#my least favorite part of fandom was seeing adults interact with childrens media in adult waysin spaces populated predominantly by children

[juusasu4evagrrl]

Growing up online in fandoms was a wild experience. If I could go back and change it all I would in a heart beat in an instant and without hesitation.

Goodluck to the next generation of super fans, fanfiction authors, and chronically online kids. I hope your time in this space brings you what you need. Be creative, be kind, be critical. catch you later!

[itsclydebitches]

I just want to enlighten the correct anon: bulk-buying cards was ALWAYS an issue. Before it was the rich kids, now it's rich internet stars (with internet making it into An Issue TM). That hasn't really changed, cause people are shitty when it comes to limited collectibles that can only by completed by select few. It's not a fair comparison. [Also, this argument kinda reeks of 'if you're adult you can't enjoy kids stuff, cause you're takin it from the actual kids'. Which is a bad take.]

I really don't know anything about the trading card scene, but yeah, as said, I think there are a couple different conversations going on in those asks. Discussing adults getting into cartoons is not the same as discussing adults invested in reboots of their childhood cartoons is not the same as someone buying up cards rather than collecting them "correctly," etc. The topic of adults interacting with kid's media is a hugely complicated one, as my own example of Cruella exemplifies. Is that even kid's media anymore? Where are we drawing this line? Who knows.

As for the question of adults enjoying kids stuff in general, I honestly don't think that's the angle the previous anon was intending to take. Their own interest in these franchises speaks to that. More importantly, I do understand the general phenomenon they're describing. Easiest (and perhaps most extreme) example I can give is that of the brony fandom. The issue there is not, and never has been, grown men getting invested in a children's show about ponies. The issue is not adults like the kid thing. If anything, the start of that movement had some really fantastic undertones: look at these grown men rejecting assumptions about masculinity and wholeheartedly embracing something society tells them it's embarrassing to like! So, on a surface level, that's great. I wholeheartedly support it. But it's just that: the surface level. Dig deeper and you find all the troublesome ways in which this interest has been expressed, from sexualizing the characters to outright Nazi propaganda. The conversation then is not, "Men can't enjoy My Little Pony" but rather, "At what point is My Little Pony, the fandom, largely inaccessible to the people it was created for: kids?" Now, a conversation like that is wrapped up in the issue of fandom itself and whether kids should even be in online spaces that are, well, sexualizing everything. But it's still a question to tackle. What do we do when kids can't google their favorite character without encountering porn? Can't attend a con without adults yelling at them over certain preferences? When adults become furious that such-and-such dark/gritty/romantic/nuanced thing didn't happen in this cartoon and other people have to remind them, "Hey... this is written for ten-year olds."

Those questions do exist and they are important but, as said, I think they're largely outliers. Adults get invested in kid's media the same way kids get invested in adult media and 99% of the time that's totally fine. If an adult tweets out, on the adult website Twitter, to their adult audience, how upset they are that the latest cash-grab (or copyright renewal) messed with a beloved franchise... that's not hurting the six-year old who is still going to happily see the next movie with their parents, ignorant of the drama. These are really questions about online spaces. Questions of accessibility. Even questions about how we respond to that ignorance in children: they don't know that a lot of the old Disney films are horrifically racist, so what are we, the adults, going to do about that? One answer might be ensuring that racist content doesn't worm its way into future works and that requires, well, being invested in that work. Or at least what it represents. For every "It's just a kid's story" I've seen in response to someone actually getting unreasonably upset over a story not written to their adult standards, I've seen triple that in response to someone getting upset that the kid's story they either enjoy themselves, or know their younger loved ones enjoy, is imparting some really messed up messages. Sometimes investment isn't just "I like the story" but is something along the lines of, "I like that this cartoon has queer rep in it and I'm determined that the insane struggle the writers had to go through to secure it doesn't continue into future shows." Adults write these cartoons. Adults invent them! How can we not be invested?

So there are a lot of moving parts here and, yeah, sometimes it's just a 40yo throwing a temper tantrum that the show aimed at 5yos didn't meet their specifically adult standards. But usually there's more than that going on and the response, "It's a kid's show. You shouldn't care" is never the right answer. We have kids of our own, we care about society, we grew up on that story, we study these works, we want to write them ourselves someday, we just like the cartoon... there are a hundred reasons why an adult might be invested in something aimed at kids.

