#it made me excited to draw something for a nonexistent movie.

[vanwizard]

okay i will admit i enjoyed these three in the like. one scene they were actually all on screen together.

sofia voice shut up and get the fuck out goncharov, i’m gonna fuck your wife now.

[honeypiehotchner]

i knew you (Bucky Barnes soulmate AU) -- part one

I know, I know. I just finished a story and I started another one and now I’m posting a different one...I’m insane. But I’ve had this idea for a while, just never wrote it down until last night! Enjoy xx.

Also! It’s Bucky x Reader, but it might read as Steve x Reader. I promise it’s platonic!Steve x Reader, though. Steve has no intentions of stealing Bucky’s girl. He knows Bucky would haunt his ass if he did (this is set in The Winter Soldier movie, so Steve still thinks Buck is dead).

Warnings: just some general sadness and angst, mentions of depression, it’s angst city honestly it made me cry

You watch as the old footage replays of Bucky’s wide grin. The only kind of smile that his best friend, Steve Rogers, could draw out of him with one single look or gesture. The only kind of expression that knocks the wind out of your lungs and sends chills down your spine.

“Best friends since childhood, Bucky Barnes and Steven Rogers were inseparable both on schoolyard and battlefield. Barnes is the only Howling Commando to give his life in service of his country.”

You hastily wipe a tear away. It’s been months since you put the pieces together. Months since your parents told you that they had known for years. Months since they told you they didn’t want to tell you because they didn’t want to see you hurt. 

Months since you’ve realized the man you keep seeing in your dreams is Bucky Barnes.

At first, you thought you were crazy. People dream of faces they’ve never seen all the time, right? 

Soulmates are said to be rare, but not nonexistent. You’ve always thought they were real, just that the world was so cynical to really talk about them. The idea that there is one person out there whose soul is connected to yours is exactly the kind of thing that would send this generation walking the other direction with their middle fingers raised and eyes rolling in disbelief.

Then you started remembering your dreams. You started to see his face more clearly. Granted, you had no idea it was Bucky that you were seeing. 

You came to the Smithsonian almost half a year ago now with your best friend. She realized you both had never been before, and she basically said fuck it one day and took you with her. Her exact words were, “How have we gone to college here for a year and a half and we’ve never been to the damn Smithsonian?”

You weren’t expecting to meet your soulmate that day. 

Of course, you use the word “meet” very loosely. Your soulmate isn’t alive, which explains the emptiness you feel on a daily. It’s been said that soulmates can feel what the other is feeling. Often times it’s muted, but recognizable. 

You got to see his face, to finally realize that it’s Bucky. The Bucky Barnes. 

It sounds ridiculous — and God, you love your best friend for not calling you pathetic that day — but when you walked up to the very exhibit you’re standing at right now and saw Bucky’s smile...you knew. Instantly, you knew. And it moved you to tears.

It was like your soul had finally found her counterpart, here, grinning like a madman next to his best friend, all the way back in the 1940s. 

Your parents knew simply because of things you would say, offhandedly, without even realizing it. 

Your interest in WWII caught their attention, but it surprisingly didn’t last long -- only from about the time that you turned thirteen to a few months before your fourteenth birthday. You would’ve found Bucky a lot sooner had your interest in the war itself lasted much longer, but it didn’t. You wonder now if you subconsciously knew it was Bucky, but steered yourself away from it in an attempt to save yourself the heartache at such a young age. 

Your taste in music has been the constant that they didn’t quite understand at first. You listen to modern tunes, sure, but you’re a sucker for the music of the 40s. Even clothes. You sometimes found yourself leaning toward the styles of the 40s in subtle ways, not realizing it. 

The true confirmation of their suspicions came, though, when your mom said she heard you say Bucky’s name. The first time was on a road trip. You had fallen asleep in the car. You were sixteen at the time. You were dreaming and you have no recollection of ever saying his name. You weren’t even aware that you said his name while you were dreaming until she confessed that day.

You haven’t told anyone about it. Your best friend doesn’t even know. She still believes you got too excited about seeing Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, that’s all. She doesn’t know the real reason, the real aching pain that you feel every day. 

The only thing that eases the ache is this. Hogging this exhibit. Watching the footage over and over again. Watching Bucky’s smile and being unable to hold back your own, despite your tears.

You know the staff must think you’re delusional. Somehow you haven’t cared enough to entertain the thought. But you have seen the security guard give you strange looks when you walk in almost every other day.

It used to not be this bad. You came every day for a few weeks, but then you were able to calm down to once a week, sometimes twice a month, if you were too busy with school to think about Bucky much.

But lately, something has changed. You don’t know what it is. You still feel the emptiness, but something is different. It’s...troubled. That’s all your mind can come up with.

It makes no sense, though. How can Bucky be troubled? He’s dead. You believe in ghosts and all -- you’ve never been given a reason not to -- but you’ve heard more stories than you can count from people whose soulmate has died. They all say the same thing. They felt it when it happened. Because it was like a switch was flipped. They were feeling everything one moment, and the next, it was all gone. Empty.

Empty. How you’ve felt since the day you were born. You’ve been to therapists and they all told you the same thing. It’s just your thinking. Change your thinking processes. You’ve never slipped or spiraled far enough for it to be classified as a depressive disorder or anything else, just...empty.

When you found out about having a soulmate, and even more so when you found out it was Bucky, you still felt empty, but not as much. It was like everything suddenly made perfect sense. The emptiness had a purpose, a reason for existing.

When you see him smile, everything makes perfect sense. You feel like you have a reason to exist.

“Excuse me, miss?”

You slowly drag your eyes away from Bucky, preparing yourself to deal with a disgruntled museum-goer or staff member complaining about how long you’ve been standing here. But that’s not who you see.

He’s wearing a hat, but the resemblance is unmistakable.

Quickly, you glance at the video before looking back to the person beside you. That’s him. Steve Rogers.

“Hi,” you say hesitantly, quietly. He’s obviously hiding, which he is right to do. If anyone got wind of Steve Rogers walking around here, there would be mass chaos.

“Hey,” he replies just as quiet. “Um...Wanna get a coffee?”

You have no idea why he’s asking, but you nod anyway. Who would say no to coffee with Captain America?

Outside the Smithsonian and down the block, you bring Steve to your favorite spot to get coffee. Your best friend turned you onto it when you first got here for college, and you’ve gone here weekly ever since.

After grabbing your coffees, you pick a table far enough away from everyone else on the patio to talk without anyone listening in.

“So, uh…” Steve exhales, shifting in his seat. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” you shrug, holding onto your cup with both hands. “Why did you ask me to get coffee?”

“You looked familiar,” Steve says, slowly. “What’s your full name, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Y/N L/N. Why?”

“Y/N…” Steve mutters under his breath, a crooked smile crossing his face. “I can’t believe it’s you.”

“Huh?”

“Bucky used to talk to me about you,” Steve continues, and you swear your heart stops. “He had me draw pictures of you. He couldn’t draw for crap, but he kept describing you to me from his dreams. I’ve drawn so many I’d recognize your face anywhere.”

“He dreamt about me?” You whisper. “Really?”

“All the time,” Steve nods, smiling sadly. “So you’re his soulmate?”

“I guess,” you say. “My mom says I used to say his name in my sleep all the time. I dreamt of his face, too, but I never knew it was him. Until my friend took me to the exhibit a few months ago.” You pause. “It sounds stupid. But seeing him there makes me feel...better.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve says suddenly. “It can’t be easy being born in a completely different generation.”

You smile softly. “Thank you. I’m sorry, too. I can’t imagine how hard it is to still be here after all this time. And without your best friend, too.”

“Yeah, it hasn’t been easy,” Steve admits. “But thanks. I appreciate it.”

“If it’s not too much to ask,” you begin, pausing to think about if you’re going to regret this. “Would you tell me about him? Just anything. It doesn’t have to be anything profound, just...anything you want to talk about. But if it’s too hard, don’t worry about it.” You wave your hands in front of your face, already preparing yourself for Steve to politely turn you down.

But he doesn’t.

“Bucky, he…” Steve pauses, shaking his head. “He was a lot wealthier than me back in the 40s. I had no business acting the way I did, picking fights with people three times my size, but I still did it. And Bucky was always there to pick me up off the ground and give me a ride back home.”

“Yeah?” You chuckle. “You used to be super skinny, right?”

“I was really sick, actually. Bucky had every reason to treat me like anyone else, but he never did. We grew up together -- though I used to joke that he grew up. I stayed the same size. But he never made fun of me for it.”

You can’t help but grin. “That video in the museum -- his smile. I see it in my dreams all the time.”

“Yeah, yeah that was Bucky’s signature grin. He could give any woman that smile and they were his.”

“I can see why,” you admit quietly, averting your eyes when Steve raises his eyebrows. You change subjects, not wanting to talk about how attractive you find Steve’s dead best friend -- despite him being your soulmate. “What was his favorite thing to eat for breakfast?”

Steve takes the bait, and for the next four hours, the two of you sit on the patio, talking about Bucky Barnes. 

His favorite color? Your eyes. Which you think is a little ridiculous, but Steve swears it’s the truth.

His favorite thing to do? Go dancing. Hands down.

His favorite thing to talk about? You. Again, you give Steve a stern look, and again, he swears it’s true. But when he wasn’t talking about you, Steve says Bucky talked a lot about the future. He was an optimist. Steve has no idea how, but Bucky always saw the brightest side.

Bucky was kind. Kinder than a lot of men his age, at the time. He had that blinding smile and instead of hiding it and going for the mysterious, brooding attitude, he chose to smile as much as he could, to anyone who looked like they needed it.

Realizing that the sun is beginning to go down, Steve decides to get you home.

“It’s alright, I can walk,” you tell him, feeling high on everything Bucky. “It’s just up here. I go to college here.”

“At least let me walk you to the campus,” Steve offers.

You raise an eyebrow. “Seriously?”

“Bucky would kill me if I let his girl walk home alone. Especially when it’s getting dark.”

“Fine,” you cave. Hearing Steve refer to you as “Bucky’s girl” sends chills down your spine -- the good kind of chills. The kind that makes you wish it was the 1940s. The kind that makes you wish Bucky was here, holding your hand, walking you home.

Once you reach campus (you decide to let Steve walk you all the way to your dorm building), you ask Steve the question you’ve been wondering about ever since you first saw Bucky in the museum.

“Hey Steve?”

Hands stuffed in his pockets, Steve turns his head toward you. “Yeah?”

“If this was the 40s...do you-- Do you think I’m the kind of girl Bucky would want?”

Steve’s steps falter. You slow your pace to match his until you’re both stopped, looking at one another.

“What is it?” You ask.

“Yes,” Steve says simply. “Yeah. I do. I know for a fact he would’ve torn down every building until he found you. Because he tried.”

Your breath hitches. Deep down, you had convinced yourself that you weren’t the kind of girl Bucky would want. Not that it’s your fault because you were born this side of the millennium. But to hear Steve tell you otherwise makes you freeze.

“What?”

“Bucky didn’t have me sketch you because he wanted me to practice my drawing. He did it because he wanted to see a picture of you. Something he could keep in his wallet and look at every night. He was a ladies man, yeah, but every single one...he wanted them to be you. But they never were.” Steve shakes his head. “It really tore him up, that he never found you. He still held out hope, though. Until the very last second.”

Tears have sprung to your eyes before you even realize it. 

“Before he fell, he--” Steve pauses. “He told me to promise that I’d find you. I guess I kept my promise after all.”

He looks up to see the tears in your eyes, streaming down your cheeks. Without a single word, Steve pulls you into his chest, and without hesitation, you let yourself cry.

He’s not Bucky. And you’ll never find your Bucky, but he’s close enough. Steve promised Bucky that he’d find you, and he kept that promise. Now he’s going to do everything in his power to keep you safe.

Because he knows for a fact Bucky would’ve wanted that, too.

[mahlergeek]

At the Heart of a Calendar Experiment

Love is neither quantifiable nor finite. Time is both quantifiable and finite.

That’s the problem at the center of my current calendar experiment that has me floating between two houses, a polyamorous nomad who splits time somewhat evenly between my wife and my girlfriend for two months.

There are risks in doing this, not the least of which is how it could impact our children. We don’t want my kids to feel abandoned or neglected by their father, nor do we want to leave the impression that we’re blending families at a most awkward time, right as our children are preparing to leave the teenage shipyard and slide down greased rails into the choppy Bay of Adulthood.

At the conclusion of our grand experiment, we’ll all compare notes and evaluate whether or not it was a success.

How will we measure success? By how much we learn. So far, just a week into the evaluation, it’s looking successful from my perspective.

OPENING UP

I’ve come to realize that the risk of silence about my unconventional relationship outweighs the risk of opening up about it. If someone stumbles upon my reality — say, seeing me holding hands with a woman I’m not married to — I lose control of the narrative. I become the victim of assumption at that point, and it’s entirely possible that I won’t even know that people saw me and are now drawing unsavory conclusions about me. The fictional tales they write in their own heads about my sleazy, shameful lying and cheating could become the dominant story when I’d prefer people know the more mundane truth: I’ve consciously picked an unconventional relationship structure in the most ethical way I know how with the full consent, and occasional prodding from, my wife of 20 years.

And let’s be real. By “unconventional,” I mean something that is extremely common but, for reasons that will likely always remain murky to me, is not considered a social norm. The longer I live, the more I realize monogamy is almost nonexistent. It’s a fantasy, yet that fantasy has become the social expectation for generations of Western people who hook up, swing and cheat while hoisting the monogamous banner.

The most honest people among us, of course, realize and admit that fact of humanity. I prefer calling them honest or observational rather than non-judgmental, although both labels frequently overlap. It’s those honest people who I’m very reluctantly opening up to.

CLOSE FRIENDS

“Are you guys free for dinner? I’m here with my longtime girlfriend, and my wife says you should meet her.”

That’s the out-of-the-blue text I sent my friends who I knew were at the same art festival we were mutually visiting. After a long pause — we figured they needed time to shit themselves, then more time to clean up — we made dinner arrangements at the kind of trendy, upscale restaurant that always serves as stark contrast with my middle-age, awkward, plaid-shirt frumpiness.

They thought I was punking them. I was not. And after three hours of lovely conversation over mind-blowing mushroom cakes, sunchoke pâté and gnocchi, we’d deepened our friendship with the closeness that only brutal honesty can bring.

The next night, we repeated the process over a dinner we prepared ourselves: bruschetta, corn salad, grilled scallops and peach melba trifle. Our guest was my girlfriend’s close friend, who opened up about some current relationship struggles she’s dealing with.

It was beautiful. We’re all human, trying to figure this stuff out. Giving and receiving raw truth — not for validation or approval, merely for connection — feels absolutely wonderful.

The food was a hit, too. Our guest described the dessert as an “orgasm in my mouth.”

EMOTIONAL WHIPLASH

One of the hardest parts of dealing with a somewhat long-distance relationship is the emotional explosion that happens when you say goodbye.

I felt that feeling bomb go off when I was leaving home, saying goodbye to my wife and kids for a week away. The fact that I was leaving wasn’t unusual, as I travel all the time for work and fun solo trips, but this time felt different. Driving away, I experienced a sad longing sensation, the kind of nostalgic melancholy that I only noticed in Brahms’ symphonies after I had some age under my belt.

Before the return trip home, it felt even more intense. It was Stravinsky sadness this time, shocking and maddening. I ugly-cried all alone after saying goodbye to my girlfriend after a blissful week, not because things ahead were so bad, but because things behind were so good.

The emotional high of opening up to a few close friends surely contributed to that, but it’s not the only reason. This roller coaster of intense highs and lows has been a continuous thread in the years since opening our marriage. It comes with the territory, I suppose, of having to say goodbye and hello so frequently when you deeply love more than one person.

Part of my sadness, though, came from a realization: I can’t have what I really want.

My fantasy life involves peace and stability. I dream of a quiet, tiny, neatly kept cottage where I socialize at the Quaint Orchid Growers Society and cook meals from the heirloom vegetables I grew from seed in my garden. My nights are filled with smoky Scotch, burning incense, silky jazz and long, thoughtful, introspective conversations with my brilliant, beautiful, monogamous wife who can’t wait to unleash her sensual side when the curtains close.

That’s the dream.

It’s not possible for that dream to become my reality, though, and not just because it’s ridiculous.

For one thing, I couldn’t ask my wife or my girlfriend to give up their other partners, any more than they could ask me to do the same thing. It’s impossible, at least, if you really love someone. Secondly, even if I had my minimalist/monogamist dream life, I would miss the freedom and excitement that polyamory provides. I’d agonize over the love I’m potentially missing out on, knowing what I know now about how great it can turn out. Even though I’m not looking for someone new to date now — the calendar forbids it, and the monogamist clinging inside me doesn’t really want it — the ever-present possibility of serendipity isn’t something I’ll easily give up.

My emotional side craves something that my cognitive side knows is impossible, but the craving for that fantasy is still very real.

CHANGE, LIKE NATURE

The stability within my fantasy is especially appealing during a stage of life, and a current experiment, where I have to check my smartphone to see where I’ll be laying my head every night.

I’m a creature of routine. I want my Quaint Orchid Growers Society meetings every Wednesday at noon, my Scotch-sipping friends every Friday night at 7, and my head in the same bed, with the same person, every night. We’ll sip chamomile tea by the fire at sunset and share coffee by the garden window at sunrise.

Again, that’s the fantasy, whether it’s my own brain wiring or my conservative religious upbringing at fault for it.

That fantasy is a black-and-white snapshot; my current life is a color IMAX movie. It’s ever-changing, larger and much more vibrant than the small, still life in my dreams.

If there’s a solution to be had, I suspect it will involve learning to appreciate the changes in my life for their own unique beauty. I’ve already got a good allegory for it: Alaskan wilderness.

On our trip to the far north a few weeks ago, one of many things I marveled at was how different all the scenery can look day to day, moment to moment. The light changes. The weather changes. The tide rolls in and out. The wildlife comes and goes.

If I took 10,000 snapshots from the cabin porch, every one of them would be different. There’s a beauty in that, of the constant change, and it’s telling that nothing in nature stands still. The universe itself is growing, pulsing, creating, destroying. We’re part of that.

When relationships change in their infinite ways — growing, pulsing, creating, destroying — it’s not something to be afraid of, which is a default reaction for many of us.

Instead, change is the most natural thing we can do as humans, mirroring the very nature we see all around us. We’re not meant to be static beings. We’re meant to change, just like everything else in existence.

[simplyotometrash]

Sunshine and Showers

//My first post on this blog! It’s just a little piece I wrote about my OC, Alex, and Kiro’s relationship!

Alex-Lee Florence was Kiro’s entire world. They met by pure luck of the draw. Alex never went out, they were agoraphobic and the mere thought of leaving the house was panic-inducing. Yet on that one day where Kiro had sneaked into a corner store, Alex had decided to go to the store as well. They tried to avoid talking to anyone anytime they had to go into the world. All he had wanted was a candy bar (while Savin wasn’t looking). They grabbed the same one, Alex immediately let go and dropped their basket, and that was that. Kiro saw that face and couldn’t help the floaty feeling in his heart. He was a big believer in love at first sight after all.

He had insisted on walking Alex home and split the candy bar with them. He was enthralled by them. The bags under the eyes and their way they constantly stretched their hands and fingers made him curious as to what kind of person they were. What did they do for work? Alex, apparently, knew who Kiro was but wasn’t actually a big follower of his career. A fact that knocked him off his feet. They treated him so normally that he felt drawn to them. He became determined to see them again.

---

It had taken months for Kiro to find out what Alex did for a living. Their social media accounts held no such details. Not even photos except of their adorable cat. Their social media presence was bone dry! Yet they responded anytime he sent them links or pictures. They gave him their number after a while and the talking grew. The quiet, almost nonexistent Alex on social media and even offline was very different. Their texts were colorful and turned to paragraphs anytime they were interested in the conversation. There were tons of cat photos blowing up Kiro’s phone at all hours of the day. The cat, named Kimchi, was Alex’s “son” and Kiro wanted to meet him.

Kiro finally found out that Alex was an indie game designer and made video games from their apartment. They did almost everything by themselves. He remembered thinking that it was no wonder they were so tired. No wonder they replied no matter how late it was, regardless of the time zone Kiro was in. Kiro, of course, looked up their handle just so he could download and play every game they had ever made. If he wasn’t already in love with Alex before, he was now. 

