out his anger on her. “Can’t you keep your fucking nose in your own damn business or are you always such a damn snake?” he snaps.

“I don’t know what snakes have to do with this,” Steve says, “but this? Isn’t acceptable.” He gestures to the screen and he’s sure Tony, with his genius brain, can figure out what he means.

Tony looks over and rolls his eyes, “I’m bisexual, get over it. Your homophobia isn’t my problem,” he snaps and Steve frowns, confused for a moment and Natasha takes the small lull as a moment to pounce.

“He means the abuse, not the gay thing. None of us give a shit about that,” she says.

“I don’t,” Steve adds fast, pauses, and then continues. “Would be hypocritical if I did,” he adds. That seems to shock Tony into submission for the time being so Steve uses the silence to talk. “People can’t keep treating you like this Tony- we’ve watched something like a dozen encounters and not one person treated you right.”

The comment seems to pull Tony out of his reverie and he eyes Steve up and down and gives him a small, flirtatious smirk. He’s seen the look a million times before and he ignores the way his stomach flutters because he has no time for this right now. “What, never met someone who likes it rough?” he asks and Steve wrinkles his nose on instinct at the vulgarity.

“Pretty sure people who like it rough consent to that and this,” he points at the screen where Tony is paused pulling away, “is not what consent looks like. Actually, that’s a pretty damn clear no to me. People should’t treat you like that.” People shouldn’t treat anyone like that but right now Tony is his priority given that this is a consistent thing.

Tony gives the screen a half a glance before that irritatingly arrogant dismissal Steve had, when they first met, mistaken for a lack of caring appears on his face. “Its fine, Steve, people have disagreements,” he says.

Steve raises an eyebrow, “well was this a disagreement or was this a consensual interaction that was intended to be rough? Why the change in story?” he asks. He watches Tony’s hackles rise and Natasha steps in.

“Tony, we aren’t stupid- we know you well enough to know what you act like when you’re being forced into something you don’t want. That’s not what we’re questioning,” she murmurs.

“What I’m questioning is why people think its fine to do this to you,” Steve says. “And also,” Tony tenses, flinching a little like he expects Steve to say something harsh, “how no one has noticed this before.”

Whatever Tony was expecting it wasn’t that. “What, don’t wonder why I put up with it?” he asks a little harshly.

Steve shrugs, “I know people who’ve been abused. At a certain point you’re just desensitized to it. I don’t even know if you consider this abuse at all and considering the way you talk about Howard this isn’t new to you. That isn’t okay either, you shouldn’t have to be used to this,” he says.

Natasha frowns a little, looking at him the way she looks at people she’s trying to dissect. Its a distinctly Natasha look rather than one of her many personas. Tony looks confused too. “Its not abuse, its just a disagreement,” Tony mumbles.

“Several of them that seem to play out the same way and this,” he turns back to the computer and finds the right video, “what the fuck even is this?” he asks, gesturing to Tony stumbling along- clearly drunk not that the woman he’s with seems to give a shit. “This isn’t even a consensual interaction- you can’t even fucking stand.” Its probably the most shocking thing they found and Steve suspects not the first time this woman has done this kind of thing. Looks too practiced to him and Natasha agreed.

Tony doesn’t seem to though. “Oh come on, you’ve never had drunk sex?” he asks and no, he hasn’t.

“Can’t get drunk with the serum, and before that I was too worried about hacking up a lung to drink. But I’m not an idiot Tony, there’s a difference between drunk sex and taking advantage of someone. If your partner can’t even fucking walk, they can’t consent to sex. Simple as that.” Tony rolls his eyes and looks to Natasha like she’s going to help and she looks at him like he’s nuts.

“You think I’m going to defend this woman? You’re damn lucky I didn’t hunt her down and give her a taste of what the Red Room taught me to do, Tony. Steve’s right, at the very least this is assault.”

Tony doesn’t seem to take it well, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring at the two of them. “I don’t need your help,” he tells them and with that he walks away. Steve sighs and goes to take off after him but Natasha hold him back.

“Let him go. I know from experience that it’s hard to accept you’ve been abused- give him time to process it.”

Its three days later and Steve’s having trouble sleeping, something that’s not entirely unusual, when Tony finds him and sits down on the couch with a blanket wrapped around him and a glass of whisky in his hand. Steve pulls the glass out of his hand and set it down on the side table farthest away from Tony. He gets a dirty look for it but there’s no real heat there. For a long time they sit in silence before Tony speaks. “Why the hell do you care about how people treat me anyway, you don’t even like me.”

Steve frowns at him, “don’t like you? When’d you get that impression?” he asks.

Tony rolls his eyes, “somewhere between ‘big man in a suit of armor, take that off and what are you’ and ‘I know guys worth ten of you’. Could have been ‘you’re not the guy who makes the sacrifice play, to lay down on the wire and let the other guy crawl over you’, or maybe it was ‘you better stop pretending to be a hero’,” he says sarcastically. “No offense, but you made it damn clear you hated me from the moment you saw me so what the fuck do you care now?”

It feels like a lifetime ago that Steve saw that, watched the footage and yeah, Tony looked like a real jackass. But Steve has spent too much time watching Tony’s self destructive tendencies to believe the footage is who Tony really is. “I misjudged you. And I also recall you calling me a lab rat and telling me everything special about me came from a bottle. I don’t hold that against you,” he points out.

Tony lets out a loud snort, “yeah, probably because I’m the only one who’s every said that to you. Wanna know how many people have said the shit you did to me? Almost everyone I’ve ever met, except you were polite about it. Lets not fucking compare the two,” he snaps.

