#i was just worried that i would not do the loveliness of the exchange justice but this made me feel better abt it <3 tysm

[boxwinebaddie]

UNCLE NINNAA ITS EARLY AS SHIT WHERE I AM RN AND IM CRYINGGG OVER THAT THAT WAS SO FUCKING CUTE OMFF FUCK YOU MY FACE IS WET AND THEY ARE SO SWWEETTTT

ahahaha!!! happy mother's day, darling! my gift to you xx

because i know not all of us have a strong mother figure in our lives, so at least you can rest easy knowing you have two super cool dads again and, in that sense, are no longer children of divorce! <3 :') EEE!

-uncle nina, single mom of two gaywads, doin gods work

[sapphicdalliances]

Hi, Yuletide writer! First of all, my sincere apologies in my delay of getting this letter written up at all, and my enthused thanks for being here!

I’m a simple bitch with simple tastes; here is a general summary of my preferences, and fandom-specific notes and prompts can be found further down!

I very much enjoy:

Romance -- anything up to and including plotless shippy drivel

Short fics, or even collections of tiny fics

Long fics too, so I guess what I mean is, don’t feel pressured either way

Comedic tones, slice-of-life, lighthearted fun, any amount of improbable romcom tropes

Am also hella on board with misunderstandings, drama or angst as long as there is a happy ending!

I’m deeply okay with AUs, and most likely would be down for any modern, romcom, fantasy/fairytale, gender swap, or remix/crossover AUs you feel inspired to explore! My favourite settings include mundane/urban fantasy (witches! werewolves!), anachronism-stew-with-magic western fantasy jumbles, and disney’s Tangled.

Specific tropes I love:

Proposal fic

Wedding fic where the couple getting married is not the main couple

Outsider/third character POV of the main couple

Exes who are still in love/getting back together

Friends-with-benefits-with-feelings/did a bad job keeping it casual

Shipfic where two or more couples are contrasted

Oblique declarations of love/saying i love you without saying i love you

Provision and caretaking (acts of service!)

Aggressive matchmaking/wingmanning by an enthused friend

Hanahaki, or any other improbably dramatic instances of Cannot Spit It Out

Arranged marriage/fake marriage/fake dating

Epistolary fic

Regrettably I also love a/b/o, especially the kind that emphasises on scent safety and contains little to no actual sex

I’m not as into:

Political or social intrigue, mysteries, complex magical plots — by no means a dealbreaker, but not high on my list of priorities

Kidfic

First person narration

Soulmate AUs specifically

In general, please avoid:

Character death or serious/permanent injury

Animal abuse or death

Infidelity

Hopeless or downer endings

Fandom specific info starts here!

Princess Tutu - Ahiru, Fakir

I’ve loved Ahiru/Fakir for years and years — they are both very strong, willful but compassionate characters, and the way they intersect is just so sweet to me. While I would be ravenous for any tutu content, gen included, I really would be particularly delighted with some overtly shippy fic for this one, I hope that’s okay!

Suggestions:

Modern AUs: vet science major Ahiru + English major Fakir meet in theatre club?

Step Up-style remix where they become somewhat-unwilling dance partners because their regular partners are somehow indisposed and work better than expected

That one ending fix-it AU where Fakir writes her back into a girl and they retire into the village, the one we all have in our treacherous hearts, i will never get enough of these

Fakir and Ahiru’s relationship progression as observed by the other members of the school/town

Or mix it up with any of the tropes in my general list! For this ship, I would like a maximum rating of T, please!

Wotakoi

I love every ship in this manga equally but perhaps I love Kou/Naoya more equally than the other two? They are just so kind and so silly, and so sweet to each other in exactly the way both of them didn’t realise they were missing! Honestly, anything with these characters that’s along the lines of canon would be delightful; the particular energy of misfits realising that they don’t have to be alone is something very dear to me.

Suggestions:

Accidentally dating ft. Kou and Naoya, or, “and you’ve made out how many times now? Hmm. Yeah, that’s not technically a bromance.”

