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meruz · 3 years

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once again i am answering asks in a big compilation post. included is... gotham, patrick stump, tips about drawing backgrounds, tips about drawing in general, links to my faq, and infinity train

like.... the tv series? No... I’ve drawn dc comics fanart before, though. But it’s been years since I’ve been really into it. I like jumped ship like 10 years ago when the New 52 happened LOL.

AFJHDSLKGH I’m sorry I (probably) won’t do it again??

Actually full disclosure I have a truly cringe amount of p stump drawings/photo studies in my sketchbook right now LOL. He’s just fun to draw... hats, glasses, guitar, a good shape... but I don’t think I’ll rly post those until I can hide them in another big sketchbook pdf.. probably Jan 2022. Stay tuned........ (ominous)

(ominous preview)

These are all sort of related to backgrounds/painting so I grouped them together even though they’re pretty much entirely separate questions.... ANYWAYS

a) How is it working as a BG artist? Is it hard? What show are you drawing for?

I think you’re the first person to ever ask me about my job! Being a background artist is great. It’s definitely labor intensive but I think that could describe pretty much any art job (If something were rote or easy to automate, you wouldn’t hire an artist to do it) and I hesitate to say whether its harder or easier than any other role in the animation pipeline. Plus, so much of what truly makes a job difficult varies from one production to the next, schedule, working environment, co-workers etc. But I will say that I think while BGs are generally a lot of work on the upfront, I think they’re subject to less scrutiny/revisions than something like character/props/effects design and you don’t have to pitch them to a room like boards. So I guess it’s good if you don’t like to talk to people? LOL

A lot of my previous projects + the show I’ve worked on the longest aren’t public yet so I can’t talk about em (but I assure you if/when the news does break I won’t shut up about it). But I’m currently working on Archer Season 12 LOL. I’m like 90% sure I’m allowed to say that.

b) ~~~THANK YOU!! ~~~

c) What exactly do you like to draw most [in a background]?

@kaitomiury Lots of stuff! I really like to draw clutter! Because it’s a great opportunity for environmental storytelling and also you can be kind of messy with it because the sheer mass will supersede any details LOL.

I like to draw clouds... I like to draw grass but not trees lol,,, I like to draw anything that sells perspective really easily like tiled floors and ceilings, shelves, lamp posts on a street etc.

d) Do you have any tips on how to paint (observational)?

god there’s so much to say. painting is really a whole ass discipline like someone can paint their whole life and still discover new things about it. I guess if you’re really just starting out my best advice is that habit is more important than product. especially with traditional plein air painting, I find that the procedure of going outside and setting up your paints is almost harder than the actual painting. There’s a lot of artists who say “I want to do plein air sometime!!” and then never actually get around to doing it. A lot of people just end up working from google streetview or photos on their computer.

But going outside to paint is a really good challenge because it forces you to make and commit to lighting and composition decisions really quickly. And to work through your mistakes instead of against them via undo button.

My last tip is to check out James Gurney’s youtube channel because hes probably the best and most consistent resource on observational painting out there rn. There’s lots other artists doing the same thing (off the top of my head I know a lot of the Warrior Painters group has people regularly posting plein air stuff and lightbox expo had a Jesse Schmidt lecture abt it last year) but Gurney’s probably the most prolific poster and one of the best at explaining the more technical stuff - his books are great too.

e) Do you have tips for drawing cleanly on heavypaint?

@marigoldfool UMM LOL I LIKE ONLY USE THE FILL TOOL so maybe use the fill tool? Fill and rectangle are good for edge control as opposed to the rest of the heavy paint tools which can get sort of muddles. And also I use a stylus so maybe if you’re using your finger, find a stylus that works with your device instead. That’s all I’ve got, frankly I don’t think my drawings are particularly clean lol.

f) Tips on improving backgrounds/scenes making them more dynamic practicing etc?

Ive given some tips about backgrounds/scenes before so I’m not gonna re-tread those but here’s another thing that might be helpful...

I think a good way to approach backgrounds is to think of the specific story or even mood you want to convey with the background first. Thinking “I just need to put something behind this character” is going to lead you to drawing like... a green screen tourist photo backdrop. But if you think “I need this bg to make the characters feel small” or “I need this bg to make the world feel colorful” then it gives you requirements and cues to work off of.

If I know a character needs to feel overwhelmed and small, then I know I need to create environment elements that will cage them in and corner them. If a character needs to feel triumphant/on top of the world then I know I need to let the environment open up around them. etc. If I know my focal point/ where I want to draw attention, I can build the background around that.

Also, backgrounds like figure compositions will have focal points of their own and you can draw attention to it/ the relationship the characters have with the bg element via scale or directionality or color, any number of cues. I think of it almost as a second/third character in a scene.

Not every composition is gonna have something so obvious like this but it helps me to think about these because then the characters feel connected and integrated with the environment.

Some more general art questions

a) Do you have any process/tips to start drawing character/bodies/heads?

I tried to kind of draw something to answer this but honestly this is difficult for me to answer because I don’t think I’m that great at drawing characters LOL. Ok, I think I have two tips.

1) flip your canvas often. A lot about what makes human bodies look correct and believable is symmetry and balance. Even if someone has asymmetrical features, the body will often pull and push in a way to counterbalance it. we often have inherent biases to one side or another like dominant hands dominant eyes etc. you know how right-handed artists will often favor drawing characters facing 45 degrees facing (the artist’s) left? that’s part of it. so viewing your drawing flipped even just to evaluate it helps compensate for that bias and makes you more aware of balance.

2) draw the whole figure often. I feel like a lot of beginner artists (myself included for a long time) defer to just drawing headshots or busts because it’s easier, you dont have to think about posing limbs etc. But drawing a full body allows you to better gauge proportion, perspective, body language, everything that makes a character look believable and grounded.

Like if you (me) have that issue where you draw the head too big and then have to resize it to fit the proportions of the rest of the body, it’s probably because you (I) drew the head first and are treating the body as an afterthought/attachment. Sketching out the whole figure first or even just quick drawing guides for it will help you think of it more holistically. I learned this figure drawing in charcoal at art school LOL.

oh. third mini tip - try to draw people from life often! its the best study. if you can get into a figure drawing/nude drawing class EVEN BETTER and if you have a local college/art space/museum that hosts those for free TREASURE IT AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT, that’s a huge boon that a lot of artists (me again) wish they had. though if youre not so lucky and youre sitting in a park trying to creeper draw people and they keep moving.. don’t let that stop you! that’s good practice because it’s forcing you to work fast to get the important stuff down LOL. its a challenge!

b) I’ve been pretty out of energy and have had no inspiration to draw but I have the desire to. Any advice?

Dude, take a walk or something.... Or a nap? Low energy is going to effect everything else so you gotta hit that problem at its source.

If you’re looking for inspiration though, I’d recommend stuff like watching a movie, reading a book, playing video games etc. Fill up your idea bank with content and then give yourself time/space to gestate it into new concepts. Sometimes looking at other art works but sometimes it can work against you because it’s too close.

Also something that helps me is remembering that art doesn’t always have to be groundbreaking... like it’s okay to make something shitty and stupid that you don’t post online and only show to your friend. That’s all part of the process imo. If you want to hit a home run you gotta warm up first, right? Sports.

I should probably compile everytime i give tips on stuff like this but that’s getting dangerously close to being a social media artist who makes stupid boiled down art tutorials for clout which is the last thing i want to be... the thing I want to stress is that art is a whole visual language and there are widely agreed upon rules and customs but they exist in large part to be broken. Like there's an infinite number of ways to reach an infinite number of solutions and that’s actually what makes it really cool and personal for both the artist and the viewer. So when you make work you like or you find someone else’s work you like, take a step back and ask yourself what about it speaks for you, what about it works for you, what makes it effective, how to recreate that effect and how to break that effect completely, etc. And have a good time with it or else what’s the point.

for the first 2, I direct you to my FAQ

For the last one, I don’t actually believe I’ve ever addressed artwork as insp for stories/rp but I’ll say here and now yeah go ahead! As long as you’re not making profit or taking credit for my work then I’m normally ok with it. Especially anything thats private and purely recreational, that’s generally 100% green light go. I only ask that if you post it anywhere public that you please credit me.

(and I reserve the right to ask you to take it down if I see it and don’t approve of it’s use but I think that case is pretty rare.)

a) @lemuelzero101 Thank you!!! I haven’t played Life is Strange but actually that series’ vis dev artist Edouard Caplain is one of my bigger art inspirations lately so that’s a really high compliment lol. And yeah I hope we get 5-8 too...!

b) Thank you for sticking around! I’ve been thinking about Digimon and Infinity Train in tandem lately, actually. They’re a little similar? Enter a dangerous alternate world and have wacky adventures with monsters/inanimate objects that have weird powers... there’s like weird engineers and mechanisms behind the scenes... also frontier literally starts with them getting on a train. Anyways if anyone else followed me for digimon... maybe you’d like Infinity Train? LOL

c) @king-wens-king I’M GLAD MY ART JUST HAS PINOY VIBES LOL I hope you are having a good day too :^)

a, b, c, d) yessss my Watch Infinity Train agenda is working....

e) aw thank you!! i think you should watch infinity train :)

#ask #trying this new thing where i tag people in the body of the post instead

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rhube · 2 years

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Keep seeing a post go round that's like 'A/B/O would be a lot better if it weren't [the tropes that make up A/B/O, but described in an extremely judgemental way]' and while I would love to be on board with being inspired by other animal mating behaviour (that part of the post is fun!) just... if you don't get a trope or kink, just move on. Don't bash it. Don't characterise it in purely negative and judgemental terms.

In my experience, no one writing A/B/O wants relationships to be that way, and IMO the best A/B/O fic centres precisely on the problems such a situation would create. Like most non-con or dub-con tropes, it explores issues like sexism and loss of power through an utterly fictional and obviously unreal set up in a way that provides enough distance that it enables people to explore anxieties that are otherwise a little too real and/or frees people to explore sexual fantasies they'd otherwise find too intimidating to engage with.

A lot of people - especially women, trans or non-binary people, and queer people in general - had to repress a lot of desires growing up in our fucked up society. Especially if you grew up under queerphobic laws (like Section 28 in the UK). We were taught that our desires and identities were bad and wrong. It really shouldn't surprise you that some of us now find some release in fantasies that feed into that feeling of taboo and transgression and threat, where just having a certain identity can see you treated differently and where sex becomes dangerous and difficult to engage in safely. It doesn't mean that's how we want things to be - the vast majority of people who enjoy content like that are passionate campaigners for things like consent and equality and against any kind of biological essentialism. It's not a contradiction - these impulses stem from the same place.

So, by all means play with and have fun with alternatives. But if you heap a whole bunch of value judgements on A/B/O based on your assumptions of why people enjoy A/B/O (which seem - from the way it's often described by people who don't enjoy it - to be completely wrongheaded and just utterly incorrect), then just fuck off with your purity culture.

All you're doing is hurting people who're trying to unpick the damaging repressions they grew up with. Not because they think A/B/O would be healthy and good IRL (I don't know anyone who thinks that!) but usually because they have a lot of complicated fears and anxieties about sex, and certain kinds of fantasies that put characters in extreme versions of what they fear give them some kind of release.

Please, please learn Your Kink is Not My Kink And That's OK.

No one has the time to figure out all the reasons why some people are into the specific things they are. But the close correlation between nightmare fuel and fetish fuel is well documented. It's so much easier and healthier to just accept that there are gonna be things other people get turned on by that squick you, and you by definition don't understand them, so if you start guessing about those reasons you're almost certainly going to end up jumping to a wildly inaccurate and harmful conclusion.

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annetteblog · 3 years

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Public figures, coming out and the responsibility

Disclaimer: Although this post mentions Jikook, it is mostly my opinion about the general issue. So you can apply this to whoever you want.

Previously on annetteblog: I made some posts regarding coming out, homophobia and how I don’t agree that Jikook (or basically any other celebrities/well-known figures which you suppose are queer) are obliged/have to/owe us to come out (in case if they are actually queer). Moreover, I said that asking or even making anyone from institutionally homophobic country to come out, hoping that it would start some social changes, is cruel, because you think only about some distant bright future and not the problems, which this particular person would face now. Problems, which can possibly ruin someone’s health, safety or life.

/the main one (Jikook centric) - https://bit.ly/3hLOpSS + the ask I consider important here (not really Jikook centric) - https://bit.ly/359IBgB /

Now: I was trying very hard to remember where I could possibly hear some similar thoughts and tadaaa I remembered :D

Dan Howell

Yep.

Those, who know him well, may skip this paragraph. Dan has been an youtuber since 2009 and around that year was a big fan of another youtuber - Phil Lester. Shortly, without going into details, after some fanboying time they actually met in person, started seeing each other, appeared on each other’s YT channels, and eventually moved in together (that’s not my creepy assumption, that was a known fact even back then, okay?). Obviously, the speculations started to grew. Were they gay? Were they in love? Were they just besties? Were they dating? This discussion had been lasting year after year on various platforms and sometimes with no decency involved. The guys remained mostly silent (there were some jokes now and then, but nothing too serious). On June 2019 both of them came out, confirmed that they were not just friends, but asked to stay away from their private life.

If you have time, I would suggest you to watch all of the Dan’s video; yes, it’s long, but he said a lot of interesting stuff to think about imo. But here I wanted to focus on two specific parts. I will write their timing and highly recommend you to watch them, they are really short. (eng subs and subs’ translation to a lot of languages are available on YT)

youtube

First of all, note that he is a public figure. Even though he is an introvert, he is still more used to put his life/actions on display (I mean more in comparison with an ordinary person, who doesn’t have a YT channel/other SM platform with a huge audience). Plus he lives in the UK, which is not the worst country on the planet, as far as I can tell.