“People used to tell me I was worthless all the damn time, Tony. That’s what happens when you grow up skinny and useless in the war effort,” he snaps. “I know more about mistreatment than you might like to think.”

“Maybe,” Tony says, “but I’m not a fucking idiot. I know when someone hasn’t felt it their whole life from everyone and it fucking sucks because I’m damn lucky. I’m rich, I’m attractive, I’m a fucking superhero so what right do I have to suffer? I’m living everyone’s damn fantasies out and I’m whining about it?” he shakes his head. “And even that’s never been fucking good enough for pretty much anyone around me,” he mumbles. “I can do the impossible- I’ve been able to do that my whole life but I was never Captain fucking America.”

Steve frowns, “who the hell expected you to be me?” he asks. He certainly hadn’t and to his knowledge no one else has either. Well, okay, people tend to compare them a lot and yeah, people favor him but that’s not the same he thinks.

Tony gives him a withering glare, “Howard. Never mattered what I did, how good I was, how much better than him I was I was never you. I used to hate you,” he says and the tone is so harsh Steve wonders if he still does.

“Why are you so pissed off about something I had nothing to do with? At Howard, I get that. He sounds like he grew into a real jackass but its not like I’ve ever made those comparisons,” he says. “And… the way you do things, it could use finessing, but you’re a damn good problem solver under pressure. I’ve never seen anything like it,” he says honestly. And his solutions- they’re always something Steve never would have thought of. They’re creative, innovative- they’re distinctly Tony.

“Who do you think the guy who lays down on the wire in your analogy was, Steve? We all know the legends and stories that follow- you’re heroic sacrifice everywhere you went. Erskine chose you because everyone ran away from the grenade and you jumped on it. You’ve made your opinion of me clear so again, why the hell do you care about me at all?”

Steve clenches his jaw for a moment before sighing. “I made my first impression clear, and I made my current assessment clear too Tony. You can’t choose to hear one and not the other. And I care about you because anyone who gets treated like you do by your lovers, and I use the word loosely here, deserves kindness. You deserve better than that, everyone deserves better than that,” he says, shaking his head.

Tony goes back to being silent and Steve lets him for a long few moments. “I’m not a hero,” he says after awhile. Tony gives him the same look Steve suspects anyone would if they heard that. “I grew up Irish, back when people still cared about that kind of thing, in a bad neighborhood with a shit father and a poor mother who was trapped in a bad situation. I had so many health issues it was a damn miracle I didn’t die of polio at ten, and I felt fucking useless my whole life. I wanted to join the war for purely selfish reasons- I told myself that it was because it was important but that wasn’t it at all. I wanted to feel like, for once in my life, I wasn’t the useless little runt everyone always told me I was. I told Erskine I didn’t like bullies, I don’t, because my whole life I’ve been a victim of them. Treated like shit for things I couldn’t help.”

He shakes his head, taking a breath before he continues. “Then I get this serum and I thought I was going to do something real, be important. Instead I was a dancing fucking monkey for a propaganda machine and I hated that too. So when I found out Bucky had been captured by Nazis I did something stupid and selfish and Peggy let me because she didn’t sign up for that program to watch me fake punch Hitler. I didn’t set out to be a hero I did what I wanted because I was scared, selfish, and pissed off at not doing anything useful. Only heroic thing I ever did was land that plane. I didn’t expect to wake up a legend some asshole used to abuse his kid his whole life Tony, that just happened. To add insult to injury no one even remembers Steve Rogers- people remember me as the myth they built to suit whatever propaganda people want to throw my image on in this decade, not the real man behind that image,” he snaps.

For some reason he looked himself up once and he’d been shocked at what political parties have used his image to endorse. Most of it is stuff he’d never actually agree with but that’s because he’s Captain America, Propaganda Piece, not Steve Rogers, man with real values and opinions. And he hates that, resents it with everything he has but what’s he supposed to do about it? People listen when he talks about as much as they do to Tony. People only take what they want to hear from either one of them.

Tony shuffles in closer, pressing himself into Steve’s side and he wraps an arm around him because they both need the comfort. “You ever kiss a guy before?” he asks and Steve rolls his eyes, huffing out a laugh.

“Once. Got my ass kicked for that,” he says, shaking his head. Bad decisions used to be his MO back in the day.

“Yeah, that happened to me once too,” Tony says and Steve suspects that’s an understatement. He turns to face Steve, face close to his and his hair isn’t styled like it usually is. Instead is flops over his forehead naturally and it feels almost intimate to view Tony like this, soft and lacking his usual mask of bravado. “When’d you figure it out?” he asks, eyes bright with curiosity.

Steve knows what he means. “Don’t know really, guess I always knew. Its when I realized people thought that was wrong that I remember, not when I was attracted to men.”

Tony nods, “incidentally I happen to have the same experience. Howard. Pretty much everything fucked up in my life comes back to him,” he says. “Still though, Rhodey was nice, almost as smart as me and that’d been the first time I ever met anyone who challenged me intellectually. Helped that he has a nice ass, too.”

“Your best friend? The Colonel?” he asks and Tony nods, laughing.

“I used to be so paranoid about it- AIDS crisis was a big thing around then, people were dropping left and right. Didn’t want Rhodey to think less of me and also I didn’t much care for the idea of dying so I kept my sexuality to myself for a long time. I’m not very subtle though and Rhodey and I shared a room so he obviously noticed. Turns out he has a gay uncle and was fine with it.” Steve laughs, probably too hard because he had almost the same thing happen to him.