5 times Hirotaka and Narumi almost, almost kissed, and 1 time they did; the unresolved romantic tension may kill me and it would be worth it

What Hirotaka and Narumi taught each other (apart from the more mundane gaming and life skills, i believe that she taught him how to smile and be loved by others, and he taught her how to be loved by herself!)

Smutty domesticity ft. Koyanagi and Kabakura — a lazy Sunday, laundry in the sun, fucking on the couch, everything easy with familiarity

The fantasy/MMORPG AU, where Hirotaka is the lazy but brilliant crown prince, Naoya the hapless but beloved second prince, Koyanagi his spymaster and Kabakura the captain of the prince’s guard; Narumi his childhood friend-cum-betrothed, and Kou a mysterious archer who saves a distressed Naoya from bandits in the village?

The gang tries to play DND. We finally find a game that Naoya is good at.

Or mix it up with any of the tropes in my general list!

Nezha - Oubing

I feel 100 different ways about this movie and 88 of the ways are SO CHINESE. The filial piety, the familial sacrifice, the friendship! I do believe that Nezha and Aobing are in love, I hope this is a reading of the text that we share, but if not, gen about their friendship/rivalry would also be well-recieved.

Suggestions:

Aobing has been practicing bigu (a cultivation style that is meant to remove one’s need for food or water) since he was born; Nezha introduces him to food, and other creature comforts — do they have BEDS in the dragon palace for example?? Buddhist-style cultivation is very ascetic and difficult, but Nezha is so wild and full of feelings and love!!

Modern AU: delinquent Nezha and prim, proper exchange student Aobing

Modern AU addendum: nobody believes Nezha when he says he’s got a hot boyfriend in Taiwan and thinks that he has made Aobing up

Arranged marriage/political fantasy AU where the prince of dragons is given to the most controversial heavenly general in an effort to improve both families’ social standing

For a gen prompt, if you want to do something about Nezha and/or Aobing’s relationships to their fathers, debts and affections and resentments, that too would be lovely!

On the other end of the spectrum, i’m down for PWP with xeno tropes re: aobing’s dragon anatomy! So long as the top/bottom roles are not too strictly defined, i just like it when they’re equitable or switch!

And of course, feel free to mix it up with any of the tropes in my general list!

Kazetsuyo/Run with the Wind

I didn’t tag any characters because my favourites were not in the list, and of course because I do love everyone, but my personal priorities are in order: Shindo, Musa, Haiji, Kakeru, Nico-chan, Yuki, the bombastic twins, and then everyone else. The spaces between those positions are very small so if you happen to have a passion for a character/ship lower on the list, worry not, there is limitless affection within me for everyone!

Suggestions:

Shindo should get to take Musa to see the snow… he deserves that

He also deserves to run the ekiden again in his fourth year and not be sick and actually win section 5!

I do think Kakeru and Haiji are most definitely soulmates — if you choose to focus on one or both of them, I really do believe they are in the romantic kind of love, is the thing!

Perhaps their relationship, an inevitable drifting together, as perceived by everyone else in aotake?

Or Haiji comes to Kakeru’s graduation, all their tenderest affections still unspoken, and somehow, without any premeditation, by the end of the day they’ve kissed

You know what I think? I think Hana-chan likes and is capable of dating both of the twins, and I love that for her

Or gen canonverse with everyone (or just everyone you care about) taking turns caring for Nira and reflecting on the race!

As above, please feel free to mix it up with the tropes in my general list!

Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-Kun

I only selected Seo and Waka because they are simply my top priority, but if you want to serve a side of Chiyo/Nozaki and/or Hori/Kashima and/or Seo and Kashima being beautiful best friends and/or Mikorin being a beautiful himbo who we are delighted to have here, i would not complain at all!

Absolutely anything about them being goobery oblivious idiots in love would be perfect, such as:

5 times they went on a date without realising, and the time they realised

Everyone else literally just thinks they’re dating and they are completely clueless

Or on the other end of the spectrum, everyone tries desperately to set them up/matchmake for them, not realising that they’ve been going steady for four months

A hanahaki AU would be particularly hilarious with these two, I feel

Urban fantasy AU where Waka is a hapless monster hunter and Seo is an annoying but deeply harmless werewolf who’s been terrorizing his town??