However, even taking these into account, he still mentions how it was uncomfortable for him to get all of these speculations about his relationship with Phil. [timing - 25:12 - 27:46] Uncomfortable to the point of triggering old mental issues (he posted a vid about depression about a year prior this one, look it up if you want). He had hard time growing up because of his homophobic environment; and he was bullied for “being gay” before he actually knew what this word meant. Years later when he and his relationship with Phil became a subject of a much broader discussion and gossip, it was not just weird or uncomfortable but actually “triggered some PTSD” (according to him).

So even if you mean no harm and generally are the nicest supporting person, going around and calling people gay may not be the best life strategy. Especially if these people didn’t give you permission to do so. Even if they are some kind of celebrities. Sure, maybe you are right in your suspicions, but this doesn’t make the situation better or easier for them. You never fully know a person’s life situation and what they could be going through. You don’t know their past and problems they faced before. You don’t know their personal feelings, thoughts and fears. And you can just accidentally make everything worse.

The second thing.

[timing 23:57 - 24:32 and 28:23 - 28:54]

“If a kid dreams of being a footballer and age 18 signed to a club and all their dreams come true, but they are scared to come out because of the insane homophobia in that community, they shouldn’t turn it down. Yes, it’s so important to be truthful about who you are and open and proud in front of the world, but it’s our society fault that these people are scared to say who they are.”

Different people perceive different things as the most important part of their lives. For someone it’s family and kids, for someone it’s being able to create, for someone it’s work and career, etc. And not everyone is willing to just give up their dream over something.

And that’s okay.

So I don’t expect people to gladly risk their successful career over coming out. Particularly if they perceive their work as their true passion in life. For some people it just doesn’t worth it, for some – career and being able to fulfill their dream is more important. Others have to make compromises in order to maintain balance between different parts of their life and personality, or they just don’t want to draw attention to the personal life altogether. And some people may be too afraid to lose everything. Especially, if the environment they live in is not friendly. They may just want to live peacefully and quietly with no additional danger hanging over their head.

In general, I think that no one owes us anything. One may say that a celebrity with a presumably higher social status and more influence has a responsibility to do something in their power to make the world a better place. Although I agree to some extent (e.g. charity), I don’t expect someone to put their life on risk. That’s too much to ask for and just not fair. Everybody deserves a happy safe life, and if this means that someone decides to stay silent for their own good, you should respect it. And if they decide to speak up - that must be their choice. Outing is never an option.

Bottom line:

If someone is presumably in the closet, stop trying to pour gasoline on it. You may accidentally burn down not only the wood, but the person in it too.

#lgbt #lgbtq #coming out #wow that was some metaphorical shit #jikook #kookmin #jeon jungkook #park jimin #jungkook #jimin #min yoongi #yoongi #suga #bts #bts ships #lgbtq relationships #lgbtq representation #lgbt relationship #long post

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lizacstuff · 3 years

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Merhaba friends - SCK episode 35 asks

(Fragman 36 ask at the end)

Apologies to those of you who sent asks for last week’s episode and I didn’t answer them. The week got away from me and then suddenly it was show day, the episode aired, and the asks were no longer relevant. Even if I didn’t answer I appreciate you reaching out!

Anonymous said: I’m dying to know what you thought.

While my ego would like to think that there are a variety of subjects that people might seek out my thoughts on, I’m going to guess you want to know what I thought of episode 35.

I had a mixed reaction. I liked a lot of things, loved a lot of things, there were some things I found disappointing, and a few characters I wanted to strangle. So let’s explore from that perspective.

Liked:

Romcom feel was back. It felt lighter and was easier to watch than a lot of eps in this arc.

Aydan, Ayfer and Seyfi working together to unite the kids. They were actually funny and trying to do the right thing, even if their methods were a bit morally gray.

Serkan and Eda’s photo on outdoor advertising and on the cover of magazines. We’ll ignore how quick the turnaround was to get those photos up, it was just plain fun to watch Serkan see himself on his drive into work and be embarrassed and aggravated by the whole thing, while there was also a little spark of excitement from him in being linked to Eda like that. That was enjoyable.

Melo is always the best bestie and Ayfer didn’t suck as an aunt!

LOVED:

Most every individual Edser scene.

Serkan out-of-his head with worry, planning to jump into the frigid sea, even though he wouldn’t have any shot of saving her that way. That’s my ride-or-die, protective romantic robot!

Serkan making faces as Eda plans her wedding. Excellent work from Kerem here.

Eda buttoning up Serkan’s shirt. That was hot. It was also hot that he just let her.

Sekan buttoning up Eda’s dress (get a room kids and start going the other way... unbuttoning, UNBUTTON) This scene was emotional and the sexual tension!

Serkan clutching his chest. The poor boy was about to have a panic attack right there. Follow through, writers, give him the full fledged panic attack!

The hair caught in the button (There’s that button again!) sequence. it was funny and sexy and made Selin into a foolish, immature third wheel. I’m all for it.

Serkan apologizing to Eda for Selin, that was big because up til now he hasn’t really recognized how awful Selin is in most situations. He has blinders when it comes to her, mostly because he doesn’t pay attention, so it was satisfying to see him acknowledge her bad behavior.

EVERY MOMENT AT THE BOLAT HOUSE. That was a great sequence, and IMO we mostly have Hande and Kerem to thank for it and not the writers. They brought it to life and obviously a lot of it was on them to just figure out what to do in the scene. I loved that Serkan saw Eda amongst the flowers in that painting. Swoon! their conversation about how they were both hungry was hilarious. Every moment with them fixing the sandwiches was gold and then it just got better from there. With him being willing to share food, to the throwback “mesala” conversation to her listening to his heart. All so... so... good.

However, while we definitely deserved those nice, long, funny, heartwarming scenes, I must say the writers didn’t use them to their fullest potential. How did the night end? How did they part? Why was no progress made after spending the night that way? If the writers were even half decent at their job they would have had Serkan confess some feelings while high, but not remember in the morning thus giving us the parallel with episode 11 when he was sick. Eda would have felt defeated when he didn’t remember, again, and it would have made more sense why she thought the fake wedding was her last shot at getting through to him.

Characters I’m mad at:

Ceren knows the whole episode that Deniz loves Eda, she knows he’s being weird about it, she makes up with Eda, and stills says nothing? WTF?

Engin makes it to the wedding, he knows Serkan has his memories back and he doesn’t stop the wedding to let Eda know before she says yes? WTF?

Ferit allegedly has the photos and he thinks the wedding is real, but he doesn’t show Eda the photos so she has a better idea of what she’s getting into? WTF? (though through that whole Ferit/Selin scene I wondered if Ferit was just playing along with Selin, trying to get info out of her and he’s not really the one who has the photos. Time will tell. )

Selin/Deniz- Obvious, psychos, I need them freaking gone. How Deniz can claim to love Eda, but sit there and watch her look devastated and cry her eyes out at the thought of fake marrying him, while knowing he’s about to pull a disgusting trick is unfathomable. He needs to be committed.

Disappointing:

To be clear, I no longer care, but I can’t believe how badly they flubbed this storyline. That? That was the payoff for the hell we’ve been put through for 7 weeks? Wow talk about not worth it and anti-climactic. I’m not going to go on about all the ways they failed, but I could.

While I fully believe that Serkan fell back in love with Eda before he got his memories back (see this post) he should have confessed to Eda before he got them back. That was the whole point of this entire storyline and they carried that the entire time, but then fumbled the ball at the 1 yard line. Good grief, these writers are bad.

Serkan gets his memories back, he knows time is of the essence, and he still is torn and has to think about it? WHAT? Just no. Ridiculous. I realize they did it for maximum suspense, but they shouldn’t have. They really shouldn’t have.

That was their reunion after all we’ve been through? Come on, writers, step it up. I realize we no longer have the writers that gave us his love declaration in 11 or Eda’s and Serkan’s proposals, or their make up scene in 28 or their goodbye scene in 28, but this was lackluster.

So, in summation, there was a lot that I really enjoyed, I thought the episode flowed better than some of the others in this arc, and lots of great individual Edser moments, it’s just the way they flubbed the whole storyline. I’m just so glad the amnesia is over, that thankfully I don't really care.

Anonymous said: when pushed by engin and aydan multiple times in the episode he never denies he ISN'T in love with her and rather skirts around the issue and deflects with "she's marrying deniz!" which should be proof enough he fell in love with her especially considering in 29 he was telling eda that "there was no such thing as love" between them. it was almost reminiscent of eda in 10/11 where she doesn't tell him her feelings bc she believes he wants selin, this time in reverse bc he believes she's moved on.

This came in response to this ask, and yes I agree. I should have hit that point harder, that Engin and Aydan ask him and he never denies it. When this arc started he would have denied it in a flat second.

He fell in love with her again, full stop. It’s just a shame that they didn’t make it the entire crux of his love confession, we deserved to see that. Just one of the many ways the writers dropped the ball with this storyline.

Anonymous said: The whiplash we got going from 26-28 to the drag of 29-35 though. 🤦🏼‍♀️ and you really could cut out that entire storyline and you wouldn’t be missing anything because really nothing happened. They didn’t even have Serkan stopping Eda before he got his memories back to fulfill a basic assumed foreshadowing. Like....huh?

I don’t want to be negative, but it’s crazy to me that they sped through wedding prep at a lightning pace and then went through this painful amnesia storyline at a snail’s pace. They should have had at least 5 episodes of wedding prep, doing just one pre-wedding activity per episode, but kept Babaanne around to create the drama. I wanted at least one episode of them back together, but keeping it secret so they could work against her. We were robbed of that!

Anonymous said: I know we’ve been hating a lot on the new writers but the showrunner still has to sign off on these scenes right? And it’s been the same one this whole time. What has she been thinking? Maybe the writers didn’t do their homework but surely she can tell that scenes being very out of character wouldn’t make sense?

Bold of you to assume there’s a showrunner as we know them on a Hollywood show. I assume you’re talking about Asena, but I always think of her more of a cross between an EP and a network exec. A bit more removed than a showrunner. I have no idea who the guiding light of this show is since Ayse left. The production timelines are so tight, I don’t think there’s time to review scripts and reject them. Sometime I think it’s a wonder anything makes sense at all.

Anonymous said: I see you've giffed some of the edser "questionable positions" bookshelf scene. (Awesome gifs btw). Honestly, that entire scene was really funny, with the rest of the art life crew jumping in. Even Selin made me laugh when she came in there and said "how did her hair get stuck?!" and Serkan very sarcastically replied with something like "I wound it up in there, what do you think??" Not to mention all the very close face talking that was going on!

Great scene! Here’s the gif set you’re referring to. I suppose the writers proved they could do fun, and romantically comedic scenes if they want to. More like this, please.

Anonymous said:

With these past 5 (?) episodes with these last set of writers, I truly believe that they did not go back to watch SCK at all before writing. Any past references were probably given to them on a checklist or something. Like I don't know if they even watched episode 28 with how they ended up doing away with the memory loss. Its kind of astounding how much they dropped the ball. Hopefully the rumors of new writers are true and they get enough episodes to give us a good ending to this story!

This came in right after the episode, but unfortunately, we learned today that we are apparently not getting new writers, at least not for episode 36.I was fully convinced we were since Sefkat (the production company twitter admin) liked Yasin’s post when he said we’d be getting all new writers for 36. Normally I don’t believe anything Yasin says because he has lied so many times that any info he actually has just comes across as a clock being right twice a day. However, when she liked it, I found that convincing. Also the way they cancelled shooting on Saturday and H/K were in for a meeting on Friday. Seemed like it was all adding up. We’ll see, maybe there will be new ones for 37??

As for not watching what came before, it certainly feels like they only skimmed and watched certain scenes and didn’t do a deep dive on the series. Watching all the eps in full should be a requirement before they start the job. I always feel they are just off with Serkan’s characterization, they don’t quite get him and they turn him a bit into a cardboard cutout of early Serkan. It’s like the character sketch outline of Serkan, but with no depth.

Anonymous said: When I saw the character description of the new cast member added to the show I was like "great, another possible screen space filler in regards to Aydan" but after watching the episode, I was actually really intrigued by his character. I know there's a bunch of theories out there that Serkan is actually his son, which I don't really buy into right now, but nevertheless he was a real potential to be a father figure in Serkan's life... and maybe the only guest character to not be a villain lol.

I’ll tell you this, that casting makes it seem like they at least want us to think he’s Serkan’s father. He’s way better looking that Alptekin and he just looks like he could genetically be responsible for the magnificence that is Serkan.

We’ll see what they do. I think it could be interesting, just because until Serkan met Eda he was so invested in being “Serkan Bolat” that having his identity shaken like this would be seismic for him. It could create some really good drama for him in all his relationships without tearing apart Edser. Also, if Alptekin knew it would go along way in explaining that relationship. Alptekin always demanding perfection and the cold way he sent him away to boarding school. It would explain why he could never earn his father’s love or approval, and that knowledge might give him some peace.

In addition, and a big plus, it would mean that his biological father was NOT responsible for the deaths of Eda’s parents.

Anonymous said: 1/ everyone for weeks was waxing poetic and had super detailed headcannons of how serkan would remember in really specific ways when he realized he was in love, something that ayfer kinda poked fun of at the beginning of the ep talking about the fake wedding, but i was genuinely laughing out loud at serkan and engin accidently getting into a fight and him yelling throughout it that he remembers and engin pushing him in front going "can you give him one good hit?!" lmaoo

2/ getting a good hit to the end to unscramble your brain that is already giving you flashbacks is more actually more realistic than the usual fairytale way.. sure, less romantic, but definitely more realistic. the man was already in love with her, super confused on what to do since he genuinely thought she was marrying deniz, and was already having flashes, all he really needed was good hit in the head lol. maybe eda should've kept going when they were boxing 😂

I like your take on it.

Anonymous said: i think they saw the fandom complaining week after week that there was too much heaviness/drama in their romcom and said "so you guys want romcom? here i'll give you full on romcom" which is what i thought this episode was! and i really appreciated such a fun ep overall to watch to bring this otherwise really sad and emotion heavy memory loss plot to an end.

Yes, the episode was a lot more fun than most that had come before it. If only they could have tied it all together.