[trans-axian-archive]

OH yeah i def agree w you, i just wasnt thinking abt tht atm. Like, someone may see wwx as, idk, more annoying than he actually is and im just OkOk cool cool, ur literally wrong but whatever, i just move on from tht bcs its not that serious. But then some ppl make wwx say some weird innuendo shit to a junior and its like, why. why did u think it was a good idea for a grown ass man to do tht to a teen? why do you think its ok? it makes some kids think its ok for adults to do tht when its Not

YEAH in my post I mentioned how much of an issue that sort of characterization/content is in the context of depicting mlm, but it really is also a big issue when it comes to the children who will see those types of posts

like first of all its just... uncomfortable to view as a teenager. even though I'm technically an Adult, I'm still a teenager, and reading about a grown adult saying weird shit to teenagers just makes me uncomfortable As a teenager. and I imagine it's much more uncomfortable for teenagers even younger than I am and closer in age to the juniors

coming from someone who Grew Up On The Internet and grew up in fandom (god I hate that fucking word), I can say that seeing those types of things and other similarly harmful behavior in fanworks definitely had a negative impact on me and how I saw the world as an impressionable CHILD. I know I'm really not that old at 18 and there is a lot more growing and maturing for me to do but.... I cannot stress enough just how Young 13 and 14 and 15 year olds really are. you feel so mature because you're a Teenager now and you're in Highschool and all that but it really is so young. this is not meant to be patronizing or invalidating, I know how frustrating and hurtful it is to know that you're mature and capable but still have adults treat you like shit and not take you seriously; this comes from a place of care and respect and acknowledgment that kids that young are exactly that - kids, and they deserve to Be kids and be innocent. they shouldn't be exposed to that sort of thing and those sort of jokes and have that kind of behavior normalized to them. being a kid and being innocent isn't a bad thing and you shouldn't let Anyone convince you otherwise - cherish and value being young and silly and immature, it really is a wonderful thing. you will miss your ability to be completely carefree and childish

and like I said, that kind of shit changes the way you view and interact with the world as a young impressionable Child. and as you mentioned, that sort of thing will start to make kids think its okay for adults to treat them and interact with them that way. I can't even describe how much seeing certain tropes depicted over and over again and normalized fucked up my perception of myself and the world and other people. I thought and said and liked weird shit and wasn't critical because I was fucking 12 and 13 and 14 and all of these adults around me on the internet were doing it and said it was okay and made it popular and normalized and I had no one to tell me that No, those things Aren't okay. if you're 13 or 14 or 15 and everyone's constantly making jokes about your favorite character in your favorite book/show treating people your age in a weird uncomfortable manor, over time and after its been normalized so much, of course you're gonna start to think "oh... okay. this is just how adults interact with minors and there are posts saying its funny when this character that I like does it so it's okay!"

idk its just.... I've seen many posts talking about this kind of thing in a broad and general sense but I've never seen it brought up in the mdzs fanbase where I Know that its a big issue. such a large part of this fanbase hold and express incredibly harmful opinions and ideas, many of which are about sex and sexuality, and its just So widespread and normalized. this is about So Much More than just weird posts about wei wuxian making uncomfortable comments and jokes to the juniors, this extends far past that to much more harmful and insidious content

I know that many of my followers are young teens and it just scares me how much gross weird shit they have or will be exposed to in this fanbase. it disturbs me that so many of those young teens have read the novel and been exposed to its harmful content, content that no child should be exposed to. of course kids n young teens will read or watch or play whatever they want and being told something is too mature for them will not stop them from doing that (might even make them want to do it more), and I believe what mature things kids and young teens should be exposed to is situational, but it is the responsibility of adults in fanbases to, at the very least, make this a safe and respectful place for them. kids will, unfortunately, find media they shouldn't find, but we as adults should make sure that the spaces they come to after they consume that media don't expose them further to things they shouldn't be exposed to, and make sure they know what kinds of things are harmful and unacceptable

[fruit-teeth]

My beef with the Monster High/Ever After High fandom

I promised myself I would never make a post like this but hey, today I got a review on my fanfiction.net page that kinda pissed me off so now I’m gonna post this.

So, only a small handful of people who have been following my blog for a while know that before I was in the TF2 fandom, I was writing fanfiction for Monster High and even Ever After High (if you’re unfamiliar, basically they were franchises based dolls made by Mattel). I did this all throughout high school and I got pretty popular on FF.net because of it.

The fandom wasn’t all bad, I should clarify: I met really cool and interesting people in there, and I even made a friend, so generally I had a positive experience. However, then there were the...not so good people. Now, I’m gonna be gentle when I tell these stories, because I’m pretty sure many of these people were actual children, but I think a few of them were really adults or at least people who were a little older than I was at the time, so I don’t really have many hang-ups about sharing these stories.