“I had a friend in the army, Morita. Poor bastard was Japanese after Pearl Harbor. Anyway, he was a smart little asshole and figured things out real fast. I thought… hell, I don’t know what I thought but when I finally got tired of being paranoid about it and confronted him he surprised me. Said I never judged him for being Japanese, never treated him badly when everyone else would have. That people were nicer to him because of it. So he said he didn’t have much place to judge me, and that maybe people were wrong about how both of our people were treated. He was the only one who ever knew to my knowledge.” Bucky probably could have figured it out but Steve is sure he didn’t, and Peggy was certainly smart enough too but she’s sure she didn’t look past their relationship. She had better things to focus on than who he was checking out when he thought no one was looking, they all did.

Tony takes in the information for a moment, eyes flicking down to his lips and Steve sighs. “How much have you had to drink?” he asks. Tony gives him a dirty look.

“I’m plenty in control of my faculties,” he says. “I can do math to prove it to you.”

Steve snorts, “you could probably do math half dead with a concussion. That’s a piss poor measure of sobriety.” At least for Tony- Steve, he’s never been that good at math. He’s not bad at it, but he’s much more suited to the arts. Always has been.

Tony laughs a little, “you’re not wrong, but I’m not actually drunk.”

“I can smell the alcohol,” Steve points out. Useless to lie when he can smell the truth.

“You have a super sniffer and there’s a glass of whisky to your left. Obviously you can smell alcohol. Just take my word for it and kiss me,” he says.

Steve opens his mouth, then closes it, frowning at Tony’s shocking forwardness before considering his actions. Alcohol could have made him more willing to open up, but what he had to say- that’d make anyone sober. And he knows what Tony looks like drunk too, unfortunately. But it does give him a solid assessment of Tony now and he’s not drunk, buzzed maybe, but Steve doubts that too. So when he carefully tilts Tony’s jaw up and kisses him he does it with the knowledge that Tony wants this, that he has enough mental capacity to want it. And when Tony throws himself into it Steve knows he’s made the right choice.

[ghoulboyboos]

Prompt for your amazing blog which I only just discovered and are now in love with: Ghoulboys being domestic and soft unknowingly and when someone points it out, they either 1) freak out and try to deny it/ avoid each other until someone else like locks them in a room or something or 2) carry on being soft and make it “official” but don’t tell anyone so someone is like “why don’t you just date already” and they’re like “we are, haven’t you noticed?”

Oh god nonny you are too much!

On top of that, letme use this moment to mention that if you’re a boy in a close andin any way physical relationship with another boy, that doesn’thave to be a “gay” thing (But if it is it’salso chill ofc.) . Before I transitioned, I cuddled with myfemale friends all the time and we didn’t end up lusting after oneanother, neither with me as a girl nor a guy. It’s fine if you wantto hug your male friends or have any physical contact for them.Humans are made to seek out that kind of stuff.

That being said (lol), this is absolutely going to be gay, becauseI’m queer AF and need this kind of stuff in the world.

Thereare a lot of things that show that Shane and Ryan are best friends.Their banter is one of them, evenif it gets a little harsh once in a while.Sometimes, a fewof their fans get a little concerned sometimes and leave questionsabout if the two of them really are friends. But just as often, thereis a fan of the show laughing and talking about all the times theyargue and banter with theirfriends in a manner that would make someone on the outside questionif theirfriendship was true.Whether it’s Ryan or Shane who finds the message first, both theghoulfriends will end up giggling about it at some point. They neverquestion their friendship and dedication to each other. It isn’tjust Unsolved or the “kernelhead” solidarity. Ryan feels saferwhen Shane is with him on location. Shane feels more energized whenRyan is around him whenever they work. It’s the trust that comeswith knowing someone a long time that helps them chill out.

Theyare comfortable with each other.

Theydon’t quite notice yet,that some people think they might be “too” comfortable.

-

One night, Shane and Ryan are out at a bar with some colleagues. Ryanasks if it’s cool to invite a couple of people he knows, because hegets a text message asking about a good location to spend Saturdaynight. Everyone encourages him to invite his friends over and half anhour later, four people wander into the bar, looking a little lostuntil they spot Ryan. Introductions are made and Ryan, Shane andtheir colleagues shift at the table to make room for the peoplejoining them. It gets a bit cramped in the corner booth and Shaneuntangles his arm from where it’s squished and throws it over theback of the seat, right behind Ryan’s shoulders. Nobody who issober enough to check sees any indication that Ryan is uncomfortable.The arm eventually settles around his shoulders, holding him upwardsafter Ryan nearly falls into him, obviously drunk.

Shane shakes him awake and laughs when Ryan grumbles at him.

“I think the little guy had enough. What do you say, Ryan? Wanna gohome?”

Ryan opens his eyes a little and glares at him, but eventually, thelook softens and he closes his eyes and nods. Shane chuckles and letsgo of him to pull out his wallet and put some money on the table.People shift around and vacate the bench so Shane can slip out, onehand holding onto Ryan’s wrist until Ryan stands, a little wobbly.Shane pulls him against his shoulder and waves at everyone stillsitting.

“That was fun, we should do that again!” He jostles Ryan ever soslightly. “Ryan, say goodnight to everyone.”

Ryan works his eyes open and gives a smile and a half-hearted waveand Shane chuckles. He nods to the table before turning and pullingRyan along. His arm stays around the shorter man, maneuvering themsafely out of the bar.