Anonymous said: Something that just occurred to me that's so crazy in addition to wrapping an episode days before it airs, is that in Turkish television, a series has like 1 permanent director and a small writing team that writes ALL of the episodes. In US TV, that's pretty much unheard of - different writers rotate owning each episode and the same director will shoot maybe 2-3 episodes at most a season. The production turnaround time is so short that it's insane that we don't hear of more last-minute delays

I know, I think about this all the time. It’s crazy to me that there’s only one director. Which is why there’s not a lot of added layers to this show. When a director just has one episode on their plate and they spend a couple of weeks prepping to direct, every shot, every angle, every bit of set dressing can be meaningful. This show doesn’t have that kind of visual depth. On the other hand you do get a director that knows the actors and crew inside and out and they all have a short hand which allows them to get to what they want faster and easier. That can’t be replicated with directors who come in for one episode.

Anonymous said: Over the past month or so, I’ve been seeing so many people cancel Serkan and wanting Eda to leave him forever and move away, but she really never gave up on him and she might finally get him back this week 😭 in fact, Eda and Melo are the only people we’ve seen who have tried to help get his memories back! Everyone who has been friendly to Selin can disinvite themselves to the Edser wedding

I’m glad I didn’t see a bunch of this nonsense myself. But, honestly, anyone who wants Eda to leave and not end up with Serkan... why are they watching this show to begin with? Did they take a wrong turn somewhere? How did they last this long watching it? We’re 35 episode in and this entire show is their love story, beyond that story and it being a vehicle to showcase Hande and Kerem’s awesome chemistry, it really doesn’t offer many other reasons to watch.

And yes to jettisoning anyone who was friendly with Selin. PIRIL I’M LOOKING AT YOU. I sure hope Piril finds out exactly how low Selin will sink. She needs to feel ashamed for welcoming her back without question.

Anonymous said: That fragman for ep 36...part of me wants to hope that it will all be solved pretty soon, since we got edser separated for so long we deserved them together now. But part of me also knows these writers suck so I’m expecting the worst. I just wanted edser together again 😭

I know. When I saw the full fragman my initial reaction was to yell “WHY CAN’T WE HAVE NICE THINGS!!!!!!!” But I’ve calmed down now.

It seems to me that we have Serkan and Eda together and working together to figure this mess out, which is good. we have romantic walks on the pier, and Eda spending the night at his place and a sweet breakfast setting with Eda in jammies. All good.

But then we also have Selin and Deniz refusing to quit. Selin comes up with the plan that if Deniz doesn’t sign the papers in time, then they will have to get a divorce which means Eda can’t marry for 300 days. So then, what? Deniz steals Serkan’s car and goes on the run?

What they hope to accomplish with this, I don’t know. Because even if they succeed and Serkan and Eda can’t get married right away, it’s not like they’ll just magically decide that they want to be with those two psychos instead. I can see Selin doing it just for revenge so she can make them miserable, but what’s Deniz’ motivation? The further psycho he goes, the worse Eda will think of him. Bizarre.

As for the pregnancy thing. It sounds like Eda must hear that from someone. My money is on Deniz. That’s his Hail Mary to try and drive a wedge between Serkan and Eda. Because seemingly when Eda brings it up, Selin asks where did you hear that. Also, phew, Eda says right away that if its true that Sekan deserves to know, which hopefully will clear things up (because the writers showed us over and over and over again that they weren’t sleeping in the same bed) and it will show Serkan just what kind of crazy he’s dealing with.

Anonymous said: I was pretty excited after watching the fragman, but surprised when I went on twitter and saw that almost everyone was really upset by it. I’m sure most people know Selin isn’t actually pregnant, but they all still somehow hate the storyline (possibly bc they think it’ll drive edser apart?) idk am I crazy for thinking that we’ll still get good edser moments and them staying together and fighting together? I guess the show needs drama to continue but I’m not mad because I think good edser will outweigh bad/miscommunication edser.

I’m sure we’ll get good Edser moments, but I can’t really fault anyone for being extremely annoyed by this fragman. I think this little plot point will end up not being a big deal at all, however, I can see how it feels like a kick in the face after what we’ve been through the last 7 episodes. It’s like can we get one happy episode? Just one?

Also it’s just very uncomfortable. I’m in the camp that currently thinks it’s impossible for her to be pregnant because they haven’t slept together. He was too fragile and injured before they came back to Istanbul (sleeping on the couch with his PTSD) and after he was too confused and consumed by Eda and just uninterested in Selin. I have to believe they kept showing us them not spending the night in the same place for a reason.

However, if they were to have had sex, it’s very unsettling because it’s a little too close to him not being able to give consent. It’s Rape by Deception. He had a brain injury, amnesia, was suffering a myriad of traumas and was not in his right mind. He did not have the full set of facts on where their relationship stood, but she did (she knew he wanted nothing to do with her and told her he never loved her and didn’t even want to be friends) and instead of being honest she abused him. She lied to him. She didn’t tell him the truth about what had happened. She isolated him from anyone who could tell him the truth and manipulated him into thinking that she was the only person in the world he could trust and the person he loved and trusted most was untrustworthy and an enemy.

However, as the audience we know the things she’d done in the past to abuse his trust, and we know for certain if he remembered, he would never consent to sleep with her. Never. So even beyond the cheating and the romance it would rob us of if they did have sex, it’s ICKY and GROSS and none of us want to even think of it. I don’t expect TV writers in Turkey to be on the forefront of thought when it comes to issues of consent, so I’d rather this door just not be opened at all.

But here we are, they opened it. Now all we can do it hope that it is a device to hear Serkan say that it isn’t impossible and for Selin to be fully exposed as completely unbalanced and a lying, manipulator.

Anonymous said: the fandom by use of sheer will forced this selin plot line into existence LOL. i swear since the beginning of the memory plot in 29, the "selin will lie to eda she's pregnant" rumor has been constantly making rounds, and i guess it's time to cash in. i will say that i've seen ppl thinking know that somehow serkan and her were intimate even though she's clearly lying.. guys, if there was even a POSSIBILITY she would've used this way back before now and would have told everyone, including serkan.

I agree with this. If this was a card she could play with Serkan, she’d play it. She’s been getting more and more desperate. And in the fragman there she is coming up with ways for Deniz to run away so he can’t sign the papers. If there was something she could hold over Serkan, she would, She’s not because then the con would be up, we’ll just have to wait and see how big of a lie she’s willing to tell.

Anonymous said: I wonder if Selin was a spy when she was younger! That woman is always watching everything from her car! Even in the new trailer.

Ha! Let’s hope that in the end she’s not a very good spy and they finally get one over on her. Oh please oh please oh please let the stable boy be the one who has the photos and let him have more on her. I want there to be tons of photos of her in her car spying on them. That would be so humiliating for her.

Seriously, though, who knows what happened to Selin to make her the way she is. Frankly, I don’t think my assessment of her has really changed (most of my old posts on her are tagged with “anti Selin”) She’s just a spoiled, selfish, entitled brat who thinks she should get anything and everything she wants. If she wants Serkan, she should have him, doesn’t matter what he wants or who she hurts, she’ll do whatever she has to do to make that happen. She was probably never told no as a child. So when she’s thwarted she thinks she’s entitled to whatever reaction she wants to have, if that’s ruining other people’s lives, so be it. No one can be happy if she’s not.

#Sen Çal Kapımı #Sen Cal Kapimi #Edser #sck episode discussion #sck speculation #sckask #asklizac #sck 1x35 #sck 1x36 #anonymous

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mira--mira · 3 years

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One obvious for the ask game. The main protagonist; Naruto Uzumaki and Izuku Midoriya.

@shiryusamarkanda it’s so nice to hear from you again! <3

I totally didn’t forget to post this and had it fully finished in my drafts for days...totally.

Naruto

What I love about them:

Naruto's a bratty kid who’s not afraid to speak up and challenge something he thinks is "wrong". This, of course, is part 1 Naruto. I actually like when he's a bit insensitive without being explicitly malicious bc its very fitting for his background/how he grew up but also gives him a clear path forward as he learns how to work as a team/starts to grow. It wasn’t exactly a smart move, but I really liked how he continued to challenge Zabuza in the Wave Arc saying “he’s still my enemy” after Kakashi told him to back off. This is all good and strong characterization that, to me, was more often endearing than it wasn’t. Naruto had goals and a purpose and in early Naruto that was still clear.

What I hate about them:

Part 2 (Shippuden) Naruto. There’s a lot that goes into this but the core deviation is getting away from the underdog story. In Shippuden Naruto is the son of the 4th, the Child of Prophecy, a reincarnation of the Sage of Six Path’s kid, makes friends with Kurama, and has the most OP power of the them all: Talk no Jutsu. What makes all of this even worse is Naruto went from a loveable bratty kid to an insufferable messiah figure. To be “perfect” his natural personality is shorn down until he’s only allowed occasional “stupid” mistakes rather than mistakes that emerge from his characterization. This also makes his ideological “wins” with villains...completely meaningless. Shippuden Naruto doesn’t really...have beliefs. He wants to be hokage and bring Sasuke back to the village. “Being hokage” was fine as a kid but I expected the progression into shippuden to be “what kind of hokage do I want to be?” This seemed natural bc we get in the Wave arc Naruto pushing against “what a shinobi is supposed to be: a tool” from Haku and declaring he’d make his own ninja way. Flashforward to the chunin arcs: hates Orochimaru for messing with Sasuke (esp when he eventually leaves to join him) and Neji for treating Hinata the way he did until he learned more about the Hyuga before declaring it wasn’t fair and you had to fight against fate and destiny. Tsunade’s arc was more about reemphasizing the village was something worth protecting and the Sasuke retrieval arc, while focused on Sasuke, at least kept up this theme. But these moments of growth are only alluded to in shippuden and by the time the war arc and ending come around...nothing changes. Naruto didn’t upset the status quo, he only maintained it. And once that ending was established it was a lot easier to go back and pick out exactly when his characterization started to fall through and the weird messiah figure took over instead. Part of this, imo, is the focus of his ultimate goal being “bring Sasuke back to the village” rather than understand what Sasuke is doing/why he’s doing it and then deciding to help him or stop him.

Favorite Moment/Quote:

“You’re cute when you’re chubby” [in reference to the frog purse]

I really love the quiet moments Naruto has and watching him live out his daily life. The frog purse is absolutely adorable and I love seeing it crop up time and time again. A close second is when Gai kicks Jiraiya in the face and, a short time later, offers Naruto the green tracksuit which he’s appreciative of.

What I would like to see more focus on:

In Part 2 Naruto having a long-term goal alongside bringing Sasuke back to the village or trying to seriously think about why Sasuke does what he does and how that would potentially affect the plot. If I could go back to the very start, keeping the actual heart and intent of an underdog ninja story rather than everything turning into superpowered mecha/kaiju battles and aliens from space this is the big point that I’d want to address. In general, I really like fics that focus on training and give him a range of jutsu besides spamming shadow clones and rasengan variants. I’ve said this before, but if Naruto really wants to keep the “number 1 unpredictable ninja” moniker, learning a variety of small, diverse jutsu and using them in interesting/creative ways would be the way to go rather than spamming the aforementioned two. I also really like fics that buckle down and just go ham and create their own variety of jutsu, especially if it’s small practical jutsu rather than the latest and greatest OP Power #839281 kind of jutsu.

What I would like to see less focus on:

The messiah figure. Talk no Jutsu. The obsession with having a morally pure hero in a world that routinely employed child soldiers and put them in war. I understand Naruto was a shonen manga first and foremost but like...this was the setting/world Kishimoto decided on having. However, I will say some fics take it to far on the other extreme for my taste, creating a edgy nihilistic Naruto that hates everyone and everything.

Favorite pairing with:

Uhh...I don’t actually have a strong feeling for this one LOL. The most I’ve read has been SasuNaru (Sasuke x Naruto) because I’ve found really interesting set-ups. I like the ship and it does have a decent amount of backing in canon but it’s the little moments (or my ability to see possible little moments) that really make or break a ship for me. SasuNaru is all Big Declarations and I struggle to see how they’d actually settle down post Shippuden time into something sustainable. My favorite iterations of the ship is focused when they’re genin age and have a better relationship...but then I recognize that this is getting closer and closer to Hashimada. The other big things I run into with shipping Naruto with Sasuke is 1. Sasuke needs a shit ton of therapy/willingness to process his family related trauma and 2. Naruto needs a good support network/family outside of a romantic partner because it personally makes me uncomfortable to read ‘you’re my one and only’ (here being: I have no other friends, family, loved ones outside of you). It’s a ship that can work but it’s not my personal OTP.

Favorite friendship:

Canon/OoT - Naruto & Sakura

I do have a softspot for fics where Naruto realizes his crush on Sakura is actually a desire to have friends/someone to care about him and then they do become close. In canon Sasuke was clearly the favorite of Kakashi (if chunin arc is kept the same/similar and he takes him away for the month to train) I really like Naruto and Sakura sticking together and trying to help each other. They’re both loud and can wind each other up but Naruto can help Sakura relax a bit from her rigid view of herself and she can help keep him on track/encourage him.

NOTP:

Again, no real strong opinions here. Probably harems? I remember seeing a lot of those a couple years ago and I fundamentally dislike the harem so it will never be ‘done well’ to my personal taste.

Favorite headcanon:

Naruto is smart, he just needs things to be explained in a way he can understand.

I’m not a fan of ‘he’s the smartest person in the entire world’ trope but Naruto is creative, he created the oiroke jutsu before he graduated to genin and has a lot of stubborn determination. He’s just really bad at typical ‘book learning’ and traditional testing and he’s not a genius/prodigy like Sasuke or Neji.

Read line for BNHA manga spoilers

Izuku

What I love about them:

He’s such a smart kid and while he’s unsure/insecure about himself he still does his best. Honestly the premise of BNHA is amazing and I was so excited to watch this little quirky (heh) boy do his best and outthink heroes, utilizing his intelligence and knowledge of quirks. I really love early Izuku and how he has to approach situations from a different angle bc he grew up quirkless/can’t properly handle OFA. The sports festival arc remains one of my personal favorites and really showed his ingenuity. I also really love that Izuku is openly emotional, he cries, he gets super happy about things, he’s angry, he’s sad, etc.

