#so much has changed but a few core personality traits are still the same

[aliteralsemicolon]

Been seeing a lot about writing Spencer "accurately" online and idk where this wave of criticism is coming from, but I need every single one of you to be so fucking for real rn. Yapsesh below the cut.

Spencer Reid is a fictional character. Fiction means he's not real. He's a not real character from a not real universe. There's no "wrong" way to write a fictional character.

There is no canon guideline on how to write every part of him. Yes there are certain traits and characteristics we're shown, but people are complex. What we see the character do on screen isn't a complete representation of how they live every aspect their life.

Even the show runners couldn't get him "right" all the time, Hell, Mathew himself deviated from Spencer's canon traits sometimes. For example: his birthday, the fact that he's a germaphobe but you can still see him shake hands with characters when he normally wouldn't and there's SO many more if you just watch the show and pay attention.

Also there are things about Spencer that the fandom has deemed canon when they are not, in fact, canon. Like the converse: it's commonly believed that Spencer has a preference for wearing converse, which is wrong. That's a purely MGG thing. Spencer only wears converse in a few episodes through out the whole show. Most of the time he wears formal/work footwear, like loafers.

Now, there are definitely aspects you can't take away from a character in your writing because that's what makes the character who they primarily are. You'll notice that even in most alternate universe stories, Spencer still has the traits he's known for. IQ of 187, eidetic memory, socially awkward genius. That's literally how he was intended to come across during the initially seasons.

We only got new traits as the show progressed. Like how he's a sassy little shit who isn't scared of authority. The reason we can deviate from those is because they're not his core traits. His personality changes throughout the show. At times he appears like his same socially awkward self, but we also get to see his confident side with strangers at times.

It's literally impossible to label him a black and white character because there's so much we don't get to see. We don't get to see how he acts with love interests in every season (every season is a slightly different version from the last), we don't get to see how he acts when he's home alone, how he changes in so many aspects of his life. I think I'm just repeating myself now, but I think you get the point.

I find comfort in Spencer Reid's character, which is why I write about him. He acts however I want him to act in my writing because that's how I see him. Everyone has their own interpretation of the character. A lot of the interpretations share similarities with each other, so they're deemed as "the right way to write Spencer" by us, but that's not possible because there is no right way.

All this to say: Please stop criticising writers for how they write a character. You don't have to agree with their interpretation. There are other writers out there who you may agree with more. Engage more with them and disengage from the content you don't want to see.

[halemerry]

On Aziraphale, Protection, and the Greater Good

Alright folks. I’ve already written quite a bit about the ways the Metatron was trying to manipulate Aziraphale here, but I wanted to give credit where credit is due and talk a little bit about how I don’t think that necessarily means it worked nearly as well as the Metatron thinks it does.

Because Aziraphale? Is not stupid. It’s one of his defining traits that though he might occasionally be slow, he has always been intelligent. He has also always been a fighter. And a bit stubborn. And though the fact he is allowed to be all that and still stay soft is one of my favorite things about him, that does not mean he is soft and soft alone.

With or without Crowley, Aziraphale has nearly always been a character who, above all else, does what’s right. This is part of what Crowley loves about him and it’s part about what we as the audience love about him too. He shelters a demon on the wall he is meant to be guarding. He gives away a sword to humans and lies to God about it directly to Her face. He struggles immensely with being asked to do anything he cannot reconcile with his morals and, even if he might fight against his impulses as to what’s right for a little bit, when push comes to shove he almost always falls on the right side of that scale. It’s important especially that this is also true of him even without Crowley in the equation.

Now, Crowley makes it much easier for him to be this person. He encourages and enables Aziraphale to be himself. He complicates and challenges Aziraphale’s worldview but in a healthy way that helps him grow and develop it, but never forces Az to be someone he isn’t. He also, most importantly, gives Aziraphale someone he understands. He is a connection. And a connection that allows Aziraphale to take his time and to make the excuses he needs to, at least for a little while. Because he understands that while Aziraphale is slow to change, he is not as resistant to it as he often reads to be - especially when he thinks that change can benefit the greater good.