---

They began dating after six months. Of course it was kept quiet, for Kiro’s career and Alex’s comfort. It was hard. Kiro being such an outgoing and enthusiastic person didn’t quite get Alex’s agoraphobia and aversion to going out with him when he was in disguise. It had been the first time he ever convinced them to go out. The date was at night and Kiro had his disguise on so that they could enjoy the evening without him being swarmed. It was supposed to be a fun night at at the fair. Alex shook the entire walk to the fair. Kiro was so excited, but that didn’t stop him from noticing Alex the second they were among the crowd. Alex shook like a leaf and was sweating. They were hyperventilating until they just....took off. Kiro followed, anxious and concerned. He found his favorite person hiding far down the street, where the sounds and lights weren’t so in-your-face. 

“Kiro...I...I can’t...” They were crying into their hoodie sleeves and his heart sank.

They tried to tell him. Over and over again, they tried. They couldn’t go into a public place, especially one so crowded, without panicking. They were utterly terrified of the very thought of an uncontrollable situation. 

“Shh, Al, it’s not your fault. I was the pushy one.” He said against their hair as he held them in darkened street. The sounds faded as he hummed the tune of one of his songs and swayed with them in place. Anything to help them calm down.

Any words Alex tried to form only came out as incoherent cries. They held on so tightly. Kiro was their lifeline. They felt so small in his arms. Kiro knew for certain that this was the person he wanted to give his heart to forever. No matter what. 

Their dates shifted into something else. Kiro performing for them in either of their apartments. They would take turns hosting sleepovers. They had gaming nights with pizza and chips, things Savin would murder him for eating. There were always pillows fights. Kiro took to cooking dinners for Alex after seeing just how terrible they were in the kitchen unless it was baking. These moments were cherished. And little by little, Kiro was able to introduce Alex to dates outside. Never anything big. Sometimes they would go to a midnight movie, where there were barely any other people. Late-night walks in the park together. Sometimes they would go to places outside of the city for picnics and to lay out to watch the clouds or the stars. 

Kiro loved his perfectly imperfect partner.

---

“Hey, sunshine,” Alex said through a mouthful of noodles, “how long is this next tour going to be?”

The sight in front of him was something to behold. Short, fading green hair with dark roots tied into the tiniest of rabbit tails (as Kiro liked to call them) on the top of Alex’s head, wearing one of his sweatshirts and a pair of shorts. The two of them sat in Alex’s living room, Kimchi fast asleep at the end of the couch, eating noodles together. If only he had his phone out for a picture.

“It’ll be a few months. I’ll make sure to bring you something from every city and country I’m in! And I’ll video chat you every single day!” He beamed, setting his bowl aside to pull Alex’s legs across his lap.

“It’s not as if we don’t do that every tour anyway,” they laughed, careful not to let their noodles spill.

He took their bowl and set it on the table just to be able to pull them fully into his lap. “I knoooow,” he mumbled, nuzzling their neck softly. “I know. It’s all we have when I’m gone, though. I always miss you so much!”

Alex rested their head against his, knees on either side of his hips. Being apart was the worst thing. Kiro had once asked if they felt comfortable enough to go on tour with them. Of course they immediately shut the idea down with fear creeping into their eyes. He never asked again. Instead he made videos of every location just to send to them. One day, though, he wanted to take them away from Loveland. Just for a vacation. Somewhere for just them. His little storm cloud deserved all the vacations he could provide. It was a matter of free time. He’d been booked solid with work for far too long. Savin wasn’t exactly a fan of their relationship, mostly because he knew how it could go if the news suddenly got out. Kiro didn’t care. He wanted people to know. He was positive his fans would not be angry. The only thing keeping him from one impulsive decision was Alex.Their comfort and consent was more important. If they wanted the relationship kept quiet for longer, then so be it. Anything for them. 

“I miss you too. All the time.” They pressed soft kisses against his lips. “I...I wish we could tell your fans. I do. It’s a mortifying thought, it makes my stomach feel uneasy to think about, but I don’t want to hide forever. It’s just...”

“Just?” Kiro tilted his head, brow furrowing with worry.

“I’m not exactly what anyone would expect someone like you to date. I mean...I’m on the chubbier side and nonbinary. I’m a shut-in game developer who is terrified of situations that I can’t easily get out of or have any form of control in. Crowds are terrifying. I’ve never been to one of your concerts. I look like a raccoon with these dark circles. I’m-”

“Let me stop you right there, Alex-Lee Edith Florence.” Kiro sat up, hands gripping gently at Alex’s waist. “You are the most gorgeous person I’ve ever met. You’re gorgeous, handsome, cute, and every other descriptor there is! Chub or not, there’s just more of you to love and you’re so soft to hold. I don’t give a damn if you’ve seen any of my shows in person because I know you watch every single performance from here.” One hand moved up their waist to caress their face, resting his forehead on theirs. “I love what you do for a living and don’t fucking care that you have agoraphobia. You’re my little storm cloud. But storms aren’t a bad thing. They bring rain and rain brings growth. I love you for you. Not for who you aren’t. You see those things about you as negatives but I see them as part of my favorite person to ever be on this planet.”

Alex had tears prick their eyes. But it wasn’t like the other times Kiro saw those tears. They weren’t tears of sadness or panic. The tears and the smile told him everything he needed to know. He kissed them softly, urging Alex to scoot further forward in his lap.

“I love you,” they mumbled against his lips as kisses became more passionate. “I love you so much, Kiro.”

He made sure to show them everything he loved about them well into the morning hours. 

---

“Do you have everything you need? You didn’t forget anything back home, right?” Alex asked for the fifth time that car ride. Before every tour, Alex became jittery and worried. Sometimes they reminded him of a parent. It was too cute for words. 

“Baaaabe,” he whined, resting his head on their shoulder, “I have everything. I promise! Can’t we just snuggle some more until we get to the airport?”

This was their normal. Before a tour, before having to leave overseas for long shoots, Kiro became more clingy than ever. The days leading up, he practically never let go of Alex. Then he was impossible to peel off the entire ride to the airport. Every single time. And every time they promised Savin that Kiro would be on time they always ended up late because a certain someone couldn’t keep his hands to himself. It was routine. Savin never expected them to actually be on time or even early. Though not thrilled about having to make sure Kiro’s relationship didn’t get exposed by accident or through the press, he had grown fond of Alex. Not so fond of their encouragement for Kiro to eat what he wanted during his days off.

“We’re already here, though, sunshine,” Alex said, gently brushing his golden locks from his eyes.

Oh boy did he pout. Every single time the pout never faltered. Parting was never easy for either of them. The months apart were unbearable, even through all the video chats and phone calls. The texts and the pictures. It eased the longing a little but then just added more fuel to the already burning fire. 

“Remember, Alex, neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night-”

“What are you, a postal worker?”

“Shhhhh I wasn’t finished! You threw off my groove!”

“Aw, I’m sorry, sunshine.” Alex pecked him sweetly on the lips as he pouted, immediately causing the superstar to break into a smile.

“Your Superhero Kiro will always be here for you. You know I’m only one call away.”

//Thank you for reading! I may actually make a series for these two if anyone is interested!!! Please give me feedback!!

[razberryyum]

The Untamed/陈情令 Rewatch, Episode 11

(spoilers for everything MDZS/Untamed)

[covers MDZS chapters 51 and 52]

WangXian meter: 🐰🐰+🐰+ 🐰🐰+ 🐰🐰+🐰🐰+🐰🐰🐰

I’m frankly surprised Wuji didn’t start playing as soon as Wei Ying turned around and saw Lan Zhan walking towards him. They even slo-moed the scene to further stress the romanticism of the moment so it was rather odd that Team CQL would let this chance to WangXian things up get away from them, especially considering the fact that since Wei Ying spent most of the episode thinking about Lan Zhan, that would’ve been completely appropriate.  

Wei Ying insistently saying Lan Zhan’s name to get his attention, even though he was being totally ignored, always makes me think of an image, which I’m going to share now, despite the fact that I’m pretty much opening myself up to humiliation due to my shamefully lack of artistic talent:

I wish this was actually drawn by a right-handed 3 year old using their left-hand, but unfortunately that truly is the extent of my drawing abilities, which is obviously less than nonexistent. I hope the spirit of what I’m trying to convey still comes through since I think the dynamics between Wei Ying, Lan Zhan and Jiang Cheng are applicable for pretty much the entire episode. 

Thinking from Jiang Cheng’s point of view, he’s probably both annoyed and befuddled by how obsessed Wei Ying seems to be with Lan Zhan. Of course he couldn’t understand the greater significance behind Wei Ying’s focus—how could he, when even Wei Ying didn’t understand at this point—but I can imagine him replaying these events years later, after all that’s happened, and only becoming even more angry and bitter at Wei Ying for already choosing Lan Zhan over his own family this early on. I mean, Wei Ying almost followed Lan Zhan to Cloud Recesses because he was concerned for his safety before he even spared a thought about his own sect and family’s safety. It's a good thing Jiang Cheng was still in his loving, brotherly phase during this time, otherwise Wei Ying would’ve more than deserved his ire. Actually, considering how much Jiang Cheng warned Wei Ying against acting out and doing something rash that would negatively impact their sect, I can’t blame him for the anger he felt later on when Wei Ying did exactly what he, and even his father, told him not to do.  

Even though we didn’t see Lan Zhan reciprocating Wei Ying’s obsessiveness in return, I did love the fact that he utilized Wei Ying’s talisman to get away from Wen Xu since that was yet another indication of how much he appreciated Wei Ying’s abilities. I guess he might have gotten the talisman when they were trying to subdue the dancing goddess in Dafan Mountain. This will be the first time he’s kept Wei Ying’s talisman, and even though he was forced to use it, I love that the second time he kept one, he actually treasured it like a precious keepsake and only used it because Wei Ying was once again by his side. It serves as a nice marker of progression of their relationship.  

Jiang Cheng Appreciation Time

It hurt my heart all over again that we will never get to see this kind of interaction between these two brothers any more, I actually got teary-eyed watching it tonight, especially with how adorable Wei Ying was being. I really love their brotherhood before everything went to hell because it’s just so...loving and unselfish, and I give Jiang Cheng a lot of credit for that. If he were a lesser person, he could have easily been an abusive brother to Wei Ying, taking full advantage of his status as the heir of Yunmeng Jiang sect to make Wei Ying’s life as difficult as possible. I know Shijie helped a lot in smoothing their relationship in the beginning, but it is also a testament to Jiang Cheng’s sweet nature that he could even be coaxed into opening his heart to this orphan his father brought home, especially when rumors of his true parentage started floating around...mostly thanks to his own mom.  

I still wince when I watch this scene where Madame Yu basically cuts down her own son out of vindictiveness towards Wei Ying. I love Madame Yu, I really do, but wow do I not admire her parenting skills. Wei Ying almost nonchalant attitude to her rant was a good indication of how common her dressing down was, that he was able to even develop an immunity towards it. Jiang Cheng’s reaction broke my heart though. So did Shijie‘s: her non-stop peeling of those lotus seeds were clearly an indication of just how stressed she was by the situation. But since Jiang Cheng bore the brunt of his mom’s criticism, my heart bled for him more. Yet, despite having lived his whole life being told he will never be as good as Wei Ying, he still loved him like a brother and even admired him, as exemplified by this scene:  

Instead of being jealous of Wei Ying being able to hit the target when he failed and the accolades he received from their sect disciples as a result, Jiang Cheng looked downright proud of his brother, as if Wei Wuxian’s success was his own. If I didn’t love Jiang Cheng before, I sure as hell loved him after this moment. It really showed how big of a heart Jiang Cheng has, how decent a person he is, and just how wonderful a brother he is (despite his constant nagging and disapproval), and it also made me so much sadder about what happened to their relationship and Jiang Cheng as a person later on. I really mourn the loss of his sweetness and magnanimity.

Madame Yu Appreciation Time

I’ve talked about how much I love Madame Yu before, and despite how brutal she is towards her family, I still love her. I loved her the moment she shot that glare of death at her husband. Him looking away and down like a properly whipped man just made me love and admire her even more. Again, I don’t approve of her parenting methods, I would not want her as my mom, but otherwise, she is just fucking awesome in my book. She is also beautiful. Makes me wish Jiang Fengmian was more of a match for her aesthetically-speaking, since he definitely was in the donghua. I wish they didn’t go older with him in the live action since the actress herself (Zhang Jingtong) is actually only a couple of years older than Xiao Zhan. I guess this version of JFM just hadn’t developed his cultivation level enough to retain his youthful appearance.  

Liu Haikuan Appreciation Time

Any opportunity I get to show Big Brother some love, I will take it, although in this instance I would actually like direct that love and appreciation towards actor Liu Haikuan specifically for his heart-wrenching performance in the scene where he begged Uncle Lan to leave Cloud Recesses to preserve his life. I totally felt his desperation and fear for his uncle, and how completely unwilling he was to leave him and Cloud Recesses behind. Some actors can’t even produce a single droplet of moisture even when a scene is calling for them to cry their eyes out, yet Liu Haikuan drops those tears even when he doesn’t need to since they were hardly noticeable. I just love his performance.  

Lan Zhan Appreciation Time

Technically I probably don’t need to set aside a specific section to appreciate Lan Zhan since I appreciate him all the time already, but since I wasn’t sure where to stick this moment, I decided to put it here. I don’t say it enough but I truly love the way he floats down to the ground; he looks like an angel descending upon the Earth.  

Ex-BFFs

I really cannot wait for The Fatal Journey’s release because I am dying to find out how Nie Huaisang and Jin Guangyao went from this to what they become sixteen years later. I know Nie Mingjue is the reason, but the journey to that point is what fascinates me, so although I love Wen Ning and Sizhui and I do look forward to their movie, I must confess that I am most excited about the Nie brothers and JGY’s saga. January cannot come soon enough.

A Questionable Picturesque Setting  

I love the way both Lotus Pier and Nightless City looked, so much so that I wish such places existed so I can go visit them one day. While I’m sure there are probably places in China that resemble Lotus Pier (or can be dressed up to look like it more or less), I doubt anything like Nightless City exists because it doesn’t even really make sense as a residence. Who in their right mind would build their stronghold on a volcano? And I guess an active one at that considering the lava running down all the surrounding mountains. Maybe that’s why Wen Ruohan looks so sweaty all the time. Since this part of Nightless City is obviously different from the section we saw during the Sunshot Campaign and Wei Ying’s final stand later on, I have to wonder just how freaking big is this place. And where was Wen Chao appearing from since there’s no building nearby? Is there some underground tunnel where he popped up from? I didn’t see any openings during the long pan up those steps. And also, for a sect known for its sun motif, I didn’t see even ONE sun printed on any of those banners. I wish they kept the original design; Nightless City made more sense in the donghua’s version of the place.  

Overall Episode Rating: 8 Lil Apples out of 10

Disclaimer: The Untamed would not be possible without Mo Dao Zu Shi and Mo Xiang Tong Xiu-laozi.  I mean no disrespect whatsoever with my humble comparisons between the novel and the live action, even when I sometimes favor the changes in the show. All hail MDZS and MXTX-laozi always and forever!  

[solastia]

The Dragon’s Lair | 1

Pairing: Dragon Hybrid Namjoon x Reader (The others will show up one by one)

Word Count: 3,141

Genre & Warnings: Hybrid au. Fantasy themes. This will have a little bit of everything. Lots of fluff, some angst, perhaps eventual smut. Mentions of physical abuse and possible other trauma or emotional issues in the future. Brief mentions of death but no MCD. 

Notes: I’ve been ‘hoarding’ this in my drafts forever. It was literally only missing a paragraph. I’ve considered the idea of doing something for hybrids for a while, and I kept getting asked about it, so this is my attempt! I wanted to do something other than the ole’ cat and dog thing. Also, keep in mind that the plan for this fic to is write it in a way that I can keep adding to it for as long as I want to. I have no definite end in mind as of yet. I figured I’d release it to give you guys something to read while you wait for Faith. 

Some days you praised Kwon Soonyoung for being the best friend and overall human being on the planet. Other days, you cursed the day you became friends. Today felt like it was going to be the latter. 

“I really don’t know about this, Soonyoung. It just seems so wrong,” you grimaced as he pulled you along towards the grey-bricked and incredibly ridiculous building.

The Fairy Pawmother was one of the most popular businesses in town these days. And, in case the name didn’t give it away, was styled ostentatiously to look like a small castle. There were koi ponds instead of a moat and a cobbled walkway instead of a drawbridge, but it was painfully obvious the entire place with themed purposely. The two towers on either side of the building were actually a popular cafe and a Hybrid specialty shop that employed the adoptable hybrids themselves. 

“You’re thinking about it the wrong way, that’s all. I mean, sure. It would be nice if they all had their freedom and people stopped treating hybrids like lesser beings. The law is easing up on them little by little every year, so maybe someday there will be hope. Until then, there are all these hybrids without anyone to care about them. They are all alone, no one to care whether they live or die.” Soonyoung sighed dramatically and wiped a nonexistent tear from his dry eyes. 

“The guilt trip route? Ugh, fine,” you groan and follow him towards to entrance.

Soonyoung smiles gleefully, as he usually does when he convinces you to do what he wants. Which is quite often, sadly. 

“Come on. You won’t regret having a hybrid of your own. Since your Grandma died, I worry about you. She was all the real family you had left. I know you have me, and I consider myself your family too, but you could do with more. Just remind yourself you’re saving them from someone that won’t feel about hybrids the way that you do. You’ll treat them good, whereas they could have gone to a sex fiend or something.” 

“Who says sex fiend? Weirdo.” 

“Your weirdo,” Soonyoung drapes himself across your back, squeezing softly.

“Disgusting. Get off me,” you kick your foot back, hitting the giggling Soonyoung lightly, but you can’t hide your soft smile fast enough before he catches it. 

“This place is great too. They treat the hybrids well. They feed them properly, have good rooms and jobs if they want them. They even bring in teachers for homeschooling and stuff. It’s where I got Jihoonie.” 

“My point exactly. Jihoon is a little brat.” 

“A brat that you spoil as much as I do. Don’t think I didn’t notice that you suddenly have jugs of milk in your fridge when you hate milk. Or that you guys have movie marathons where he comes back so stuffed he doesn’t want to eat dinner. Or the fact that those headphones you claimed you won in a contest at work and gave to him were almost $3,000. And you forgot that I share your Amazon account.” 

“Having a nosy best friend is the worst,” you grumble, looking around the lobby of the Hybrid shelter. 

It looked bright and welcoming, with ivory painted walls covered in pictures of past adoptions and a lounge filled with plush crimson couches. There were several nice looking families waiting, presumably to pick up their new Hybrids, but Soonyoung pulled you away from there and towards the front counter. 

The man at the counter was stunning, with beautiful dark eyes and pouty lips. When you couldn’t see any evidence of him being a Hybrid himself, you were almost disappointed. His eyes glimmered with mischief as he caught you checking him out, his gaze piercing you in a way that made you wonder if he could hear your thoughts. You blushed and looked away, glad for Soonyoung’s interference as he excitedly greeted the man. 

“Heechul hyung! How are you?” 

“Better, now that you’ve brought me something pretty to look at. Jihoon’s class doesn’t get out for another hour if you’re here to get him.” 

“I know! I actually brought my friend Y/N here to look around. I think she’d give someone a great home,” Soonyoung pulls you forward, and you wave shyly. 

“Allow me to introduce myself, then. I am Kim Heechul, the Fairy Pawmother himself,” he catches your cringe and laughs. 

“I know, it’s a silly name. I wanted to just call it Heechul’s in sparkling lights, but my partner Leeteuk told me this isn’t a Casino so I couldn’t do that.” 

“It’s not a casino. It’s not a real castle either, but that didn’t stop you. So don’t blame me,” a yell comes from the office behind Heechul.

“Are you getting mad already, babe?” Heechul turns and smirks at the door. 

“I’m not mad!”

“You’re yelling.”

“Well, I’m mad now!” 

Heechul giggles and turns back to you, observing you from head to toe with a thoughtful look. 

“I don’t think a cat or dog will do for you.” 

“If you’re about to suggest a hamster, I’ve already got one,” you smirk and jerk your thumb to point at Soonyoung, who huffs. 

“That’s great! I totally see it.” Heechul laughs, slapping the counter a couple times. 

He slowly sobers before rounding the counter and gesturing to the two of you to follow him down a spacious hallway. 

“No, I mean something...a bit more challenging.” 