What I hate about them:

Why do stories insist on calling themselves “underdogs” when for a majority of the time, they’re not? Or not as much as they would be from the original premise? Look, TDP came about exactly bc BNHA was billed as ‘quirkless boy becomes number 1 hero’ it changed rapidly into ‘Izuku gets the strongest quirk but can’t control it’ and while I was...disappointed with that, it happened so quickly I wasn’t really upset. Fast forward to apparently OFA has...what seven(?) quirks inside it and I just...it’s frustrating. Even more the longer we go the more Izuku strays away from a character that is forced to use his intelligence and creatively outthink his opponents and instead becomes...I just have to hit him harder! The Muscular fight already inched towards this but the Overhaul fight just felt like Super Shonen Smack-down 728329. Which, isn’t an inherent problem, it just doesn’t match up to the expectations I had about BNHA I had at the start and how I hoped the series would go. For a character trait that I hate: Izuku is stupidly self-sacrificing. It makes sense with his character but he shoots beyond what is safe and reasonable and I wish there would be more internal emphasis on the question “is it better to save one person today if it meant I couldn’t save ten people tomorrow?” I think he’d choose the former or forsake the question altogether (we touched briefly on this during the overhaul arc with Eri) but I think it’s a serious question needs to be touched on (or I just need to go back and rewatch things again LOL)

Favorite Moment/Quote:

See entire sports festival arc. I don’t really have a favorite moment because I love the entire arc and we get so much out of it.

What I would like to see more focus on:

Quirkless Izuku. There’s already a lot of fics, but I really do love them. It deviates a bit, but I do like the creativity of giving Izuku his own unique quirk and then exploring what he can do with that/how it changes canon. Really I want Izuku to keep his original characterization and not trade his smarts for more punching power or deus ex machinas for quirks hidden inside of OFA. If OFA!Izuku is kept, I like story ideas where he still has to rely on means outside of his quirk. Preferably this is isn’t because he injuries himself so much, but I like toying with the idea that Izuku never gets OFA to All Might’s level so he really does have to make the quirk his own and still rely heavily on his intelligence and quirk journals to become the number 1.

What I would like to see less focus on:

Quirks hidden inside OFA. Strength should have been enough, it was already billed as the most powerful quirk of all. I know this is a common theme for shonen stories, and I don’t mean to harp specifically on Izuku, but again the premise of BNHA was an underdog story.

Favorite pairing with:

Tododeku (Todoroki Shouto x Midoriya Izuku)

Friends to lover and battle couples lads, I am weak to them. I like the contrast between their personalities as well as origins (Shouto being the number 2′s (now 1) kid and Izuku from a quiet civilian background). At the end of the sports festival arc both of them are extremely well characterized and it’s easy for me to imagine how their relationship progresses from there and how they can support each other and help each other grow. It’s a very sweet and wholesome ship the way I write and read it and it’s v cute.

Favorite friendship:

Canon- Midoriya Izuku & Uraraka Ochaco & Iida Tenya

I really like the core trio and think their interactions are really sweet. They balance each other out well and their friendship was immediately believable to me. I also like later when Tsuyu and Shouto start to get included in the group and out of the “main” core friends I’m endlessly entertained whenever Izuku and Tokoyami interact with one another. (This is also because I love my bird son, but you know.)

TDP - Midoriya Izuku & Ashido Mina or Midoriya Izuku & Hatsume Mei

Really, I love all of TDP’s kiddos interactions. Their chemistry is one of my favorite things about the fic and all the villain school kiddos meshed really well and had hilarious interactions. Mina and Mei are my faves but just barely. Mina came out of left field for the fic but she plays a similar role that Ochaco does in canon as a usual source of positivity (but unlike Ochaco with additional chaos). She’s Izuku’s first real friend even before starting HIVVE and wouldn’t hesitate to call Izuku her cousin as she views him as family. In return, Mina’s someone Izuku can completely count and depend on if necessary. Mei is...Mei. Izuku is her best “useful customer” and it’s actually terrifying how similar their thoughts are, just Mei has an (un)healthy dose of Hazmat’s insanity and her own business acumen added into the mix. They have slightly different fields of interest but are intellectual equals that work well together and that’s something new to both of them.

NOTP:

Bakudeku (Bakugo Katsuki x Midoriya Izuku)

It’s unhealthy. Unless it’s an AU that changes what the start of their relationship is like, Bakugo and Izuku will always have a toxic friendship to me and I can’t ever see them in a healthy relationship. Both of them have a lot to learn and I am of the opinion that Bakugo should get the opportunity to grow and become a good person and leave behind his past as a bully. However, I’m also of the opinion that no matter how good of a person a bully becomes their victim is never required to absolve them of past wrongdoings. Izuku and Bakugo were friends once, their relationship turned toxic, and now it’s in the interest of both of them to grow apart from one another. I even hesitate to really say they’ll be friends again because the early characterization of their relationship was so imbalanced to me, but for the right author and the right work I may see them being on good terms. It’s still a romantic relationship that I dislike.

Favorite headcanon:

Crack headcanon? Izuku does have a natural quirk, the force of his tears is clearly superpowered 😂 Regular headcanon, (that is canon in TDP and kindaaa in regular canon(?)) when Izuku gets really engrossed in a super stressful fight he focuses on what will work rather than what is moral. It has...mixed results.

For the ask game.

#shiryusamarkanda #naruto #bnha #mha #naruto uzumaki #izuku midoriya #my fics #the diverging path #out of time #spoliers #bnha manga spoliers #asks

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spartan-officer-brasidas · 4 years

Text

It seems like a few of you agreed that Ubisoft mishandled the Gods in more than a few ways, and I’m still mad about it so I just want to go through and explain how they were so poorly represented. I will concede that there are more than a few ‘right’ ways to represent a God and it all comes down to your own interpretation of the Gods and their myths, but I think in general, Ubisoft really fell short. My personal interpretations come from my major in Classics and my worship of the Greek and Roman pantheons, so my opinions on this will reflect those interpretations but feel free to have and share your own!

Let’s start simple. Juno. Juno is a really interesting Goddess, both in religion and in the games. I, personally, don’t do anything special for Hera/Juno/Uni, but I know that she is an incredibly loving Goddess and is remarkably loyal to her husband and those she holds dearly. Now, I think Ubisoft did Juno okay, only because her loving and loyal nature can make her a fierce enemy, and I think Ubisoft showed that well. She, from my knowledge, is a main antagonist in the series, and given that “modern” Rome is a part in Ezio’s story, that makes sense. Juno was NOT a supporter of the foundation of Ancient Rome. She made several attempts to keep Aeneas from getting to Italy and she is openly not a fan of Aeneas, given his Trojan heritage and his role in Rome’s founding. Basically, her being an antagonist makes sense and I don’t think it really devalues her as a Goddess at all.

This is, unfortunately, where the praise ends. I’ll just go in order, so Persephone is next. Persephone is, perhaps, the biggest victim in this mess Ubisoft created. I would like to first clarify a few things regarding Persephone as a Goddess. How you choose to view her relationship with Hades doesn’t really matter to me—that’s something only you can decide, but there are a few aspects that are important to consider. First of all, beyond the initial kidnapping and drama with that, there’s not too much suggesting they had a rocky relationship. There were a few minor hiccups, but nothing major. And two, going on Ancient Greek standards, Hades did nothing wrong. Now, kidnapping is bad, we know this. Except, Hades didn’t really kidnap her, per se. He asked Zeus for her hand in marriage and Zeus agreed. Hades actually did the “right” thing, though in a twisted way that really isn’t acceptable in today’s standards. All that said and done...all I can say is what was Ubisoft thinking? I mean, Persephone is routinely a benefactor for heroes *who come to her* and she is mostly portrayed as incredibly benevolent. The fact that Ubisoft made her a borderline tyrant with a unreasonable desire for total order and control and made her relationship with Hades one of the worst depictions I’ve ever seen is upsetting. It’s tragic, really. I almost feel like I have to personally apologize to Her whenever I think about what they did to her.

I’ll keep Hermes and Hekate short and sweet because they got off a bit easier than Persephone did. All I have to say is both Gods are insultingly shallow in the dlc. Hermes is blinded by his love for Persephone, and while he definitely did pursue her in the myths, he didn’t dwell on the unrequited feelings—he is a powerful God of many things, he doesn’t need to dwell on it. And Hekate was given the short end of the stick between the two and she became the backstabbing friend. We honestly don’t learn much about her at all and she’s made to be extremely unlikable, which is not the aura given from the Goddes Herself. It’s a shame what happened to these two.

Now we will move to Hades. My biggest issue with Hades is actually the whole issue with continuity between Jupiter/Zeus/Tinia being the same but Pluto/Hades/Aita not being the same, but alas, Ubisoft totally butchered his character as well, so I can put aside my grievances about the continuity. Hades is portrayed as this chaotic antagonist who really only has his own benefit in mind which is...an extremely confusing interpretation. I mean, Hades is, IMO, the least chaotic God out there. And even more so, he isn’t a vicious leader like they make him out to be. Sure, he maintains order in the Underworld with an iron fist, but that’s just the issue. The Hades seen in Odyssey is...not that. He doesn’t maintain order at all, and yet he’s doing something with a very aggressive iron fist. He’s power hungry, angry, and violent, and all of that goes unchecked until Kassandra/Alexios rolls around to stop it for the time being. The Hades I worship isn’t like that at all, and I don’t think the Ancient Greeks viewed him that way either, though I can’t say for certain.

Charon is next and I don’t have too much to say about him. He’s just so forgettable in my opinion. Charon is the ferryman of the dead, so I suppose he’s not supposed to leave a lasting impression, but he takes on the role of maneuvering you through the Underworld—a job he, historically, doesn’t have. His job is to take you across the River Styx and then be done with you. It’s a relatively minor complaint really, but I would’ve liked to see his character fleshed out a bit more.

Down to the last three, and Poseidon is up. The issue I have with Poseidon is kind of a personal one. Poseidon, while not one of my primary deities, is one of those that I frequently turn to and worship more frequently, so naturally his rather bland portrayal was disappointing at best and insulting at worst. I personally don’t think he gets much character development at all, which is unfortunate because Poseidon, as a God and in the myths, is incredibly complex. He’s a great asset if he’s on your side, but he can also be a very formidable foe, and they seem to want to show those two sides but they really fall short on both. Now, this could be related to the fact that of the three dlcs, Atlantis truly felt the most rushed. You have hardly any time to really take in the story and the whole thing just seems like one big after thought, and Poseidon, unfortunately, took the hit with that. Also, he just passes judgement and in a way rule over Atlantis over to a mortal, which I get is important to the story, but why? That’s so not how things are done.

Now we have Aita. So for those of you who don’t know or haven’t figured it out by now, Aita is the Etruscan God of the Underworld. I’ve already explained my main issue with him, and how he and Hades should be the same, but honestly, that’s the least of the crimes committed against him. In my opinion, Ubisoft has completely striped Aita of his Godhood. All of the other shown deities have this natural feeling to them that Aita lacks. He seems so lackluster standing next to Juno and he’s reduced to this scientist role, which—don’t get me wrong—is neat and powerful and all, but this is the Etruscan god of the underworld! Why should he linger in the shadows of Juno when he could be an equal to her, all things considered! I know the Etruscan gods/pantheon are not as widely known, but that doesn’t make them less godly, and what they’ve done to him is upsetting to say the least. I would love to see some other Etruscan gods, like Tinia and Uni, and I would like for them to be treated with the respect they deserve. More people could know about this fascinating culture and religion! Is that too much to ask?

Finally, we get to Aletheia. Now, she is a bit different in that I don’t know of many myths surrounding the goddes of truth, and it’s totally possible that she may solely be a representation of truth more so than a character in the myths. Aletheia’s story was...anticlimactic. I honestly don’t think her story got resolved at all. Ubisoft left me feeling like there was more we needed to know about her, and they also implied that she isn’t exactly a good guy. I mostly just want more from her. I think if they play on Juno being related to her, they could really make a very good story, but as it is, Aletheia got put on the back burner, and that? That is unfortunate.

This is already a very long post, so I won’t continue, but I would like to mention that characters like Adonis, the Greek heroes, Elpis, and Atlas received similarly disappointing treatment from Ubisoft. Let me know if you want me to make a post about them! I encourage you guys to share your own thoughts on this! Different perspectives yield different reactions and I’d love to see y’alls, so feel free to share! I will remind you that these are living Gods. Part of why this was so upsetting is because I research these gods as part of my studies and because I actively worship many of Them. Seeing Them reduces to these characters was...not the greatest feeling in the world. It’s important to separate the characters from the myths and even the myths from the Gods themselves, but what Ubisoft did was make a character that loosely relates to the myths—not the Gods Themselves as well. Just as Zeus is so much more than his myths, Persephone is more than the character Ubisoft gave us, so think critically when absorbing content about religious figures. All Gods of all religions are deserving of respect, and Ubisoft did not do a great job with that. I can only hope they will do better for the Viking Gods.

#ac odyssey #fate of atlantis dlc #me talking #i tried to tone down my anger #hopefully it worked lol #i also tried to condense some of my grievances #for yalls sake #long post #please tell me if the keep reading didnt work

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muzzleroars · 4 years

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An Explanation of Yaldabaoth

So with Christmas Eve coming up, let’s finally talk about Yaldabaoth – who he is, his motivations and goals, and why he suits P5’s story. Basically, I see a lot of confusion (as well as frustration) surrounding his character and his status as the final antagonist, but I totally get that. His writing is messy and his execution left a lot to be desired, despite the idea of him being sound, so I understand why so many players felt he came out of nowhere and screws up the story’s themes. As I am (unfortunately) a big fan of his character, I wanted to put together a post that might help people confused by him see how he fits in, why he was included in the story, and why he makes a satisfying final boss for the plot of P5. And even if you still hate him (totally fair! Everyone’s got different taste and no matter what, his handling is god awful), I just hope I can sort of explain him so he at least makes more sense. This is going to be long, so let’s get started!