One of Ryan’s friends turns to TJ. He looks a little confused.

“I didn’t know Ryan was dating… Shane was his name, right?”

TJ takes a sip from his drink and shrugs.

“He isn’t, to my knowledge.”

The other man raises an eyebrow and looks after the two. Then heshrugs as well and returns to the conversation on the table.

-

Taco Tuesday means that Ryan spends his entire break eating, becausehe adores tacos. It also means, that he’s usually not that hungryon Wednesday, suffering from a “food-hangover”, as he calls it.Ryan has been poking at his mac’n’cheese for the last fiveminutes, not really eating much. He mostly pushes the food around onhis plate. Jen takes a sip from her coke and shakes her head.

“Ryan you look like a toddler, stop that.”

She snorts as he gives her a playful look and scoops some of thegooey pasta on his fork, pretending to catapult it in her direction.

“I said stop acting like a toddler, jeez!” She giggles andlooks up.

“Shane! Help me! Ryan wants to bombard me with cheese and noodles!”

“Well we can’t have that.” Shane says, clearly amused. He haswalked over, possibly curious what the fuss was about. “Food wasteis a terrible crime.”

Ryan shuffles to the side so Shane can sit next to him. He’s onlycarrying his water bottle.

“Do you want the rest of my food?” Ryan asks as a greeting.

“Sure.” Shane reaches out for the plate, but Ryan suddenlyhesitates.

“It probably got my saliva in there, though, now that I think aboutit.”

Shane snorts.

“I don’t care, Ryan. I’m cool with soft germs.” With that, hepulls Ryan’s plate in front of him, picks a fork out of the cup onthe table and shovels a bite into his mouth. Ryan looks at him,shaking his head, but he is smiling.

Jen lifts an eyebrow, looking between the boys. When Ryan catches herstaring, she pretends to zone out.

-

Kelsey I. thinks that Shane is probably one of the weirdest people atBuzzfeed and that’s saying something. At the same time, he isreally funny so hanging out with him during the break is a lot offun. He is trying to explain to her what the hell is happening in theHot Daga at the moment, but she still doesn’t understand how thehell he even ended up writing a story about anthropomorphic food inspace.

“You know what, let’s just sit down in the lounge and I’ll showyou season one and you can tell me what you think.

“Isn’t that all part of your postmortems? Are you going to skipthrough a bunch of videos now?”

Shane laughs.

“Oh no, don’t worry. Someone on Youtube has made a mastercut ofthe complete seasons.”

Kelsey blinks. She wants to ask why the hell someone would dosomething like that, but it’s Youtube and there are weirdercompilations out there. So instead she just says:

“Of course someone has.”

The lounge is almost empty, except for Ryan who is leafing through astack of papers, probably a script, considering he is holding a redpen, ready to mark things on the page. He is sitting with his back tothe armrest of one of the sofas and his legs stretched out over allthe seats and he doesn’t look up when they enter. However, whenShane gets closer to him, he pulls his legs up to his chest and makesroom. Shane sits down without a comment and reaches out to pullRyan’s legs on his lap. Ryan doesn’t even look up and simplystretches out over Shane’s legs. Shane doesn’t address it in theleast, he simply pulls out his phone and looks to his right. There isa two-seater, perfect for Kelsey to sit down and watch the stupidanimation on his phone… and she is wondering why he didn’t justsit down there. She looks between him and Ryan and can’tquite hold back a little smirk. He looks up, clearly confused why shestopped in her tracks. She gives a little, meaningful nod towardsRyan and he glances over, looks back at her and… frowns. As if hedoesn’t get what she is insinuating.

Kelsey decides it’s none of her business in the end, even thoughshe’s curious. She sits down on the two-seater and allows Shane toshow her the madness that is the Hot Daga.

-

Snow on location is always a hazard. The crew has to take care ofboth their equipment and themselves, driving required extra care andwalking through a forest could get a little dangerous sometimes.

They are not filming at the moment. Mark has enough shots of themtaking in the landscape and they are all cold and want to get to theactual location as quickly as possible. Shane rubs his hands togetherto keep them warm. He keeps teasing Ryan, who takes the cold muchworse than him and Ryan snaps back about the snootiness ofMidwesteners, when he suddenly slips. Shane grabs his wrist andhoists him up, preventing Ryan from slamming into the ground. Ryanfinds his footing again, blushes a little because of the surprisedyelp he let out and pats himself down. Shane is laughing, but stillasks if Ryan is okay.

They don’t dawdle for long. Once Ryan is sure he found his footingagain, they press on. Shane is still holding onto Ryan, his graspslowly migrating to hold hands with the shorter man. Ryan doesn’tseem to mind, he even entwines their fingers as they walk on.

Behind them, TJ tilts his head to the side in confusion. Mark shootshim a questioning glance and TJ shrugs, not sure if he should commenton it. He doesn’t.

-

Ryan drops on Shane’s couch and kicks his feet up on the coffeetable. He grabs the controller of Shane’s PS4 and enters hispassword without even having to ask. While Netflix loads up, hescrolls through instagram, eyes widening at some of the fanart he hasbeen tagged it.

“Holy Shit Shane, we got some really talented fans. There is somuch!”

Shane carries a bowl of popcorn into the living room and sits downnext to Ryan, glancing over his shoulder.

“Oh yeah. Hey, I think I know this artist.”