As you follow him down the hallway, you look through the enormous windows that stretch all the way across, revealing what appeared to be common rooms on either side. You observed the Hybrids, pleased to note that they all looked healthy and happy. There were multiple televisions and game consoles for them to use, toys for the younger ones, plenty of comfortable lounge chairs. The walls were lined with bookshelves, most of them packed full of all types of genres, some used for organizing board games. All in all, it didn’t appear to be the type of shelter that you’d heard horror stories about. 

“What do you do for a living, Y/N?” Heechul suddenly asks. 

“I’m a graphic designer. I work freelance taking on commissions for various companies.” 

“That’s good. That means you are at home a lot, right? Your hybrid will appreciate that. So you’re the artsy type?” 

“That’s one way of putting it,” you laugh softly. “It’s mostly making promotional stuff. Ads and things like that. Pays well enough. I still try to draw and paint what I want on my own time, but I don’t get paid for that.”

Heechul nods, continuing on silently, but with that same thoughtful look on his face. Maybe he was trying to think of the right hybrid for you? That would explain the questioning, anyway. 

“The halls for exotic breeds are right in here,” Heechul explains as he stops you in front of an elaborately carved door. “Normally, you’re only allowed to see the exotics if you’ve been thoroughly vetted. Most don’t even know they are here, because many of them are the only ones of their kind and we only want them to go to the right people. But I have a good feeling about you. Not to mention, any friend of Hamster's is a friend of mine.” 

“You’re never going to let that go, are you hyung?” Soonyoung sighs next to you.

“Not in a million years. Sorry, Hamster. Anyway, there is a class in session right now, and I thought we could sneak in there so you could look around. See if anyone catches your eye,” Heechul leads you to a room that had an open archway instead of a door. You could hear a deep voice rumbling above the rest, presumably the teacher as he was answering questions. 

Heechul leads you into the classroom, and the three of you sit in the very back of the class. The room was set up like a small college classroom, with one long table and four seats at each one. The room was bright and covered in educational posters, most of them cheesy. There were probably fifteen hybrids here, most of them with no characteristics to tell you what they were. 

When you finally glance at the podium, you feel like the breath has been knocked right out of you. The man standing there is so very tall, with a small waist and long, toned legs. His tan skin was practically glowing, his cheeks slightly flushed with excitement as he enthusiastically explained something to one of the hybrids. When he finished his explanation, he smiled, and you swear your heart stopped. His full lips alone could have caused that reaction, but the sweet grin was accompanied by two deep dimples on either side. You’d never understood the fascination with dimples, but you had to agree they added a touch of innocent appeal to his face, making the overall picture irresistible. 

As you looked closer at the man, you realized he was a hybrid too. His eyes glowed a sparkling golden shade that would be impossible otherwise. He was, unfortunately, wearing a beanie so you couldn’t tell if he had any ears or something under there. His nails were different too. Either he painted his nails, or they were naturally a shimmering blend of silver and gold. 

“Class dismissed! Don’t forget to do your reading, I’ll pop quiz someone at dinner,” the man smirked at the grumbling hybrids as he collected their things. 

You watched the hybrids file past, curious what made them “exotic.” You couldn’t really see much that struck you as something that different. Just the occasional odd eye color or hair that could be brushed off as coloring if one didn’t know better. The golden-eyed man stayed at the front, writing something into his big notebook. 

“Hi, I’m Yixing,” a handsome hybrid plopped into the seat next to you, smiling gently. He was so adorable you couldn’t help smiling back. 

“Hi, I’m Y/N. And this is my friend Soonyoung.” 

“Oh, we all know him. He’s old news,” he teases Soonyoung with a poke to his cheeks, and he tries to act offended, even if the effect is ruined by his giggle. The hybrid turns back to you. “Are you here to adopt?” 

“It seems so.” 

“That’s great! We exotics don’t get adopted out very often, but you look nice. I’m sure you’d take care of one of my friends very well.” 

“Not you?”

“Yixing here is already adopted. His owner had to go to some conference thing for Doctors, so Yixing was staying with us until he comes back. Which will be tomorrow. I bet you’re excited to see your Baekyun again, huh?” Heechul grins at Yixing, who starts babbling excitedly. 

“Yes! I hate when he goes on those trips. I miss him. At least I can come here and still take my classes and stuff, so I’m not lonely.” 

“That’s nice of you guys to do that,” you quirk an eyebrow at Heechul in surprise. “Usually once a hybrid is adopted out, the shelter wipes their hands of them. Or so I understood.” 

Heechul nods. “Most places, yeah, that’s probably true. But we let all the hybrids here know that they can always come back, no matter what. Even if it’s just for classes, or for respite care like Yixing here. This is a safe home for all.” 

At least you knew you’d be adopting from a decent place, even if the idea of ‘owning’ something that was whatever percent of human they were made you feel uncomfortable. 

“So, I don’t know if it’s rude of me to ask or not, but I can’t tell what kind of hybrid you are,” you ask hesitantly. 

Yixing’s eyes shine mischievously as he grins. 

“I see Heechul brought someone back here without telling them everything again. He did that to Baekhyun too. He loves to watch peoples faces as they discover the truth,” Yixing giggles as he and Heechul share a look. 

“I’m a Unicorn.” 

“Har Har,” you respond flatly. 

Yixing winked before closing his eyes. A glittering pastel glow appeared around his forehead, and slowly what appeared to be a horn grew out of his forehead. The color of the horn reminded you of the inside of an abalone shell, truly beautiful and shining brightly with a myriad of colors. You blinked a couple of times in disbelief. 

“And before you say anything, no, I’m not a Rhino,” Yixing laughed as he took in your befuddled stare.

“But...Unicorns aren’t real. They’re a myth,” you stammer, unable to take your gaze from the still shimmering horn that refuted that statement. 

“Myths had to come from somewhere, didn’t they? In fact, most of our exotics could be considered “myths,” Heechul countered softly. “Hybrids themselves shouldn’t exist, according to science. And yet, here I am with a building full of them.”

“Does it...what is...um,” you floundered, trying to search for the way to ask about him without seeming rude. 

“What does a Unicorn do? I have healing magic. I’m also able to emit a calm aura, which is probably why you’re not running out of here screaming about crazy people right now,” Yixing giggles.

You nod, unsure of how else to respond. It was a lot to take in. And you weren’t quite sure what to believe yet. 

“So you thought I should adopt a mythical hybrid?” you mumble to Heechul,  who merely nods and gestures towards the golden-eyed man who was still scribbling away at a desk. 

“Not just any. I wanted you to meet Namjoon. He’s been here for a long time because I was waiting for the right person to care for him. I have a gut feeling that you’re the one,” Heechul explains. 

“OH! Y/N would be perfect for Namjoon! I don’t know why I didn’t think of that myself!” Soonyoung squealed. 

“Wait, if you know all of them and aren’t surprised by all this, is Jihoon an exotic?” you ask with a frown. 

“Yup. He’s a Bakeneko. So, still technically a cat,” Soonyoung laughs. You make a mental note to remember to look that up later.

You couldn’t even imagine being the one to try to care for someone like Namjoon. Namjoon. You tried the name out in your mind a few times. It fit him. However, he was almost intimidatingly gorgeous and obviously smart, judging by the fact that he was in here teaching a class. What use would he have for you? 

“What is he?” You ask, almost terrified to hear the answer. 

“I’m a dragon,” a deep voice replied in front of you. You quickly meet Namjoon’s eyes as he grins reassuringly at you. 

“Hello. I saw that Yixing had his horn out in front of someone new so I thought I’d see what was going on. I’m Namjoon.” 

“Did you say a dragon?” you ask, unable to keep the shock and worry out of your voice. You realize your mistake when Namjoon’s face falls, and his easy-going grin was replaced with a polite smile. 

“Yes. Sorry.” 

“Oh, no. Don’t mind me. I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I’m just learning that you all exist is all,” your laugh is a little self-deprecating, but Namjoon seems relieved. 

“You’re very pretty.” Namjoon mumbles, a little blush growing on his cheeks as he studies you. 

“Thank you, Namjoon,” you're flattered that someone as beautiful as him would think so. 

“Are you here to pick someone up for adoption?” Namjoon asks as he pulls up a chair to the table and gets comfortable. 

“Uh, yeah,” you blush from the intensity of his stare, his golden eyes flickering as he observes you.

Heechul is grinning as he watches the two of you interact. 

“I brought her to meet you, dummy,” Heechul snorts. 

Namjoon’s eyes widen in shock. “Me? You want to adopt me?”

If you’d had any doubts before, they were gone now. The way that his voice wobbled and his eyes filled like it was unbelievable that someone would want to adopt him broke your heart. 

“If you’ll have me. I have a lot to learn, I think.” 

Namjoon’s smile was so wide and bright, and he reached over to pull you into a hug. 

“Thank you. Thank you so much,” he mumbled into your neck. You squeezed him gently back then turned to Heechul. 

“So what all do I have to do?”

“I can take care of all the boring paperwork myself. Why don’t you and Namjoon hang out for the day? Get to know each other. He can show you his room, so you have an idea how to decorate his. You probably have enough rooms in your Grandma’s house to even build him a studio.” 

You stared at Heechul in shock.

“I never told you I inherited my Grandma’s house.”

“Whoops,” Heechul smirked, not concerned to be caught out in the least. 

“You’re not quite an ordinary human either, are you? Are you a hybrid?” 

“I’d be offended to be called an ordinary anything, sweetheart. Come along, Hamster. Let’s leave them to get acquainted.” 

[eldritchsurveys]

588.

What's your name? >> Mordred.

How old are you? >> 32.

What's your hair and eye color? >> Dark brown, both.

How tall are you? >> 5′5″.

What's your relationship status? >> Married outworld, bonded inworld.

What's your favorite song? >> I guess it’s still Death is the Road to Awe by Clint Mansell. I don’t feel the need to actually have a favourite song, but that’s a good working answer.

What does that song mean? What is the message behind it? >> It seems to be the culmination of the leitmotif on The Fountain’s soundtrack. When I listen to it, it feels like a journey through a lifetime, a gradual and sometimes uncertain and sometimes rushed and sometimes dramatic and sometimes quiet crescendo towards the one singular moment of complete and utter awe. It feels like the most exultant piece of music I’ve ever heard, to the point where it’s painful.

Is it your favorite because you relate to it, or do you just like the beat? >> I feel comfortable with naming it as a favourite because it has a profound visceral emotional effect on me that no other song can really claim.

Have any pets? If so, what are they and what's their names? >> A black cat named Spooky Mulder.

Have you ever met your idol? If so, were they nice or were they kind of an ass? >> I don’t have any idols, but all of the musicians and celebrities I’ve met have been friendly.

What's your favorite method of gaming? (PC, Xbox, Playstation, etc) >> PC.

If you're in college, what's your major and why did you pick it? >> I’m not in college.

How're you doing today? >> I’m all right.

What color are your bedroom walls? >> Beige.

Describe your favorite shirt. >> Okay, naming favourites is hard enough with media and such, but there’s no way I can name a favourite shirt. I only keep the shirts I really like as it is.

Use this space to tell someone off. >> I’d really rather not.

What's your view on smart watches? Cool or a waste of money? >> I think they’re neat. But I don’t have the kind of income where I’d feel comfortable buying one, and I don’t want one anyway. I’m happy with the electronics I have.

What is one poster that you have hanging on your bedroom wall of? >> I only have one poster on my wall (the other things are art pieces), and it’s a Cradle of Filth promo poster that I found lying around with the free flyers and zines at the record store.

How many times have you moved in your life? >> So, so many.

If you moved, do you like where you are now better than where you were? >> This most recent move (almost 4 years ago now) has done wonders for me, even though I still don’t particularly like the location itself.

What's your favorite color and why? >> Gold. It just is, man.

Do you have a calendar? If so, what's the theme? >> No.

Have any famous person's autographs? >> Not anymore.

Do you draw well? >> Not anymore.

What type of cell phone do you have? >> Motorola, bleh. I’m never leaving Samsung again.

Should you be doing anything else right now or are you just bored? >> I’m doing this because I want to do this, not because I’m procrastinating or bored.

If you're in school/college, what's your favorite subject and why? >> ---

Are you a cat or a dog person? Why? >> I’m a “I’d rather not share my living space with animals” person. Outdoor-kept animals are absolutely fine (and those tend to be dogs, which I favour).

Tell me about the plot of your favorite book. >> ---

Do you wear glasses or contacts? >> No.

What do you think about horror movies? If you love them (I do), what's your favorite? >> I do love horror movies, although I can be rather particular about them. I wouldn’t say I have a favourite, but I’ve been obsessed with the Hellraiser franchise (movies, novels, comics) for like 12 years, so there’s that.

Got any cool Christmas presents picked out for family or friends yet? >> No. I’m going to try to see if I can get a pre-owned copy of Super Mario Odyssey at GameStop, but otherwise I have no idea what I’d get Sparrow as a full-on gift, especially since I’m low on funds right now. I just have a bunch of small things that I’m going to put in her stocking.

Do you do Black Friday shopping or wait for Cyber Monday? >> I don’t do either, really, but I prefer Cyber Monday as a concept.

Have any mental illnesses? >> Probably, but the only reason that’d matter is for the purposes of retaining my government income.

What's your favorite word and why? >> ---

What is the most expensive thing you own, and what is it? >> My gaming laptop, probably.

Did you buy that item yourself? >> I did.

Where do you work and what is your postion? >> ---

How often do you cuss? >> Quite often.

What type of car do you drive, if any? >> I don’t drive.

Are you happy with it? If no, what's your dream car? >> ---

Do you have a lot of social media accounts? Which ones? >> No, I just have facebook and tumblr. I might do some research into Mastodon soon, because I’m curious.

What is your favorite genre of music? >> ---

Does your family have holiday traditions? If so, what are they? >> ---

If you're in a relationship, are you happy with it? >> Sure.

How long have you been with your significant other? >> Eight or so years.

Do you like psychology? (It's my college major). >> I... sigh. I think it’s interesting to study, but I think the way it’s used has done a lot of harm for me personally, so I have very little confidence in it as a practice.

What is something your state is popularly known for? >> I don’t know... beer and wine? Snow? Apples? Detroit?

Do you like to do craft projects? If so, what's the coolest thing you made? >> I don’t mind doing craft projects, but I don’t do them often.

Do you watch sports or do you think they're overrated? >> I don’t think they’re overrated, I just don’t care about them.

What's one occupation you think gets paid too much and doesn't deserve to? >> I don’t have an opinion about this.

Do you straigthen your hair? >> No.

Ever dyed your hair a color that isn't natural? (blue, pink, etc) >> Purple, yeah.

How's your relationship with your parents? >> Completely nonexistent.

Do you still live with them or do you have your own house? >> I obviously do not live with parents.

What's something you are currently saving money for to buy? >> Nothing.

Do you smoke/vape? If so, what brand do you smoke/what device do you use? >> No.

Ever done drugs? >> Yes.

Tell me one of your worst habits. >> Meh.

What's a weird quirk you have that no one else you know does? >> I don’t know, I don’t pay enough attention.

If you game, what type of headset do you use? >> I have a Razer headset.

What type of computer do you own, and do you like it? >> I have an MSI computer for gaming and a Lenovo one for everything else. I love them both, they’re good machines.

What's the thing that annoys you the most? >> Meh.

What brand of TV do you have? >> Samsung.

Are you excited for Christmas? (It's December 1st today when I made this) >> Yes!

Tell me about your favorite vacation you've taken. >> This most recent one to New Orleans, because we got to spend a whole week and we were there for Halloween. Also, there was a wedding.

Tell me something cool about yourself. >> I was born with twelve fingers. Fuck you, that’s cool.

Did/do you get good grades in school/college? >> ---

What's your ringtone on your phone? >> I have no idea, it’s always on vibrate or DND.

What's your favorite store to shop in? >> ---

If you won the lottery, what is the first thing you would buy and why? >> Dude, I don’t even play the lottery.

How long have you had a Bzoink account? >> I don’t know, like 9 years.

Ever been to Field of Screams? If so, what's your favorite attraction? >> No.

Do you own a Polaroid camera? >> No.

Do you have hardwood floor in your room or carpet? >> Carpet.

It's a Saturday night, what are you typically doing? >> I don’t know, messing around on the internet as usual.

Do you have a lot of friends or do you not have any at all? >> I have... er... I don’t know. Two? One? Three? I don’t know what a friend is, ask me some other time.

What's your all time favorite movie and why? >> The Fountain. Similar reasons to the song question (especially considering the song comes from this movie).

How many blankets do you sleep with at night? >> I sleep with a sheet and one of the weighted blankets.

What's the last TV show you watched? Did you enjoy it? >> Grey’s Anatomy. You’re damn right I enjoyed it.

Do you prefer cable TV or do you use Netflix? >> I use streaming services.

What is your dream job and why? >> ---

Do you think you would be a good therapist? >> No.

What's your favorite brand of clothing? >> I don’t have one.

[eilonwiiy]

ALSO FOR RAYLAIR (baldrynn??)

omg i’d apologize for how long this is, but i kNOW we both love it

who hogs the duvet Baldair FOR SURE.  But Raylynn has no qualms about roughly tugging them back and, in doing so, waking him up.

who texts/rings to check how their day is going Neither. They’re both pretty independent people and focus on what they’re doing during the day.  Every now and then Raylynn will send Baldair an unexpected ‘hi’ in the middle of the day - nothing else - and it always makes him grin like a fool.  Often he’ll send a simple ‘hi’ back and that will be the end of it.  It’s all they need to say to know they’re both thinking of each other.  

who’s the most creative when it comes to gifts They’re actually pretty shit when coming up with ideas for gifts.  Every holiday, both of them, in a moment of desperation, suck up their pride and ask their friends for advice.  Aldrik always chastises Baldair for waiting until the last second to get a gift for “the woman of which your heart supposedly belongs to” and goes on and on about what he’s gotten Vhalla and how he made it months in advance and if this display of procrastination is any indication of their relationship, then perhaps he does not deserve Raylynn.  Only when Baldair threatens to tell Vhalla what he’s made her does Aldrik grudgingly agree to help.  Raylynn turns to the Guard and inevitably rolls her eyes at Jax’s usual suggestion to offer Baldair a “sexual favor”.  In the end, Baldair always manages to catch Raylynn off guard with something sickly sweet and sentimental, and Raylynn reconsiders Jax’s advice.  

who gets up first in the morning Raylynn.  It takes an army to drag Baldair from bed in the morning.  Or the promise of shower sex. 

who suggests new things in bed PFFT PLS. BOTH.

who cries at movies They’re too busy making out to pay attention.

who gives unprompted massages Baldair, and they always lead to sexy fun times.

who fusses over the other when they’re sick Both of them put on a pretty good show of fussing over the other, but mostly bc they both know how much the other hates being treated like an invalid.

who gets jealous easiest Neither.  They’ve been each other’s ‘person’ for years.  They know who they are to each other and nothing could change that. 

who has the most embarrassing taste in music Baldair has caught Raylynn singing some pretty questionable tunes in the shower.  He provides back-up vocals.

who collects something unusual Raylynn doesn’t like to accumulate too much stuff and weighing herself down, both physically and mentally.  Childhood Baldair went thru phases of hoarding stuff bc Aldrik was always collecting unusual trinkets.     

who takes the longest to get ready Baldair, though even then, not very long.  His natural charm is his greatest accessory and it’s never a big affair to get ready in the morning.

who is the most tidy and organized Both are pretty tidy creatures, mostly bc Baldair has a staff of servants and Raylynn owns very few possessions.

who gets most excited about the holidays Baldair makes a HUGE fuss over holidays.  His parties are legendary.  Once he threw a month long party for the Festival of the Sun at the Imperial Manor in Oparium, and to this day, he doesn’t know how he ended up at the beach buried neck deep as a sand mermaid.  It was quite a shock when he woke up surrounded by a crowd of curious locals. 

who is the big spoon/little spoon They like to wrestle in bed for the title of big spoon, but Raylynn always lets Baldair win and he does so without comment.  He knows what it means for her to willingly lose.  It took her a long time to enjoy the protective feel of his arms around her, but now it’s the last thing she wants to remember before falling asleep.  

who gets most competitive when playing games and/or sports Both! They’re vicious back-and-forth smack talk across the carcivi board is heard throughout the halls by the staff so often that they secretly keep a tally of who has the best insults.  And whenever they spar with each other, they’re sure to draw a crowd and Jax is quick to get bets on the winner going.

who starts the most arguments Fights are almost nonexistent for these two.  They love a good vocal sparring match, love to get under each other’s skin, but they never have angry confrontations.  It’s simply never been the nature of their relationship.  Their disagreements are more like level-headed debates that they never get the fire burning underneath them to fuel them into something less contained.  

who suggests that they buy a pet Baldair.  HE WANTS A DOG SO BAD PLS RAY LET ME HAVE A DOG I PROMISE I’LL TAKE CARE OF IT

what couple traditions they have Once they FINALLY become an official couple, they have a sparing match on the anniversary of when they first met (which both were extremely shy to admit that they remembered).  It’s always somewhere privately and neither one keeps track of how many times each wins or loses. 

what tv shows they watch together They’re both very active and prefer to be outdoors, rather than sit on the couch and watch TV.  But Raylynn will admit that she has a morbid fascination with Keeping Up With The Kardashians.  Baldair has been sworn to secrecy about this guilty pleasure, especially amongst the Golden Guard.  He is more than happy to indulge her if it means he can watch with her and do obnoxious Kim K impersonations.  Raylynn has never laughed so hard than when one time in the middle of a heated argument with Aldrik, Baldair told him that he had the emotional range of Kourtney Kardashian.     

what other couple they hang out with It takes some time for Baldair & Raylynn and Vhalla & Aldrik to find a comfortable rhythm together, but they eventually they get there.  With the high demands of the Empire, they like to have quiet nights in together, usually teaming up in pairs and playing a game of carcivi.  Charades is now banned from date night bc no one, including Vhalla, wants to be partners with Aldrik (sorry bb you’re just BAD at it)    

how they spend time together as a couple They like to travel, and since Baldair is “the spare”, he has more freedom to do so than Aldrik.  They’re also on a mission to have sex in every secret passageway and hidden chamber in the palace.  Since Baldair knows where most of them are, he lets Raylynn see if she discover them.  Yes, Aldrik has walked in on them before.            

who made the first move It was a mutual moment.  They were each others ‘person’ for years and neither one wanted to best the other.  Truthfully, it didn’t feel like an world-shattering confession for either of them.  It felt like coming home after a very long trip.  It was always there, just out of reach.   

who brings flowers home While Baldair would be more than happy to oblige any demands for flowers (he’s done so MANY times with MANY young maidens), Raylynn has no interest in them.  

who is the best cook Raylynn.  Baldair grew up with a royal kitchen staff, whereas Raylynn has always had to fend for herself.