First, Yaldabaoth (also known as the Demiurge) is a figure from Gnostic lore, the false god of the material world. He came to be when Sophia, a part of the unknowable, Supreme God, decided to create something separate from the Pleroma (the divine totality) all on her own, without divine permission. So she gave birth to Yaldabaoth; however, he was so monstrous she grew immediately ashamed of her creation, and so provided him with a throne which she then wrapped in a cloud to hide him and make him ignorant in turn. Unable to behold his mother or the divine, he then believed himself to be god. Because of this, Yaldabaoth set about creating the material world, a place he unwittingly based upon the true world of divinity. His creations are animal, like him, but with Sophia’s divine spark as she provides him the power to create. This world is poorly made due to Yaldabaoth’s own incompetence and so that divine spark is trapped in the material, making it something like a spiritual prison. Because of this, however, humanity can ascend while Yaldabaoth cannot, making him envious of human beings. He grows to hate humanity, angered by their imperfection (as he bungles their creation) and the fact that they can ascend while he’s forever trapped in the depths – he turns spiteful, and he is sometimes thought of as the God of the Old Testament as an explanation for his cruelty. Obviously this is incredibly simplified (as I am by no means an expert on Gnosticism), but this is the basis of his character, and I think it really is something the writers played with (including that Satanael, his son, is the one to rebel against him and his ignorance, which is why he is cast from heaven).

A false, artificial god who believes himself to be the Supreme Being, resents humankind, and traps them in a prison...sounds pretty familiar. So what’s different about his character in P5? This Yaldabaoth is the creator of the Metaverse, and he is born from the will of the public – people wished for ease and comfort over free will, the luxury to be free of making decisions and taking responsibility for themselves, which the Holy Grail explains to the PTs as its origin.

However, Yaldabaoth is also just a manifestation of that need - one that gained sentience through the power it was fed, but he is still simply the unconscious desire of the public made material as pointed out by Lavenza (but this explanation scene is where things get rushed, confusing, and glossed over to a frustrating extent)

Yaldabaoth IS society, a tangible stand-in for the true villain of P5 – The people of the public that allow, condone, and even encourage those the PTs have fought. They can defeat criminals, but as long as society remains intact, another will immediately spring up to take their place. Makoto actually states as much when Joker comes to retrieve her from her cell:

Yaldabaoth, therefor, is not just a god thrown into the plot randomly for the biggest bad possible – he is the evils of society incarnate, the people who allow the heinous crimes the PTs had been fighting against, the people that consumed these devastating crimes as entertainment or turned a blind eye to people in need, the people that threw the PTs out the minute any doubt was cast on them. The apathetic, uncaring, callous public as a whole, the ones who constantly ignore or support these criminals until it is no longer convenient (more on that in a minute) – The palace rulers are absolute monsters and yet...we see them all over society because they are a product of that society. And then there’s Futaba, an orphan and mentally ill girl left to rot by society; Sae, a woman trying so hard to achieve her justice and support her sister, constantly stamped down in a society that says a woman can’t, a woman shouldn’t. Society is the true villain and Yaldabaoth is their collective will, manifested so that the final boss battle of the game can just be the PTs taking down the whole of a corrupt society. It’s really the ultimate culmination of their efforts and what they’ve fought against. Because as awful as they all are, the palace rulers are products of a screwed up society (one that reflects our own) – Totally and 100% responsible for their acts, but they were allowed to exist due to this society.

SO if they’re made by society, why are they “escaped convicts” from the Prison of Regression? This is a representation of how society is broken – it creates these criminals, it condones their actions, but once they become too “disruptive”, THEN and ONLY then do they become an issue. Yaldabaoth, to me, is similar to a supercomputer type villain (think AM, a very similar character imo) – the palace rulers are errant, erratic variables that upset the status quo and so must be culled. His dialogue reads very much like a sterile computer program and I think rather than completely outright malicious in his intent, he is performing what he believes to be a necessary function:

Society creates them, encourages them, and then becomes upset when their actions are brought to light and so punishes them (or in Shido’s case at first and so often irl, are let off) so as to quickly restore equilibrium where they can once again ignore all of their ills. Essentially, the palace rulers exhibit that the whole system is sick and doesn’t work, yet people by and large pretend it does because it’s so much easier to say it was one “bad apple” or blame the victims rather than admitting the entire framework of society is completely rotten from the inside out.

What is Yaldabaoth’s goal then? He sets up a game to see if society can be shaken from this apathy or if they no longer wish to lead their own lives. Joker plays the trickster, an antihero the public can root for, the rebellious and glamorous rogue that punishes criminals without help of the establishment. If he wins, this would indicate the public no longer wishes for the status quo, but for a new society that wants to reinvent itself, which is generally well explained...

Goro Akechi is his opposite – He creates chaos and fear in the public to push them back into their comfortable boxes, make them wish for the status quo represented by Shido so they can stop living in fear and return to their lives where they can ignore everything around them. If he wins, this would signal that the public don’t want to fight but instead only want security and familiarity, choosing to turn a blind eye to everything the trickster had accomplished in order to remain safe. (This is made much less clear in the dialogue, because they don’t go over Goro’s role much at all.)

He sets up the entire game on this premise, and the experiment runs...however, it ends unexpectedly. Joker succeeds in taking down Akechi and the PTs expose Shido’s crimes as well as the conspiracy itself, but the public still does not support the Phantom Thieves. They clamor for a disgraced Shido and THIS is why Joker still loses – remember, Yaldabaoth is only a representation of society itself, and society no longer believes in the Phantom Thieves. Yaldabaoth did expect the loss, he knew how far gone humanity was, he just didn’t expect this exact scenario. Of course, the game was rigged – as Lavenza says, Yaldabaoth expects Joker to fulfill the role of the Trickster and so he keeps him close, watching over him in an attempt to stall him out as Lavenza explains.

However, due to the set up of the game, the only win condition is public support. Joker doesn’t earn it and therefor he loses, a decision that is not arbitrary despite possibly appearing so (although it is certainly unfair, pointed out by Morgana).

After offering Joker his deal (that’s a whole OTHER post I could write, y’all know I’m a clown), Yaldabaoth then moves to merge reality with Mementos in order to exert his will over the whole of the public. He wishes to rid them of their free will because, as Yaldabaoth sees it, it seems a vast majority of the public wish to no longer have it anyway and the ones that do merely become anomalies that must be purged from his system before they become too disruptive. Of course, this is an oversimplified way of viewing the issue, but again, he’s sort of like a computer – he will take care of the issue in the most efficient way possible, and that is to rule over society himself. (Again, using the word “administrator” invokes computer terminology and likens him to a mechanical program):

Interestingly, his defeat is brought about by the public backing the Phantom Thieves 100% - an action that triggers Arsene’s evolution into Satanael, Yaldabaoth’s rebellious son. Satanael is of the Fool Arcana, the confidant that represents Joker’s bond to Yaldabaoth himself...to the public, in a sense, and so it’s fitting that this persona is the one to destroy him as he is no longer needed.

So Yaldabaoth is both a character in his own right and representative of the will of the public as well. His writing is confusing, lacking in explanation, and relies heavily on obscure references to his Gnostic roots along with religious symbolism (eg., the floors of Mementos taking their names from the Qliphoth and the palace rulers being representative of the seven deadly sins), and I think that’s why he feels so out of place to so many players. However, the best possible final antagonist for P5’s themes and plot is society itself – the society that shunned them, the society that created the palace rulers, the society that desperately needs to be done away with if we wish for these travesties to come to an end. Because P5 isn’t about individual evil, it’s about institutional evils that create and perpetuate so much individual pain that goes unnoticed and uncared for. Yaldabaoth is the amalgamation and manifestation of that broken system, he gives it a presence and a voice so that the PTs can fight back against it physically. So even though his writing is handled poorly and his execution is lacking, I find him to be a perfect fit and a satisfying conclusion to P5’s themes as an unfair, cruel society turned into a dogmatic god.

This meta really just gives an overview of everything he represents, so I can always go into more detail about any of the points but I hope this explanation helps those that were confused by his inclusion in P5! I’m perfectly happy to elaborate on anything I talked about and clear up any confusion (I didn’t want this post to go on literally FOREVER, so I know some things might require more info), so feel free to ask questions! Other than that have a happy Day of Reckoning and remember to celebrate Bad End Akira’s birthday 🥳🎉

#persona 5 #yaldabaoth #CAN YOU BELIEVE I WROTE THIS???? GOD....#also this is just my read so there's probs other theories out there #but i'm satisfied with this explanation and i think it covers most things #and this is not criticism of ppl that don't get him bc he's so fucking confusing #like it took me forever to understand what his whole deal was it's so frustrating #y'all are valid as hell but i was just hoping i could help out #i'm super nervous posting metas in the tags but i worked hard on this one!!!#so i'm throwing it out there and if u read ALL of that...ur my hero thank u sm #p5 spoilers #persona 5 spoilers #nothing for the new game tho this is all vanilla

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wikipediaredoengl199fa20 · 3 years

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Brennan’s Wikipedia Redo on Elon Musk page

Edits are in bold. Original Wiki page can be found here.

Early Life, Human Flight and SEC Lawsuit

Early life and family

Elon Reeve Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, Transvaal, South Africa.[15][16] His mother is Maye Musk (née Haldeman), a model and dietitian born in Saskatchewan, Canada,[17][18][19] but raised in South Africa. His father is Errol Musk, a South African electromechanical engineer, pilot, sailor, consultant and property developer.[20] He has a younger brother who was an early business partner of his, Kimbal (born 1972), and a younger sister, Tosca (born 1974), the CEO of the video streaming site Passionflix.[19][21][25] His maternal grandfather, Dr. Joshua Haldeman, was an American-born Canadian.[26] His paternal grandmother had both British and Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry.[27][28]

After his parents divorced in 1980, Musk lived mostly with his father in the suburbs of Pretoria,[27] a choice he made two years after his parents separated but which he subsequently regretted.[29] Musk has become estranged from his father, whom he has described as "a terrible human being... Almost every evil thing you could possibly think of, he has done."[29] He also has a half-sister[30] and a half-brother on his father's side.[31] After his parents divorced in 1980, nine year old Musk and his younger brother primarily lived with his father in the suburbs of Pretoria,[27]. This was a choice he made two years after his parents separated but it was one that he subsequently regretted.[29] Musk has become estranged from his father, describing him as emotionally abusive and tough to his children. [Kosoff 2020] He also has a half-sister[30] and a half-brother on his father's side.[31]

During his childhood, Musk was an avid reader.[32] At the age of 10, he developed an interest in computing while using the Commodore VIC-20.[33] He learned computer programming using a manual and, by the age of 12, sold the code of a BASIC-based video game he created called Blastar to PC and Office Technology magazine for approximately $500.[34][35] His childhood reading included Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, from which he drew the lesson that "you should try to take the set of actions that are likely to prolong civilization, minimize the probability of a dark age and reduce the length of a dark age if there is one".[29]

Musk was severely bullied throughout his childhood and was once hospitalized after a group of boys threw him down a flight of stairs.[29][36][37] He attended Waterkloof House Preparatory School and Bryanston High School[37] before graduating from Pretoria Boys High School.[38]

Although Musk's father insisted that Elon go to college in Pretoria, Musk became determined to move to the United States, saying "I remember thinking and seeing that America is where great things are possible, more than any other country in the world."[39] Musk knew it would be easier to get to the United States from Canada and moved there against his father's wishes in June 1989, just before his 18th birthday,[40][41] after obtaining a Canadian passport through his Canadian-born mother.[42][43]

Human flight

On May 30, 2020, SpaceX launched its first manned flight called Demo-2 becoming the first private company to both place a person into orbit and to eventually dock a crewed space-craft with the ISS.[108] Further, the launch was the first time since the end of the Shuttle Program that an American astronaut has been launched from American soil on an American rocket.[109]

During discourse with his peers when the technology of SpaceX was criticized or had the potential to cause fatalities, Elon Musk has described himself as the company's responsible chief engineer/designer, while giving the entire team at SpaceX credit for its success.[110][111]

On November 16, 2020, Space X successfully launched with NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) four astronauts into their space mission on SpaceX Crew Dragon. They docked with the International Space Station (ISS) approximately 27 hours later. Unlike the test flight in May, 2020, this flight had a full set of scientific experiments planned for the trip, as well as plans for a stay on the ISS for six months. The launch was nearly stopped, as Elon Musk announced that he had symptoms of COVID-19 the day before the launch, but careful contact tracing verified that the astronauts had not been exposed. This joint project, where the space vehicles are owned by Space X but with NASA buying their use for missions, means that Space X will be able to fly tourists, private scientists and others, with a projected ticket cost of $50 million for the trip. [Wattles 2020]

SEC lawsuit

In September 2018, Musk was sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a tweet claiming that funding had been secured for potentially taking Tesla private[149] (at a price of $420 a share, an alleged reference to marijuana[150]). The lawsuit claimed that verbal discussions Musk held with foreign investors in July 2018 did not confirm key deal terms[151] and thus characterized the tweet as false, misleading, and damaging to investors, and sought to bar Musk from serving as CEO of publicly traded companies.[149][152] Musk called the allegations unjustified and that he had never compromised his integrity.[153] Two days later, Musk settled with the SEC, without admitting or denying the SEC's allegations. As a result, Musk and Tesla were fined $20 million each, and Musk was forced to step down for three years as Tesla chairman, but he was able to remain as Tesla's CEO.[154]

Musk has stated in several interviews since that he does not regret sending the tweet that triggered the SEC investigation. According to Reuters, Musk said the tweet was "Worth It".[155] According to ABC News, "As recently as Oct. 4, 2018, Musk issued a sarcastic tweet, describing the agency [SEC] as the 'Shortseller Enrichment Commission,' despite having agreed to settlement terms a week earlier that his company, Tesla, would monitor his tweets and other communications."[156] In a December 2018 interview with CBS's 60 Minutes, Musk stated, "I want to be clear. I do not respect the SEC."[157] On February 19, 2019, according to Forbes, Musk stated in a tweet that Tesla would build half a million cars in 2019.[158] The SEC reacted to Musk's tweet by filing in court, initially asking the court to hold him in contempt for violating the terms of a settlement agreement with such a tweet, which was disputed by Musk. This was eventually settled by a joint agreement between Musk and the SEC clarifying the previous agreement details.[159] The agreement included a list of topics that Musk would need preclearance before tweeting about.[160] On May 19, 2020, a judge prevented a lawsuit from proceeding that claimed Musk's tweet on May 1 regarding the price of Tesla stock ("too high imo") was in violation of the agreement.[161][162]. Legal experts suggest that some of the legal actions by the SEC against Musk for stating his view, is a violation of First Amendment rights of free speech, and that he should have equal protection of free speech about his viewpoints on how successful his Tesla company will be. These experts argue that this is no different that the free speech protection provided to political figures. [Markham 2019]

Essay -

This essay addresses a review of the Wikipedia page of Elon Musk, an entrepreneur, industrial designer, engineer and also billionaire. It is a detailed web page covering his extensive business ventures, and when converted to a single-spaced Word document, it was approximately sixteen pages long. Three sections were addressed in this review, his Early Life, Human Flight, and SEC lawsuit.

