#random fandom ramblings

[alittlesliceofcucumber]

You know what I want to see? I want to see a spiderverse-like movie but with all different versions of Sherlock Holmes needing to team up.

I want an exhasparated book!Holmes. I want to see BBC Holmes and RDJ Holmes butting heads the whole time and trying to one-up each other. I want Herlock Sholmes Ace Attorney to be batshit insane and do nothing but troll the others. I want Elementary Sherlock to want to be literally anywhere else at any given moment.

I want Basil of Baker Street to be the only competent one there.

[secretmellowblog]

People who try to analyze what happened on Tumblr on November 5th, 2020, often really overstate how much it was actually “about” Supernatural. As someone who has never been in the supernatural fandom ever but dID join in on the hysterical destielposting—it was really more about the stress of the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election.

The two biggest Youtubers I’ve seen try to dissect “what happened that November 5th” in video essays both weren’t American—- and I think that explains why they both tried to explain the hysteria primarily via analyzing the Supernatural fandom/the original show, rather than through the lens of the election. And while those videos are cool, valid, informational, and make lots of really well-considered interesting points— I can tell you that me and almost all my mutuals had literally no knowledge or interest in the fact that “oh supernatural had made nods at the ship in the past but the creators were adamant that I wouldn’t be canon” or etc etc etc etc. the first time I learned about any of that context was way later, watching videos where people claimed that fandom history context (that I did not know anything about) was the actual reason for the hysteria.

But the reality is that people latched on to the Destiel stuff because it was a piece of big useless inane zero-stakes fandom news in a time when we were desperately waiting for serious high stakes election news. We were latching onto a “positive “ piece of inane stupid fandom news in a time of great stress, with all the desperation of a drowning man who latches onto whatever piece of wood will keep him afloat.

The core of the hysteria was that Americans (who make up a huge chunk of tumblr’s userbase) were currently glued to their laptops watching the live presidential election vote counts come in. These vote counts were taking an extended amount of time due to the pandemic causing high numbers of mail-in ballots, resulting in a constant state of Election Day Stress for multiple days straight.

This was also during the height of the Pandemic. People had predicted Trump’s presidency would be bad; no one had predicted it would be this apocalyptically bad. No one had predicted pandemics and lockdowns and hospitals overflowing with bodybags. remember Trump spreading Covid lies and conspiracies?? There were so many Qanon conspiracies about democrats being Satanic child traffickers who had to be put to death, and coup threats were mounting from the right wing side. It seemed like this election was a choice between ‘centrist democrat’ and “apocalyptic right wing conspiracy theory authoritarianism,” in the midst of pandemic conditions that people feared would never ever improve— and it seemed like a close election.

Another major point was that Trump voters were more likely to be antimaskers/Covid deniers, while Biden voters were more likely to take the pandemic seriously— so Biden voters were more likely to send in mail-in ballots instead of risking the in-person voting crowds, which meant their ballots would take much longer to count. And so, in many state electoral vote counts, it would initially seem like Trump was very far in the lead— only for Biden to slooooowly build up an agonizingly small lead as the mail in ballots came in, and then defeat Trump at the very end.

So you’re just watching these news sites giving live election updates, refreshing the page every 2 minutes to see if you’re going to live under a spineless centrist democrat or a literal Qanon Dictatorship. And then you go on tumblr to distract yourself, and there’s more election posting, and more agonizing over the votes, and more stress and despair—-

And then it’s been days and we’re right at the crucial tipping point where it’s anyone’s game and the next few hours will determine whether Trump will win, so you need to keep your eye on the vote count, because the next hours will determine the future of the pandemic and your country and your plans for your entire life—

And then stupid Destiel becomes canon! And it becomes canon in the silliest way possible!

If Destiel had become canon at any other time, it would have been a big goofy tumblr celebration? But we wouldn’t have gotten the insane explosion of hysterical interaction.

The entire core of it was the contrast between the inane meaningless stupidity of fandom news vs the actual stressful election news you wanted to hear! It really is best conveyed in that meme where Castiel says “I love you” and Dean indifferently responds with a piece of important election news.

It’s about the contrast between the low-stakes inanity of fandom and the massive life-destroying stakes of a terrifying election. There really was no reason it had be Supernatural specifically, except that Supernatural was a thing everyone knew basic things about from dashboard osmosis— it could’ve been any other equally huge silly fandom ship news about a ship everyone *knew of* but might not necessarily be invested in (ex. Stucky becoming canon, Johnlock becoming canon, Kirk/Spock becoming more canon somehow, etc etc etc.)