Because Aziraphale fundamentally loves Earth and the people on it. And he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that Crowley does too. Not taking an opportunity he has to help someone has never sat well with him - even if that person is a naked Gabriel showing up on his doorstep. He does not run away with Crowley in season 1 because it would have been wrong to run away when he felt he could help and the same principle applies here too with the decision he comes to about the Metatron’s offer.

While I definitely think the Metatron was using lovebombing and other manipulation techniques on Aziraphale I highly suspect he is underestimating his new Supreme Archangel. And I highly suspect that what is happening here is not Aziraphale folding back into this own cult as much as much a few other things that could be happening.

I may poke around at a few more of these later but for now I want to focus on Aziraphale lied theory laid out here by @las-lus. This whole season has focused quite a bit on Aziraphale lying/using sleight of hand for Crowley's sake. It makes sense he would do this too to protect him from the Metatron and critically I don’t think it’s an accident that the only shot we get of his conversation with the Metatron are flashbacks from Aziraphale's narrative point of view. Reading this actually changed the whole trajectory of this meta so please take a look at it if you've got the chance! I really love this theory a lot and would've slapped this all on a reblog if it wasn't so big. (Though I'll be the first to admit I'm biased to anything that lets Aziraphale do some rescuing.)

At it's core this makes this action a protective one. He is a guardian given a flaming sword by God. He was built to protect. And we see him in this role throughout the series even if it's not always in the way we expect or in the way he was necessarily built for.

I want to start before the beginning. This scene is an important one for a lot of reasons, but for the context of this the important bit is that Aziraphale is already anxious. He’s a bit starstruck and a little baffled by the strange angel he’s stumbled into chatting with, but his primary focus in the meat of this scene is actually concern for this stranger's welfare. The instant the topic turns critical he immediately starts glancing around anxiously. This scene ends with him saying, "I'd hate to see you getting into any trouble." and giving us one of the most worried expressions I've ever seen on his face.

Then again at Eden, the first time we meet Aziraphale, we are shown him acting twice in a row for the sake of keeping others safe. We see him offer Crowley shelter from the storm and also give away his God given weapon to protect Adam and Eve. A lot of people tie Crowley to Eden for obvious reason but I think people often forget that, yes, without Crowley humans don't leave Eden but without Aziraphale they do not survive it.

We then see him in conflict over the Flood. As far as we know he doesn't act here but he quite clearly thinks it is wrong. He's high strung and tense and his attempts to rebuke Crowley's frustration feels more like him trying to convince himself.

Now we get to Job. This minisode is so fascinating to me for a lot of reasons because through most of it, against pattern, we have Aziraphale as the driving force throughout it. First we get Aziraphale checking in with Heaven to make sure there wasn't some official solution to this. (We also get a line in there that I think says a lot about Aziraphale's priorities when he specifically draws attention to his concerns for Sitis being old enough birth that many times would be hard and risky.) Once Heaven fails him here Aziraphale is the one to reach out to Crowley and Aziraphale is the one to press for them to work together. He takes a gamble, hoping that his instinct that Crowley does not want to hurt kids is accurate, and gets up in Crowley's face to challenge him when Crowley refuses to prove him right. It is not Crowley taking the lead here, bringing Aziraphale in but rather Aziraphale trusting his owns instincts are right.

Aziraphale is also crucially the one constructing the charade Crowley plays in front of the angels as Bildad the cobbler/midwife. Aziraphale immediately and without hesitation provides Crowley with the pieces he needs to make the lie convincing enough. He tells him that what they need is an expert on human births and Crowley rolls with it and then clarifies very quickly that Gabriel witnessed Eve's birth, signaling to Crowley that mimicking that would be the play.