There seem to be a number of biases in the Wikipedia page by omission of content. This might be considered implicit, perhaps someone forgot to add the information, perhaps they did not think it was important or necessary. It also might be considered explicit, such as purposely excluding content that might give someone a different view of the subject, in this case of Elon Musk. Some of the omissions could be in progress, such as the discussion of the November 16, 2020 successful space launch, which was covered in depth by the United States Press, both on media and print. On the other hand, Wikipedia pages can be updated in a day, which often seems to happen when someone dies.

In the first part, Early Life and Family, there seems to be an explicit bias against Elon Musk’s father, and includes a quote from Musk, according to Rolling Stone Magazine, saying of his father, that he was "a terrible human being... Almost every evil thing you could possibly think of, he has done." There is no clarification of what these evil things might have been, but it sounds pretty horrendous. There is no counter argument to provide any context for his father. I modified it, changing the line above to one used in an article by Kosoff that refers to his father as being emotionally abusive and tough on his children. This still conveys a difficult home life, but without evidence it doesn’t seem right to describe it as evil. There did not seem to be any available resources on the father’s perspective of his son. Also added the detail that Musk was only nine years old when he moved to live with his father. I removed the line that described some of his ancestors as it seemed to try to provide implicit bias for him, in particular to explain why he might have the right to come to Canada first and then the United States as a citizen, since his ancestors were from there. This convey that he is entitled because of his ancestors, but it seemed out of context to list one maternal and one paternal grandparent.

The section on Human Flight ended with the May 2020 test launch and did not include the highly publicized and successful mission launched with four astronauts on November 16, 2020. This seems a dramatic omission, as it was all over the news. This seems to me to be an explicit omission, perhaps because of the COVID-19 scare, which also meant he could not attend the launch, or if it was because some are jealous of the success of his ventures.

The SEC Lawsuit section presents an implicit suggestion that Musk is rejecting the right of the SEC to regulate company officers, in particular to protect investors. The SEC did have a number of legally defensible points, which led to a large fine and limiting Musk’s participation in the Tesla company. However, there are some legal experts that also defend the right of Musk to have free speech about his opinion of how the company will do in the future, which is different that suggesting he has arranged for company financing to go private.

The revisions that I made primarily fill in gaps in the Wikipedia page, that indicated potential bias. While much of the document appears to be very factual, the omissions, although only a few, can lead to bias.

The sources reviewed and then used for this review are included in the Works Cited section below. These included news articles, business stories and biography sites. There are also books available, that would have provided some additional depth and analysis, but they were not used for this particular review.

Works Cited -

"Elon Musk." Wikipedia, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.

"Elon Musk Biography." The Biography.com website, A&E Television Networks, 17 Nov. 2020, www.biography.com/business-figure/elon-musk. Accessed 7 Dec. 2020.

"Elon Musk Promoted Coronavirus Misinformation for Months. Then His Own Infection Kept Him out of SpaceX's Astronaut Launch." The Business Insider (Blogs on Demand), 2020. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsgao&AN=edsgcl.642824056&site=eds-live&scope=site.

Kosoff, Maya. "Elon Musk's childhood was 'excruciating' and he got beaten up a lot." Business Insider, www.businessinsider.com/elon-musks-childhood-was-excruciating-2015-5. Accessed 7 Dec. 2020.

Markham, Jerry W. "Securities & Exchange Commission vs. Elon Musk & the First Amendment." Case Western Reserve Law Review, vol. 80, no. 2, 2019, pp. 339-79.

McLean, Rob. "Elon Musk Says He Has Moved to Texas." CNN.com, 9 Dec. 2020, www.cnn.com/2020/12/09/tech/elon-musk-texas/index.html. Accessed 9 Dec. 2020.

Shephard, Alex. "Oligarch of the Month: Elon Musk." New Republic, vol. 251, no. 3, Mar. 2020, p. 5. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=buh&AN=141536506&site=eds-live&scope=site.

Wattles, Jennifer. "SpaceX launch: Four astronauts take off aboard Crew Dragon bound for ISS." CNN, 16 Nov. 2020, www.cnn.com/2020/11/15/tech/spacex-nasa-launch-crew-dragon/index.html.

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kinetic-elaboration · 3 years

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November 1: Mad Women, Writer’s Commentary

Now that Chopped reveals are complete, I thought I’d write down some thoughts on the writing process for my fics, before I forget them entirely.

I’ll start with Mad Women, the first one I wrote. Technically, it was my second idea. But they came pretty close together, both originating the first night the tropes were revealed. I was excited to sit in bed, read through the themes-and-tropes document, make some vague notes, and brainstorm, as I always am.

The first even semi-concrete idea was for the fic that would later become The Wanheda Tape, but I was also attracted to the Sci Fi theme and the idea of doing Horror in Space. I’ve also long loved the image of Mad Scientist Raven, and since that was one of the tropes, it seemed like a great opportunity. Of course, that was only one trope, and one image. So I had to build a whole fic around that.

Just as I was going to sleep, I had another idea, a scene that came to me fully formed but bizarre as I was already half-dreaming: Murphy and Clarke in the cafeteria of a space ship, Murphy realizing with slowly-dawning horror that Clarke is not Clarke at all. I found it very scary myself, although its form then wasn’t quite its form in the final version: I think Clarke’s eyes turned black and some kinda black smoke-tentacle came out of her sleeve or something lol. Something that would have read as funny if I’d actually written it.

Nevertheless, I liked the scene in general. But at the point when I went to sleep I really only had these two disconnected concepts: possessed alien!Clarke reveals herself to Murphy; Raven is a mad scientist. I didn’t have many great ideas as to how to connect them, and so I initially thought that The Wanheda Tape, which at least had the outline of a complete narrative (Blair Witch + frame story) would be easier.

Then I talked through it with my mom and did some brainstorming with her, and she convinced me that Mad Women might be simpler--I think she was thinking about how it didn’t have a frame, which was an intimidating aspect of my other idea. Or she just liked it better. At any rate, I decided to pursue the science fiction concept.

The tricky thing was building a bridge between the two concepts. I had a variety of ideas for the two additional tropes--I knew that once Murphy found out Clarke wasn’t Clarke, she’d immediately be a threat to him, he’d be running from her, searching out help, etc., so dead communication device seemed obvious. And ‘cliffhanger’ was also on my initial brainstorm list. I was also considering ‘the fright beside you’ but I didn’t think I could quite make that work, and I didn’t really need it.

Forming a narrative that included both mad scientist and alien was hard, though. I liked the idea of them being thematically linked: both the alien and Raven are messing with something they shouldn’t out of a desperation to restore life/return to their loved ones or return their loved ones to them. They have similar desires and similar attitudes and they both wreak havoc as a result. (Admittedly, Raven’s havoc comes after the cliffhanger...but there is implied havoc imo.)

But how to connect them on a plot level? I obsessed a lot about this: why does Raven need tech to do what the alien did so easily? And why does she have to build it from scratch? Because humans aren’t aliens? But then if the aliens don’t need tech to move their non-corporeal selves to a new body, why do the components of such a machine even exist? I won’t honestly say I solved these problems, so much as I figured exact answers weren’t necessary for my goal: a decently short and simple narrative, with a strong creepy feel. The aliens are mostly mysterious in the fic and that’s okay. In some sense, the more inexplicable they are, the more alien they feel, and the better the overall mood.

What was important to me, and I think this was an idea that came from my mom originally, was to have Raven and the alien in on it together. Raven either didn’t stop or actively helped the alien possess Clarke, with the the promise that the alien would give up the body when she returned home, and because the alien promised her the raw material to potentially bring back Finn. Again, how or why this material exists isn’t super important, but I think it goes something like this: the aliens can exist in a non-corporeal state, but they need bodies to do things like physical work or travel. Thus they have technology that can resurrect dead tissue, so that their physical forms can exist as long as their...spirit essences. The physical breaks down before the spirit, perhaps, or is more easily damaged. The tech does not re-create the soul, and it wasn’t meant for humans, so what Raven is messing with is not for her. It won’t bring back who Finn is, and it will have unforeseen consequences when used on Earth material (the incredibly hungry, weirdly powerful, quickly growing plants). But she doesn’t care, and the alien doesn’t care either, because she’s using Raven to get what she wants: vessels (in the form of both Clarke’s body and the ship) to get back home.

(While this fic is pretty much the opposite of Star Trek in terms of aesthetic, I will say that the idea of a non-corporeal alien taking on a human body temporarily comes from the excellent and underrated TOS episode, Return to Tomorrow.)

The second and even more difficult problem, which caused me an embarrassing amount of stress given how easily it was solved, was: how to anger the alien. I knew that everything would fall apart when Murphy realized who Clarke was, and that at the point of his realization, all of his companions would be immobilized already in some way. But I also knew that the status quo we enter in scene one would include Clarke already possessed. So why does the status quo break? Why is she no active threat to them in one scene and then suddenly chasing Murphy down the halls in the next?

So this is like Storytelling 101, honestly. She’s not a threat when she and the ship’s crew have the same goal, or at least when the crew has no reason to actively thwart her goal in any way. Hence, the distress call from the Arkadia: a reason for Murphy et. al. to tell the alien no, we’re turning the ship around now. Now actually threatened, the alien retaliates, immobilizing the crew however she needs to in order to regain control of the vessel. Pretty simple!

Originally, I wasn’t going to include Bellamy in this fic, because my instinct was he would see something wrong with Clarke too quickly. But my mom convinced me that their close relationship would actually be more of a reason for Bellamy NOT to figure it out. He sees what he wants to see. He’s vulnerable to manipulation because of his feelings. I was convinced, and added him in. And honestly, it was genius of her, because having Bellamy and Bellarke created a parallel with Murphy and Murven that I hadn’t initially seen: both men have all the evidence they need to see something is deeply wrong with the women they love, but also all the motivation to NOT see it, to not want to see it.

I also knew that alien!Clarke would have to kill or disable Bellamy, and I thought I might get a lot of shit for writing anything in which a person resembling Clarke caused harm to Bellamy, given...the actual canon (”canon”). So first I decided no one was going to die because I am a WIMP and I can’t do that. And second, I decided to include a ‘fuck you JRoth’ line where Bellamy says his big clue that Clarke wasn’t Clarke was that she tried to kill him--something we all know Clarke would not do! I don’t know if that came off lol but that’s what I was going for.

Before I settled on Bellamy, I was going to have the rest of the crew be Octavia, Jasper, and Monty. I knew Murphy needed someone else to talk to, for exposition purposes early on, and O an Jonty are a good dynamic. But when I added Bellamy, I really didn’t need anyone besides Octavia--5 people in the first scene, turning into 4 people to dispose of later, would have been too much. I’d already decided that Raven was going to experiment on Monty’s plants (because a mad scientist needs to start on non-human living things before she moves on to the human-experimentation stage, but I also, again, I am a wimp, and didn’t want to imply Raven was killing rabbits or whatever), which made me hesitate briefly to cut Monty. But then I realized I didn’t need to show Monty at all to get his plants on the ship, and thus the passing reference to bootleggers entered the story.

Even though the Clarke and Murphy revelation scene came to me early, I didn’t actually know what would tip him off that Clarke wasn’t Clarke until I was literally writing the scene. Like I sat down to write that scene and didn’t know, and just let it come together as it would. I’d toyed with her not knowing something about the ship, but the thing is, it had to be a human factor she was missing--first because alien!Clarke has been practically living in the ship’s archives, learning everything about the ship and all the general stuff that allows her to pass most of the time for a human. But she doesn’t know Clarke’s personal life. So it makes more sense that she would get tripped up on Clarke’s family. And second, it’s more emotionally resonant: of course a Clarke who doesn’t care about her own mother, her own people, can’t really be Clarke! It also allowed me to reference the past Memori again, which I liked doing.

I didn’t initially have a concrete reason for picking Clarke to be possessed--that was just the image that came to me, of Clarke and Murphy, plus it worked with her being the captain of the ship. I was about halfway through writing when I realized I’d uh accidentally re-written S6 with the Josephine-possession story line. In my defense, I didn’t watch S6 lol. But really it just made it more fitting!

As I mentioned, this fic was very slightly TOS inspired, because I’ve been watching so much of it lately. Both the alien-possession, and the lines about “haunted space” or space legends are from Star Trek. But obviously I wanted the exact opposite aesthetic, so I reached for Wolf 359, a podcast I was listening to over the summer while working on a boring, brainless project at work. There’s really no connection between the two, but the grungy, dark space station with the limited staff was the closest aesthetic I could draw from to overpower the shiny-sci-fi aesthetic that’s dominant in my mind because of TOS. I very briefly toyed with the idea of including a character who was an AI but that really wouldn’t have added anything to the story lol.