I think it’s true that people who weren’t paying agonizingly close attention to the American election news got swept up in it, and that non American Supernatural fans also were extremely excited for purely fandom reasons — but the entire reason it blew up to an unprecedented degree was because of that core of stressed out terrified Americans glued to their computers watching election results and suddenly receiving stupid fandom news instead, and deciding to just hysterically parodically hyper-celebrate this absurd useless zero-stakes news.

I think it was also all elevated by the fact that, as I said before, this happened at the crucial “tipping point” of the election where the next few hours would determine the winner. The fact that Biden began to slowly develop a lead in the hours after made it feel, hysterically, as if the hours after Destiel became canon was somehow the turning point where he began to win; so celebrating Destiel felt like celebrating that slow turn towards victory.

The tl,dr is that it’s so important to Remember the Fifth of November …..in preparation the inevitable hysteria that will happen in the presidential election on November 5th of next year. XD. Personally I’m rooting for Johnlock or Frodo/Sam to somehow become canon in the eleventh hour right before the democrats win

[anthurak]

One of the funny things I’ve recently realized after browsing old TOH posts is that the whole idea of the ‘Luz and Hunter are siblings’ dynamic feels like almost entirely a creation of the fandom. Not only that, but a dynamic that was created basically by accident.

Consider for a moment just when and WHY fans actually started the ‘Luz and Hunter are siblings’ idea: It wasn’t in the wake of King’s Tide or after Hollow Mind when Luz and Hunter start really becoming friends, it was following Hunting Palismans. AKA, the episode where the mysterious ‘Golden Guard’ is revealed to be the show’s resident ‘edgy bad-boy with a sad backstory’ named Hunter, and also established that despite what he may think at the time, him and Luz are definitely going to be friends sooner or later.

In other words, the fandom’s idea that ‘Luz and Hunter are siblings’ started mainly as pushback against shipping those two and more notably, any theories/claims that Luz and Hunter might end up together in the show. As in, right after Hunting Palismans released, you can find a ton of posts that amount to ‘THEY’RE LIKE SIBLINGS DAMMIT!’ as fans try to get ahead of any ideas people might start getting that Luz and Hunter might be some endgame couple.

Now of course, in should have been pretty clear even when Hunting Palismans released that ‘Lunter’ was NEVER going to be an actual thing in the show. Like I’ve always commended the foresight of Dana Terrace and her crew for making sure that Amity was FIRMLY locked-in as Luz’s love-interest before they let Luz anywhere near the show’s resident ‘edgy bad-boi with a sad backstory in need of a redemption-arc’.

But for me, the funny this looking back on all this in hindsight; this presenting that Luz and Hunter are going to be like siblings as pushback against any theories that they were going to end up together romantically nonetheless made the same underlying assumption about where Hunter’s character was going: 

That he’d end up being this super-close friend and ally to Luz and that she’d be the one facilitating his redemption arc, ala Aang to Zuko or any other case of ‘hero(ine) redeems rival and they become best friends’.

And of course what makes that so funny is the fact that this DIDN’T actually happen, at least not in the way most of us were expecting. Yes, Hunter did end up being A close friend and ally to Luz, but the people who he’s actually closest to and the one who really drove and facilitated his redemption arc wound up being Willow and Gus!

In conclusion, the whole idea of ‘Luz and Hunter are siblings’ dynamic feels like one of those cases of a fandom coming up with an assumption about where characters might be going, and then forgetting that they were the ones who originally came up with it while the show itself does something else.

And also, Hunter is WAY more of an older brother to GUS than he is to Luz, and frankly I think we need more recognition of that fact XD

[fortheloveofhylia]

Late night thought time.

Me and my girlfriend were talking nonsense last night and trying to decide what the Chain would call each other if they were just trying to adapt the name Link instead of completely different nick names.

Let me know if you have any alternatives or if you just want to tell me how unhinged this is! 😂

Hyrule - Link (Just because)

Legend - Pink (Pink bunny)

Time - Tink

Sky - Sink

Wars - Hink (HW or because he a Himbo)

Wind - Wink 😉

Four - Fink

Wild - Brink (Breath)

Twilight - Twink! 💪😁

[knightinink]

I wake up & have 3 different ways I could obsess over HB for the day:

Option 1: I could think about these two & read fix-it fics about them, where Blitzo confessed & they ran away together.