The first major thing that happened was about five years ago, when I was browsing other people’s fanfics, and I happened across one that seemed very familiar. I started reading it, and a that was when I realized that the author of the story I found had practically plagiarized a story I had written a few days earlier. I don’t mean like they just stole my idea, but there were parts of the story that were obviously copied and pasted from the thing I had written but just re-arranged differently so it looked like an original piece. The craziest part was that when I looked at the comments, nobody had any idea those parts were stolen although it was completely obvious the author had not written them. The sections that the author actually wrote themselves were littered with bad grammar and typing errors, while the rest had been proofread (how do I know? Because I wrote them!). I was super pissed off, and I was about to message the person when I checked their bio and saw that they were like 11 or something, and while I personally think kids that young should NOT have a social media presence, I kinda let it slide. This kid was really young, they probably didn’t know any better, so I just let it go. Looking back, though, I feel like I should have at least said something since no one else was calling them out and they weren’t going to learn until someone talked to them.

About two years after that incident, I started writing story that was a crossover with Monster High and Ever After High, and...HOOOO BOY. That brought some weird folks out of the wood work. I can only think it was because I started writing for a bigger audience, but for some odd reason an adult man messaged me and tried to pay me $50 to write a weird fetish fanfic involving Ever After High characters, and he had really specific words and phrases he wanted me to use in the fic. I was really creeped out and said no, but he kept messaging me about it until I just blocked him. What’s even weirder is that I’m pretty sure I was like seventeen or so when this interaction took place, so...yikes.

Around the same time, another user messaged me asking if I took requests. I said yes and asked what it was they were requesting, and they suddenly launched into this entire description of a Thomas the Tank Engine and Ever After High crossover fanfic and sent me a link to a very specific song they wanted me to base it off of. I was caught off guard and didn’t answer for a few minutes, which caused them to become really paranoid and they started asking me if I was going to block them. I hesitantly replied and just told them it sounded like a lot of work but I would look into it later, and they accepted that answer and never messaged me again. It was really odd, to say the least.

Also worth mentioning was the person who left what had to be at least fifteen messages in my PM inbox and like eight different reviews on the same story literally DEMANDING that I write a chapter about their favorite character (the character in question was Twyla, by the way). I sensed this person was also really young, so I replied and kindly told them that she wasn’t part of the story yet, but if they wanted to they could request a separate story about her. Well, this kid got REALLY frustrated and tried to start an argument with me, and when I asked them to leave me alone they called me a ‘bitch’, so I just blocked them.

Eventually I stopped updating my crossover fic since I never found a good way to continue it, but there’s one person who keeps leaving reviews on not just that story but also the various TF2 fics I’ve reuploaded there. They keep begging me to continue it, and normally I’d just ignore it but what’s really strange is that they seem to come back and leave comments every few months. I just got one from them earlier today, which was what made me write this. I get the feeling this person is a kid, but I swear to god I get really pissed off when I open my email and go, “Oh cool, I got a review” only to find out it’s this same person who’s been begging me to update a story I haven’t touched in two years. It’s also irritating when they leave comments about that particular story on my unrelated TF2 stories, because it’s super clear that they just see me as source of entertainment rather than a real person who makes fan content.

I dunno, I guess people like this exist across all fandoms, but I’ve only ever experienced this kind of weird entitlement when I was in these two fandoms. I can only think it was because there’s a lot of children present in these fandoms, but like...I dunno, man. Weird stuff.

[fishtomale]

When I was 14 a friend got me into Hetalia, and being that Hetalia is a bit of a hot topic right now I wanted to talk a bit about my experiences within that fandom and how I saw it cause harm. This was my first real fandom experience, so part of what I experienced will have been somewhat common in any fandom around 2011 and possibly even today, but this is the lens through which I can attest.

I would also like to note that I am not proud of my engagement with Hetalia. When I came to be 15 I grew out of believing offensive humor was harmless and edgy, and I realized that Hetalia’s very source material was unapologetically racist, antisemetic, and pro-imperialist, so I cast off any association with the fandom and original media.

Under the cut my experiences will be divided between the topics of racism / antisemetism, homophobia / transphobia, and pedophilia, so please read at your own discretion.

[[MORE]]

Racism / Antisemetism

- It goes without saying that the premise of Hetalia is problematic. The series, initially at least, focuses on humanized versions of the countries within the Axis Powers during the reign of Nazi Germany. These nations are not only treated sympathetically, but are the main protagonists.

- It was not uncommon for fascist and imperialist iconography to be found prominently displayed in both fanart and cosplays. It was a bit of a joke between certain cosplayers to say “I am not a nazi, just a weeaboo!”

- Cosplayers would sometimes take photoshoots in which they would do the “Heil Hitler” salute, and also point (fake) weapons at the Star of David.

- All this being said, among the “ironic” Nazis there were some legit out-and-proud Nazis. I wouldn’t say that these Nazi’s had a significant voice in the fandom, but the fans didn’t really have an issue with them existing in the same space.

- It was not uncommon to see fanart and fanfiction of ships between a country which had colonized / occupied / invaded another and the country that was colonized / occupied / invaded. Some more obvious examples of this would be England x India or France x Seychelles.