[frederator-studios]

Diane Obomsawin: The Frederator Interview

Diane Obomsawin, also known by her pen name Obom, is a Quebec author, illustrator, and animator. After becoming a legend in the comic art scene in Montreal, she forayed into animation—and we can all be glad for it. Her films are quirky and evocative; funny and full of heart. Her latest short film, “I Like Girls” (2016), based on her graphic novel On Loving Women, won the Nelvana Grand Prize for Independent Short at the 40th Ottawa International Animation Festival. It is a film close to her own heart, featuring the story of her own coming of age, and coming out. I was privileged to discuss the importance of positive Queer representation, and combatting stereotypes of homosexuality in film and TV, with a leader and role model in LGBTQ media such as Diane.

When did you first become interested in animation?

I began making graphic novels when I was 10 years old. I was always drawing, but it wasn’t until a friend recommended animation to me, that later in life - I was 35 - I joined the animation program at Concordia.

How did you become involved with the NFB?

My teacher at Concordia, Wendy Tilby, had long made productions with the NFB. I was lucky to learn from her; at the same time that she taught me the ‘correct’ methods to animate, she encouraged me not to change from the different ways I’d been working. The NFB was looking for someone to do a few author commissioned short films, “Understanding the Law,” and she recommended me. It was a great, because although they were commissions, I could do them in my own style. At first I was nervous about bringing my humor into them—but they told me to have fun, so I did!

How did you come to write the graphic novel, On Loving Women?

I wanted to tell tiny, real stories. All my life, lesbians and gay people have been marginalized. Now there is less marginalization, and more films and TV series talk about lesbian and gay people’s experiences. So when I went to write the graphic novel, it felt as though society was ready to hear these stories—and I felt ready to tell them. I hadn’t always been. But even if the timing is better now, for so many years, lesbians - gay people, but lesbians especially - have not been represented in films and TV. So as much as we’re talking about these experiences more now, we can never talk about them too much. With the Bechdel test, we see that women are already under-represented in movies, and lesbians have been practically nonexistent; aside from the old trope of lesbian and gay love ending in tragedy! I wanted to show the reality of lesbian’s experiences - the joy, bittersweetness, sexuality - in their own words.

What was your process in interviewing women for the piece?

I chose 10 friends of all different ages. My hope was to interview women young to old to reflect the variations in stories across generations. The youngest was 28, and the oldest was 70. But that didn’t translate into the film—the oldest woman is actually Charlotte, but she appears to be the youngest because the actress was young. But I purposefully cast young actors because it’s a film about youth. I asked my friends about their first attraction, not first love. And first attraction might begin very young - ages 5, 6, 7 - long before they realize their sexuality, or fall in love with another woman.  

And all of the little details in the story - did they just emerge during your talks?

Oh yes, I didn’t change anything. I recently asked my friend, “Is it true? You ate Pepsi dipped ice cream cones?” and she said, “Yeah, absolutely!” The details came naturally. I think it helped that I didn’t directly ask them about their experiences, so much as their smallest memories - anything that came to the conscious. I was so surprised by some stories. One friend, she never consciously or unconsciously felt attracted to another girl, nor realized that she was a lesbian. It all came together for her in a single day, when she was in college. She tried LSD and fell in love with a woman, in that order.

Whoa, what a story. It must have been tough to choose only a few for “I Like Girls”!

So difficult. I chose four: the ones I felt to be the most romantic, the goofiest - Wonder Woman with a horse face - and my own. As well as the saddest story, Marie’s. Hers is even more sad in the graphic novel: her mother gave her a terrible time, trying to put her into treatment for her “problem”. Her experience is what I mean by generational difference. Marie is only 5 years older than me, and just from those 5 years, our realities were so disparate. The culture shifted and perceptions changed—not totally, but quickly. They impacted our parent’s perspectives. For her family, and those of my other older friends, coming out was a very big deal. “You’re not my daughter anymore”—they considered it unacceptable. But when I came out, I was accepted. My parents told me, “We love you, we want you to be happy”. I was lucky. But even though it’s easier today, it’s still not easy. In normalizing the experience of coming out, I was thinking about young people who are going through it now.

Have any responses to the film stayed with you?

Yes—it’s been so touching to hear from young women that they identified with a character, or that the film helped them in some way. One even sent me a picture of a tattoo she got of one of the graphic novel characters. I remember reading The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith (adapted into the film Carol, 2015). It was the first novel that ended happily for women in a lesbian relationship. I felt such joy and relief seeing myself in those characters. And so did countless lesbians and gay people who have written to her for years since!

What were techniques you used to make “I Like Girls,” and how did you choose to make them animals?

For some of the scenes, I used rotoscoping. The scene with two characters in bed together, I filmed dancers, for their comfort level and ability to move. Then I drew over them. It’s already difficult to draw two bodies entwined, but it’s even more so with a non-realistic art style like mine. And I also rotoscoped because it was important to me that the character’s movements be sensual, and that they be sexy. There’s a stereotype of gay women as lacking sexuality, and I wanted to make a point against that. And my non-realistic style is also why I gravitate toward animals rather than humans; if I could draw people that didn’t look so boring, I would! But the main reason to make them animals was to ensure that my friends wouldn’t feel too close when they saw their stories unfold on-screen. They could still recognize themselves, but with a degree of separation.

Do you have a favorite among your films, or love them equally?

I think I love them equally. Well… maybe “Kaspar”, perhaps because it didn’t do well at festivals. It’s like if you have one in the bunch that is less successful, you actually like it more! “Here and There” was about my own adolescence, growing up; “Kaspar” was about Kaspar Hauser, who grew up in a cave before dying very young; and “I Like Girls” is of course about coming of age. I realized recently that they all talk about childhood! So the next one will be something new. It also won’t have voiceover - there will be dialogue, but not voice-over.

What are you up to currently?

I’m working on my friend Khoa Lê’s film, “Dans nos ville”. He brought on 18 other creators, including me, to each do a segment on a different fairytale. It’ll play for 7 days in 7 different places, narrated by an actor and with live music. It’s exciting, but my segment is almost 4 minutes long—and I have a month and a half to do it! So I’m using more abstract animation than usual. I’m also doing the opening animation for Le Carrousel festival in Rimouski, which has a focus on children’s and YA work. The animation is a series of loops that go up and down—it’s meant to have a feeling of perpetual movement, reminiscent of a carousel.

You’ve recently ventured into visual exhibitions as well - how do you like  compared to traditional mediums?

t’s a different way to tell a story! Unlike graphic novels and films, they don’t require a beginning and end. You can come into the story at any point. In 2015, I created an animated visual art installation in Quebec City called “La Forêt” (“The Forest”). We projected images of a forest upon three charcoal covered walls. My aim was for the spectator to feel that they are not supposed to be there; they are spying on the forest life, and the forest is revealing its secrets. Tiny things happen, mostly from mythology and fairy tales. Little Red Riding Hood makes an appearance. I have another installation coming up for spring 2019. It will be half animation, half-graphic novel; spread throughout three gallery rooms of a small museum. The theme is dreams and mythology. I dream a lot, a lot, a lot—so I record them in a journal. I want to explore the links between our dreams and mythology.

Do you have other projects in the works?

I’m working on my friend Khoa Lê’s film, “Dans nos ville”. He brought on 18 other creators, including me, to each do a segment on a different fairytale. It’ll play for 7 days in 7 different places, narrated by an actor and with live music. It’s exciting, but my segment is almost 4 minutes long—and I have a month and a half to do it! So I’m using more abstract animation than usual. I’m also doing the opening animation for Le Carrousel festival in Rimouski, which has a focus on children’s and YA work. The animation is a series of loops that go up and down—it’s meant to have a feeling of perpetual movement, reminiscent of a carousel.

Do you have a favorite artist and favorite animated film?

One of my very favorite artists is Copi. I like his simple drawings and his writing, which is absurd, poetic, and corrosive all at once. I discovered him when I was young, and didn’t know whether he was a man or a woman until I was an adult, and found out that he was an Argentinian transvestite and playwright, and lived in Paris. So far as films… I could choose a different favorite animated film every week. But today, I will go with the very beautiful and strange film Nighthawk from Spela Cadez. After I saw it, I asked myself, “What just happened to me?”. Watching that film is a very sensitive experience.

Thank you so much for the interview Diane! I look forward to keeping up with your many projects. Especially excited for your next short film!

- Cooper

[sparxwrites]

I would be incredibly interested to read what you were talking about in the tags of that ask/post~

#there’s a lot more i could write abouthow this is an emerging pattern in fan culture #and how what wasinitially meant to be a community free from content creators #is nowincreasingly becoming a community beholden to them and their approval#a community that operates within their oversight #and how people whouse fandom for what it was traditionally used for - as a sociallysubversive medium outside of mainstream control #are being penalisedfor refusing to sanitise their content and fall in line

Ihope you wanted an 8k essay about fan-creator interactions and whythey frequently end up being toxic for fans, creators, and also aboutfandom as an increasingly monetized and manipulated community, anon,because that’s what you’ve got.

Asa disclaimer, before we start: I am a linguist by training, not aneconomist, sociologist, or psychologist (though my discipline doescross over with the latter two in several places). This is written inan academic-ish style, but it’s largely based on my personalexperiences in fandom over the past ten years, the personalexperiences of the hundreds of friends and strangers that I’vetalked to or read essays by during that time, and a lot of personalresearch and reading. It’s not Word Of God, and I’m entirely opento people critiquing it, arguing with it, or elaborating on it –stuff like this is, I feel, something we need more dialogue about infandom spaces. With all that said…

Thesisstatement: Historically,fandom has very much operated on a “keep creators as far fromfandom as possible” basis, for some very excellent reasons. Withthe rise of social media contact, the gradual mainstreaming offandom, and increasingly fandom-aware creators and corporations, itis no longer possible to keep creators away from fandom. However, inthe rush to embrace creators into fandom, many of the hard-learnedlessons of fandoms past (and present) have been forgotten andignored. This, in combination with the increased monetization offandom and the exploitation of free fan labour by capitaliststructures, is a dangerous and potentially toxic combination. Whilstit’s not possible – and not desirable – to turn back the clock,fandom needs to carefully consider exactly whywe’re inviting creators into fandom space, how that should behandled, and how to mitigate the potential consequences of that.

Firstoff, there are a few pieces of terminology uses I want to make clear,and a few starting assumptions I want to detail, just so we’re allgoing into this from somewhat the same starting point:

When I say fandom here, I mean creative fandom – ie. writers, artists, graphics makers, cosplayers, and various others, along with the people who support them and interact with them in a variety of ways. There are other kinds of fandom, of course; notably casual fandom where someone simply enjoys a book / show / movie, or collative fandom, focused on collecting facts / statistics / comic editions / props. These types of fandom are not the ones I have experience with, however, and are also not entirely relevant given this discussion is specifically about creators in creative fandom.

I’m assuming that fandom is a space where people should be allowed to create whatever the hell they want, within the bounds of legality. That means if people want to write rape fic, draw art of extreme kinks, cosplay “problematic” characters, or ship unhealthy / abusive ships, they should be able to – without people going “think of the children!” or “you’re a Bad Person”. Debating whether this attitude is the right one is another conversation entirely; you can read more about why I take this stance in an essay I wrote a while back about ‘heavy’ kinks, and also in the purity politics tag on my personal blog – but if you fundamentally disagree with this stance, you’re probably going to disagree with this essay in general.

When I use “creator(s)” here, I’m talking about the people making the canon content – whether that’s an actor, a voice actor, a writer, a director / producer, a comic artist, a game development studio, a youtuber, whatever. When I use “fan(s)”, I’m primarily talking about individuals within creative fandom (ie. those who create fan content, and those who support them). Yes, some (if not most) fans are absolutely creators too, given fan content is just as valid and creative as ‘official’ content – but it is, linguistically, easier for me to use “creator” and “fan” rather than having to tie myself up in descriptive knots. Yes, there are areas of fandom that are primarily about curation rather than creation, and there are fans who simply enjoy the source material and don’t involve themselves in what they would consider “fandom” at all, and those are valid ways of interaction with the source material – but, as I mentioned above, that’s not the aspect of fan-creator interaction and fandom I’m talking about.

So,now we’ve got that out the way…

1.Fandom History, “Purity Politics”, and Censorship

Historically,mainstream media has not been kind to fandom – nor have mainstreamwebsites, or even primarily fandom-oriented websites for that matter.Fanfiction.net is notorious for having done a mass-deletionof “adult” works(though theirongoing policing of this is spotty at best and nonexistent at worst),and I remember them also having a list of authors who’d contactedthem and “asked” them not to host fic from their books / serieson the website. Livejournal also had severalmass deletions thatpartially targeted fan communities, especially communities producing“unacceptable” fanworks. Slash communities and the like wereoften specifically targeted, because the people pushing for thedeletions had homophobic agendas and considered queer fiction more“inappropriate” than heterosexual / gen fiction.

Thiswas, in some ways, the beginning of our current purity politicsepidemic – people campaigning against certain types of fanfic thatthey personally disliked or disagreed with under the banner of“protecting the children” – except, in these instances, it waspressure coming from outside fandoms rather than within them. AO3(and the Organization for Transformative Works’ associated effortstowards fandom archiving, fannish academia, and legal advocacy) wasfounded partiallyas a response to these deletionsand to the concept of “acceptable” versus “unacceptable”fanworks.

I’mnot gonna do a huge history lesson here, but if you want to read moreabout this, a little bit of googling will get you a long way (as willfollowing the links above). These events have been talked aboutextensively by people who were more involved in them than I was, andif you haven’t heard about them before, they’re worth readingabout. Fandom history is important, y’all.

WhatI’m getting at here is there’s a reason older fans / peoplewho’ve been in fandom a while have a good reason to be faintlyparanoid about creators coming into fan spaces, or being too aware ofthem. Specifically,fans who write “inappropriate” or “bad” fanworks –including adult or nsfw content, Real Person Fiction (rpf ) / RealPerson Slash (rps), slash or femslash, anything involving dark ormature themes such as sexual abuse, child abuse, incest, rape,domestic violence, etc. – have the most reason to be concerned.Backlash to the same degree as has happened in the past is a littlemore unusual, due to the mainstreaming of fandom and increased fansolidarity, but it still happens.

(Assomeone who’s both been in fandom for A While now and remembers theaftermath of the deletions (even though I didn’t have an LJ accountor write mature fanfic at the time) and writes “bad” fanworks, Ihave doubly good reason to be paranoid. Hence why I talk about this alot, and have Strong Opinions on it. Most of the other people I’vetalked to who have Strong Opinions on this tend to fall into thosetwo categories, too. If you’re not from these groups, then… maybeconsider, if you’re sitting there going, “yes, but Idon’t feel threatened by anyof this,” whyyou don’t feel threatened. Try to see it from our perspective.)

Inaddition to corporate / website efforts to stamp out fandom spaces ingeneral, and “undesirable”, non-mainstream, or subversive fanspaces specifically (including, again, gay / queer spaces, becausethat was considered “undesirable”), various authors and showsmade their own efforts. Anne Rice is notorious for her veryaggressive stance against fanfiction. Even JK Rowling, one of thefirst authors to publicly say she was okay with fanfic, has gone onrecord saying she objects to adult work involving HarryPotter characters – although“innocent” fics by “genuine fans” are okay, apparently.

Theshow Supernaturalhas had several entire episodesdedicated to taking the piss out of fandom in general – andfangirls specifically, caricaturing them as ditzy, obsessive, creepy,lonely, unlikeable, sex-obsessed – despite the fact that theirfandom is the only reason they’re still running. It’s all thesame usual, unpleasant stereotypes that get pulled up every timewomen, and especially teenage girls, become invested in or excited bya piece of media. A previous fandom of mine, the Yogscast, had ahistory of begging and / or outright stealing fanart from artists formerch, video use, or general promo stuff – but also decided to reada fairly ‘innocent’, fluffy fic on stream in order to mock boththe author and the fic (and in the process drove the author off theface of fandom internet, basically).

Again,we see fandom and fanworks being split into “acceptable” and“unacceptable” by content creators – people not actuallyinvolved in fandom, but feeling as though they have a kind ofownership over it, or say in it – based on mainstream mediastandards and their personal morals (and what they can monetizeversus what they can’t, though more on that later). And the reasonthey feel like they have any kind of ownership over fandom is veryoften that they are a creator, and they see fanworks as, in someways, “belonging” to them rather than just being a derivative oftheir work.

Creatorshave always struggled to understand that fandom is, primarily, forthe fans– not there as an expression of the fans’ heart-eyed adorationfor the creators, but as an expression of the fans’ creativity, oftheir ideas and enthusiasm for the work itself, and often of theirdissatisfactionwith the source material. Fandom is a space for the fans, butcreators often feel as though they should have some kind of say init, merely by merit of having created the source material.

Historically,this entitlement – valid or not, though I’m inclined towards not– has manifested itself as creators aggressively(and generally unsuccessfully) trying to stop the creation of fancontent based ontheir material. Which is a pretty terrible option, given it destroysfandoms and often leads to harassment and legal issues for fans.

Somewherebetween that and where we are now, we had creators realising therewas fuck-all they could do about fannish activities, given the sizeof the web and the determination of fans, and instead just did theirbest to ignore it all. This was, in my opinion, a pretty good courseof action. This was what tended to happen with fandom when I firstentered it – creators were aware of it, it occasionally got broughtup in interviews if a particularly dedicated reporter had discoveredit existed, and the creator usually laughed nervously and saidsomething to the effect of, “I know it’s out there but I tend toavoid it for legal / personal reasons”.

2.The Monetization of Fandom, and the Exploitation of Fan Labour

So,what changed between then and now? A lot, I think – including theemergence of a generation of new, fandom-savvy and tech-savvycreators, many of whom grew up in fandom (think Rebecca Sugar, AlexHirsch, the cast of Critical Role to a degree… others, probably,but those are the ones I’m aware of) knowing where to go to findfandom. Also, the rise of social media, and the increasing ease ofinteracting with fandom on a variety of platforms.

