Actually I really wanna write a role reversal gerrymichael au and let me be so, so transparent when I say it is literally just bc I wanna fantasize about the tall, gangly blond man beating monsters to death
Everyone else has the same roles. Mary Keay is still Mary Keay in all her abusive and obsessive glory; Gertrude is still the Archivist.
Vaguely spiral aligned Michael who Does Not Like It. Pretends his connection is a hell of a lot looser than it is.
The only benefit (that Michael thinks of the Spiral) is how he can move around the Institute with relatively little interference and watch, after all, it is hard to behold something that is both nothing and everything and never was all at the same time.
Gerry ran away from home really young and actually succeeded. Spent a few years fucking around and learning what kind of benches are best to sleep on before applying to the Magnus Institute because that's what his dad did. He lied to hell and back on the application, but was hired quickly because of how thoroughly touched by the entities he was (thanks Mary) and Gertrude was running low on assistants. Gerry also felt completely justified in faking stuff and that he was perfectly qualified bc he grew up in a bookshop and how much different could it be (very different, as it turns out).
They first meet each other when Michael is prowling through artefact storage like it was a shopping mall, and pocketing everything he saw that didn't immediately mesmerize him. He was nervous and jumpy as all hell, even though this was not the first time he's done something similar and he's fairly certain Gertrude doesn't care, so when Gerry first spotted him from behind, he was immediately suspicious even before he saw Michael try to shove a lamp into his jacket pocket. This led to an altercation that eventually led to the lamp being accidentally turned on, Michael smashing it to pieces with a hammer Gerry had not realized Michael had, and Gerry suddenly being a lot more consciously aware of the supernatural than he was.
Gerry's mother was still obsessive over Lighteners, and she didn't make an effort to hide what she did, but she didn't actively try to educate Gerry on anything to do with the Fears. So he is fairly knowledgeable on the supernatural, but he doesn't know anything concrete about the Fears themselves and their categorization. The role of a stand by sacrifice instead of an errand boy and heir.
Michael still trusts Gertrude, but this time he knows he shouldn't and hates himself for it. Gerry wants to trust Gertrude, and she does hide him from anything Fears related and behaves around him like she did Michael in cannon, but he just feels something off about her and doesn't like it. She's just a bit too much like his mother for him to let his guard down.
Michael gets referred to by "it/its" pronouns once by Gerry as a teasing joke before Gerry fully knows what he is and is absolutely terrified by how happy the pronouns make his feel. (He thinks, maybe, that the Michael of his childhood liked something similar, too, but everything too far back is all twisted and he doesn't know what has been touched by the Spiral and what hasn't, so he doesn't trust any of it). He/it Michael ftw
At one point Michael just started putting black lipstick on himself because some of Gerry's always stuck to him when they kissed anyways n this gave them plausible deniability. Michael will never admit to the little spiral thrill it gives him when people do a double take upon seeing his face, the black lipstick contrasting literally everything else about his style.
Gabriel attempted to track Michael down exactly once, a few years before he joined the institute. He had heard about Michael's unsavory... Hobby... (<- reckless destruction of artefacts and throwing himself at all monsters and avatars he sees with a murderous rage regardless of their affiliation) but spiral avatars capable of holding a conversation are so few and far between and the Great Twisting was almost prepared, so he thought a meeting would be worth it. He showed up at a cafe Michael frequented one day expecting lovely, but tense, conversation, only to promptly lit on fire (mostly) in the back alley behind the cafe after he introduced himself. Gabriel survived, but some of his clay body still hardens unexpectedly or shows signs of firing from time to time.
Occasionally Michael's eyes will change colors and shapes, so he likes to put contacts in (he used to just use tinted glasses, but after one time of Gerry getting lost in his eyes in the far too literal, not at all romantic, sense, he decided to invest in smth a bit harder to take off and forget about). Unfortunately, this sometimes means other, very much not his original eyes will pop up around his body and in his hair as protest when he puts them in. It's not very fun to have to chase off eyes at 6am, but he does it regardless and complains the whole time about how he shouldn't have to deal with eyes when he very clearly isn't of The Eye.
Gerry: Oh hey you were running pretty late. I was starting to get worried.
Michael, not about to admit he spent an extra thirty minutes to get ready yelling and brandishing a lighter at a door that was following him around like a lost puppy: Ummmmmm I forgot my wallet. :((
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i know you said hopes had negative character development for the cast, but who do you think is better in hopes than in houses?
Better like in better writing, or better as in I appreciate them more?
Without a doubt, I'd say Felix and Sylvain who are better in Nopes than their FE16 versions, and in a way... Rhea herself, thanks to having more screentime when she isn't PTSD'ing lol
Call it chauvinism, but Sylvain in Nopes was scrubbed out of everything that made him... unlikable/feel flat in Houses.
His sob story about people only wanting to fuck him for his title/crest really felt... straight out ripped from some High School AU, with John McChad acting like an ass because the only girls who want to date him are interested in his situation as a heir of his dad's big company, and not because they love him. Yay. Great. Perfectly what I'm looking for in my medieval fantasy game where you whack people with swords.