Option 2, these two. Fizz & Asmodeus have my heart in a vice grip & I re-watch s2ep6 & ep7 over all day.

Option 3: I read about this lovely family, & think about what their lives were like before everything went to shit.

[kyouka-supremacy]

I think we should just bring back Wungo Wednesday and start a fandom collective anime rewatch

[bluerosefox]

Cuckoo Clocks

Red Robin (Kinda) AU where everything during that timeline happens and Tim finally has his proof Bruce is still alive and he's ready to tell the JL and stop Ra's (whose on his way to Gotham to destroy all of things/people Bruce loves to get back at Tim for the whole blowing up his bases thing) all at once...

Only he suddenly finds a glowing green sticky note on his forehead. He is no doubt confused and jumpy from everything so far so he's tempted to forget about it and just move on but Tim has always been curious so he reads it.

"Finding the Lost in the stream will not be easy to fish out even with help gained. Find me first and I might lend you the correct lure.

Finish your battle with the False Immortal and find Phantom, he shall lead you to me and should you be right on time, I might be inclined to help.

-CW"

And Tim... well, he's done a hell of a lot of questionable things so far at this point, why not take a chance on this too.

[my-name-is-bunnyfoxy]

Why he doing this pose

[deeply-unserious-fellow]

Something I don't like about a lot of Vox takes I see is that they tend to portray Vox as someone who's unpleasant to work with and has weird ideas about what partnership means when really... he's not? He's not and he doesn't. It's just that two of the most prominent interactions we've seen him have are with Valentino(who is a fucking NIGHTMARE to work with) and Alastor(a man he has undisclosed, deeply emotional history with). But everyone seems to discount his OTHER important relationship: Velvette. Which by all accounts, is INCREDIBLY normal.

Like, yeah, their first interaction opens with her yelling at him, but that's less about Vox himself and more about Valentino. As they keep talking throughout the first bit of the episode, she starts calming down, and they just seem to genuinely get along? She has every right to look upset during Stayed Gone because Vox is being really weird and she's nOT THE ONE WHO ACTIVELY ENCOURAGED HIM TO DO THIS SHIT(staring directly at Val rn), but even then during the meeting after Stayed Gone she does actually. Participate. Unlike s o m e people. Despite being on her phone the whole time(which is literally her job-), she actually pays attention and contributes real ideas! Which tbh she didn't have to do at ALL like she did not have to put up w/ Vox's bs in RKtVS the way she did. There's also their phone call during the overlord meeting which, while I definitely think Vel was playing it up to annoy Carmilla, still sounded like a conversation between two ppl who genuinely like and respect eachother!

No matter what you think their relationship is(romantic, platonic, etc...), Vox and Velvette seem to get along REALLY well(outside of Alastor-related incidents). Like, better than either of them do with literally anybody else in the show. Vox & Val do LIKE eachother, but I find whatever the fuck is going on beneath the after the battles & masterless cattles to be DEEPLY upsetting to think about for too long(ex; any of my other posts abt their relationship), and the only other interactions we've seen either Vox or Vel have are Stayed Gone & Respectless, which are literally just song battles. Both of their only interactions outside of the Vees have been song battles. Aw fuck I'm getting off topic... BACK TO THEIR RELATIONSHIP AS COLLEAGUES- okay uh basically, I don't think they would get along this well if Vox was a terrible person to work with(note I said WORK WITH. Hate that I need to specify this but I don't think Vox is a good person overall, just a good business partner). I think Velvette is generally a good bench mark for both Vox & Valentino's relationships with other characters because she's their equal, their friend, and isn't in a weird toxic relationship with either of them. Their interactions with her provide a window into how they just generally interact with people. And based off of their interactions, Vox seems to be actually pretty decent to work with when he isn't being Actively Provoked for shits and giggles or trying to sooth the tantrum of a man child. Also when he views you as an equal and doesn't own your soul that helps too.