Asa creator, when you’ve got a bunch of people who love the thing youcreated, and are producing a bunch of derivative works from it, thatcan be very flattering! And people tend to react positively to theopportunity to interact one-on-one with a creator, which social mediaallows them to do, and again this positive feedback is veryflattering. Being in a fandom space for a creator is, at its mostshallow and cynical, an ego boost – you have a huge base of peoplewho all (usually) like a thing you’ve made, like you and thinkyou’ve very clever for having made it, and are (usually) eager tocreate things either based off of the thing you did, or even as adirect present for you.

There’salso the fact that fandom is now big enough to very successfullymonetize, and creators (and big businesses) are increasingly workingout how to do this successfully. This takes a lot of different forms:ever-growing conventions with ever-more dealer tables, more merch,subscription-based services (such as Geek & Sundry and Nerdist’sAlphaor Roosterteeth’s First,or even Twitch subscriptions), Youtube in general, Patreon /Kickstarter… and also, more insidiously, theuse of fandom as free labour.

Fandomhas alwaysbeen partially about labour,as anyone who’s ever made fanart or fanfic or manips or a podcastor… well, really anything, can attest to. Even being actively partof a community is, in some ways, labour. However, there’s adifference between free (and freely given) labour – writing a ficis hard work, true, but often it’s funtoo, and is done as a labour of love, as a form of play or relaxation– and exploited free labour.

Freelabour is the creation of fanart and fanfic and other art and objectsby fans, for fans. Free labour is labour done under the heading of“play” or “relaxation” or “a hobby”, something thecreator enjoys doing. Free labour is even fan-run websites, or fanscampaigning to get a show back on air, or doing other things thattraditionally PR and advertising managers would do except for free,of their own free will just because they love the source material.

Exploitedfree labour is Anime Expo, a 10,000 attendee strong for-profitconvention callingfor volunteer translators to do skilled labour for free.Exploited free labour is the Yogscast, a major Youtube network,askingfor free art from skilled fanartists, and repeatedly failing tocredit fanartists who’ve done commissions for them.Exploited free labour is Amanda Palmer raising $1.2 million onKickstarter, but solicitingfans of hers who were professional musicians to work for her for freebecause she “couldn’t afford to pay them”.Exploited free labour is Universal Studios solicitingFireflyfans to help market and promote the movie for free, and then sendingthem a cease-and-desist letter once the movie had been released.Exploited free labour is E.L. James getting FiftyShades of Grey published offthe back of reviewsand collaborative idea generation from hundreds of fellow fandommembers, butcompletely failing to acknowledge this. Exploited free labour isLiveJournal’s(thankfully failed) attempt to make a for-profit fanfiction sitewhere writers had to surrender copyright to the creators of canon.The examples go on, and on, and on.

Fandomhas gone from something small and rather community based – wherepeople didprovide skilled labour for free, because cons and such were organisedby the community for the community, because there wasn’t a lot ofmoney going round, because it was about fandom rather than profit,because they were recompensed for that free labour in non-monetaryways (including reputation and other social currencies) – tosomething monetized. Cons are run by businesses now, primarily, andorganised fan events are professional affairs where a lotof money changes hands. Corporations that try and equate the two arebeing deliberately manipulative.

Basically,fundamentally capitalist constructions like the kind we see incorporate-ized fandom deliberately invoke fandom’s history of giftculture in an attempt to scam fans out of free labour. The wholepoint of gift culture is that it is reciprocal– I create something for a friend or someone I like, and in returnthey create something for me (even if that creation is a review ofwhatever I created, or something more abstract than a tangiblereward). The whole point of capitalism is that it isn’treciprocal, or at least not in the same way – I provide a servicefor someone who is likely to be a complete stranger, and in returnthey give me money. When capitalism tries to wriggle out of the“giving me money” bit of their equation by appealing to the factthat, in a gift culture, I do things for “free”, it’s blatantbullshit quite frankly.

It’sblatant, deliberatebullshit, because the companies know exactly what they’re doing,and what they’re doing is devaluing and exploiting fan labour offthe back of fandom’s cultural traditions.

(Andbefore someone says, “but it is reciprocal! Creators make a thingfor us, and we make a thing for them,” I’m going to point outthat often fans have alreadyengaged with the capitalist modelto access the Creator Thing in the first place. Fans have paid forthe movie, book, TV show, or they’ve subscribed to the Twitchchannel, or the Patreon, or donated to the Kickstarter. The creatorsare already getting monetarily compensated for their work, becausemainstream creators work in the context of the capitalist model, notthe gift culture model. Therefore, the things the creators are makingcannotbe the reciprocal part of the gift culture, since that has alreadybeen bought.)

It’sone thing for me and a friend to organise a fanmeet for a fandomwe’re in, for free, where the meet is about meeting friends fromthe fandom and socialising. It’s another thing for, say, a companyrunning a convention that will be making tens of thousands, if nothundreds of thousands, of dollars of profit, to ask if I’llorganise thatfor free. That’s a dramatic (and somewhat unrealistic, though seethe translator thing above) example, but the point stands.

Capitalismtakes advantage of fandom’s innate gift culture, and itstraditional free exchange of ideas and fan collaboration, in moreinsidious ways, too. As thispaper (which youmay not be able to read in full if you don’t have institutionalaccess, but I can provide if you message me) notes, regarding a viralseries of videos on Youtube called Lonelygirl15that was one of the first new media fandoms:

[…] the team consciously used to theiradvantage the myth of the do-it-yourself (DIY) celebrity inherent toYouTube. […] YouTube’s ability to freely distribute content tomillions with little investment holds the promise to broadcastoneself to fame and fortune. As a result, hundreds of fans, with thehopes of becoming legitimate storytellers, created videos around theLG15world. Most hoped that mere mention of their work in the franchiseproper would open doors for them. In the process, the fans werewillingly generating value for the franchise. The team, on the otherhand, heavily regulated the boundaries of the LG15canon by actively marking fan fiction as ancillary and used copyrightclaims as ways to carefully manage community initiatives. Keeping thefans at arm’s length ran counter to their initial rhetoric ofcommunity-led collaborative storytelling and subsequently estrangedthe very community that had initially given them exposure.

[…] I argue that it is a form ofexploitation because the creative team mislead the fans into thinkingthat their participation would have a more meaningful impact on theshow proper. This intentional misleading was primarily to garner theattention of the mainstream media and grow the show into a robustfranchise. The team claimed to be experimenting with a new type ofstorytelling, a community-based narrative that embodied the generalspirit of co-authorship. They sold their show to fans as anunprecedented initiative that would blur the actor/producer and fandivide, a promise that did not actualize for many fans and wasfrequently curtailed by the creative team’s eagerness to protectthe artistic integrity of their show. Ultimately, the team’s goalof proving LG15 to be a financially viable initiative led them toconfine fan engagement within strictly defined parameters thatultimately undermined their initial rhetoric of community-ledstorytelling.

- “Exposingconvergence: YouTube, fan labour, and anxiety of cultural productionin Lonelygirl15” by Burcu S.Bakioğlu

This“business model” – in which fandom-savvy creators with a closeconnection to their fandom and a marketing-based knowledge of howfandom works string their fans along with ultimately empty dreams,whilst simultaneously holding them at a distasteful arm’s length –can be seen as echoes through somany new media fandoms, and avariety of traditional ones too. It’s the typical push-pull ofcreators who are hungry for the free advertising and labour fans canprovide, but who find fandom in all its queer, subversive,traditionally-female glory to be fundamentally distasteful.

(Fanartistsare, I think, the most vulnerable to this kind of exploitation.Fanfiction is often seen as undesirable (sometimes even within fandomspaces, but that’s another essay), but fanart? Provided it’s the“right” kind of fanart – ie. sfw, fairly canon-compliant,well-drawn, no implications of gay/trans stuff – then it’s verydesirable. Fanart contests,t-shirt or merch design contests, gif contests, are all fairlycommonplace. I’ve never heard of a fanfic equivalent.)

It’sa far more subtle form of monetization, but all the more dangerousfor it, especially because it lures fans into a false sense ofsecurity with the creator. They feel that the creator is on theirside, is “one of them”, is going to reciprocate the unpaid labourthey put in, actually “gets” fandom or is supportive of itsnon-mainstream and subversive endeavours… only to then bedisappointed, because inevitably the creator isn’t interested inanything other than maximising profit by manipulating their fanbase,and may actually find the fans they’re toying with activelydistasteful.

Youcan find a hugeamount of writing and research on these concepts via googling “freelabour fandom” or “fandom labour exploitation”, by the way, ifyou’re interested. This isn’t a concept I’ve just come up with– it’s something academics and business-people have been aware offor a long time, but hasn’t quite filtered down into general fandomconsciousness yet. The companies know about it, and are activelyusing it to their advantage, but fandom as a whole hasn’t quitesavvied up yet.

Whichis, I think, a large part of what I take issue with. Some people,after reading the above few paragraphs, will respond with, “So? Ilove [thing], I don’t mind my labour being used to support it andits creators.” However,some people will be going, “Holy shit,I didn’t realise that was a thing? That’s awful, even though I dothings for [thing], I don’t want to support the parent company / Ididn’t consent for my labour to be used like this.” Some of bothgroups, given the fact that the average age of people in fandom isskewing increasingly younger, will be twelve, or thirteen.

Thisis what I object to. Not necessarily that the labour is being used,but that there’s no informed consent to it (and also that it’soften used by the same people who mock fandom, or find it‘disgusting’, or have rather poor views of their fans). That it’smanipulative,very deliberately so. That it’s often couched in terms of it beinga moral obligation, a “labour of love”, a “volunteer position”,as “helping the community”, even when that’s evidently bullshitbecause the group trying to feed you that line is a business that isonly interested in fandom as a profit-making machine. That, often,it’s vulnerable fans – younger fans, poor fans, fans fromminority groups – being taken advantage of, deliberately andmanipulatively, by creators.

Fansare inherentlyvulnerable, for a variety of reasons (more on that later) due to thepower difference between them and content creators, and thatvulnerability is being exploited, often using the language of fandomto disguise the exploitation.

Howoften do creators run a “design a t-shirt / poster for us!”competition, where the artist gets paltry recompense (or none atall!) and often no credit for their work? How often do competitionTerms of Service end up having loopholes where the creators nowlegally own your work, in its entirety, forever, and you can’t doshit about it? Professionalfreelancers are aware of these kinds of things, and look for them incontracts – youraverage fan is not,however, and yet they are being used as (easily exploited, preciselybecausethey don’t have the experience professionals have) freelancers bycreators.

Asthisarticle regardingthe Amanda Palmer debacle above rather neatly puts it:

Ideally, you don’t even know you areworking at all. You think you are keeping up with friends, ornetworking, or saving the world, or jamming with the band. And youare. But you are also laboring for someone else’s benefit withoutgetting paid.

3.The Fan-Creator Power Imbalance and Fan Vulnerability

Let’sbe honest here: all of this manipulation is possible because fans,and fandom, are incrediblyvulnerable, on severaldifferent fronts – legally and financially, emotionally, and oftenin terms of age and experience. Though not allcreators take advantage of these vulnerabilities, it’sunfortunately not unusual.

Fansare primarily vulnerable legally. In general, the legalityof fanfiction and fanworksis super iffy,to the point Wikipedia has an entire article on it, and creatorsaren’t always happy that it’s being written (again, covered inthe Wiki article, and mentioned above as well). Fans also don’thave a great deal of legal protections– one of the reasons why AO3has a legal teamthat fights for fans and fandom – and what they do have has oftenbeen won by other fans who’ve fallen foul of copyright laws orcease-and-desist demands and fought back. Often though (but notalways), fans are young, and have neither the money nor the legalknowledge to fight back should a large corporation or dedicatedindividual creator with a beefy legal team decide to start legalproceedings against them.

Fansare also vulnerable because of their age and life experience.Increasingly, fandom is skewing younger and younger, which means manyfans (perhaps now even the majority) are underage. It issignificantly easier for creators to manipulate and use younger fansthan it is to do so with older fans. Even older fans, though, whohave more life experience, may not have relevantlife experience. A lot of fan writers and artists are hobbyists, notprofessional freelancers. “Tricks” by corporations such as dodgyterms of service or questionable phrasing in competition terms may beless noticeable to fans than they would be to professionals providingsimilar services. Fans may also not have the same tools asprofessionals when it comes to knowing how to deal with being takenadvantage of. Professional artists may have a standard procedure theyfollow when they discover their art has been plagiarised, or haveother professional artists they know as part of the community who canadvise them – fanartists are lucky if they have any such resource.

Fansare alsouniquely vulnerable with regards to interacting with contentcreators. There’s a power imbalance. This isn’t exactly the placefor discussions regarding (usually sexual) harassment / abuse of fansby creators, and I don’t want it to turn into one entirely, but…it happens. It happens a lot.A quick google search found me thisarticle listing anumber of scandals and allegations of sexual abuse or abuse of power,just regarding Youtubers,in the past year or so alone. Here’sa post from my personal blogsummarizing the multipleallegations of harassment levelled against the Yogscast, includingsome really rather serious ones, and the… frankly appallingresponse from the Yogs. That’s without even touching on theaccusations against more mainstream / Hollywood personalities thatcrop up every five seconds.

Thiskind of stuff happens a lot more than fandom would like toacknowledge. Creators hold power over fans, and sometimes – a lotof the time – they don’t use that power entirely for good.

Ofcourse, fans often enjoy having creators in fandom spaces – or,more accurately, enjoy having creators accessible. Fans want to benoticed by creators, have a personal relationship with them, meetthem, talk with them, share things with them. They often also wanttheir fandom pursuits, whatever those may be, to be validated. Theseare all perfectly normal things to want, especially from people youadmire and look up to. Hell, I would be a huge hypocrite if I triedto pretend I’ve never wanted to be friends with the creator of afandom I was in. I’m not here to rag on people for havingfantasies, or for looking up to creators – I’m here to point outthat people should be exercising caution along with those.

Becausethe issue is, a lotof people don’t feel safe with creators too far into the fandom.And some other people don’t see that as a reasonable boundary forthose people to have, or are too caught up in their “senpai noticeme” heart-eyes to care.

Beingon twitter is good, it makes creators approachable, you can tweet atthem and they might even respond – and sometimes it’s even a bitfunny if they admit they’ve gone looking for fanfic. But a creatordemonstrating a huge deal of internet savvy, having a tumblr blog,going on AO3? That’s enough to make a lot of people feel unsafecreating and sharing fanworks.

(Ifmonetization and exploitation is a particularly big issue forfanartists, then feeling unsafe is a particularly big issue forfanwriters. Not that fanartists never feel unsafe, especially if theyproduce “undesirable” content – but, for almost every creatorI’ve ever come across, whilst somefanart is acceptable, perhaps even desirable, fanfiction isunanimously “othered” in terms of fan crafts. Perhaps because,due to inherently needing a plot and the use of headcanons and havinga non-canon focus, it’s more threatening to the creator? I’m notsure and, again, that’s another issue. But for fic writers, eventhe most “harmless”, innocent, fluffy, G-rated gen fic risksscorn, humiliation, disapproval, or accusations of being “weird”or “creepy”. Those who write darker or more mature stuff, likemyself and many of my friends, have to deal with being aware thateven creators who take a “live and let live” approach to fanficwould likely be disgusted if they ever found our work. As I saidbefore: if you’re sitting here thinking “but I’mnot worried”, consider why.)

And,again, fandom is primarily forthe fans. We should beprotecting fans above and before creators.

Areally good way of doing that, whether protecting them from legalthreats, from having their labour exploited, or from creatorharassment, is to keep fandom separated from creators. Not entirelyseparate, not “buried in the depths of the web where no one canever find it” separate, but just… an acknowledgement that fandomis for fans, not creators. That fans deserve spaces they can putthings up for other fans to see, without being worried about theirwork being stumbled upon by creators or ‘upsetting creators’ –or, more unpleasantly, being mocked by creators, broadcast outside offandom spaces without their consent, or being judged according to anarbitrary, mainstream moral code.

Fundamentally,fans deserve a safe space. And when I use that word, I don’t mean“somewhere where no one will ever be triggered” or “somewherethat has been entirely morally sanitised” or “somewhere whereroving mobs of thirteen year olds get to dictate who is problematicor not”. A fandom safe space should be a space where people canpost what they want (within some reason) without fear of Big BrotherCreator watching, without fear of being mocked, without fear of beingtold they’re gross or disgusting or Wrong – and a space wherepeople can reasonably be expected to take ownership of their owncontent consumption, helped by stuff like content warnings orblacklists or AO3 tags.

Havingcreators there complicates that. It makes people worried, for a wholevariety of reasons. Something I said on a post a while back that isrelevant here: “Creative fandom, in terms of art and fic, issupposed to be an area of fandom without creator oversight – orwith very limited creator oversight. Feeling like you’re beingwatched, worrying that you might unintentionally offend, killscreativity.” Even if canon creators don’t intend to have anegative impact on fan spaces, or even want to join fan spaces inorder to interact with and please fans, they have an adverse effecton the safety and fandom-ness of the space.

Or,as out-there-on-the-maroon’sresponse to thatpost put it, probably better than I did:

This is something I’ve seen happen inreal time on the various official G&S [Geek and Sundry] discords.Initially fan-only spaces, they quickly started to welcome andexplicitly invite the cast and crew onto the discords. Which has itsbenefits and cool aspects, but also turns a fan-only private spaceinto a space watched by the creators, where the creators havepowerful voices of authority.

Suddenly any criticism or “I didn’tlike this part of this episode” comments became awkward orself-censored. Fanfic talk got dialed way back, hidden in privateDMs, or moved to separate private discords. Then there were clasheswith mods and other fans who were debating what was appropriate talknow that the cast were becoming members. It’s one thing to yell“omg I HATE [writer X]!” during a livestream of a tense episodewhen in a private discord, it’s another to do so in a channel wherethat writer frequently reads the chatlogs. Among fellow fans it’sunderstood that such talk is hyperbolic, but when the creators areright there chatting with you in a friendly way, it becomes risky.

[…] A large chunk of the “drama”that happens in these new media fandoms can be traced to there beingpoor separation of personal and private, be that a creator venting ontwitter and getting into fights with fans, fans sending explicitfanfic to a creator, or those “dramatic readings” at conventionswhere a room full of adults is invited to mock the un-edited writingsof a 15 year old. I’ve seen a lot of issues arise when someone, saya youtube star, rises to fame very quickly and is ill-prepared forputting up boundaries between themselves and their fans. (Mostyounger celebrities are actively discouraged from doing this,encouraged instead to be always available, always friendly, alwaysopen and personal with fans.)

Havingcreators engaging with fandom is not necessarily bad in and of itself– fans are excited to be noticed by their heroes, creators areexcited to hear from people who love them and the stuff they produce.It can be good, or at the very least not-bad. The issue is, though,that creative fandom is for fans, by fans, and there’s no intrinsicplace for creators in it, but creators are increasingly trying tomakespace for themselves in it anyways without understanding the effectthat has. That’s where the problem lies.

I’mnot suggesting we never ever let creators talk to their fans everagain. I’m just saying that we have sites like twitter for that –they don’t need to be coming onto tumblr, or browsing AO3, to haveconversations with fans. It should be up to fans to make the firstmove regarding contact, nine times out of ten, not the creators.

Creatorsdeserve spaces where they’re safe from being exposed to contentabout their characters that they don’t want to see or finddistasteful. Fans deserve spaces where they don’t have to worryabout the creator deciding they’ve seen stuff they don’t want toor stuff they find distasteful. The easiest and best way of doingthis is to make sure there are separate spaces for creators and fans– and that each side acknowledges, when they go into the other’sspace, they play by the rules of that space and don’t try toenforce their own. End of.

4.“Not MyCreators!”

Ifyour response to this has been, “Yes, okay, but mycreators are nice, though,” then consider: you’re probably notgoing to be in that fandom (or at least, not solely in that fandom)forever. You are eventually, inevitably, going to encounter a creatorwho isn’t nice. Your creator may also not be nice forever – it’snot unusual for creators to seem lovely and friendly and reallyinvolved in fandom, and then turn out to be a massive douchebag (seealso, Ridgedog and Sjin from the Yogscast).

Eventhe nicest creators can cause drama and conflict, too.  If they’reseen to endorse a particular headcanon that people start trying toimpose as canon, if they state “preferences” for fanworks thatpeople feel compelled to (or are forced by other fans to) obey, ifpeople think they’re playing favourites… it gets messy. And thelonger someone is seen as “the nicecreator”, the longer they’re up on that pedestal, the harder theyfall when they do the slightestthing wrong.