- Within the show and most offical art, characters that were obviously supposed to be understood as people of color were usually drawn very pale. Sometimes fanartists would draw these characters darker and would recieve a lot of harassment in the comments and inbox. The fans that would draw characters darker were almost always people of color themselves.

- It was really common to try and represent Japanese accents in fanfiction by writing dialogue like “Herro” instead of “Hello”. Most people did not see the issue with this and would go on and on about how cute they thought Japanese accents were.

- I remember a young girl from Bangladesh speaking up about how she was uncomfortable with how the creator of Hetalia treated brown characters, especially India, and she recieved a lot of anonymous messages that threatened sexual violence in response to this.

- It goes without saying that criticism was not well recieved or encouraged in the Hetalia fandom. You’d be much more likely to see the word “squick” than “problematic”.

Homophobia / Transphobia

- There are a few canon LGBT characters in Hetalia, all of which are cis men. I would argue that every single portrayal of same gender attraction in Hetalia is shown to be predatory.

- There was a wide range of attitudes towards shipping in the Hetalia fandom. Some people saw m/m shipping as activism. Some people were blatantly homophobic and saw m/m ships as a guilty pleasure. Some people would exclusively ship m/f ships and pretend they were oppressed for it.

- There were a couple of gender-nonconforming characters and it was really common to hear them referred to as “traps” and be portrayed in fanart in various stages of undress. It’s worth noting one was a child.

- There was a big split in the fandom based on whether or not you believed trans people were their gender. Those who were “pro-trans” or whatever were often referred to as the “SJWs” of the fandom, and when people posted trans headcanons there would usually be lots of bigotry in the notes.

Pedophilia

- It is worth noting that there are some pedophilia jokes in Hetalia’s source material.

- It was a huge joke that the character France was a rapist. There were multiple stories going around of adult France cosplayers jokingly threatening to rape children at cons.

- Adults at cons were also known to attempt and solicit sex from minors in order to “make their ship come true”.

- Characters that were children were frequently sexualized.

- Not only did pedophilia fics and art exist, adults I would have considered friends at the time would message them to me as a “favor” if they contained my favorite characters.

- When I would post closet cosplays adults would attempt to solicit inappropriate pictures of me in cosplay.

- Adults approached me on multiple occasions in order to roleplay sex and romance between Hetalia characters. They would take time inbetween the roleplay to ask me intimate questions about my own sexuality and sexual desire.

- When I expressed discomfort with a very popular ongoing fic, “Giving In”, after one of the protagonists admitted to having raped children multiple times, I was encouraged by an adult to stick with the fic anyways because it’s message of forgiveness was apparently really important.

- Looking back I was being groomed in some pretty public spaces and no one at any point stepped in and tried to help.

- It was pretty public discourse and opinion that teenagers reading pedophilia fics was a healthy way to cope with trauma. (Hint: It’s not.)

- There were no healthy boundaries between minors and adults in that fandom. Questioning adults, especially popular creators, often came with consequences because they were apparently the backbone of the fandom.

- I would gamble to say that many of the predatory adults I interacted with when I was 14 may still be in the fandom, as well as their previous victims who have normalized what happened to them.

[sophygurl]

Did my what’s coming up on TV quarterly-ish organizational project and re-did my shows I watch page. Figured it would be a good time to make an update post on my media consumption of late.

I’m still embroiled in the Big Brother season. It’s been a pretty terrible season truth be told, and I’d have noped out except for there being one houseguest left in there that I adore and want to support, and of course the fan community I have (a chat room I’ve been in for a decade now and also a twitter list of fans, update sites, and BB alum I enjoy interacting with). We’ve still got a ways to go, and I am not watching the live feeds much this season, but still watching the shows (mostly to chat with my friends about) and keeping up with the feeds via twitter to see what’s happening and watching the few small clips of that one hg i still enjoy. 

It’s an interesting thing when being part of a fandom starts to feel like a chore. Like, yes, you do this for entertainment purposes and could stop at any point when it stops being fun for you - but you do also create a community around you and half the fun is that community interaction and it’s harder to let go of that. Because you can’t generally pack that whole community up and take them to another show or experience with you. 

Another fan experience that was a let-down this summer was Veronica Mars. I won’t post any spoilers in case there is anyone out there yet who wants to watch S4 unspoiled and has yet to find out what happened, but suffice to say I am not pleased. 

I did enjoy most of the series right up until the ending. I know a lot of people are upset about other things that happened, but I can defend or at least explain most of that based on what the show and the characters have always been. But that ending. Wow. I am still recovering. And not at all interested in a season 5 or really anything else that Rob Thomas might want to work on in the future. He’s really ruined any fan goodwill he had in my eyes. 