Add to that the focus on crusts being the supposedly only reason why people are lusting over him - and not because, hey, you're a member of one of the most important noble houses in the Kingdom - to play in the general "crust bad" orchestra that can lead on the Supreme path, and the fact it's never ever adressed, and we have... this, which completely, to me, hides the other parts of Sylvain's character - like being someone who thinks outside of the box and resolves to lessen the reliance on his relic to defend the border by... creating a situation where they'll be no tension at the border, aka, a peace with Sreng.
Now, Sylvain works so well in Nopes partly because all of his "wah ladies only want my penis because i'm rich :'( " is erased, so we see a character who takes his duties as the heir of Gautier seriously, assists his Lord and friends and bring "new ideas" to help everyone. Sylvain, under his frivolous appearance and behavior, actually thinks and learns and suggests a lot of things that are quite useful, a bit like a "what if Sain wasn't only interested in courtship, but was raised as a future lord and had insight and suggestions on what to do". So sure, it's not as quirky and memorable as John McChad's sophomore year of school, but it fits better, imo, in the FE series.
As for Felix, well, it's more or less the same, his entire "duh boar bad chivalry bad and stupid - but wait no don't die and i'm sorry to have hit you dad i liked you but I was too busy playing the tsundere that I never got to say it to you before you died" schtick felt... old and annoying in FE16.
Sure, Felix can have his own, personal feelings about Dimitri being a hidden boar, but Felix is also the only heir of Rodrigue, and will become the next Duke Fraldarius, aka the second most important person in the Kingdom after the King himself, and the one tasked to protect it. Should Felix completely ignore his feelings and do what is expected of him, or take his role seriously? No, and Nopes has him give some "boar this, boar that", but Felix isn't a petulant 16 years old who wants to be "edgy" anymore, Felix is the next Duke - something he never shied away from, especially in his FE16 paralogue! - and has to start learning the job, thinking about Faerghus in something else than small jabs thrown at Dimitri and how to protect its people and second the King.
Heck, Felix's support in Nopes with Dimitri where Dimitri confesses about the ghosts, where Felix tries to carry him, the more or less cutscene where the general feeling is him saying to Dimitri he can count and rely on them... Given how FE16's Felix was written, even in AM, I can't see it happen before Rodrigue's death... and yet, in AG, Rodrigue is still alive (his optional death doesn't change those scenes), so when FE16's Felix realises there were more important things to do to help both his friend and country and dad but he only noticed it too late because he was too busy... being edgy, Nopes has him drop the edgy act (not completely drop it though, else it wouldn't be Felix anymore!) and act (lel) as his FE16 self, but only, without needing his dad to die first.
As for Rhea...
Having more screentime seriously helps, just like being allowed to talk about non plot relevant things with someone else than Billy or about Billy, I gushed a lot about the Nabatean paralogue, but it depicts her relaxing with her family (pissing on the "u r the only person i can talk to myself not the archbishop" pandering shit from FE16 even if FEH pissed on it first) and making tiny baby steps at apologising and confessing part of her guilt (for something completely stupid like Seiros the Warrior "borrowing" Cichol's shield to gift it to Willy!) to a member of her family.
Would that mean she would have confessed about the rez Sothis plan to Seteth earlier on? I... don't know, don't think so, and we don't have enough interactions between the two.
Compared to FE16 where she is an oyster until Billy turns green and Seteth nags her again and again and again, here she willingly makes the first step to apologise... sure, it's for something silly and not, resurrecting their mother, but it feels like a small progression (tiny baby steps) from FE16 where she has to be reveal stuff due to forced circumstances.
I also like how it sort of teases (or maybe that's just me lol) Seteth realising that Rhea still misses days long past to an unhealthy degree (tfw too much nostalgia), or just, having to remind her twice that those days are gone. Would he later realise her strange nostalgia hides something more deep, and ultimately her wish to "return" to those days by resurrecting Sothis?
idk, it's fuel for HCs and AUs, but for what it's worth, this paralogue and Nopes in general help flesh out Rhea more than what FE16 does, aka tying 80% of her mentions/appearances to Billy and Sothis.
(hell, in Nopes, she finally has lines with Flayn!)
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“ Well that wasn’t very slay of you! ” ( gojo )
unhinged comedic relief | @resolutepath pokes at chiyo!
" it's late and a school night, " chiyo rebuts immediately, watching as a mildly disappointed trio of teens makes their way back onto school grounds. " it might not be ' slay ' of me, but those kids needed to get home. one of 'em has to see shoko before he can even get to bed. " her fingers tap against her steering wheel. she has the report to finish writing, laundry to do, and more cases to review and organize by the time the week is up, too. but...
her gaze slides over to gojo. there's still a lot to do, but what's another hour before chiyo starts on it all?
" now, if you want to get something to eat before we call it a night, maybe i can make that happen. " she's smiling, leaning in with a finger up to her lips as if sharing a secret with the sorcerer. " just don't tell the kids. "
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