It’snot just fans that can suffer when creators get too close. In myprevious fandom, a fan that was jealous of the attention a creatorwas showing to another fan (ie. notto them) decided to start asmear campaign over it. They tried doxxing the creator in question,got several other people to threaten doxxing, started attacking otherfans (myself included) and sending death threats, and generallymanaged to really badly fuck up a whole number of involved parties’mental health. A similar thing happened with another creator in thesame fandom, where said fan is stillrunning a smear campaign against them. These are not isolatedincidents.

AsI mentioned in replyto a content creator I’m personally acquainted with, on one of my initial posts on this topic:

I think… regardless of how hard theytry to integrate, canon creators are Apart and Above fans. They can’tbe part of their own fandom in the way that fans are - howinsufferably arrogant they’d be if they were! - and they have anatural, inescapable power over the fans in the sense that their fansare inevitably going to look up to them and idolise them / put themon a pedestal. It makes things a little sticky for creators in thesense that they’re stuck as almost a god-figure, but also thattheir fans want to be friends with the Real Them - and, of course,either the creator keeps up the god-figure persona, stays on theirpedestal, and disappoints the fans who feel held at arm’s length;or they drop the god-figure persona, get off (or fall off) thepedestal, and disappoint the fans who feel angry and betrayed andupset that their idol is actually fallible and human (and hasopinions the fan disagrees with / is boring / is bigoted / isn’tfunny when they’re not performing / isn’t a role model ordesirable when they’re not pretended to be a god-figure). Damned ifyou do, damned if you don’t.

Fandom,especially younger fandom, has an idolatry issue when it comes tocreators – and it hurts people on both sides of the god-worshipperequation that that behaviour creates.

5.Conclusion…?

Isuppose, actually, that despite the thesis statement there are a fairfew different questions actually being asked in this essay: How okayare we – as a community of fans, regardless of the particularfandoms we call home – with censorship? How okay are we, or shouldwe be, with the commodification and monetisation of fandom by bothbig business and / or fans themselves? How okay are we withnon-fandom people and groups, whose aims and morals may not alignwith fandom’s, attempting to manipulate / change fandom and use itfor their own ends? How do we plan to protect our own?

Theseweren’t the questions  I expected to end up asking at the end ofthis essay but, here we are.

Iwould hope I’d made my personal positions on them clear. First andforemost, we should nottolerate censorship. Not fromwithin fandom, and not from without. We should alsonot tolerate manipulative attempts at monetisation by corporations –and should fight hard within our communities to preserve gift cultureand the fandom-as-play mentality that fandom is built on, despite therise of commissions-based fan interactions and Patreon / Kickstarterculture. We should fight hard, not to prevent fandom from changingper se, but to make sure we don’t lose our roots and principles.

Creators,by merit of being the people who create the media we love and engagewith so much, have power. A hugeamount of power. Maybe that’s legal power, maybe that’s the powerof a savvy and manipulative marketing department behind them. Maybethat’s the power conferred by being adored and idolised by a largenumber of fans, maybe that’s the power of having a twitter mob attheir control that will harass anyone they disagree with. Maybe thatpower is just older fans knowing how creators can turn on fans andfandoms, and being afraid to create things because “big brother iswatching”, regardless how benevolent that all-seeing eye is. Maybethat power is just having people feel it’s “polite” to “respectthe creator’s wishes” regarding what sort of fanwork can / shouldbe produced in that fandom.

Asthe old fandom term “Word of God” implies, creators are… well,the gods of their fandoms. That’s not necessarily a title theyearned (some creators are supershitty people, let’s be honest here), it might not even be a titlethey wanted(see also: Undertale, Homestuck, and other fandoms that suddenlyexploded), but it’s a title they have nonetheless.

Inthe end, this issue ties together a lot of things, I think – notjust creator involvement in fandom, not just censorship, not justmonetization, but purity politics, and the legality of fanworks, andhow to manage communities both online, and irl and the habit ofpeople to put creators they admire on a pedestal.

Howdo we, as a community, plan to self-organise, disseminate importantinformation, make decisions, and work as a united front in thefuture? Is that even possible – is fandom a fundamentallyanarchistic entity, unable to survive attempts to formalise it in anyform still recognisable as “fandom”; or, conversely, is fandomdoomed to dying and being subsumed by corporate manipulations if itdoes notformalise and organise, and work to protect its roots and the uniqueculture that has sprung from them?

I’mafraid I don’t really have the answers to those particularquestions, but… food for thought. I know I certainly think aboutthem a fair amount, and perhaps it’s time fandom in general starteddoing so too.

6. Fandom: The Next Generation

Whatdo we doabout all this, though?

Well,for starters, we educate both fandom and creators. There’s somegrassroots efforts to do this within fandom – professionalfreelancers making pushes to ensure people who offer commissionsprice their work correctly, and also checking through various contestterms of service and spreading the word if something’s dodgy, therecent pushback against censorship and purity politics within fandomspaces. Various fandoms on tumblr who know their creators often usetumblr, or check specific tags within it, have developed “private”tags for nsfw or shippy content, or fanfiction, to keep them awayfrom creators – either at the creators’ request, or of their ownvolition.

That’snot enough, though. We also need to educate creators.Even for those that grew up “geeky” or “nerdy” or “infandom”, they’re often talking primarily about the curative sideof fandom activities, not the creative. That side of fandom has verydifferent rules, social mores, and opinions to the creative side offandom. Creative fandom, essentially, needs to set out its stall forcreators – this is who we are, this is what we do, this is how youengage with us politely. We’re happy for you to come look at ourthings, if you want, but if you’re coming into ourspaces (ie. livejournal, tumblr, ao3) then don’t try to tell uswhat we can and can’t do, because we’renot doing this for you.Remember, when you interact with us in our spaces, you’re in ourterritory, and you should behave as such. Remember, we are acommunity, and if you try to take advantage of us or our vulnerablemembers, we will not tolerateit – even if you didn’treally realise that you were trying to take advantage.

Andhonestly? Some creators just need to remember to have basic goddamnmanners. Going on twitter to go “ewww I just read the creepiestfanfic about my book” and linking to it, or reading something outon stream without author permission, or telling part of your fanbasethey’re bad people because of how they choose to engage with yourmaterial… that’s just plain rude. We shouldn’t have to teachcreators how to be decent human beings. A remarkable number ofcreators fall short of this standard, honestly, and we need to stoptolerating it.

Ifthe creators aren’t dicks, then they’ll want to learn how to dobetter, both for themselves and also for their fandom. If they aren’tdicks, they won’t want to take advantage of their fandom, or farmthem for exploited labour. And, well, if they are dicks… that’s alittle harder, but it requires fandom as a community to stop keepingcreators on pedestals, to separate fandom from the creator of thesource material, and to be willing to occasionally kick someone’sass if need be. We’ve got to protect one another, is what I’mgetting at here.

Isuppose, if I have to end this essay with anything, it’s this:educate yourself.

Knowyour history – there are plenty of older fans on tumblr talkingabout their experiences, and plenty of blogs dedicated to it. OTW hasa huge number of resources for this, including their open-accessjournal for fan matters (TransformativeWorks and Cultures), theFanlorewiki, and the summaries of the legal activism they’ve done in agiven month for fandom in general and also specific fans. Livejournalis practically a treasure trove, with huge communities that gatheredand collated drama, wank, and general history and informationregarding fandom. Wikipedia, and the wider internet, also hasincreasing amounts of information on fandom history as fandom getspushed into the mainstream media spotlight.

Educateyourselves, educate others, and listen to people who’ve been infandom longer than you have been – though “listen” doesn’tmean “automatically agree with”. And, most importantly of all,look out for other fans. Help them, support them, protect them.Fandom’s something pretty special, after all. We’ve got to lookafter it for those that come after us.

[aion-rsa]

A Toy Store Near You Creator Talks Shop

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The pandemic had at least one happy outcome, people stayed home and played. When the docuseries A Toy Store Near You brought viewers into the collectible toy store community, they did it to keep the tightly knit group together. The Nacelle Company knows about the power of collective nostalgia. They made Netflix’s The Movies That Made Us, and The Toys That Made Us. But even they were surprised at how many people found comfort in the smallest things. Nacelle will premiere A Toy Store Near You season 3 on June 23, on Amazon Prime Video.

The first season of the behind-the-scenes specialty show showcased store owners scrambling during COVID. Season 2 highlighted the vintage toys. A Toy Store Near You season 3 trots the globe to drop in on stores and lets the owners, employees and sometimes customers explain why this is their favorite vintage toy store. The upcoming season also explores educational and science toys, and brings attention to the local artists who are bringing a new age of collectibles into the community. The documentary series moves quickly through the aisles, but takes time to appreciate the gags, mixing humor with serious play.

Den of Geek persuaded Brian Volk-Weiss, the creator, writer and director of A Toy Store Near You, to take some toys out of the attic. 

DEN OF GEEK: I know the point of A Toy Store Near You was to raise money and get exposure for the stores. How are the stores coming out of the pandemic?

Brian Volk-Weiss: This is one of those stories that I’m happy to say is having a happy ending. I would also say a very unexpected happy ending. If you had asked me in July or June of 2020, “How do you think things are going to go for all these stores?” I would have said, “I don’t think it’s going to go very well. I think we’re going to lose a lot of stores.”

By August, everything had changed. Almost every single store that we were talking to, even stores not connected to the series, were having great years or were the best year in the history of the store. The best description I heard of what was going on was from Larry from Blast From The Past Collectibles. Around August or September, he said, and I quote almost verbatim, if not totally verbatim, “Wednesdays are like Saturdays and Saturdays are like Christmas Eve.”

Based on talking to tons and tons of stores, my theory, because there’s a good chance I’m wrong, so I want it to be my bad theory. What I think happened is the public in general, between February and say Julyish of 2020, was very scared about everything. Even people that were not fired or took pay cuts, I think they were worried about getting fired or taking pay cuts, so everybody just drastically scaled back their spending. Then sometime in the mid to late summer, people thought “Hey, maybe I’m not going to get fired. Maybe I’m not going to take a pay cut.” And then they also realized, “I go to Disneyland every year for a week and I didn’t do that this year so that’s five to 10 grand extra. I haven’t gone out to eat for six months.”

Basically, you had all these people that I would say a tremendous percentage of the collecting community did not lose their jobs, did not take pay cuts. And then in the late summer when their confidence returned, they were sitting with an unusually high amount of money in their bank accounts for July and August. And it was like, “Fuck it. Time to buy some shit.”

I want to talk about the community, how much interaction is there between stores themselves?

The stores are incredibly connected to their, for lack of a better word, constituents. I mean all the stores I go to regularly, and I think this is great, I would imagine my wife does not. I’ll walk into the store and they’ll be like, “Oh, Brian, I put this aside for you.” There’s no pressure, there’s no obligation to buy. They’ll be like, “Hey, this just came in. What do you think?” And I’ll be like, “Oh cool.”

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I would honestly say, and I am extremely picky about what goes into my collection, I don’t put anything on the shelf unless I’m crazy excited about it.  A lot of these stores have an 80 to 90% success rate if they text me or say, hold something for me that I end up buying it and putting it on the shelf. So very connected.

If someone wants a Back to the Future hoverboard, would a store owner know that they can get one at Toy Fusion?

If somebody in that community is a big Back to the Future fan, I would imagine if something like that comes in, they will either text to those fans, or they’ll hold it, or they’ll do a post about it and tag them.

By the way, I have this relationship with my local stores in Burbank, but whenever I’m in Minneapolis, I go to the same two stores. I’m in New York right now and unfortunately a couple of stores went out of business, but it was not because of COVID. They went out before COVID, but because rents have been rising in New York so much.

Will you ever feature specialty record shops or music toys?

We are planning on doing 50 episodes of A Toy Store Near You. Season three only gets us to episode 15. So, if we do 50 episodes, and that’s a big if, then yeah, I would definitely do a record store. I would find that very interesting. Part of why I would find that interesting is I know almost nothing about a vintage record store’s business. I assume there’s some similarities to toys, but I bet you there’s also a lot of differences as well.

How long do you hang out at each store?

That’s such a great question. No one has ever asked me that before. There are times I go to Blast From The Past and I’m in there for 30 minutes. It’s all different. I travel a lot for my job, so frequently I’m going to stores I’ve never been in before, or stores I haven’t been to in a year or two. But the thing that’s so interesting about this hobby is how random it is how the stores get their inventory.

I was in Tucson earlier this year. Phoenix and Tucson are garden spots for vintage toy collecting. I went to seven vintage toy stores in three days. All of them were A or A+. There was not even an A- store.

But one of the stores I went to was this very small store. It was the smallest and the least famous of all the stores. The owner of that store had a walk-in the week before, a widow whose husband had just died. The husband was a huge Trekkie, and not only was he a Trekkie, he was a model maker. He was not just a really good model maker, but he was a really intricate model maker. He would buy these 25, $30 kits that anybody could buy. He would make these gorgeous models that not only were lit up, he would add lights and everything, but they were on these beautiful bases and he had made buttons and stuff so you could turn the lights on and off and everything.

That store got this entire collection of Star Trek stuff. Most of it was extremely unique, meaning they were one of a kind. So, if I had gone into the same store nine days earlier, I probably would have spent five to 20 bucks because they had just gotten all this stuff. I mean I probably spent three, 400 bucks. Like I said, it was a tiny store that had the fewest social media followers. I’m a part of a bunch of toy communities and I’m like, “Hey, I’m going to Phoenix. Hey, I’m going to Tucson.” None of them even mentioned this store, but that’s the store where I spent the most money, and bought the most shit, and spent the most time.

You mentioned the model maker. I noticed that Death by Toys has a local artist who’s affiliated. This season highlights a lot of local artists. Can you tell me about the relationship between the stores and the creators?

It’s a really interesting trend that was always at a low boil for decades. Only in the last three to five years has it really grown exponentially. Basically, what’s happened is everybody, with the rise of 3D printing and the rise of crowdsourcing and all of this stuff going on, a lot of these stores are making the very logical and smart conclusions, “We got a fan base, we have 80 to 300 people coming in every day. Why don’t we just make our own stuff?

Obviously opening a vintage toy store there’s a very high chance that they’re very creative themselves, it just makes sense, partner with a local and start making your own stuff, contribute to, for lack of a better word, pop culture. It’s becoming more and more common and, in my opinion, could not be a cooler thing in general, but also, I think a very good sign of how healthy the business is right now.

I noticed that some of the stores have museums, is this because they want to display the collectibles with respect or is it that they just can’t bring themselves to sell certain items?

Yeah, that’s a great question. A lot of it is that they may not have enough room at home to display it. But also, a lot of the museums are designed to bring in business. A lot of these stores have specialty items that you’re in Sacramento and you go to a store, that’s the only place where you can see certain prototypes. That’s a big draw for this very tight-knit community.

There are a lot of unique, one-of-a-kind things. I think that’s a part of the process where you open a store, it’s going great. But then by the nature of how the business works with maintaining the inventory, which by the way, a lot of that inventory comes from people dying, divorces, finance, someone loses a job and has to raise some money real quick. So, you’re dealing with these very random events. If you’re a restaurant, you do a deal with a farm and you say, “I need 1,000 potatoes a week,” you get 1,000 potatoes a week. Technically all the potatoes look different, but unless you stare at them, they all look the same. A vintage toy store, again, because you’re dealing with divorces, deaths, downsizing, the inventory control process is practically, I wouldn’t say it’s nonexistent, but it’s random.

The museums come about because, very often, because people come in with things that are maybe too expensive to sell, they act like a big, shiny object to get people to come into the store. So yes, definitely connected. But I will tell you this, one of the stores we’ve shown sold very recently their crème de la crème item for a variety of reasons. The stuff in the museum does get sold occasionally.

I love the clips you throw in, things like Dr. Strangelove and the old commercials. Tell me about the editing.

Basically, the whole company now, what I would call our post Toys That Made Us period like Monet had his blue period, or was that Picasso? Somebody had a blue period. I have a comedy background. When Toys That Made Us got greenlit, I didn’t run out and hire editors that I didn’t know to make a show. I hired the editors I was already working with. A lot of those editors had comedy backgrounds.

It’s funny, one of the editors who I’m very blessed to work with and he’s more than just an editor, he’s an EP on everything we do, Ben Frost. I’ll never forget this. We were probably almost done with season 1 of Toys That Made Us. And I was like, “Dude, that last cut you sent me, I was literally crying my eyes out. I was laughing so hard.” Ben was like, “That’s great, man. Other places where I’ve worked, when I do stuff like that, the producers are like, ‘Oh my God, I love it. That is so funny, but you’ve got to cut it.'” And he’s like, “Well, I don’t understand. If you’re laughing and you find it funny, why do I have to cut it?” The answer is usually like, “Ah, that’s not our show. We’re making a documentary.”

From day one, we’ve always infused comedy into what we do. Our rule is we entertain first and if you learn anything or you get any information, that’s a bonus. But our goal is to entertain. The original inspiration for all of this by the way, also goes back to Toys That Made Us where it took me a long time to sell that show. I remember when the show finally got greenlit, it was one of my things I said very early on to the whole crew where I’m like, “Listen, we are making a documentary about fucking toys. It needs to be fun.” That’s what we try to infuse in everything.

I know you are a toy collector. What are your favorite toys?

My collection is over 2,000 pieces. There are less than 20 pieces from my childhood. I’ve never counted, but it’s probably 12 to 15 pieces connected to my childhood. I live in California in the 2020s, so I get to evacuate my house every year because of fires. So, I was able to learn in a real world experience, “Hey shit, we have to evacuate. What am I going to take?”

It’s so funny, I didn’t take any of the valuable stuff the first time. By the way, we now have a whole checklist of what to do when we have to evacuate. But the first time when I literally had 60 seconds to run in, grab stuff and get out, I took my R2-D2 from when I was a kid, I took my Constitution-class Enterprise model, a die-cast, and my Playmate Enterprise, and I had a Stormtrooper from when I was a kid as well. That’s basically what I grabbed when I was running around like a lunatic. We almost forgot to take our pet with us, that’s how frantic it was. Based on that experience, those are the most important toys to me.

Which are the ones that you wouldn’t take out of the box?

It’s funny, the box thing is very interesting. I do not like displaying stuff in boxes. To me, toys are toys. I don’t play with them, but I love the artistry, or the history, or the story behind the toys. All my toy-loving friends make fun of me for this. One of my friends calls me “Brian no box.”

I’ll give you a great example. There’s a specific G.I. Joe vehicle I’m looking for right now, the Warthog. I don’t want to buy it with a box for three reasons. Reason number one, I do not want to display it in the box, so why am I going to pay for it? Sometimes being in the box is 50% more than not being in the box. If I don’t want it in the box, why am I going to pay 50% more for something I don’t want?

Second of all, I’m not going to open the box because that’s just bad. If you’re buying a 40-year-old toy that hasn’t been opened before, it’s not my place. There’s a very finite supply of stuff that hasn’t been opened before, so I feel guilty opening the box.

And then, last but not least, I don’t collect art. I don’t have paintings. I don’t have sculptures in my house or anything like that. I recognize that people think a lot of the artwork from the ’80s and even the ’90s was beautiful and everything should be displayed. That’s great for them. But for me, it’s about the toy and I like seeing the toy on my shelf. I would say less than 2% of my collection, maybe even less than 1% is boxed.

Why is there no substitute for something like the original Wonder Woman golden lasso?

Well, a related story is about G.I. Joe. On the Cobra hovercraft, there’s a spotlight. When the toy was new, the spotlight came with a clear plastic lens. That lens is not only usually missing. Anytime you want to buy one of these things, there is a market for those lenses. It’s so funny, if you buy a complete hydrofoil in good condition, it’ll probably cost you about 300 bucks. That lens is 40 to 50 bucks of those 300 bucks. It’s the same logic with the lasso. There are certain toys like a Luke Skywalker, a Jedi Luke, everybody was like, “What’s Luke without his lightsaber?” So, everybody was very aggressively passionate about the lightsabers and not losing them.

With the Wonder Woman lasso for example, and with the hydrofoil example with the lens, there are other objects that no one really cared about at the time and easily got lost because they weren’t being tracked. And then 30, 40 years later people were like, “Oh shit, I want to get the hydrofoil. I want to get Wonder Woman.” It’s very hard to find things like that in pristine condition with all the accessories that weren’t being tracked religiously, sometimes four decades earlier. If I go to someone’s house and I look at their collection and I see a hydrofoil, the first thing I’m going to do is see if it has the lens. It’s the same thing with Wonder Woman’s lasso where like, “Oh, you have it. Great. But do you have the lasso?” That’s what created that phenomenon.