Edit: Hiiiiiiii just here to say that now, in the light of day, I don't really agree with everything I've said in this post? I wrote it at midnight while like half asleep so my ability to consider the fact that. We barely know anything about either Vox or Velvette at this point in time. Was kind of impaired I think. Cuz we really don't. I do stand by everything I said about their relationship to EACHOTHER, and I stand by the idea that we should take that dynamic into consideration for character analysis more often, but everything else I'm a little iffy on and I just woke up like an hour ago so my brains still a little fuzzy & I can't explain exactly WHY I'm iffy on it, but just know that I think the conclusion I drew is a bit of a leap in logic at the very least and I recognize that now lol

[soundbluster]

Unpopular opinion time:

Been watching a bit of Cyberverse again recently and I gotta say, I way prefer the Cyberverse take on Tarn over the MTMTE one!

I just find that version so much more interesting as a character, than the overly edgy leader of the DJD...

Even when MTMTE was being released I never really got the hype around Tarn, I suppose its the Boba Fett effect, a cool design can really carry a character into popularity even if there's not all that much to go off in the source text.!

(I love MTMTE but admittedly I can't say I ever found the villains all that compelling/interesting, with the exception of Getaway and to a lesser extent Pharma, though Lost Light's rushed conclusion kinda cut that short too.)

It kinda illustrates why trying out new ideas / continuities in the franchise is a good thing, it can completely change your feelings towards a character or do something cool with neglected concepts etc ...

[leopardmuffinxo]

i thought i had escaped the post that tried to take a statement on discord out of context, about durge and astarion being a 'canon ship' or w/e, but alas it showed up on my dash. i don't have the energy to go through this kind of bs w/ bg3.

THERE. ARE. NO. CANON. SHIPS. IN. BG3.

i don't care how much more dialogue a character has w/ another character. i don't care what you think is implied though a vague statement made by a writer or VA. shit like that is what caused a lot of people in the DA fandom to get harassed by so many braindead people in the fandom because their ships were "not canon". the fact that it was also added in because of crunch is a huge disappointment. it's allowed to be your canon but it doesn't make it canon for the game in general.

[alittlesliceofcucumber]

if i had a nickel for everytime i fell in love with a quirky, older, ethically-dubious scientist character who was changed after exposing themselves to a mysterious higher power in pursuit of knowledge and who also happens to be absolutely jacked for no reason, i'd have 2 nickels

which isn't a lot but it's weird it happened twice

[charliedaltonssaxaphone]

I believe that getting an A on my poetry assignment where I was so afraid of my poems not being good enough makes me feel like Todd lmao

[tallyhoot]

age regressor Mind is real and no one can tell me it isn’t

[ninadove]

I think many more people would appreciate Feligami if they realised that they were not, in fact, written according to the enemies-to-lovers trope.

Their story is not about that; it’s about two kids who spent their entire lives being othered and rejected, finally found someone who went through similar hardships, and immediately developed a connection as a result. The fact that they were originally on opposite sides of the conflict is almost an accident.

Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look at the ✨ symbolism ✨, shall we.

Secret identities form the very core of the Miraculous universe: masks are worn by heroes and antagonists alike, and as such are manifestations of their narrative roles.

Which is why it is so important that Felix and Kagami’s first significant encounter took place during a masked ball, and that they were the only attendants not to hide their faces.

Kagami’s vulnerability even pushes Felix to throw caution to the wind and reveal way too much about himself, compromising both his evil plan and his safety. In that moment, they’re not Ryuko and Flairmidable, or even Ryuko and Argos; they’re just two children who have been hurt in similar ways, and bond over their shared desire to run away.

And of course, in Representation, they recount their love story and take off their masks in the same breath — because authenticity and acceptance are the foundation of their romance.

So to be clear:

Yes, they were once enemies;

Yes, they are now lovers;

No, it is not the point of their relationship.

“But Nina,” I hear you ask, “Why is it so important to make that distinction?”

Because it has a massive impact on the audience’s expectations, and whether or not Feligami was developed properly.

When reading an enemies-to-lovers story, chances are you’re looking for a slowburn; for chapters upon chapters of tension; for seemingly insurmountable hurdles that are eventually overcome through the Power of Love™.

But if you’re reading a story about two kids who have been through Hell and back (because they’re very very queer and very very neurodivergent on top of being child abuse survivors), desperately crave love and affection, and also might get murdered or torn apart any second — then suddenly it makes perfect sense for them to celebrate new beginnings by kissing in front of the sunrise within two weeks of meeting each other.

This is what Feligami is about, and this is why it works.

[antiquelover]

The worst thing is when you are so fixated on media nobody talks about. Who am I supposed to ramble to I need to intake as much of this as I can