Other TV shows I’ve been enjoying this summer: 

The 100 delivered another fascinating season. I know the show is problematic in a number of ways, but it still has such wonderful characters with incredible arcs of growth and struggle and learning to overcome together. The plots get wilder and wilder, but whatever, I’m along for the ride. 

Agents of Shield was ... interesting. I don’t even know what to say about it anymore, tbh.

American Princess on Lifetime was a surprisingly fun new show - a NY socialite runs off on her wedding day and ends up at a Ren Faire, where she meets new friends and decides to stay and create a new life for herself. It’s charming, sweet, romantic, funny, and fun for any found family fans. 

BH90210′s pilot episode cracked me tf up. I kind of can’t believe the cast is going along with this satirical version of playing themselves trying to get a reboot of the original show going. It’s soapy and campy and so delightfully weird, while also being nostalgic. Can’t wait to see what they do with it. (Also I miss Luke Perry enormously)

Elementary has one episode left and I will be very sad when the story is complete, but happy for everyone involved for having been part of such a unique spin on Sherlock Holmes in such a successful way.

Euphoria season one was an intense emotional process, watching teens and their families struggle with addiction, violence, abusive relationships, sexual discoveries, gender navigation, mental illness, and so much more. Also just a visually stunning show. 

Grand Hotel is a fun soapy new show that I am enjoying very much. Classic soap tropes, a largely Latinx cast, a lesbian main character, and lots of eye candy.

Jane the Virgin put out a wonderful final season and series finale. I laughed. I cried. I was very satisfied. 

Killjoys has started up it’s final season. I’m loving it, but I also wanna cling to it and scream��“no! don’t go!” 

Pandora is a new show on the CW, which is interesting. Futuristic space academy featuring a clone, a mind reader, an augmented human, an alien from a planet we were recently at war with, and Pandora herself who has some kinda mystery surrounding her and the recent death of her parents. Lots of political intrigue and conspiracy, with episodic plots that the young adults uncover together each week, and just about every sci-fi trope you could think of being covered. 

Trinkets on Netflix was a cute lil show about teenage girls in a shoplifting support group. It was a really genuine look at the highs and lows of female friendship at that age. 

In other TV watching news, I finally got all of the Northern Exposure DVDs and am doing a long-awaited re-watch of my all-time favorite show. I’m on the second season. 

In addition to completing that DVD collection, I also completed collecting all of the Realm of the Eldering books (yay birthday money!) and am doing my re-read of those. It’s going to take me a long time, because my re-reading gets done while attempting to fall asleep and also when I wake up trying to get back to sleep, so depending on how the insomnia is going, it could be anywhere from a couple of paragraphs to maybe 50 pages tops per night and RotE is a looooot of books. I’m still on the first novel now. 

That also means, I am taking a little break from my otherwise-continual Raven Cycle re-reading lol. 

Other stuff I’ve been reading - started the Wayward Children series by Seanan McGuire, finished Tamora Pierce’s Emelan series (although I think she’s writing one more of those yet), and got caught up on Patricia Brigg’s Mercyverse series. Then, since I’m caught up on all the series I’m reading (other than Wayward Children since I just started it), I went and put a crapton of new books on my library hold list - some of which are the first books in series themselves. So here we go! 

And of course, I’ve been playing lots of Sims. Love love loving the Island Living expansion pack. The mermaids are so much fun, as is swimming and boating in the ocean, other beach activities, and just living in a more communal setting (people show up to help put out fires, bring food over randomly, fix things that are broken, etc.). I definitely won’t tire of the stuff in this pack before the next new pack comes out, which I imagine will be sometime late this fall or early winter, if they go according to the usual schedule. 

Guess that’s all for now. Might do some more specific VMars meta at some point, once I get my thoughts and feelings more collected. IDK. This post is so all over the place I’m not sure if I’m gonna tag it with any specific fandom or media. 

[izzyovercoffee]

I've been a fan of the Republic Commando series for a long time now, but just recently I realized what an asshole Kal really is. As well as problems with how Etain's pregnancy is handled. I still want to enjoy the books but these facts really disappoint me. Any suggestions?

Well … yes and no. I’ve been through this, and I have a few suggestions, but I feel like… it’s dependent entirely on what you want out of Republic Commando and/or what you need out of it.  Just like any other piece of media, there will always be bad (sometimes horrible) parts alongside the good. Focus on the good parts of the series while recognizing the bad parts that are still there. 

I guess I’m going to come at this from a specifically personal point of view, because I’ve had the ups and downs with regards to Republic Commando quite a few times. 

You, of course, don’t have to take any of my advice whatsoever, of course, and you’re not obligated to create content either.