I noticed a lot of these stores are extremely specialized and some of them are very vast.

There are a lot of stores that are crazy specialized. There used to be a store in New York up until 2018. There was not a single word of English in the store. I mean everything was Japanese vintage. There are stores that focus on role-playing, there are stores that focus on science fiction. Stores like that are getting fewer and fewer, and not because they’re going out of business, but because they’re increasing their product line. They’re basically like, “Hey, this is going great. But we have 10 to 20% of everybody who comes in is asking about X. Maybe we should sell X.” That phenomenon is changing very, very quickly. I’m not seeing as much specialization as I used to. The other thing that’s going on is a lot of stores that for their entire existence, and some of these stores are 20 to 30 years old, only vintage. We’re starting to see a fair amount of those stores slowly but surely get into selling modern.

I’m the Simpsons geek at Den of Geek. You have been all around the world, have you found Comic Book Guy?

Oh yeah. There are tons of people like that. Owning any business is really hard, really hard. It cannot be understated how difficult it is keeping a business afloat, even without a pandemic, dealing with the public is tough. One of the things that these toy stores have in common is a lot of them start with the owner having a crazy collection that they just run out of room. They have a day job that they’re not excited about. So, they’re like, “Fuck it. I’m just going to start a store, and have more room for my collection, and get out of my shitty day job.”

That’s what gets it started. But when you’re sitting there dealing with the public eight hours a day for years, it can get a little grueling. Yeah, that could absolutely lead to a toy store owner maybe not being as jovial in year 10 as they were in year one.

A Toy Store Near You season 3 premieres June 23 on Amazon Prime Video.

The post A Toy Store Near You Creator Talks Shop appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[bryozoans]

@reaverofworlds First of all: Bruh. Your tags make my day ten times better. Forreal. I love seeing you talk on the tags of my posts. Second, thank you for liking my art and actually voicing it. That’s rare to see these days. I really, really appreciate it. Third, you’ve got a great attitude towards your art. Art is hard. It takes a long time and a lot of effort and focusing on shit you don’t want to do because you just want to draw all those cool ideas and it feels like there’s never any pay off. You can do it. It’s not impossible. Keep that idea in your head and that want to be better in your heart and you’ll go places. Fourth, the FUCK you mean someday you’ll be good as me? Look at this. You’re going to tell me THIS is below my skill? THIS? This one too? How about this? This one? I look at your art and I see shit that I can’t do, even on a good art day. I see stunning attention to detail and nuance. That Mephiles piece made me die, the inkwork and detail was so fabulously done. Your art has volume and interesting shapework. I’m interested in your work from fandoms I’m not even in, because it’s so nice to look at. Many of your pieces have dynamism and a movement which I long to put in my own work.  I appreciate that you value my art and see me as being a positive influence on you, but shit, do not sell yourself short!!! We all have our differences and our strengths and weaknesses. You may not always be happy with your work, and you may think that everyone else is leagues ahead of you, but know that other people are looking at what you do, and they don’t have those little doubtful voices that you hear, and they can’t see those little mistakes and flaws you beat yourself up over in every piece. It’s something I’m still working on myself. I know we can both overcome it someday.  Realize how far you’ve come. Want to see one of the first times I ever drew Shadow? I bet you do~

My god. Lookit those shrimpy legs. Those nonexistant hips. What are arms. Some swollen gross eyebrows. His wrists are losing circulation those rings are so tight. Somehow I think I was better at drawing Shadow’s shoes back then, though, and I was actually at least comprehending muscle tone and details. Sometimes old art fucks with you like that. And as the time stamp so helpfully states, I drew this in August of 2015. A little over two years ago.  I copied the style of the actual Sonic anatomy for a while because that’s what I thought I wanted to emulate. Turns out, I really hated the fact Sonic characters had no necks. Which for a long time, turned out abominations like this:

(Ignore the lopsided face and the arms that look like I ripped off some alien design from a B horror movie. And wow, look! This is an even earlier drawing than the previous!) I drew like this for a long time. I have a two inch thick stack of loose printer papers scrawled on with Bic mechanical pencils to prove it. In that two inch thick stack, about eighty percent of it is Sonic drawings. And out of that 80 percent of Sonic, about ninety five percent has never even touched the face of this blog or the eyes of anyone except those who managed to glance me in the middle of math class in highschool. Because a lot of those drawings were dumb repetitive practice, or stupid idea doodles, or just art vomit.  And two years and a hell of a persistent Sonic art drive later, here we are. You see how far I’ve come. Two years is a long time, but not really. I’ve improved a lot. So much. I’m still learning, I’m still struggling, but everyone always is.  I see your art, and honestly, you have so much potential. I cannot wait to see what you create in two years, three years, five. I can’t wait until I see what I make in five years. I’m excited, because even though I still get discouraged, and I still feel like I’m not reaching my potential, I know I’m going to be better.  Someday, you’re going to look at your art and think “Fuck, this is so bad, I wish.....” But then you’re going to stop, and you’re going to think of what you did in the past, what you’ve accomplished, what you still have to work on. You’ll smile a little, and think “Maybe it’s not so bad.” Someday, you’re going to actually believe there is no secret contest where everyone’s art is graded on a scale of goodness instead of trying to cram that ideology down your own throat constantly. Someday, we’re both going to see each other’s art and appreciate the skill without needing to compare ourselves to it all the time. It’s hard, but not impossible. You have great potential and a concrete start. And I am no part of that creative equation except for whatever my art inspires within you. You probably didn’t want a rambly support fest call out post, but that’s what you get for being nice to me. Keep being creative. I’m excited to see what comes from you next.

[askfrankpritchard]

Francis Pritchard x Reader Chapter 1

P1TH0N’S JOURNAL: FEBRUARY 9TH 2027

7:38am

         In the distance sirens can be heard as I made my way to Sarif Industries. The building reflects the face of Detroit, dismal but full of new hope. This new company just became well known only a year or two ago.

       A motorbike coming to a stop in the underground parking garage barely lit by the lights embedded in the walls. The basement entrance unlocked with a triple beep granting access to the engineer room. Spacey and dark since none of the lights in the building have been turned on yet. Black lights can be seen out in the hallway running low on power.

     I flip the switch fuses that give power to everywhere in the building. I squinted at the sudden brightness of the room as I hung my jacket on the coat rack.

     The last Engineering manager disappeared and they needed a replacement asap, so they gave me the promotion to fill the position. My talent can go from fixing Coffee machines to hot wiring cars in hollywood movies. Speaking of coffee, I should go get some myself. I walk up the flight of stairs towards the Café, provided by Sarif himself, and to where the kitchenette can be found.

      “Froger’s Instant Coffee.” Tastes just as good as its name. Cheap. Sarif may provide for the Café, but it doesn’t mean he has to get the good stuff.

         I start the coffee maker and began digging through the cupboards for that one special mug. Scribbled on it was the word ‘coffee’, but in a /blue/ sharpie instead of black. I took a quick look inside and noticed something crusty in it, “JC. Whoever washes the dishes around here need more elbow grease next time.” I rinsed it quickly and watched the coffee maker…make coffee. Just as exciting as watching the scientists work, but eventually something good happens.

       The coffee maker started gurgling and stopped making coffee, so I banged on it a few time just to get it going again. After ten minutes of a whistling solo the coffee maker beeps abruptly bringing me out of my wind concerto and over to the pitcher to get the daily dose of caffeine one needs if they wake up at 7am every morning for work.

         The rest of the building was silent. Pretty peaceful unlike later in the day where everyone is running around like they’re trying to get someone to the moon in a day. BigBro cameras were the only thing making a noise at the moment buzzing as they scanned the areas. I inspected one that has been fizzling in and out just outside the dining area. It needs to be tweaked soon. It has been two weeks its been doing that. Maybe I’ll tackle it after I do something nice for my bosses. Besides give them more paperwork to fill out. Today is going to be slow and boring, so why not give them some encouragement.

   I turned to read the clock on the microwave.

7:45am

        “Crap, Pritchard will be here soon.” I hastily dig through the cupboard to find his mug which had the infamous Nucl3arSnake logo drawn on it. I did that for him since he was getting vexed at people stealing his mug, 'Just put my name on it or draw a logo on there or SOMETHING so they’ll know not to take it.’ He frantically said a few months ago.

      I’ve been with SI since they started hiring advanced security back in 2026 in January and Pritchard joined in just at the end of July of the same year. He is the very same way today as he was a year ago, annoyingly snarky and dashingly clever. He’s recently been opening up a little more to me. Considerably everyday actually, I’m quite honoured.

      Looking back at the mug and out of my day dream I look at the drawing again. It wasn’t the best and was quickly squiggled on, I’ll just put it on my to-do list to fix later. I filled the mug with hot coffee, spilling some on my hand in the process and opened the fridge to find the vanilla coffee creamers. It’s never another flavour is it. Hesitating a moment to think about two creams or three. Three of course, he has a sweet tooth and man he can be so cranky in the morning.

7:50am

          I was about to book it with the coffee to his office until more hot liquid touched my hand. “Geez!” I politely cursed to the nonexistent audience that I write to while grabbing a small tea plate to put over the mug and run towards the Tech Lab. Almost tripping on the stairs going up, I safely managed to open the door with my free hand and speed walk inside to set the plate and coffee next to the computer. The only reason I know the code to his office is so I can make sure the cameras are facing the proper direction…and he secretly enjoys my late-night company, but he’s too proud to admit it.

    The little Korean vacuum cleaner beeped at my presence upon entering.

7:55am

      I hear his motorcycle rumbling underneath my feet even from the second floor. I quickly leave the office accidentally squishing the bot that followed me out the door. “Sorry buddy, you can’t come with.” I gently move it back in the office with my foot and close the door. Soft thumps can be heard from the bot and from the nearby stairs. I make a 180° in my tracks and take the scenic route to the stairs to avoid him for multiple reasons. Peering around the corner, I check to make sure he’s in his office before proceeding downstairs.

      Now back in the dining area I take my coffee and go to my own office to begin a long and bland day. “Wait, I forgot Adam’s coffee.” I breathed in then clumsily got out of the Jetson chair and went kitchen bound, again. Finding the only other clean mug and /carefully/ filling it this time. Two creams, two sugars. I grabbed another small plate to hold the lava hot liquid in the mug then hurried onwards up an extra flight of stairs and to his office. “Oh geez,” I forgot his code… 0451…1723…? I only have one entry left. Do I risk the alarm system going off and having an even scarier morning Francis? Or do I just ask him…5375. “Oh thank god,” the door opened to reveal a very hot and humid office and a slightly dishevelled and sleeping Adam. He must have left his humidifier on by accident. I didn’t even realize he didn’t leave work last night either. I set the coffee on his desk and poked the cactus on my way out. They thrive off of negligence I heard.

      Now finally in my office there’s a stack of paperwork I have to get to and a camera to fix later.

6:15pm

    The fucking alarm system went off on the first floor. Where the café is with the busted camera of course. When I got to the area, Adam was already down there checking out the scene for clues as to why the alarms were going off.

All of the workers except for Francis, Adam, and I have evacuated the building to safety protocols. A walking turret was stalking about looking for the intruder that it will never find because there are none.

    “What the hell is going on Jensen?”

    “I might ask you the same thing since you have all the camera feeds in /your/ office, Francis” Major emphasis on his name.

    “Well-”

    “It’s not my division.”

    “Damnit Jensen it /is/ a part of your division! You are a part of our security, tech or not!”

I figured I should do something before their quarrelling turns violent, so I disabled the bugged cameras making the alarm system shut off.

    “Finally, could this day have anymore interruptions!” Francis’ ponytail swished as he walked off. How cute…I didn’t realize I was staring until Frank spoke up.

    “And thanks (y/n) for doing something right unlike /some/ other people.” he glared at Jensen then disappeared up the stairs and probably to his office.

    “Thanks (y/n), seriously. Im sure he was about to have a seizure from restraining himself from punching me.”

    “Pfft, you’re welcome, but y’know he’s not as bad as people think he is.”

    “Could be, but you have also been working with him and the company for quite some time. He knows you.”

    I shrugged then walked back to my office broken camera in hand, “Maybe so.”

[divasdamselsandsmudgedmascara]

“Fahrenheit 451″ starring Julie Christie - 1966 (Movie Review)

Does the thought of a day without a book in your hands give you the shivers? Does the idea of never being able to step foot in the quiet, blissful corners of a library or bookstore give you the nightmares and cold sweats? How about a possibility of never even seeing a book again...never again in your lifetime? Not only that but your children and their children will not even be able to comprehend the notion of printed words on a page. 

The book and all of the knowledge, delight, enlightenment, and discovery it possesses will be permanently banished from the collective consciousness of humankind and in its place, nothing but what the state wills for you to watch...eyes frozen...mind paralyzed...on an ever-present, obnoxious screen on your wall.

Oh wait, we're halfway there already.

Step into the warped world of Fahrenheit 451 and a man and a woman whose minds are awoken to the truth of their society and their own inner demand for enlightenment.

Throughout history, humanity has often struggled with the dictatorship of the deluded and their attempts to suppress and even eradicate free will. It's come in the form of new forms of tight-fisted government, their intimidated and delusional followers, evil laws that refuse to acknowledge the fact that human beings should not and cannot be mentally controlled. Banning of free speech and freedom of the press has gone hand in hand with these repressive governments' efforts. But in Ray Bradbury's razor-sharp examination of a society where all text is threat, repression takes on an insidious form where faux-contentment is fed to the masses in the form of mind-numbing "entertainment". The book and all its intellectual and emotional challenges is deleted from these citizens' lives and done so cleanly and forcefully that most don't even realize what they've lost and don't understand the first thing about regaining it. There is a minority who resist however. There is ALWAYS the resistance! 

Enter Guy Montag. He's a simple man. A hard-working man. He's also a firefighter but in his society, he does not save people but destroys their legacies.

Guy Montag burns books. And he's very good at it.

In the very first scene, Guy and his fellow firemen are racing off to a drab apartment block in this future, dumbed-down England. Enter another man in a turtleneck happily munching an apple in his drab apartment in said drab block. He receives a phone call on his rotary phone (nobody is allowed to write books, research papers, essays, or ANYTHING anymore, so they'll never reach the digital age!)

"Listen, get out! Hurry!" a female voice on the other end urgently whispers to turtleneck man mid-chew. Puzzled by the fact that his pleasant afternoon has been interrupted, the dude keeps saying "Hello, Hello?" instead of hustling out the door, clutching a paperback for dear life.

Frustrated, the mysterious female bellows, "For God's sake, get OUT of there!"

Finally getting a clue, turtleneck man hears the sirens of the book-hating bastards, hides his contraband and makes a break for it.

I really liked this scene. It introduces the urgency of the situation SO well, with just a few words spoken and the cinematography doing the rest. The steel-gray sky is juxtaposed against the coldness of the industrial looking apartment blocks, with a desperate, nameless fugitive's coat flapping in the wind as he makes his escape from the men who would destroy what’s precious to him...masterful. And truly a sign of the cinematic treasures to come from this film. I've always felt that the mark of a great movie--not just an okay movie or even a "good" one--is the power of the opening scene. If it can grab you and never let you go until those last few minutes, you'll have a masterpiece! Not just a decent way to spend a few hours.

Montag is doing his job SO well that a promotion is dangled in front of him by his captain (played by the phenomenal Cyril Cusack), a quietly fanatical true believer. This "bright" young man is going places! Onwards and upwards as the British like to say, or er...downwards if we're gonna be real about the whole destruction of human knowledge thing.

That is...until a fateful meeting on public transportation with a disarming young schoolteacher who is much more than she seems.

Enter Clarisse, a luminous Julie Christie.

Now, this movie did something I consider pretty original and effective. Christie was cast in two roles both directly linked to the lead character, both influencing his decisions, and both integral to the details of the plot. She is thoroughly convincing as two women with different motivations, purposes, and feelings. She is Clarisse and she is Montag's wife, Linda. Where Clarisse's mind is opening to the world around her and its realities, Linda's is dull, empty and withered.

Clarisse is instantly drawn to Montag. The scene where they first encounter each other is a study in character development. The moment she introduces herself to him on the crowded (upside-down!) train, you realize that there is something significant at play here. She is not a dullard. Her eyes are bright, her questions are incisive. She, in nearly all important ways that his wife and other citizens are not--is ALIVE. Another interesting juxtaposition is inserted here. As Clarisse gazes curiously at Montag, he himself is looking around the train at several passengers who are, as if in a daze, fidgeting with themselves, one woman drawing on the mist of a window like a bored and sleepy child. It's almost as if they are asleep and attempting to pinch themselves awake. 

Clarisse is wide awake.

In the middle of her chat with the awkward-looking Montag, she drops a few interesting lines that looking at it, seem to indicate with brilliant subtlety the emerging truth of who this young woman is and what she's about. 

"Once I get started, nothing can stop me! My uncle says I'm a veritable well of words."

In a society where printed words itself are considered destabilization and a threat to the maintenance of the state's lies, I find it powerful that this is a comment made in the first conversation this clearly intelligent woman has with a destroyer of words.

"You don't frighten me." she cheerfully says to Montag as the upside-down train barrels its way towards their destination.

Montag and Clarisse then disembark and as they head down the path to their homes, their conversation takes an interesting turn, guided by Clarisse as they stroll in the sunshine.

"Tell me, why do you burn books?" she asks and you get the sense that this is not merely a question but a gentle challenge.

At first it seems that he tries to dodge the true meaning of the question by calling it "good work like any other" but then he shrugs off the meaning of literature as "just so much rubbish".

“They disturb them, make them anti-social.”

The question that I asked while viewing the film was whether Montag in that moment, was a believer in his cause or whether he was merely parroting the propaganda fed to him likely throughout his entire life. One of the details I like about Oskar Werner's performance was the casual indifference, the weary demeanor of Montag's whole being. He does not come across as a man particularly set afire by his ideals. He does his job, repeats the party line when need be, and goes home. No more. No less. 

Does Clarisse sense an ambivalence in Montag's spirit that even he did not recognize?

In any case, Montag tries to convince Clarisse and to a certaint extent himself, about the "nobility" of his work and as they part and he walks down the road to his antiseptic little house with his wife waiting before their ever-present television screen, you see him walk into an existence that is so strictly ordered and formulated by the influence of the state that you can't help but notice that basically, most of the VIBRANCE and REASON for life has been stripped away. What’s left? Go to work, go home, eat, make love, gape at a gigantic TV screen filling your head with propaganda entirely designed to keep you from ever fulfilling anything of importance. When people are neither challenged nor seek out answers to any significant life question, what is the result? When something as precious as literature, text in general, is eliminated from a civilization, what really is there to learn, achieve or contribute to humankind anymore? What’s left is a society left to languish, stagnate, and ultimately fade into utter purposelessness.

That is demonstrated with the odd state-run "theater" his drugged-out wife Linda is excited to be a part of, one of the few opportunities she has for stimulation as she lies around their home, popping state-approved pills and draining what's left of her energy and intelligence.

The state theater rambles on and on in a childish and simplistic way, the nonexistent "plot" being which rooms to place houseguests. The whole thing is like a third-grade math question on a school test but this is what passes for "entertainment" in this aggressively anti-intellectual society.

Linda is thrilled later on in bed, that she has given "all the right answers" and she chirps on about her moment of rare excitement to the bored-out-of-his mind Montag as he browses through a wordless comic strip, filled page to page with garish color cartoons.

The emptiness of this couple's life is brought into full focus, and the perfection of Werner and Christie's performances is that it doesn't even take a great deal of dialogue to do it. The body language is expertly detailed--and with Christie, so pronounced that in her double role as Linda and the schoolteacher, Clarisse, you almost feel as if you are watching two different actresses.

Montag's awakening is soon to come into full bloom with the gentle encouragement of schoolteacher Clarisse, who for reasons that are never specifically stated, has become an ex schoolteacher--rejected by her fellow teachers and the administration, and in a surreal scene, treated with contempt as her things are shoved across the floor to her, wrapped in a sack, as Montag looks on.

Now, that's the definition of a brush-off.

The reasons are like I said, never explicitly stated but you definitely gain a general understanding of just why Clarisse is fired, shut out and treated with this kind of contempt. Although she obviously does not officially go against state rules, there is something about her personality, the alertness and the creativity that is a part of her identity not only as a teacher but as a private citizen of this oppressive, draining state (she says early on that "we have fun in my class") that is found threatening. She is not a drone. She has never relinquished a special spark within her, a spark of individuality, that the government ruthlessly wants to snuff out within the hearts and minds of each and every man, woman and child.