He points at a take on “Demon!Shane”, which depicts him withblack eyes and the shadow of something big, winged and horned behindhim. Ryan chuckles and double taps the piece.

“I have to make a new fan art appreciation post, soon.” He musesand Shane hums in agreement.

“Hey, want to take a selfie to send them some good vibes?”

“Sure!”

They shuffle closer together. Shane puts an arm around Ryan and holdsup a thumbs up while Ryan leans his head against Shane’s so theyboth fit in frame. They take the picture of both of them squishedtogether on the couch, smiling widely and Ryan posts it with acaption:

“Hanging out with the one and only @shanemadej for movie night andthe ghoulfriend and I got distracted by looking at all the amazingart you guys are creating! Keep being awesome, we really appreciateyour support!”

He locks his phone and drops it on the table in favor of grabbing thecontroller and picking the movie. Shane sinks in the couch and kicksup his feet as well. Two pairs of legs stretch out in front of them.Shane’s arm hasn’t moved from around Ryan’s shoulder and onceRyan puts the controller aside and places the bowl of popcorn on hislap, he settles into it.

They don’t see the amounts of heart eye emojis and screaming theirinsta has until the movie is over.

-

“Ryan… uh, can I ask you something personal?”

Ryan is sitting next to Steven and they went for coffee on theirbreak. He shoots him a suspicious look that drags from the tips ofhis hair down to his shoes and back up again. Steven almost laughs.

“Sure..?” Ryan sounds very careful.

“Are you and Shane… a thing?”

“A thing.” Ryan repeats, deadpan. “Like, what thing?”

Steven huffs.

“You know what I mean. Are you two dating?”

Ryan groans and rolls his eyes.

“Not you, too. People keep asking me that. Why do people always askme that?”

Steven makes a face. It looks like he’s a bit done with Ryan’sshit.

“I don’t know. Maybe because you hold hands? Share food? Go hometogether when one of you is drunk?”

“How do you even know all this stuff?” Ryan says, a littleincredulous.

Steven just shrugs. “I don’t know, people. People talk.”

“Apparently they do…” Ryan rolls his eyes. “But no, we’renot a thing.”

Steven shoots him a look and Ryan sputters.

“I’m not lying to you, Steven!”

“I didn’t say that! I just- you guys go on movie dates-”

“They’re not dates. We both love movies and watching aloneis boring!”

“You walk around holding hands-”

“So do you and Jen sometimes and nobody asks if you are dating.”

Steven sighs.

“You know what? Maybe it was stupid of me. Forget it.”

“Already forgotten.” Ryan huffs and pulls out his phone.

He’s lying.

He can’t forget it now.

-

“Shane?”

“Hm?”

Shane looks up from the book he’s been reading. He is lying on hisbed with his head in Ryan’s lap. Ryan is sitting on the mattress,legs crossed and scrolling through social media. His hand is inShane’s hair, occasionally scratching the scalp.

“Are we… dating?”

Shane closes his book and looks up at him.

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Oh good.”

Shane frowns a little and Ryan laughs.

“Not- Not like good, I would hate to date you, just like…people asked me if we were and I assumed we aren’t.”

“No, Ryan. We aren’t dating. If we were, I would actually takeyou to restaurants, not head for the nearest Drive-thru.”

Ryan pouts.

“But I like fast-food.”

“Well then.” Shane says, opening his book again to find the pagehe stopped at. “Then, I guess, we’re kind of dating. Maybe?”

Ryan frowns at the air in front of him.

“Maybe?!” He echoes. “I think we should know if we are or not.”

Shane closes his book again. He sits up and Ryan’s hand drops outof his hair. Shane shuffles around till he’s sitting and facingRyan.

“Do you want to? Date, I mean.”

Ryan pauses and thinks.

“Not just… because people think we are, right?”

“No.” Shane chuckles and puts his book away. “I’m askingbecause I like you. And I think we would be a great couple.”

“Really?” Ryan asks, not sure if he’s surprised or not.

Shane shrugs.

“If you don’t want to, that’s fine. But… I kind of want to,if I’m honest.”

“Huh.” Ryan says, blinking. He thinks for a moment, with Shanepatiently waiting in front of him. Then-

“You know what? I like the idea.”

Shane smiles.

“Alright.” He says softly. “I guess that means we’re datingnow.”

Ryan laughs. “What, just like that?”

“Sure.” Shane shrugs. “What else is there to decide you’redating?”

Ryan eyes him up and down for a moment.

“Well, I guess we could try and kiss, for a start?”

Shane smiles.

“I’m into that.”

Ryan’s face splits into a grin.

“Cool.”

Shane shifts a bit till he sits right next to Ryan, their hipstouching. He places a hand on the back of Ryan’s neck and Ryan putsa hand on Shane’s knee as he’s pulled in. They meet in themiddle, their eyes slipping shut as they kiss and one of them makes asoft humming noise before they part.

“Shane?”

“Hm?”

“Let’s not tell the others just yet. I want to…”

“See them squirm?”

Ryan throws his head back and laughs. The sight causes Shane towheeze and drop to his side, propped up on one elbow. Once Ryan hashimself under control again, he leans in and braces himself over theother man’s body.

“Yeah. I kinda want to see them try and figure it out for a while.Is that too mean?”

Shane chuckles and rolls on his back, Ryan moving with him until he’sbracketing Shane with his arms.

“Never. I love it.” Shane admits with a slightly sadisticgrin and Ryan grins back, tongue pocking out between his teeth.