What worked for me was four things:

picking a specific character (or characters) to focus my attention on, and lots and lots of meta

fanfic, headcanons, drabbles, art of the characters

creating OCs either based on or inspired by RepComm (new RC squads, developing Death Watch Cuy’val Dar, creating OC Cuy’val Dar, creating pilots, etc etc etc) 

deconstructing the literature, starting with Kal and moving on from there

aaand I’m putting a cut bc I just realized how long this is lmao

Pick a character you really like, and go through the times they’re mentioned in the books. For me … I really grew attached to Mereel, and I’ve done … a lot, a lot of meta, not least of which was the accelerated aging cure I posted the other day. I wouldn’t have been able to finish it if I didn’t focus on Mereel. I also wouldn’t have really come to understand his character if I never up and decided one day to pay extra attention to the mirsheb. 

Try writing drabbles, if that’s something you like to do, or come up with headcanons, or little snapshots of moments they might have with other characters. Fill up the gaps, because there are a lot of gaps, for all of them. Share your thoughts with other fans, or friends, or me! I’m always excited to talk about RepComm, honestly. I hope my salt about Kal is not too … off-putting? I do gush a lot about the other characters, too, just not as often lately. (I have to fix this. I will fix this.)

Create AUs. Make fix-it scenarios — pieces of the narratives that you don’t like, or that just don’t fit, and come up with ways to make them so. AUs I’m a fan of, too, because it gives us different environments in which to exercise ways to recreate our favorite characters. In this new setting, what could possibly be the reasons that x character is still x way? why? how do they get reacquainted with the rest of them? That sort of thing.

Or from there, start creating OCs. There’s at least 100 Cuy’val Dar, not including trainers for other parts of the Grand Army of the Republic, outside of Special Operations. 10,000 Republic Commandos, and each squad of 4 is different from the others.

There’s also quite a bit of mandalorian cultural worldbuilding packed into these novels, so long as you’re also able to unlace Kal’s heavy-handed misogyny and cissexist heterocentric bias. It’s been fun trying to figure out how mandalorian enclaves (Little Mandalores) might look on city planets, for one example.

When the series gets something right, it gets them really right. And it’s important to recognize how … well, good, and right, the things it does get right actually are — and this goes for most every piece of media out there. In this one, it’s the intense loyalty and sense of found family that really drew me in. The relationships between the commandos, the relationships between everyone (that isn’t Kal) … the potential for hijinks and the really intensely emotional moments across both platonic and romantic lines is really, really high between everyone, and it’s actually really easy to miss the first go around because how focused the narrative is on Kal, specifically … which is weird, given that these stories should be more focused on the clones and not him.

Everything seems to revolve around him, and you kind of forget about the other characters, or that they have relationships, interactions, conversations with the others beyond Kal’s gaze.

And the last thing is to tackle that disappointment head on. Part of the reason why myself, and others, are so adamant about being vocal of Kal’s abuse is because this type of abuse (emotional, mental, psychological) is often invisible, or outright ignored/forgiven by people in real life — not just in fandom. It’s especially concerning when all the things that Kal does are all surprisingly textbook abuse, but learning about the intricacies of how and why, and learning how to really pick apart abuse as committed by someone as beloved as Kal … well, learning to identify these things does extend to learning to identify them in real life, and in fighting them — or in, at the very least, supporting those affected by abuse.

I mean, it does not by any means make one an expert (though I do recommend, say, picking up books about abuse, like Why Does He DO That and Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, just for references and personal knowledge), but again — learning how to break these things down and identify them in a relatively safe capacity (literature) really helps to put things into perspective that would otherwise be incredibly hard to do because of how rarely we get the opportunity to see someone actually emotionally abusive in action.

Or how difficult it is to realize that abuse is happening when you’re under its direct influence. 

Some people might laugh or scoff, but Republic Commando as a series is really an excellent example of how insidious and damaging emotional abuse committed by a parental figure can really be — and how easily we, as people, are willing to overlook abuse or outright forgive it because we want to like the abuser, or because we personally understand his reasoning in spite of the harm he’s committing. 

I was actually going to go through the books and ignore all of Kal’s POVs, just to see how that changes the narration. Not because I dislike Kal so much as I recently noticed that Kal actively erases entire characters from his narrative that isn’t done in other chapters by other character POVs (most notably Mereel and his work towards the cure, but I’m sure this happens w/ other characters too). If a character, and it doesn’t matter how close to them they are, doesn’t fit exactly as how he defines they are or should be … he actually erases their achievements or outright ignores their contributions and qualities. 

And when I realized he does that, I was like what !! Because after all this time, going through the novels like I’ve done for meta, and I never noticed this before. And it’s upsetting, yes — but it’s also interesting. It’s fascinating to really take apart the narrative and try to really get inside characters’ heads and understand them.