Regency or faux-regency AU where Waka is literally like “drive by your rival’s estate slowly so that she may seethe with jealousy at the loveliness of your new hat” and Seo is like “oh goodness, he is courting me. What a fool. What an absolute buffoon.” and challenges him to a swordfight

Fairytale AU where Seo believes she must rescue the prince from the tower and deliver him back to the kingdom capital, and the prince, who had not realised he’d been kidnapped, thinks Seo is a usurper from a rival kingdom who must be supervised all the way back to the kingdom capital to be served her justice

Or anything else equally romcom-y, and of course, as always, throw in as many tropes as you like!

Thank you for reading this whole mess of a letter, and I sincerely hope I haven’t bored you too much. The most important thing to me is that whatever you end up writing, you are able to enjoy the process at least somewhat, and deliver a fic that you like! I can also be found on twitter at @hawberries_ (for art) and @popplioikawa (for general ramblings), and if you have any desire to send an anon ask to this tumblr with questions, i’m actually not sure if that’s allowed but i’d be happy to get some! Thank you again, and happy holidays!

[michelles-garden-of-evil]

Episode 9 Review: Nine of Swords

{ YouTube: 1 | 2 | 3 }

{ Synopses: Debby Graham | Bryan Gruszka }

{ Screencaps }

Another day, my darling Erica, another day without you. The storm we’ve been sitting through has subsided and I’m going over to the main island to commission the young man your sister recommended to do an oil of you. Until the day your loveliness returns from the beyond to reality, your portrait and I will share the hours.

My darling Erica, I have to go. Quito is waiting. Sleep, my love. I love you and I need you.

Don’t you want to give Jean Paul a hug? No? I do.

After an argument scene between Reverend Matt Dawson and Elizabeth Marshall that consists entirely of recap, we see Jean Paul and Quito in the Great Hall talking about how they need to find Raxl before they leave to watch the cryonics capsule. (It’s really weird how this show lampshades the absent cast members by having the other characters say things like “Where is X?” and “we need to find X.” There’s a whole pointless filler scene about halfway through where Jean Paul says, “I was wrong about Raxl. She was with my wife all the while.” If Raxl doesn’t show up and isn’t important to this episode’s plot, why does she even need to be mentioned?)

Jacques, too, has to comment about Cosette Lee’s absence from this episode.

In other news, Jean Paul has begun to suspect that he is not only damned, but is also a devil. Fearing that Jacques has cursed him, he threatens to cut up the portrait, which pleases Jacques as much as one would expect. “If you do, you just might cut your dear sweet Erica from you,” the handsome devil replies. “The choice is yours. But I do promise you this: I won't bleed.”

“Raxl is right!” Jean Paul exclaims, and Jacques does not refute the claim, but rather says, “I'm the devil? As you yourself said, maybe you are too. Now, how does the saying go? As thick as thieves.”

With this line, we get one of the first examples of a clever script-writing trick Ian Martin often used in his episodes: having the last word or line of dialogue in one scene double as the first word or line in the next scene, with different characters. Here, the scene transition line is “as thick as thieves,” used both by Jacques to describe his possession of Jean Paul and by Elizabeth when telling Matt of Holly’s closeness to the late Mr. Marshall. We shall see many more of these from now on.

Because this episode jumps back and forth from Matt’s office to the French Leave Café, I think that, for the rest of this review, I will do what I did in my Episode 3 review and lump all the scenes in each setting together instead of writing one small paragraph for every mini-scene. Elizabeth says this rather enigmatic line about Holly: “ I begin to realize why you helped her to run. Suddenly, a child seemed like a woman to you--a child who is going to be very rich very soon, a child who knows how to twist men around her little finger. I should know. I lost a husband to her.” (Emphasis mine.) What does she mean by this? Is she jealous of Holly because her late husband liked her more or gave her more attention, or is there a darker meaning behind it? Could she possibly be blaming her for Mr. Marshall’s death? This is a plot point that none of the writers ever explored, one of many plot threads dropped later on. That Matt responds, “You lost your husband to God” only makes it sound more like she’s blaming Holly for his death. Was that Ian Martin’s intent, to imply that Holly somehow caused her father’s death, or am I reading too much into this scene?