“Alright!” He says and leans down to kiss Shane again. Shane humsand smiles into the kiss, wrapping his arms around Ryan.

They post to instagram that night, with the single goal to mess withpeople. Ryan is sitting on Shane’s bed, legs crossed and lookingrelaxed and surprisingly chill for having a plush figure of one ofthe Hot Daga characters on his lap. Shane is taking the picture,sitting on the floor in front of his bed, with his back leaningagainst it. He gives an enthusiastic thumbs up.

The caption reads: “We got em!”

Not even a third of the comments address the issue of Ryanappreciating the Hot Daga. The reactions are occupied with differentthings. Including the very visible hickey on Ryan’s neck.

[horrible-monstrosity]

Those last three episodes of Steven Universe: a mini-essay

JUST FUCK ME UP

kevin party, donner party, what's the differenfe

hey guys, remember when lion disappeared? i legitimatedly don't. he ran off with connie or something and even though lars is probably in mortal peril and lion's the only way to get to him... naw don't need him. even though now steven's all worried bout lion he didn't give a shit enough earlier to search for him just for lion's own sake. nothing matters.

the party sadie and co fucked off to in the last episode and the tit-ular kevin party are not one and the same. why not? because none of this matters. nothing fucking matters. just... some stuff happens and none of it ever fucking lines up or amounts to fucking anything. why is this show still airing?

Kevin thinking Steven's name is Clarence is the best if not only joke this show has produced in the last like twenty episodes. Or thirty. How long has this season been going for? How many episodes does this show have?...

kevin is allergic to dog but lion is still here ok. the joke is he think lion it dog but the fact he hasn't like broke out in hives should maybe tell him something?.......

So the crux of this episode is, Kevin gives Steven this patriarchal man male romantic advice which basically amounts to "have a good time and don't be a sniveling soyball" and is entirely reasonable. But since this is Steven fucking Universe, it's clearly absolutely fucking terrible. I mean, maybe it's not the perfect solution for *this* particular situation, but why the fuck would he know that? Is he supposed to read Steven and Connie's fucking minds? Why does the feminist solution to problems so commonly require the male reading peoples' fucking minds? It's a perfectly fucking reasonable piece of general advice, and Kevin even seems to be at least the littlest bit actually concerned about Steven's love life issues beyond getting the cool quantum-tranny Stevonnie at his party... but no, he's gotta be wrong, because he's the designated small-time patriarchal oppressor and 84opposition to the gender revolution.

connie assumes that steven doesn't want to talk to her not because she's been bitching at him and been doing shit like accusing him of being friends with kevin leaving him to wonder what he's done wrong... but because he's friends with kevin, obviously. female accountability and logic at 0%

kevin doesn't know how to friends. are we supposed to hate him or feel sorry for him? ... never mind, both of those options are equally depressing with the way the show treats him.

connie likes steven's maximum soy pink polo shirt, because the way to get grils is to treat yourself like a defective woman who needs re-estrogenizing and soy yourself up. just fucking go cry at her and wear the soy clothes she bought you and drip snot upon her. bitches love snot and then even though steven said kevin had his heart broken and it looks like they have some sympathy for him connie goes "lol ofc he did" and he falls in the pool and they shit on him. fuck this gay earth the rebellion was a mistake homeworld did nothing wrong

So... what the fuck was the conflict here again? Seems like the only thing keeping Steven and Connie from making up was bad timing and mutual awkwardness. Did anyone learn anything from this, aside from Steven discovering he needs to get even more soyful if he wants to inject his gem cummies into a strong big-nosed short-haired minority female someday? Did any of this fucking matter?

Also, I've no idea if this is just fan conjecture or what, but apparently the "Sabina" (because yeah that's a name normal people hsve) who fucked Kevin up is actually the le mysterious pink-haired person mute lesbo who hit it off with Pearl forever ago and probably showed up again at some point in the last X episodes but I don't fucking remember it. You... you... how did you manage to make this even worse? So not only is Kevin terrible and wrong and evil for existing, and for hitting on hot five-gendered quasi-minority manchicks at parties, and for giving reasonable advice... he hit on a thicc pink turbo-lesbo and we're supposed to hate him for that, too. Just... how the fuck do I put this? It's like... stupid fucking cis straight normal fucking a white male, thinking this world is full of other normal people like yourself- the real Earth's population is 99% minority queer demigender faggosexuals, how dare you think you can get into a normal heterosexual relationship with a female of the species? He tried some normal human courtship instead of feminist-approved all-gendered-yet-female-oriented interactions fit only for mentally-deficient degenerate aliens, so he deserved to have his heart trampled on. She's a stryng fymyle fat womyn person, you fucking piece of shit, not some thing for you to treat like (an object/your property/an animal/whatever) by treating her like a normal human being. You're shit, normies are shit, and treating a transcendant gender-goddyss as equal to yourself is oppressive. Or... some fucking shit like that. fuck i don't know whatever

-

c'mon plot it's time to go the fuck back into space already!!! It occurs to me that Connie (probably, I don't fucking know) knew all this time Lars was trapped in spacedanger and Lion was the only thing Steven or anyone else on Earth could use to rescue him, but she decided to fuck off with him anyway. Because why? Because her selfish little emotional snit over Steven valuing her life is more important than Lars' own fucking life? Remind me, why are we supposed to like Connie again? Also why did Lion stay with her this entire time anyway? Usually he just fucks off and does whatever he wants. He never wandered back to Steven?