Or, well, I find a lot of enjoyment out of doing that.

Of course, your mileage may vary, and you might not find my advice helpful … and that’s totally okay! This kind of thing is not enjoyable to everyone. Ultimately, once you get to this point, to get enjoyment out of RepComm (or any media, really, but I digress) you sometimes have to acknowledge that it will have bad parts — most things inevitably do, and few things are ever perfect. How you deal with those bad parts determines how you enjoy the work — but also, don’t forget to focus on the good parts, too, because there are good parts … it just sometimes takes more work to find them again once the realization of the bad hits.��

And if you’re totally put off from the work, even after all this, then that’s totally okay, too. It’s entirely understandable, entirely reasonable, and I would never fault you for that. I’ve known quite a few people who hit that realization, put the books down, and never picked them back up — and, again, that’s totally okay. Disappointing, yes, but like … that’s also life, sometimes. Things that you liked when you were younger, when you come back to them … they’re not what you remembered — or you notice things that make you balk you hadn’t noticed before. It happens. 

Oh, and also — take breaks. Lots of breaks. Take RepComm in small chunks, so that you don’t get overwhelmed if you’re the type that can or could (I am, sometimes). And, like I said before, drag some friends into it if you want, or drag me into it, if you’d like. I try to be as available as possible, even if I’ve been busy lately. It’s always nice to bounce ideas off another person, even if it’s just liveblogging or whathaveyou.

[proofthatihaveaheart]

I'm gonna send a lot :) :DC, Marvel, Borderlands, Gayperion, Carol Danvers

001 | Send me a fandom and I will tell you my (DC):

Favorite character: i have a lot of characters i really love in dc but no one really jumps out as my top favorite above all others…. i’m going to say selina because i love her in a lot of media and i picked up the current batman comic to read about her specifically (and then dropped them when she left lol, i’l have to pick up her solo series sometime too) 

Least Favorite character: hmmm………..i don’t know……….can i say jervis from gotham specifically? he makes my skin crawl in a very bad way and i kinda want to punch him in the face. although he also has his charming moments and i think his power-set makes for a very interesting villain hmmm. OH can i say all the various Big and Boring Cosmic Villains like Steppenwolf??? they all blur together and i just don’t care about any of them

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): selina/bruce, harley/pamela, oswald/ed, raven/beast boy, diana/steve

Character I find most attractive: diana aka wonder woman aka have my heart

Character I would marry: as much as i want to say diana, i feel like i would constantly be overwhelmed with awe around her so maybe that’s not a good idea………. can i marry bruce for his money?

Character I would be best friends with: if she wasn’t evil, pamela, she could be one of my fellow grad students (y’know, in another life). i would hang with steph too, she’s cool 

A random thought: dc was my first superhero love, teen titans specifically, and that show probably laid the groundwork for what i want in my superhero teams. also i should get back to reading dc comics

An unpopular opinion: i don’t think this is unpopular exactly but the joker is overused, there are so many other good batman villains 

My canon OTP: bruce/selina (GIVE ME THEIR WEDDING YOU COWARDS)

Non-canon OTP: harley/pamela except it’s canon in some verses if i remember correctly sooooooooooooooooo :) 

Most badass character: i want to say diana……..and i can’t think of anyone more badass so

Pairing I am not a fan of: clark/diana is just Bad, what were they thinking?

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): it’s comics, who hasn’t been screwed up by a writer at some point? ok but jokes aside, no one specific is coming to mind right now

Favourite friendship: i love all the batfam so *points at all of them* 

001 | Send me a fandom and I will tell you my (Marvel):

Favorite character: i don’t know how you could possibly expect me to choose a single character when there are so many………….. carol at the moment, kamala and mj and peter (parker, not quill) in general are at the top of the list too

Least Favorite character: ……………….there’s probably someone i hate…… but no one is coming to mind…… i guess thanos? i can’t believe he got a solo series 

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): the spidey ot4 (peter/harry/gwen/mj), steve/tony, carol/jessica, carol/maria, clint/natasha

Character I find most attractive: ooooooooo, a good question. i think i’ll go with carol because brie larson is

Character I would marry: if it had to be a superhero, janet. if not, gwen and we would run away together and never get involved with the angst of superheroes

Character I would be best friends with: maybe cindy moon (she likes pokemon! and is just a lovely person!) or gwen 

A random thought: in the avengers tower that absolutely exists and that they all live in (at least part of the time), tony builds additional rooms for all the new members. he puts glowing stars up in carol’s room and calls her space-face and laughs when she chooses star wars for movie night because of course that’s what you pick, danvers    

An unpopular opinion: spider-man h*mecoming is bad and it isn’t a comics-accurate adaptation of spider-man, let alone the most accurate