At the French Leave Café, Vangie tells Boring Artist Tim that she keeps drawing the Nine of Swords--“the card of death”--for Holly whenever she tries to read her fortune. This worries her especially because, as she explains, her ESP is accurate slightly over half the time, meaning that Holly will almost certainly die. When Holly walks up to them and asks Vangie to read her future, she refuses and the focus shifts to Boring Artist Tim and the debt that Jean Paul is just about to pay off. Cue an interminable recap of Tim’s backstory (in short, he’s in debt to the Mafia because he took out $7,500 in loans to pay his mother’s hospital bills). Also cue one Holly line that is interesting if you’re re-watching this after Desmond Hall and you consider how the writers of that arc turned her into a hopelessly naïve ingenue:

An example of the Dunning-Kruger effect? Or did Martin originally intend for Holly to be smart and later writers dumbed her down? I’m thinking the latter.

Enter Jean Paul looking especially dapper in an all-blue ensemble, to which the poor video qualty does not do justice. (He also wears it in the next episode which has clearer video, so, when I write that review, there will be good screencaps.) He goes to talk to Vangie, who tells him that she keeps drawing the Nine of Swords when reading the fortunes of everyone connected to him. She also tells him that he knows of Dr. Menkin’s death because Quito brought his body to the island (or is it mainland?) where the Café is located. And then they have this exchange:

Vangie: "I guess now you will be leaving the Island."

Jean Paul: *shocked* "Why should I?"

Vangie: "With your wife in her last months of pregnancy, she should not be so far from a doctor."

Jean Paul: *suspicious and worried that she knows about Erica* "She isn't. Her sister is with her; she's a doctor. Now...” *hurriedly pulls out paper from his pocket, desperate to change the subject* “Tim Stanton?"

He promises to pay off the Mafia so that they stop pursuing Tim. Then Vangie says, smiling, “Your wife will love his work!”

She has to be feigning ignorance, or at least pretending not to be suspicious of him. Jean Paul is trying so hard to act nonchalant, but failing because he, too, knows that she suspects that something is going on.

Jean Paul: “Will she?”

Meanwhile, Holly is discussing her plans for the future with Tim:

LOL

He flirts with her a little before Jean Paul comes over to the table to commission him. He gives him $7,500 in cash, which must consist of $500 and $1,000 bills that were withdrawn from circulation that same year because the wad of bills that he gives him is way too thin to consist of 75 Benjamins.

That does not look like 75 $100 bills.

  Jean Paul tells Tim that he hopes he can bring Erica to life, which Holly thinks is a strange thing for such a “dreamy” man to say. Tim, on the other hand, is just grateful that his debt with the mob has been paid off before the end of Week 2--which is also probably before most people in the audience have started to care about that subplot. Still, it’s downright exciting compared with his next subplot, which will provide many of the low points of the Maljardin arc and, in some episodes, slow the pace down to a screeching halt. But that’s for another review.

Vangie hires Holly, but, right after she does, look who comes waltzing into the Café just as she stands up:

It’s Reverend Stalker!

Holly: “Why don’t you leave me alone? Get out!”

Overall, a mediocre episode, save for a few good scenes and that cliffhanger ending. Other than that, it mostly consisted of filler--especially of the “where’s Raxl” variety--and recap. Next one’s better, though. I just don’t know if I’ll have time to review it this week, because I’ll be very busy. (I actually wrote this post last week and scheduled it for today, if anyone is wondering.) Granted, I don’t think that anyone other than me reads this blog yet, but I have the sort of personality where I want to do everything yesterday and so I feel like I should be writing these reviews at a faster pace even if no one else is reading them. I wish that I could publish a new review every single day, but it’s just not practical for me, especially during this time of year. So I’ll see you...whenever.

{ <-- Previous: Episode 8   ||   Next: Episode 10 --> }