Connie immediately shows her ignorance and downplays the situation as a fun and funny adventure, steven and connie in space o ho ho! an attitude which hey you know might be conducive to PEOPLE THINKING YOU'RE NOT FUCKING FIT TO HANDLE YOURSELF IN SPACE AND THEY SHOULD LEAVE WITHOUT YOU TO PROTECT YOU... Pretty fucking retarded thing to say after all that bitching about... no, wait a minute, Connie never said anything about being treated like Steven's equal or being coddled, did she? I mean, she barely said anything about anything because this was an underdeveloped aborted fetus of an arc, but the entire crux of this disagreement really was just... #

god fluorite still creeps me the fuck out. She's basically some magna-tranny that's gone through eight different transitions of like three genders each and gained a new fat roll for each one. Is this supposed to make me like "diverse" people? Because it's not working. Every single second of her vocal drone grating across my eardrums makes me want ever more to perpetuate a holocaust against the legbutt people. Eugh. two children are all we need to save lars, don't bother bringing garnet or any of those other fucking main characters we have lying around or anything naw fuckit

On some level I almost enjoy how few fucks Lars has come to give, even doing shit like spouting the aesop he was just given as a kewl one-liner as he (kind of) trounces the bad guy... but still, it's all off-screen development that raises a lot of questions. Maybe it's just the change in environment and the lack of anyone to try and impress (the shitgems sure as hell aren't the cool kids) that's brought this out of him- that almost makes sense, but there's nothing indicating that's the case... or anything's the case, really. Maybe it's just some kind of tangential stockholm syndrome where I'm happy to see something actually fucking happening, I don't fucking know.

also how did they steal the ship? they """explain""" but... they really don't. They're just that good because take our word for it lars is really happy for those clean pants. how much did he shit himself over the past couple weeks

And then shit gets terrible again. Lars is more triggered over sadie than his own parents... because of fucking course he is. No, she wasn't worried sick, she was faffing around whining about having to do your work for you or having to work at all and then fucking quitting her job to go become a marxist rock guitarist. Hey, remember the purple cake incident? Lars was legitimately fucked up over his social anxiety and his inability to hang with the cool kids despite wanting so badly to do so, so Sadie just fucking around with them like it's nothing because she really is barely worried about his wellbeing... yeah, I think that shit's gonna fuck him up a little bit.

But no, Steven basically just... tells him to get the fuck over it. Because, like, he's not there so she can do whatever the fuck she wants, immediately. Fuck is this shit? Like all of five minutes into the episode Steven just starts fucking explaining this shitty twisted aesop to both Lars and the audience. Yeah man, you go die in space, your gf can immediately go do everything you ever angsted over with ease and I'll come rub it in your face and you should just fucking get over it because u totes love her that much, lol. *You* aren't entitled to your own emotions.

Oh and then Steven compares Sadie's faffing to Lars's fucking comandeering a space ship in order to keep himself alive. Because the woman's feelsies are equivalent to the man's fucking life. Guys, what the fuck am I watching?...

I think this is one of those... things... this show does, where it at first vaguely approaches something that would pass for a normal human cognitive outputting, but then turns, farts in your face like that sexy alien from Star Wars and flits off like Tinkerbell leaving you confused and asmellied. Where in an attempt to create an unthought new aesop never before cognizized by mankind it ends up with a bizarre twisted mess.

At the very least Steven maybe shoulda thought twice before bringing some of those photos. "Oh, look how well your abusive not-gf has been doing without you! Befriending everyone you ever wanted to befriend but couldn't because you need a fucking therapist! Yeah that'll make him feel better". Hey, remember when Steven was empathic, you guise? I mean that being thrown the fuck out was part of what defines this arc, but come on...

It also severely hurts the thing that it's played out so fast. Lars is #triggered by the photos, okay, but then Steven immediately gets on his case and REEEEEs at him for... trying to destroy Sadie's something or other, because I don;t fucking know feminism is the radical idea that a man's emotional freedom is so disgusting it'll destroy a pure beautiful deserving woman from a distance of a thousand light-years in a fucking instant- Calm your fucking tits, Steven Sugar, we're in the middle of fucking space, Lars has no way of destroying Sadie's whatever the fuck it was he was supposed to be destroying. Let him have his knee-jerk reaction. Also, all of a week or a month away from your best friend slash romantic interest is enough you should expect she's moved on from you completely. Okay.

... Hey, wait a minute, I thought Kevin Praty taught us that sniveling was the way to get all the pretty wymyn? What might have changed between then and now, a difference of one entire episode? ... No, really, I have no fucking clue. This time, the contradiction is so fucking incoherent I can't even turn it into "because Sugar and feminists like her place female emotions above all else". The only way I can see it is if shitting on certain types of males is equal to or higher than muh womans, as the Kevin Party incident was twisted specifically to work at Kevin's expense. ... It's funny how this runs completely opposite what I'd think most people would find healthy. If the person you're hurt over is nowhere fucking near you then get it out of your system, but don't go dumping all your emotional baggage on them at a fucking party. This show wants us to bottle up our emotions when there's no fucking reason to at all but mainline emotional diarrhea in the most inappropriate of situations. what is this shit?

lol the crew are made so fucking useless just by a single fucking photo phone just take it from him One of the shitgems calls Stevvie "friends"... plural. they aren't a singular "they". SOC JUS FAUX PAS

man i can;t believe stevonnie;s fucking dead to bad the show ended here guys i guess homeworld can just go take over the world now. it's better this way

-

This was apparently some sort of special event called "Stranded", but the stranding only lasts one episode. Oooooookay.