My canon OTP: any of the canon ships within the ot4 - but if i had to choose just one, it’d be peter/mj. all the good comics history

Non-canon OTP: THE SPIDEY OT4, MY ULTIMATE MARVEL SHIP

Most badass character: CAROL ‘SORRY I’M A BADASS’ DANVERS

Pairing I am not a fan of: sp*deypool is the ultimate notp. i don’t get why it has such a massive following

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): see my above point about comics (though the other thing about comics is that once there’s a switch in writers, it often resolves itself). currently, i feel this way about peter (although i’m behind so maybe spencer’s undid all the slott nonsense) + eddie and the symbiote (not so much their individual characters but the relationship between them)

Favourite friendship: steve and carol and tony currrently

001 | Send me a fandom and I will tell you my (Borderlands):

Favorite character: lilith or fiona

Least Favorite character: i love them all but salvador is….. well i just don’t have as much of a connection to him (sorry sal) 

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): lilith/roland, brick/mordecai, fiona/rhys, rhys/vaughn, athena/janey

Character I find most attractive: lilith. also amara who may outcompete lilith, we shall see

Character I would marry: would i marry any of them?? (the answer is no but i guess if i had to, maybe janey? at the very least, she could repair any problems in our house)

Character I would be best friends with: janey possibly

A random thought: each set of vault hunters is a weird dysfunctional family and nothing can convince me otherwise (i will be sorely disappointed if the bl2 gang aren’t close in bl3)

An unpopular opinion: there’s more to borderlands than handsome jack and i wish fandom would focus on some of the other characters more 

My canon OTP: lilith/roland or athena/janey

Non-canon OTP: rhys/vaughn just edges out fiona/rhys

Most badass character: zer0

Pairing I am not a fan of: rhys/handsome jack

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): no one really except where they killed roland and it was sad

Favourite friendship: i love timothy and athena as friends 

002 | send me a ship and I will tell you (gayperion):

when or if I started shipping it: i think it was sometime during episode 1???? i can’t remember a specific moment, it just kinda happened

my thoughts: they’re very good and it would be even more amazing for them to date now. can you imagine the ceo of atlas with the scruffy leader of a bandit gang (who also happens to be a math nerd)? SO GOOD 

What makes me happy about them: they’re best friends, they have a lot of stupid jokes between them, they very clearly would go to the end of the earth for each other

What makes me sad about them: the fear that they may never interact in bl3

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: there isn’t enough fic for me to have noticed any annoying tropes

Things I look for in fanfic: any fic in general

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: rhys/fiona

My happily ever after for them: they haven’t spoken for a while but vaughn comes along on sanctuary (idk how he ends up there, maybe he’s upset with his bandits leaving for the children of the vault) and then he hears rhys’ voice over the comm for the first time in YEARS, he could cry, he’s so happy. anyway us vault hunters help rhys out with his maliwan problem, vaughn and rhys reunite, there are tears and hugs and then they kiss and have to figure out what they want (hint: they want to be together forever but rhys has a company and vaughn has his bandits and they need to navigate that complexity - but they do and it’s awesome)

003 | Give me a character & I will tell you (carol danvers):

How I feel about this character: if you told me last year that i would fall in love with carol, and read everything i could with her, i probably would not have believed you. but here i am, almost caught up with the captain marvel comics and helplessly in love with her. i love her bravery, her humor, her impulsiveness, her kindness, her fight-me attitude, her determination, her cockiness - really i love everything about her and i’m inspired by her drive to be better and to protect as many people as she can (also the whole speech but especially this quote at the end of captain marvel (2012) #1: and we will be the stars we were always meant to be GETS me every time i see it, i love ambitious ladies who reach for the stars)

All the people I ship romantically with this character: carol/jess is the ultimate 616 otp while carol/maria is the ultimate mcu otp. i also like carol/rhodey and i read a ship manifesto for carol/wanda that has made me interested in learning more about them

My non-romantic OTP for this character: steve and tony, i can’t choose between her two relationships with them because they’re both so good (it might be tony??? he helped her through aa and i love their snark? but then steve and carol are also very good). also in the mcu, nick fury, their chemistry is GOLD 

My unpopular opinion about this character: i hate that so many people have started putting carol into the role of peter’s mom/aunt, not every adult that interacts with him is automatically his parental figure and she has no real reason to feel that way towards him. also they went on a couple dates in the comics and even though i don’t ship it, it’s weird to think about

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: LET HER DATE A WOMAN

My OTP: …………how could i possibly choose between carol/jess and carol/maria………….they’re both so good in different ways

My OT3: i don’t have one for her although now i’m considering whether a jess/carol/maria situation would work idk i feel like it wouldn’t just because there would be this imbalance in two of them having superpowers and maria unable to join in their superhero battles so??? idk. i need to think about it a little more