Montag comforts her as she sobs into his shoulder on the elevator, and she suddenly looks at him in wonder, wondering how the gentle and compassionate man in front of her could be in what is such a barbaric business.

"Why? How did it come about? What made it begin? What made you want to do...how could someone like you be doing this sort of work? I know everyone says that, but you? You're NOT like them. When I say something to you, you look at me. Why did you choose this job?"

Montag replies,

"Do you remember what you asked me the other day? Whether I ever read the books I burned? Remember? Last night I read one."

With that twist of Montag’s destiny, both their lives will be intertwined.

Montag himself has changed...radically. He does not want to continue a life lived in darkness and ignorance. He's flipped the switch and the light is pouring in. He begins to stash books in every nook and cranny from the raids he goes on and his bewildered wife Linda stumbles upon his furtive reading in the middle of the night. He is desperate to read as many words as he can on the dusty, forgotten pages. He is like a starving man, feasting on an enormous amount of knowledge. He starts to wake up to just exactly what the state has been feeding other intellectually and emotionally starved people, their replacement of the knowledge books can bring, with shallow desires and empty platitudes.

Linda is confused and upset at the change in her husband. 

She has given the entirety of herself to the demands of dictatorship and the presence of the books make her afraid, not just of the consequences of reading, but I always felt that her character was terrified of the discovery. Scared of opening her mind beyond the limited confines of what has been established for her....like a child who has been used to playing in a sandbox her entire life, and never ventures out to explore the world around her.

“I found these things in the house! I don’t want these things, Montag. They frighten me.”

A pivotal scene, one that never fails to send chills down my spine, is a fire that happens at a middle-aged woman's house, which doubles as a secret library (it is a legitimately kick-ass library).

Amidst her pile of books, a veritable treasure trove that she has hoarded, cherished, and protected for years, the woman sets the pile aflame herself....with her in the middle of the blaze. Montag stares in abject horror as he sees this woman kill herself in the most horrible way possible. 

Montag is a man who has followed orders without question, going about his questionable "duties" as if a man who is sleepwalking. Death is actually this one reader’s choice rather than allowing the state to control her and discover a pivotal secret that she holds.

He reaches another level of rebellion and dives into an ocean of words, head-first.

In the process, he turns into a person who not only questions the stupid and corrupt laws, but his married life, the existence he has built up with a woman who is blissfully ignorant.

Linda wants Montag to return to their life of ignorance. She begs, pleads and threatens in a desperate attempt to force him to destroy the books that he is now clinging to...for understanding... of what he has done, why he is been made to do it, and for what yet he needs to do.

And in the middle of all of this upheaval, Clarisse and the uncle that she lives with, has been discovered as "book readers". She has made the escape her uncle has prepared her to make, away from a society that is determined to consider her a “thought-criminal” (Oops. Wrong authoritarian regime dystopia.)

Montag has joined her in the quiet "resistance”, though! He vows to work from the inside, sabotaging the system he has been serving for so long. 

“I must stay in the city, I have a plan. I will hide a book in every fireman’s house until they denounce him. The system will eat itself.”

Meanwhile, she will flee to the country and join a band of underground bibliophiles called "the book people", a bunch of passionate readers who've BECOME books, memorizing the precious pages one by one. 

(What they’re burning ties in to the old woman’s death.)

He doesn't have a chance though to follow through on his plan, because his wife becomes an informant on his midnight reading habit, fleeing from their home in a fit of exasperation. 

The years of the boob tube's endless manipulations had turned Linda into the consummate follower. What was so interesting and realistic about her character was how it presented the end result of effective governmental indoctrination. There were and are so many citizens of certain nations just like Linda, who have swallowed the lie that their natural human freedoms should be taken away in the name of "protection", when what these corrupt governments have really been seeking is the destruction of their will and suppression of their power.

Montag flees in panic after he does something absolutely irreversible--he has become a fugitive! His face is plastered on every TV around him and he flees from a city determined to use him as both an example and a form of entertainment for the millions of dead eyes plastered to their wall screens.

Francois Truffaut's adaptation of Ray Bradbury's book is subtly and powerfully interpreted. The beginning of the movie is all cold edges, uniforms reminiscent of jack-booted Nazis, and boring sameness.

That coldness and an almost desolate feeling of emptiness is carried over into the way people are relating to each other in this society, such as the barren relationship between Montag and his wife, Linda. The truth of it is that Montag and Linda simply don't have an emotional connection anymore. The intrusion of the state, the ever-present wallscreens, the constant consumption of propaganda has destroyed the soul and the integrity of their marriage. Julie Christie's blankness as Linda and brightness as Clarisse are like night and day. Truffaut's decision to cast Christie in both roles is an inspired touch. It brings a striking contrast to Montag's life. Clarisse is definitely her own woman. And I never viewed her presence as simply a device serving to "wake up" Montag. No. Clarisse as a character, as an intellectual woman with agency in a fiercely anti-intellectual state, was a whole lot more than that. But I believe she is also an interesting representation of duality in Guy Montag's life and I feel that Clarisse represents to him the "what-ifs" of Linda. An alternate version of her in a way.

Clarisse also represents the truth of discovery that is forcing its way into Montag's narrow existence. She is a woman who sticks out in a subtle but at the same time, blatant way.  Standing out is dangerous, standing out is looked upon with distrust and is stamped out whenever possible. She loses her job and has her spirit and creativity literally thrown back in her face. But Christie's Clarisse has this indomitable optimism I've always found pretty damn fascinating about her character, an inner source of satisfaction that comes from the fact that unlike so many other zombies of the state, what she has in the end....is HERSELF. One of the most defining details of Francois Truffaut's classic is the serene and unshaking confidence Clarisse has in who she is and what she believes in. She is in my opinion, every bit of the hero as Montag if only because of her total confidence and belief in the normalcy of the pursuit of knowledge despite everything and everyone ordering citizens like her to shut down and go to sleep.

The thing about Linda, Clarisse and Montag, and what's so intruiging about Truffaut's direction, is that all of these characters have multiple layers beneath the surface. The film explores the fascinating concept that when a person is forbidden knowledge for so long, the void can become their familiar and even comfortable world, or they can choose to step out into unknown, scary, but vastly rewarding territory.

It's a unique take on authoritarianism, and quite frankly, one of the most unsettling ones I think has been depicted in film. These characters are well-crafted and wonderfully brought to life, but in the end, they are, in my humble opinion, mere vessels for a larger message.

That message is that theft of the progression we are entitled to as human beings, can just possibly be on the horizon if we aren't constantly vigilant about whom we place our trust and loyalty in. That trust and loyalty can all too quickly be bent into obedience and that obedience switched into mental enslavement. Fahrenheit 451 is a story of human resistance, and I feel one of the most amazing politically charged scifi films ever made. The performances are excellent and I guarantee you, the ending is a work of searing, powerful beauty.

It's a five star flick!

[trippinglynet]

The Cacophony Society: Best Pranksters Ever?

 Karma Bennett × April 1, 2015 

  “All-seeing-eye” by Winston Smith, from Tales of the San Francisco Cacophony Society

Pop quiz: What do Burning Man, Fight Club, flash mobs, urban exploring, art cars and the Billboard Liberation Front have in common? All of them were born of the pranksters known as the Cacophony Society. They started in San Francisco, 1986 and expanded to have chapters in Detroit, Portland, Los Angeles, and dozens of other cities. With April Fool’s Day approaching I knew I’d want to share some stories from this incredible group.

The Cacophony Society combined art and theater in mischievous ways. They outlined bodies on sidewalks and glued toasters to walls. One time they set up a booth offering “Free Casts—arms or legs.” They claimed that a fake injury was all the rage, and they would offer to help passers-by come up with an epic tale to explain their feigned maladies. They paraded the streets as a legion of drunken Santas (today this tradition lives on in Santarchy and SantaCon).  Every year at the Bay to Breakers foot race, people dress in salmon and run in the opposite direction as the racers—another tradition started by the Cacophony Society. They staged a flash mob zombie attack long before zombies or flash mobs were trendy. Are these actions pranks or art? The Cacophony Society didn’t care about labels, only mayhem.

They welcomed transgressive or even illegal events, but discouraged anything overtly religious or political. They held a pigeon roast next to a PETA protest in Union Square and staged a Republican rally in People’s Park (ground zero for hippies in Berkeley). Neither of these acts was meant to be political, they were meant to be participatory works of art that both delight and confound.

I got in touch with the publishers of Tales of the San Francisco Cacophony Society to share with you some of the antics they’ve pulled off over the years. Tales of the San Francisco Cacophony Society is a tremendous book, full of photos and stories. Today’s excerpt focuses only on their pranks, but the book also details outrageous parties, urban exploring, explosions, art cars, creative vandalism, the zone trips that led to Burning Man and much more.

As a resident of the Bay Area, it’s hard to express how much the Cacophony Society impacted San Francisco. Organizations that plan urban street games like SF Zero and the plethora of art cars and costume parties show Cacophony’s influence. And Burning Man itself is a huge part of the culture of the city. Reading this book showed me that a prank is never just a prank. A prank is a way to excite the imagination and upset our expectations. Pranks force us out of our routines and expand our notions about what we can and should do with our short lives, to look beyond the rat race and the passive comforts of media. So as you read the excerpt below, remember the Cacophony Society motto: “You might already be a member.”

Epic Pranks of the Cacophony Society

The following excerpt and images are courtesy of the publisher, Last Gasp.

Tales of the San Francisco Cacophony Society combines narrative recollections with first-hand accounts and actual flyers and zines from the events, which is why the following excerpts change POV.

Decadent Meals for the Homeless

Crumbs anyone? On the morning of Bastille Day, 1994, 31-year-old Peter Doty and a couple of friends went to San Francisco’s City Hall dressed in full 18th century attire and carrying fancy trays with a few crumbs on them. After presenting Deputy Mayor, Frank Jordan with the “Copper Crumb” award for crummy homeless policies, Doty and company joined a crowd gathered to show support for Food Not Bombs activist Keith McHenry. Unfortunately, the members of the San Francisco Police Department present that day had no sense of humor and proceeded to arrest Doty’s co-conspirators for serving food without a permit.

Despite the arrests, Doty remains undaunted. In fact, Doty, also known as Pierre, Le Marquis de Gateau, says the annual roast at Union Square, “Let Them Eat Cake,” has become something of a hit. Every Bastille Day, July 14, Doty and a host of others make decadent desserts and serve them to the resident homeless people. The servers all dress in 18th-century French aristocratic garments, but often homeless people help with the act. “We had one guy last year who sat down at a piano and played Mozart,” Doty recalls.

The SPASM Against Fantasia Hoax

Doty says his pranks are meant as “shame tactics.” And he hasn’t limited himself to care of the homeless. Satires of whiny political correctness and pack journalism, for example, are probably his favorite pranks. When the Castro Theatre decided to show Disney’s Fantasia in July 1991, Doty formed CAFE, the facetious Coalition Against Fantasia’s Exhibition. Calling himself Dwayne Newtron, Doty wrote a statement claiming that his six-year-old daughter’s terror at the Night on Bald Mountain segment had prompted him to form SPASM (Sensitive Parents Against Scary Movies). SPASM anchored the CAFE, which also included Dieters United (who claimed that hippos in tutus were offensive to overweight people) and BADRAP (Bay Area Drought Relief Alliance Party, which felt that “water conservation efforts will be hindered by showing Mickey Mouse’s waste of water in the ‘Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ sequence”).

The San Francisco Chronicle and Examinerand The Washington Post all reported the protest as real; not one reporter bothered to check out Newtron and his nonexistent daughter or call anyone else in SPASM’s constituency. The denouement of the media hoax came a few weeks later when it was mentioned in a Time Magazine cover story. Finally, on April Fools’ Day the following year, Doty came clean and The Wall Street Journal tracked down the reporters who’d been had, including The San Francisco Examiner’s Rob Morse. “I’ve been in San Francisco so long, I tend to believe anything,” Morse told The Wall Street Journal. “You’ve got to go pretty far in San Francisco to make something look like a joke.”

Suicide Note Writing Workshop

An event description from Rough Trade, the Cacophony Society Newsletter:

Consider the many applications of the well-written suicide note. Many a job application, love letter, or similar pathetic plea for mercy could be better served by a simple threat of self-immolation. Then too, even if one has the good sense to avoid this arguably cowardly method of honorable reality exit, it pays to have one’s parting shot ready. Carry it at all times; in the event of intersecting with an inebriated MUNI driver, jealous rival, or falling building cornice, well, you can leave ‘em guessing, can’t you? At this workshop we willl look at a few famous examples, and polish our own epitaphal epistles. Bring: Examples you admire from the genre, famous or obscure. Do not bring: Sharp objects, loaded guns, and so on. Acts of self-inflicted violence willl be sternly discouraged (the landlord, you know).

SF MOMA Tour

We examined and critiqued the utilitarian details of SFMOMA, as if it were the actual art on display. And as a tribute to the “readymade” art pieces presented to the public in the early 20th century by Marcel Duchamp. This was held in the old SFMOMA building on Van Ness, with its intricate humidification measuring devices (looking like a tiny seismograph!), old brass fire extinguishers, cracked plaster walls, shiny doorknobs, plush benches, Stoic guards, light switches, urinals, and more.

With Cacophonists’ minds ready to discover art that abounds, and express adventurous conceptual and cultural insight within this fine modern art establishment, we played the most serious game of art critique, and the pretentious hyperbole flowed forth as we reflected ideas of how the art object (a museum doorknob), with its precious patina, was constructed in such a way as to juxtapose a paradigm shift from a new and old world. This is representing a paradox, of transformed self-realization indicative of a cookie cutter individualism integrated by an isolated industrialized society, subliminally suggesting a radical sensibility within the seemingly mundane. Brilliant!

Passersby in the museum joined in briefly at times, looking at what we were critiquing, as if we were seriously seeing something on museum display that should not go unmissed… then realizing after a few minutes of our exaggerated BS that it was a utilitarian device used by the museum for utilitarian purposes. (They’re looking at and critiquing a light switch?) The passing museum-goer would then move along with a puzzled shrug.

Sketch books were pulled out as the critiquing went on. Challenging to the artist was capturing the intricacies of a high tech humidification device, A device that itself also draws lines, designed for measuring sensitive humidity levels in museums. OR, a benchmark conceptual piece, symbolizing the delicate juxtaposition of a lost barbarism in art, if in fact the artist is still using hands with pencil on paper, hearkening back to medieval sensibilities. This realization made obvious to the viewer indeed does render this piece a great work of art for our tenuous post-neo-avant-modern times. We critiqued a guard, to his amusement. I posed still in an alcove, to be critiqued verbosely. Urinals were signed “R Mutt” in honor of Marcel Duchamp, who was our hero in this game.

 The Bart Lounge

As much as we all liked to entertain each other, we really loved it when we could play to an unsuspecting audience. The BART train between San Francisco and the East Bay was our perfect playground. One Friday evening we all boarded BART and our MC announced to the passengers that this was a pilot project that BART was testing to bring entertainment to riders on Friday evenings. We proceeded to “entertain” the passengers with such acts as “Duane and Dusty” (Peter Doty and Sara Rosenbaum), a dynamic duo straight from Vegas and the amazing “Shirley Bassey “ (Robert Hubbard in the most believable Shirley drag) singing her great Bond hit “Goldfinger.” Along with assorted magic acts, poets, and total silliness, we “entertained” passengers all the way to the end of the line.

I was the cigarette girl with a 1950s night club tray around my neck, offering cigars, cigarettes, chewing gum, and condoms, accompanied by a pet rat courtesy of the rat girls, climbing all over the tray. We even handed out surveys to the passengers asking them to let BART know which were their favorite acts, and would they would like this to be a regular feature of the Friday night commute.

On the return trip two young guys boarded the train in Hayward. They were dressed in nice suits and ties, on their way to meet their dates in the city. I climbed in one of the guy’s lap and started flirting with him. As I played with his hair, the rat climbed off my tray and on to his shoulder, where it let go with a very messy, gooey shit. I was sure the guy was going to start screaming at me but instead he turned out to be a great sport. He laughed, tried to clean off the mess, and said that this was going to be a great story to tell his date. He gave me his card and subsequently came to many parties that my husband and I had at our home over the years. This is how I met Mark Harmond, who is one of the best sports I have ever met. —Rat Girl

Smugglers Chase in SF’s Biggest Tourist Trap

Lotteria Cabal hosted many live-action street games using the urban landscape as a playground. This ‘Smuggler’ game took place in Chinatown and Fisherman’s Wharf during a typical work day.

At high noon, under the cable car turnaround at Fisherman’s Wharf, a group of 25 men and women in business attire and dark sunglasses arrive carrying cell phones and walkie-talkies. They look stern, tight-lipped, ready for action. There are five briefcases and one set of jewels. The object of the game, Smuggler, is for the FBI to capture the jewels before the jewel thieves can get them to home base. Historically—in games played in Chinatown and on the Embarcadero—the FBI has always had the advantage, but there are pitfalls at Fisherman’s Wharf: very heavy car traffic, security guards who don’t like interlopers, and, of course, tourists. We make our way to the finish line, the Fisherman’s Wharf ship wheel on Jefferson and Taylor. We line up, while mobs of tourists stop and snap pictures. We pick teams, and the thieves head off with their loot. Two agents guard the wheel while the rest spread out across two square blocks to guard the perimeter. It’s a nerve-wracking wait. Looking for suits among the throng of colorfully clad sightseers, I nearly tag a real businessman with an innocent briefcase.

Radio contact tells us that the thieves are closing in. FBI agents are chasing thieves through nearby souvenir shops. Frantic searches are taking place in alleyways. The jewels are nowhere to be found. One thief is nearly captured by a casual bystander, but, using an old football maneuver, she escapes both the citizen and the agent in hot pursuit. The jewels are still nowhere to be found. The thieves are on their way. I’m agitated. I can’t get a clear view of our perimeter. There are too many people. The Nicaraguan band behind us has drawn a crowd. They’re in our finish line. Some of them are wearing suits. I’m sweating. I can see two thieves in the parking lot behind us, hiding behind the valet booth. There are two more on the southwest corner, moving fast through the crowd. I want to back up, but the other agents have their hands full with decoy briefcases. There’s no way to tell. Suddenly, it’s a rush. Thieves coming in from all directions. We capture two suspects but it’s hard to expect the unexpected. While searching faux cases, a car pulls up to the stoplight, and a thief jumps out, depositing the briefcase containing the jewels in the safe zone.

An observant little girl who has been watching the game with her father innocently points out that we’re “just playing Cops and Robbers.”  Twenty-nine-year-old FBI agent Trixie Dare camouflages herself by looking through a garbage can before an onlooker tips her off to a nearby villain, 38-yearold Christopher Valentine.

She chases Valentine through a construction site, tagging him just as he is pulling the basement door closed. No jewels. Forty-six-year-old Porky Pig dashes through stopped traffic, carrying a decoy, with an agent in hot pursuit. Acting as a thief, 24-year-old Agent Smith jumps out of the bushes and rushes the finish line with a blocker and three decoys running interference. Smith is tagged but a sloppy FBI search leaves the jewels, taped to the inner rim of the lid of the briefcase, undiscovered. It is the thieves’ day.

“We are a nation, not of men, but of laws. The law must be enforced at all cost,” says Smith through his impassive sunglasses. “But being a thief filled me with fear and unknown exhilaration.”

During the third and final game, secret agent Speedbump apprehends a thief and wrestles the briefcase out of his uncooperative grip in the middle of an intersection. A cable-car load of tourists erupts in violent applause. Something to write home about. Street vendors begin to offer secret-agent discounts. Briefcases are tossed over the heads of people waiting in lines from thief to thief, with agents in hot pursuit. Witnesses ask to join in the game. And eventually that is how the day is won, with the jewels nestled inside a ham sandwich, wrapped in a paper bag, inside a brief case, shoved in a backpack, on the shoulder of a 16-year-old kid who walks up to the finish line and casually sits down on the bench next to the ever-vigilant FBI. The kid gets a $5 payoff, but no doubt he’d have done it for free. The FBI is completely undone.

And the next game? You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.

Text and all images excerpted from Tales of the San Francisco Cacophony Society edited by Kevin Evans, Carrie Galbraith, and John Law. Factoid Illustrations by Kevin Evans. Painting at the top is “All-seeing-eye” by Winston Smith.