This one is entirely just a nitpick, but I find it so strangely interesting from a writing perspective that I just can't leave it out... The "everything is broken" joke is like three lines long and two lines two long. Stevonnie is like, man what's broken and we're shown the readout from the ship showing everything flashing red, okay... and then she's like, ohhh man wow look almost everything it broken?? who expect that ha ha. And then she says, at least the screen works... and that immediately gets broken. Ha haaaaa. I dunno bout you, but I woulda laughed more if they'd just cut it short- have Stevonnie see the screen and go "oh, everything" or even just "oh", in that high-pitched, slightly breathy tone of voice that says "well, shit". Then crash. Boom, short sweet and to the point and gives you like ten more seconds this episode to spend on the plot of the epi- oh wait

Stevonnie is stranded on spaceplanet because no communications, but... xei have magic. Just... shoot some magic fireworks or start a magic fire for smoke signals. Or a normal fire, even. If the problem is that random new green gem will also find you if you do this... actually mention that. Steven and Connie don't even seem to consider sending a physical signal of any kind, even though it should be an obvious idea.

And then Stevenconnie just... finds a random alien species? And casually eats it? This... this just raises so many questions... Throughout the entire run of this show up until this date, the only alien species we've seen has been the gems. The center of the entire show, something that's been continually developed (if not consistently, coherently or well)- there's a decent amount of thought put into how these lifeforms that're completely unlike anything on Earth function, both in biology and society, with some degree of interplay between the two. The show was kept focused on the effects of Rose's rebellion and events related to it, and we avoided all the extra thought, logic and possible scientific plot holes that would be brought into existence by trying to create and balance multiple forms if alien life from multiple different origins. But now they just... dumped this stuff on in there? Because why

This is at once the first new alien species we've seen since the very beginning of the show, the first organic species, the first animalistic/non-sentient species, and the first found in it's alien habitat... and not only are a fucking bunch of them all introduced at once, they're thrown in casually and Stevonnie fucking eats most of them. What the fuck? There's no thought put into these things either, they're just a bunch of wacky squacky animals mainly comprised of random Earth animal parts. There's no logic to how they work, why they exist, how they evolved like this, they're just... wacky funny animals for no reason. Fuck you. After the series up until this point has focused on developing one species with an entirely different biology, history and culture from humans, with all of those things to at least some degree influencing or connected to each other, seeing these critters introduced just at random with no logic or context is incredibly jarring. This was such a fucking bad idea...

Also Stevonne eats the fucking fruits and animals and drinks the water because all planets just have human-compatible food species and good old motherfucking H2O I guess

stevonnie has more stubble than steven ever did because i hate life and i hate everything. this is disgusting. It's even distributed weirdly; instead of being on ziouir's chin it spreads up either side of zoidrgh's face and actually on to the cheeks. And we just have to see it's fugly little cheekstubble for the entire fucking rest of the episode. gagh

And then we get to this... really weird dream sequence where some really weird writing decisions are made. It starts off in Connie's house with Connie's mom... uh, rising up out of the carpeting, but Stevonnie identifies them as "my house" and "my mom". Stevonnie is both Steven and Connie, but given we're used to Steven being the main character and usual viewpoint throughout the entire series this comes off as though it's Steven saying this is "his house/mom". But, you know, they're not. And for any fan who's not devoted enough to commit to memory which character's household interior this is, it's misleading until Connie's mom shows up and then confusing after that. Why the fuck did the writers decide to write the scene like this? Why not have Stevonnie go "my, uh, your, uh, Connie's house" or some shit? Or just remove this part entirely because it gets really weird when the mom starts talking about EXTERMINATING ORGANIC LIFE and setvonnie notices nothing. Then the mom turns into this... weird brownwashed minority fusion version of YD with a big ol' jellyglob of Conmom's hair slapped onto the back of her head. What is this shit? if you're going to make it a meaningful dream you can't just do random shit like that. stop mixing messages. Just... stop. why did they choose to do this, and with Conmom specifically? If it's supposed to imply PD and YD's relationship is like Connie and her mom's... well first of all, that doesn;t fucking work because PD is nothing like Connie at all. But ignoring that, if it's supposed to imply YD is some sort of a parental figure to PD... why Connie's mom? She's not particularly important, and we don;t know her all that well. If it's not a comparison to her specifically and it's just that she parent... why Connie;s mom? Of all the parental figures in the show, because... I don't know, this is dumb fuck this

Though once that shit stops I actually almost like this dream sequence. Having our main character taking the place of PD in the dream, reliving her memories, it not being clear we "are" PD and that Stevonnie is acting out this memory rather than acting under xfer own will until we get to the mirror scene, where Stevonnie punches the reflection of PD while their own appearance remains the same... that's pretty fucking nice. This might also be a manifestation of that Stockholm syndrome I mentioned earlier, though. PD wants things and is frustrated with her current situation. She tries to get what she wants by bitching at someone else to give it to her, sure, but the way she storms off on her own and punches the mirror implies she wants to change things, there's just something holding her back. She has a trajectory. Apparently the fnadom hates her for being a brat, but I almost like her. ..... bets are open on how long it takes for the writers to completely fuck this up.

and then steven and connie just go home and who fucking cares nothing mattersfuck this show

... It seems the fandom has latched on to PD being an off-color because she's small (because height is a color what the fuck is that term why is it that). Like the rich family that hides their embarrassing retarded offspring in the basement, I guess. (i still crackship lars with kevin by the way)