...And I think that’s it!

#the year 2020 #2020: writing thoughts #mad women #the 100 chopped

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mymostimaginaryfriend · 5 years

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Hello! If Guero didn’t die on the road to Phoenix, how would he affect Jeresa’s relationship? Would Teresa say James that what they’d done was just one time thing and go back to her relationship with Guero? Would James let Teresa go to Guero? Thank you :)

Hellooo, anon! So, I lied earlier about saving this for my s3 rewatch. This ask was burning a hole in my inbox so here we go! I put it behind a read more b/c as per usual I get wordy.

We’ve stumbled across one of my favorite AUs because, separate from anything Jeresa related, I would have loved to see Teresa choose to close her Guero chapter without his death closing it for her. She was well on her way toward it on the show–when Guero didn’t show up en route to Malta, she moved on geographically, professionally and romantically. Her trajectory and Guero’s were already diverging wildly and it was his dumbass decisions that not only set it all in motion but kept it all in motion. The fact she just assumed Guero Guero-ing it up was why he missed the boat to Malta kind of says it all.

When you have the combination of Guero who, collateral damage and common sense be damned, is determined to view himself as a Tragic Romantic Hero of cartel life (h/t @northcountry39 ) paired with Teresa Our Lady of Survival the numbers just don’t add up and well, Teresa is good at math. Her heart gets in the way of her logic (yes, she is human) but eventually something’s gotta give if Teresa wants to stay in such a dangerous business. Guero has shown time and time again he is a liability.

So here’s what I think:

Let’s say Guero survived and joined the business. I don’t see Teresa and Guero romantically rekindling anything right away. Instead I think there would have been a most likely deliciously awkward and painful adjustment period with everyone involved realizing This Doesn’t Work. The added stress and pressure of the Pecas and Mayo situation would speed this along imo.

As for Jeresa specifically, is it a cop out to say, I think it would have mirrored what actually happened on the show? Instead of her grief creating the tension between them, the arrival of Guero would create the distance, aided by Teresa having to juggle everything else going on with La Comision. Assisted by his truly aspirational emotional maturity I think James would do as he ever does: adapt. If Teresa’s super power is survival, James’ is processing shit in real time and adapting to whatever will get him through the situation, moment, job etc. That’s not always a healthy thing of course but it’s what has kept him alive. I think he would have put some distance in their interactions and followed Teresa’s lead. Remember James believes he doesn’t deserve good things. I think he’d lock his shit up tight and try to adapt. We saw him already starting to do it on the car ride back to Phoenix. True to form, I don’t think James and Teresa would even talk about it until like a Guero Fuckup™ inevitably put their lives in danger forcing them to hash things out, while probably still carefully avoiding the topic of feelings.

As for Teresa, I think it’d go a little something like the song Down in It by NIN (stay with me here) with her eventually figuring out that Guero was the tiny dot back on the ground, catching her focus and pulling her down, impeding her meteoric rise. You think Guero would have been content to be ‘another guy at the winery’? Cool with Teresa being his boss? He had enough trouble adjusting to Bolivia Teresa. What would he think about running-her-own-cartel Teresa? How do you think he’d react to Pecas shushing him? Teresa’s inherent kindness and the misplaced guilt over Guero’s captivity would present some hurdles but after what I imagine to be at least a few aforementioned Guero Fuckups™ she’d come around to the realization that both professionally and romantically:

Harder to fly with ankle weights. Easier to fly with a boost.

I guess this wasn’t as melodramatic as I promised so I’ll leave you with this AU scene possibility: James pulling a ‘you don’t need me anymore’ and trying to exit gracefully because he’s In Too Deep and thinks she’s still in love with Guero. Teresa, panicking but not sure why. Until she is.

Thank you for the ask!

#asks & replies #qots asks #qots #long post #txt post #jeresa #i remain ur melodramatic neighborhood qots blog #can't finish a fic for the life of me but #send me an ask and i'm off to the races #makes u think what if #for a bolivia judas redo for teresa james and guero in s3 huh

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dear-wormwoods · 6 years

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i know that eddie's first encounter with It and the way It manifests itself as his fear is very telling of him being gay, but what do you think the encounters It had with the other members of the loser's club (like mike with the bird, stan with the dead boys, etc) are indicative of?

Okay Let’s Talk About the Losers’ Fears!

The interesting thing about IT is that, for most kids, the fears IT manifests as are pretty basic. Movie monsters, comic book monsters, vampires, mummies, etc. So not all the Losers have super deep meanings behind their fears, the way Eddie and Beverly do, and I think it definitely reflects the level of contentment they experience in their every day life. Obviously Eddie’s IT experiences are symbolic of his fear of his sexuality and the self-loathing that comes along with that, disguised as a ‘diseases are gross!’ sort of thing because that’s easier to process for a little kid (and because IT needs something physical to take the shape of). We don’t need to rehash that. But as for the others…

Beverly is not afraid of blood, her fear is much deeper than that, blood is just the easiest physical representation for what she really does fear, which is her own womanhood. In one of MANY parallels between Eddie and Bev, both of their fears are based on gender and sexuality, and both fears exist, at least in part, because of their abusive home lives. Bev’s fear takes on the disguise of ‘blood is gross!’ but really it’s about puberty and menstruation, and what that change will mean for her sexually - because her dad never stops talking about how boys look at her, and what her role will be as a woman re: having sex with boys. And this isn’t the first time King has used blood symbolism for a girl’s fear of the sexual unknown - he did it in Carrie too (and lbr if Eddie and Beverly were fused together into one character, it would be Carrie and if Sonia and Alvin were fused into one character, it would be Carrie’s crazy fucking mother).

Next we have Bill, whose fear is pretty self-explanatory. IT always manifests as something Georgie-related for him, but what Bill fears most is not literally Georgie’s corpse, it’s Georgie BLAMING him for his death. Bill feels incredible guilt for what happened to Georgie, and feels responsible because he helped make the paper boat and because he was too sick to go out with Georgie that day and therefore could not protect him (this comes up again and again re: his insistence that Eddie not leave his line of sight like, ever, because he’s projecting his Georgie guilt). Bill actually comes the closest to ‘losing’ to IT because his fear is the most emotional - he almost gives in to the apparition of Georgie basically accusing him of murder, and would have, were it not for the other Losers (particularly Eddie) screeching that it isn’t really Georgie.

Richie’s fears are all based around movie monsters, but they’re a little more symbolic than that because of one small addition: Richie’s name being used repeatedly as a label FOR IT’s manifestations. IT also seems to talk to Richie more, because taunting him is more effective than just existing as a visual. On top of that, IT takes multiple forms for Richie, which is unusual. So we have three (unless I’m forgetting one) - the Crawling Eye, the Werewolf, and Paul Bunyan. The Crawling Eye is a movie monster that really freaked Richie out as a kid to the point where he’d have nightmares about it and wet the bed, and he has a lot of eye-related body horror dreams and it’s pretty gross… dreaming about eyes can symbolize needing to (or refusing to) look inward, and dreaming about something being in/hurting your eyes can symbolize being unable to (or refusing to) confront certain truths, or avoiding emotional intimacy. All of this can easily be applied to Richie, the King of Avoidance, and it’s particularly interesting that the Eddie is the one who injures the Eye, and encourages Richie to fight it too, and that Eddie is mentioned by IT later on in relation to the Eye (the SHOES THING also ties into the Eye whenever it comes up!). So there’s THAT. The Crawling Eye, imo, stands for Richie’s denial and emotional stagnation.

The Werewolf is also a movie monster, and Richie was very effected by the plight of the teenage werewolf when he watched that movie - so it’s telling that when IT manifests as the werewolf, it is wearing a jacket with Richie’s name stitched into it. I know this has been said over and over, but Richie relates to the werewolf on some level because the werewolf is seen by its peers as a horrible monster, but it’s something it cannot help, and while it presents as ‘normal’ most of the time, when the ‘monster comes out’, it’s instantly ostracized from society. Richie sees himself as a ‘monster’ because he’s consistently treated as annoying, or ‘too much’, or borderline-suicidal to the point where he scares a lot of people off from wanting to get to know him. He feels guilty about being a burden on his parents, he hates that he constantly gets himself into trouble for things he can’t seem to control (undiagnosed and untreated ADHD, most likely), and on top of all that, he’s also hyper-aware of the dangers of ‘looking queer’ in public if he’s caught being affectionate with his male friends. There is a lot going on in Richie’s head that all point to him being very aware that he’s not ‘like everyone else’, but he can’t help it, so Richie sees himself reflected in the Teenage Werewolf… and IT knows that, and tries to use that to ITs advantage.

FINALLY, there’s the Paul Bunyan statue, which involves a little more reaching to figure out, so bear with me if this sounds insane… Paul Bunyan, in a way, represents Richie as well. Richie is well aware that the statue is an attention-grabber, but it’s also kitschy and stupid looking - he himself describes it as having a ‘cheerful vulgarity’. It’s big and loud, but people hate it and think it’s lame. Richie wants attention, but he’s afraid of being Paul Bunyan - he wants to be GOOD at something, and get attention because of his skill and his humor, not just because he’s loud and ridiculous. He doesn’t want to be talked about as “horrible, garish, and unbelievably gauche”, the way Derry townsfolk talk about Paul. As an adult, Paul turns into the clown and has a literal, casual conversation with Richie, and then eventually turns into Buddy Holly - a musician Richie admired and related to, who died tragically young - only Buddy’s glasses weren’t his usual glasses - they were Richie’s glasses, mended with adhesive tape. So even then, he’s sort of seeing parts of HIMSELF in what IT appears as. SOOO LONG STORY SHORT, Richie is his own worst fear.

Stan’s encounter with IT, I think, was meant to push the boundaries of what his mind would accept as ‘real’. Stan’s whole worldview was based on order and a certain expectation of reality being… reality. So IT created a visual as ridiculous as possible, while still maintaining some level of offensive realism (by using corpses of real kids who drowned in the Standpipe) and creating a multi-sensory onslaught that Stan couldn’t deny - music, smells, visuals, etc. ITs goal wasn’t to scare Stan so much as break him, but Stan was able to ground himself in reality with his bird book well enough to escape. But what he takes away from the experience in the end is being offended by what happened. He doesn’t give a shit about being scared, he’s just plain OFFENDED by what he saw. So I think Stan’s kids-in-the-Standpipe experience was meant to just…. totally insult the way he sees the world around him. It’s also one of the coolest visuals in the novel and I will be forever angry that the movie changed his IT experience so completely.

Ben’s IT encounters are SUPER typical… movie monsters, Halloween costume type of shit, like most of the other Derry kids who became ITs victims. The clown with the balloons floating against the wind, the mummy, the vampire… but unlike Richie, I don’t think there is much deeper meaning to it than just being your run of the mill scary shit, because unlike Richie, Ben doesn’t hate himself. Ben is pretty damn content with his life. He loves his mom, they have a close relationship, he doesn’t have any friends before the Losers but he wasn’t bent out of shape about it… he was fine with being alone, and just being a good student, a quiet bookish kid, and he liked buying candy and eating it in front of the TV with his little bathrobe on. Like, Ben was chill. He was confident in what he liked and what he knew how to do, he was a real ‘you do you’ kid. He wasn’t even THAT upset about being fat until other kids made fun of him for it. So Ben’s just going through life, more comfortable than the other Losers. He’s content with his gender and sexuality, he’s content with his skill set and his interests, he doesn’t care about how others perceive him, he’s adaptable, and he’s not plagued with guilt. So IT doesn’t really have a TON to work with, lmao. Movie monsters are all IT has at ITs disposal when it comes to Ben, and that’s all there is to it. And in general, Ben is one of the least affected by IT… he really doesn’t even seem that afraid of IT, on the whole, but he reacts most strongly to the things that sort of go against the laws of physics (the balloons moving against the wind, the Neibolt House seeming to change shape and size)… but even then, the only real symbolism there is that Ben loves physics and architecture.

Lastly, Mike’s experience with IT is… interesting. I’ve talked about this a lot with @mikehanlonstan and we can’t really come up with good symbolism for the bird aside from the simple ‘he was attacked by a bird as a baby’ explanation from the novel. Which would be fine, if it weren’t for the fact that Mike’s dad… saw the same bird?? Like, what is it with the Hanlons and this weird bird? Who knows, I sure don’t. I was looking for racism symbolism but like… I feel like ‘It’s a bird… like a crow, get it?? Like Jim Crow??” is too lazy even for Stephen King. Also it wasn’t a crow, anyway… it was something that doesn’t exist in the real world, otherwise Stan wouldn’t have been able to get it to go away with his bird facts later on. If anything it just establishes a stronger connection between him and his father, and the long-term connection they both have to IT.

#asks #stephen king's it #it novel #eddie kaspbrak #richie tozier #beverly marsh #ben hanscom #bill denbrough #stanley uris #mike hanlon #it meta #my meta #anonymous #meta #losers club

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shitfics · 5 years

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hi, im a fanfic writer who is trying to break into original fiction and publication. i noticed in the notes of one of your short stories that you were trying to write longer chapters. One of my favourite stories by you, One of These Nights is 90,000+ over 11 chapters. what kind of advice would you give to someone like me who struggles to break over 2,500 words per chapter? how can i work to make my chapters longer and still be interesting like yours? thank you x

Oh gosh, thank you so much! I'm hoping to break into original stuff too, and maybe get published, but don't have much hopes for it yet...still slugging away at my wip. ^^; It's sweet that you hold my stuff highly! And I'm sorry this got a bit long…I'm not good at being succinct when trying to talk about writing things, since I still feel so clueless myself. I’ve put most of the rambling behind a read more.

For me really, writing longer things has just taken time…not in the sense of taking time to write a story (tho obvs it does), but like, each thing I wrote naturally got longer and longer as I got more used to storytelling, I guess? At this point, I think everything I write is almost too long, so I'm wondering what story it was I wanted longer chapters on…lol. It was kinda like lifting weights in a way, lol…I took a long time before I could get to 90k, and you can kinda see how each story got longer and longer (copy and paste was 12k, synchronicity/book of blood were around 20k, da au was 40k in part one/60k in part 2, and the hyung au was 90kish).

Ofc I have a few breaks from that pattern, but those were kinda 'side projects' for fun that I wanted to keep short, like the esports ontae. Wherever you're at right now in terms of overall story length, I think writing regularly is the most important for building the "endurance" for longer stories and scenes -- and being as patient with yourself as you can about getting there is ideal. It’s a lot like working yourself up to lifting heavier weights, imo.(And full disclaimer though, my confidence/mental health wrt my writing is generally rock bottom, so I know it's not easy lol.)

Once I got into writing longer stories, I've kinda grown to see writing as having two kinda moods: gut-level writing, stuff you HAVE to get down and are dying to write, and the 'fill-in', less exciting parts or parts you really have to discipline yourself to get through.

For writing fic (especially shorter fic), I know I started with just gut-level writing. And for short stuff, that's generally all you need! I really struggled (and still kinda do) when I got to the point where that wasn't enough to fill in a long story, but I've kinda found a way of dealing it.

I don't know if it's a good habit, depending on how you work and how your ideas come about, but for me, I start by writing as much as possible for the scenes I do have fairly established in my head, then create an outline and fill in/revise the rest. It makes it easier for me to feel like I'm working off of inspiration and not just a rigid outline, so I get a good mix of the story/characters 'developing naturally' and 'not going entirely off the rails.' I will say that I think I struggle with endings because of it tho, since the 'gut-level' stuff for me rarely/never touches that part of the story. I usually have to outline to figure out where I want things to end up or what I want to show last.

For the your chapters question -- I'm not sure if by 'chapters' you might mean scene (since a lot of people break things up that way), or if you just mean in terms of other chapter divisions, but I'm gonna try and address both!

Personally, I don't really think in terms of chapters, if that makes sense? That part comes way later when I'm writing. Like right now, I'll be honest and say I don't have set 'chapter' divisions in my head yet for my wip, lol, tho the scenes might be long enough for stand-alone chapters. When I start a story (either with just inspiration or from an outline), it's a matter of scenes, and then after that, I figure out how many scenes I want in a chapter and what would feel "right" in terms of dividing them.

Usually, when I end a chapter it's either because it's an emotional high-point, it feels like a "natural" place to break (due to a jump forward in time for the next scene/resolution to a current conflict), or it's somewhere I need to change the point of view (if I'm writing a story with multiple). Like, for a high-point, I'd think of ending after the scene in hyung au where Jinki comes out, or in the esports thing, where ontae sleep together the first time. For "natural" break places, it's often a matter of time/resolutions, like…jongyu parting ways before jinki starts japanese promotions in hyung au, or in my current wip, them kinda breaking up for a few months after a fight. Pov changes for breaks are pretty self-explanatory and I could go on forever about how I try to pick which pov to use for a scene/chapter, but I think the most important thing is to use those breaks to avoid confusion.

As far as interest goes -- making sure scenes have enough "meat" to them without dragging can be hard, esp if you're trying to setup a plot. Imo, scenes are interesting when there's conflict or emotional high points of some kind (which can be a lot of different things). Once you figure out which of those you want in a scene, I think it gets easier to write around that. Like, to go back to hyung au, when Jinki came to visit Jong at Blue Night and they hung out after -- I started the scene just knowing I wanted Jinki to surprise him, because I thought that'd be cute.

So in thinking about what purpose the scene might serve to move things forward…I knew mood-wise I wanted to capture some more of the uncertainty of how to act around each other, now that they're both know the other is gay, have Jinki be torn between making a move/confessing and his fear of changing things for the worse, set them up for some messy revelation of feelings in the next scene, and ofc have them both be horny because how else are you gonna feel being around your crush for the first time in a month.

Once that was kinda setup in my head, it was easier to fill in what the characters say/how they act. Jinki flirts with Jong on air, because that's 'safe' (it can't go anywhere since they're in a studio and it'd be easy to dismiss as not serious since he's in Onew-mode), Jong is defs very

And as another note…. I just think some parts are always going to be difficult to write, because we all have different strengths when it comes to writing. Like, I hate writing setting descriptions, so I don't do it much and generally provide a bare-minimum for scene context -- but when I need more for the purpose of mood or plot or whatever, it feels like pulling teeth. Since it's such a miserable process for me, and that's so long, I assume that means it sucks or it's a real slog for whoever's reading it, but…they don't always correlate.

Not every part of a project is gonna be fun -- which sucks! -- but it's also why it's important to take mental breaks and imo, step away from your story at milestones. It's not great to make yourself miserable for writing, (I say while I doing just that most of the time), but I think going in with the knowledge that it IS going to be hard sometimes can help. The more stories you write, the more you'll be able to hone your instinct for like...if you're struggling because there's something wrong with the plot/scene/prose or if it's just because writing be like that sometimes.

Oof, this got too long, and I don’t even know how much of it is useful, but I hope it might help a bit? Thank you again for the compliment and best of luck with your writing!!

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kosmicdream · 6 years

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Hi I’m Kosmic. I draw webcomics and my webcomics are really long sprawling huge cast ones that will go on for years and they’re non linear and all this stuff that makes ppls heads spin when they try to explain wtf they’re about. I ask myself this question a lot: How the fuck do I maintain this motivation for continuing projects that are honestly, probably bigger than i can possibly feasibly create??? How do i avoid swallowed up by anxiety of my own creations???? is that energy going to run out at any time? should i be worried?? Well! For some reason I... don’t? like i get winded sometimes but in the end, I actually quite like what i do and I don’t care that it takes literally years to make my stories. but when I step back and look at it objectively it does make me scratch my head and wonder how i came to be in this situation. So, sometimes i try and write a few things that help me with understanding my own process, for whatever reason. Or at least I’ll TRY to articulate some of the things i seem to tell myself again and again that help me feel very comfortable with my writing/creating process. So if you want an insight into tips that i give myself.. this is that!

TIP #1 - Everything you Plan will take longer than you planned, but you can make it easier by unexpectedly including information you might have otherwise withheld.

Secrets are cool in your stories. I have so many of them, but I also understand that they’re much more fun to share than to always keep locked up and out of knowledge. I often overshare to the point where ‘info dumping’ happens which is often considered an unattractive quality in comics. But IDM it so much because my comics just need to be drawn and you can’t glorify and hold every flaw over your shoulders when in the end its not going to be that big of a deal. I think its better to give out more information than finding reasons to bend around a story to avoid revealing things. I feel it might even be more obvious if you attempt to do that.

Also, I feel that everything planned in a story can happen quite quickly, and feel much shorter than actually drawing it. Even with the experience ive gained, i still am surprised just by how much i must throw out to make my long scenes shorter and snappier. even then, they are still really long scenes. I don’t mind doing this, I like to make my stories this way- but ive also designed my comic to serve this pace by making my pages less intensive physically to make. I’m not going to go in depth about this as ive already discussed this many times before, but I do think its important to understand that generally, a commitment to a comic is going to be bigger and longer than it appears in your mind or even on paper as a script or thumbnails.

(my comic eggshells, for example, was originally going to be 340ish pages long. but back then, my pacing was much different-- and my pages were generally twice as wide with around 15 panels per page..sometimes more. but i would over-render and make them hard to read, and now i draw very few panels per page and my comics are much ‘longer’ in page count.)

TIP #2

-Accept that your ideas are bigger than what you can draw and enjoy the private context and history of your work without feeling like its less accomplished for not being all out there. Validate yourself but also understand that your readers are not going to understand the depth from your perspective and they will be engaging with the view they’ve been exposed to.

This is kind of a complicated one but I think that its both humbling to accept your work as this multi layered experiences of contradicting perspectives.. theres the planning and your engagement with the goals, the work of translating your creation to others and the vulnerable exposure of these ideas to the audience. As the creator, you get to see things in a very unique way that no one else can but... the one feeling you will never get to see is the audience who has no idea what will happen next. You can anticipate it, but in the end its so vast and unpredictable that it will be impossible to judge what they ALL will FEEL and sometimes? their perceptions can alter your own enjoyment of your work. I guarantee it will change it in SOME way.. that’s part of the sacrifice.

TIP #3

-Allowing change, flexibility and growth into your series- and letting go of control over all facets of it.

As time goes on things just change. Its hard to accommodate or prepare for that kind of investment in your work when you feel like you havent even gotten through the starting gates of your story. Comics are particularly difficult for that because once you draw a thing, it takes time to edit and you cant really undo and go back. Each panel informs and builds on the next. You have to use what’s there and figure out how it can be a structure for the future.

Accepting the past that has helped create the situation and platform of your comic in the present, which will lead into the future. Personally, i’m not a fan of retconing* certain decisions that have been already made into the canon-- however, i think if a new conclusion or idea is discovered in the process of writing and it works to include because it creates a new and alive energy in the work that will help push it to the next stage.. i think that’s very helpful and useful for sustaining the growth and motivation in a story. Making choices like this can be tricky, however, but even small ones can give a lot of natural growth and flexibility in the comic. The problem can often come with letting go of that unseen, unrealized version we had intended. I know for myself, i can get very nostalgically attached to old ideas but-- if i think of something better that works or makes more sense, I’m always thankful to let go and let my stories grow into a better thing. I try to remember where it came from, however. Because that helps inform me where to go.

(*generally my definition for this is altering events of the past, certain core plans of the comic, character motivations, or facts that are connected to the worldbuilding. im kind of a hoarder so once its in the story aka on a specific page-- its not going anywhere. until then things can be up in the air. for example, the characters knife and spoon were not originally intended to be mutually in love and it was more of a one sided idol worship, but as i fleshed their characters out i realized that it was mutual and it changed and altered the story because of that. now it cannot/will not be “undone” for whatever reason bc this is.. an established fact in the story. but at one point, it was not! i hope that makes sense.)

SO TO SUMMARIZE... plans will always be “”bigger”” in the ever expansive space of your mind so also dont be afraid to get to the point sometimes even if it feels a little, like. less exciting than you thought? accept your story is going to be different for YOU vrs your audience and make peace with that disconnect even tho its disorienting + upsetting sometimes & accommodate the ~natural personal and artistic growth~ you will experience and let go of things that might be holding you or your work back from improving with you. but also dont try to cut out too much of the past because.. it is what helped you get to where you are right now? focus on the present & allow growth for the future, dont try to alter the past and pretend it didnt happen. bc that will be confusing as fuck for everyone involved and also probably hurt the story more than help it. esp if its a long one. ur building a tower dont pull out too many foundational blocks and try to make it too much of something else unless its growing there on its own.. u kno?

When I try to write these tips these are just things I find myself doing in a cycle as i create that seem to keep re igniting my passion for my story again and again. It makes me curious because it also is a very instinctual thing so I thought I might try and write it out!!!!!!!!!! ENJOY.

ALSO some bonus thoughts!!!!!!!!!! I will say that I’ve never completed a long format comic series, so take it w/ a grain of salt imo. HOWEVER...I probably will, eventually. Even if I don’t, I do enjoy writing really big ones and I feel very happy with the work i do on them! and still feel no inclination to move onto other things. Or even when I work on other things, I don’t have a feeling of dropping a story entirely. (for example, i still intend to work on my older series eggshells and don’t really feel a desire to ‘quit’ that story even when i have matured as an author/artist since starting it.)

When I read really long comic series I wonder a lot of internal decisions that happen out of sight, since the timeline of a comic that you read is so much different than the timeline it takes actually creating the thing. its so easy to write/plan/form ideas for lifetimes of work that will never be realized, so what is it that we actually get in the pages? What aspects of this author are we actually seeing? how much have they grown since beginning and what about the story we will never know? I know I’ll never know, because, I am only the reader! And as the creator, I will never know what the feeling of my work as the reader. or the cool and interesting things they predict will happen based on their perseptions, which are so different from mine. Yet!! we are all engaged in the same story unfolding, never fully discovering what its like on the other side but only getting little glimpses and thats fascinating how a story is almost this vast illusion of experiences maintained by so many different minds.

Long format comics captivate me because they are just, really time consuming to make and the pacing of them are so different and less consumable than other stories. They like become.. this place you live in! Why are they my favorite to enjoy even when its natural that, when a story becomes longer, its going to end up attracting more & more issues? Why do i Not care about resolutions to long stories sometimes bc my expectations for them are different?? (also lets face it, experience writing long stories is going to be different than writing short ones because it takes time to write longer things & we are not going to have as much experienc having more than one completed super long multi-act-multi-characterplot story vrs a bunch of smaller ones. it doesnt mean its EASIER to write shorter ones, if anything id argue its probably much harder to write good short things + isolate a story down to that focused vision than making tons of long ones that avoid endings) but..yet!! here i am...

why am i constantly drawn to trying to understand long format stories when I probably could improve faster by writing shorter things??! i dont really know! but i follow my heart and my heart likes to do things this way......

anyway, this entire post is mostly inspired by the fact that many of my favorite stories started before i was even born or have been going on for decades and i wonder if we’ll ever read the endings to many of them.... would it.. matter? they’ve already inspired me so much even without a resolution because i can imagine my own endings to things.. but in the end that is not what happened in the actual story. it was only in my mind.. and yet it never happened, and was an illusion unknown to anyone but myself.....and sometimes my favorite stories are my favorites because of the things i imagined them to be, rather than what they actually were or how they actually turned out.. i dont know how this happens..... but i wonder about what this means with my OWN comics, and how my perceptions of what they could be vrs what they are is like, this weird illusion that also exists only in my mind and no one else can see it. yet we are both looking at the same thing. and i want to know what others see and i never will get to??? ....stories are......... so fucking spooky!!!!!!!!!! AHHH!! ok thats all. thx for reading

#personal #comic writing #ffak faq

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