He is trying to tip the scales to get the outcome he wants - to keep this family safe - before he ever utters a lie. And then he does. He lies directly, giving his word as an angel. This is an act that eats him alive inside. He literally thinks he has fallen for this and has perfectly resigned himself as being damned to Hell for it and does it anyway. Because he knows it was right. Because he thinks a family of five he has no real connection to are worth falling to protect.

By the time we hit the Globe in 1601 Aziraphale's primary objection to their Arrangement has evolved from concern about what Head Office will think into concern specifically for Crowley's safety.

Then in 1827, even if it's in a misguided way, his concern starts out on Elspeth and her soul. He tries to protect her and very quickly changes his tune as soon as he's given proper evidence that what she was doing was net good. Again he is the one driving most of this narrative and the duo's actions forward as Crowley drifts along trying to get him to see that some actions aren't fully good or bad but can exist in a moral gray space. We also get him verbalizing his own moral code here explicitly when he wants to heal Morag.

He continues to have concern for Crowley on the forefront of his mind - asking very quickly after his good deed for Elspeth if he's safe or if hell noticed and then a few years later denies Crowley holy water out of concern that it could destroy him.

In 1941 we first get him operating under cover trying to unsuccessfully lie his way into dispatching some Nazi. We then get him offering himself as a magician for Crowley's sake and using sleight of hand to keep evidence of their relationship from making its way to Hell.

In particular I want to draw attention here to the fact the episode we revisit this moment in has two very similar moments toward the beginning and end of it. This episode opens with what the episode is named for - Shax hitching a ride with Aziraphale. He's relatively amicable with her until she at one point implies harm to Crowley wondering out loud why he would risk destruction for Az. Then toward the end when Furfur enters the dressing room, Aziraphale is pleasant and kind until the moment it becomes clear Crowley is being threatened. In both cases his expression turns more neutral and his body language becomes more focused and serious. He is ready to protect at all costs and is done being polite to these people who threaten his demon.

From there we go to 1976. Here as he hears about Crowley's holy water heist, he makes a choice. Even though he does not want Crowley having this weapon at all and tells Crowley as much that that position hasn't changed he realizes how dangerous trying to steal it could be. So he decides to make it as safe as he can in the circumstance, putting aside his own wants and feelings for the sake of minimizing even potential harms.

Even good old 'you go too fast for me' is a form of protection here. Even if it hurts and even if it's not want they want they need at least one of them to pump the breaks to make sure they are not discovered.

Then the world nearly ends. I won't examine what happens there too closely but I think we can all agree Aziraphale was willing to do quite a lot to insure the world and Crowley were safe once Crowley gets him on board with raising Warlock. Though I do want to note I don't think it's an accident that a lot of what Aziraphale says to Crowley at the end of six has echos of the bandstand - the last event Aziraphale has to reference that he knew would make Crowley go away.

A lot of the core of the current season is built around all sorts of protective Aziraphale actions. The flashbacks all gesture at it in some capacity, and anther notable one is him sacrificing books both as weaponry and to make the ball happen. He has committed to securing their safety before a single demon even shows up looking for Gabriel. We also get him willingly risking war to defend the people in his shop. Episode six in particular shows us a lot of Aziraphale in this mode, which he's pretty much locked into from the moment the demons arrive, Whether it's protecting Gabriel, Nina and Maggie, or at one point putting his body between the demons and a whole crowd of people including Crowley.

This season is a season that emphasizes that Aziraphale is a liar. It is one that draws attention to him pulling tricks and on him learning to do that for the greater good. It it about him learning that sometimes the choices we make are often more morally gray than we would like. And most importantly it is about Aziraphale believing this world and the people in it are worth protecting.

And who does he want to keep safe more than anyone? Who did he fight to share his life with? It makes sense to me that he would do this for Crowley. It's perfectly in character and gives Aziraphale the due credit I think a lot of theories lack. Because, to me, Aziraphale isn't the one that walks away from Omelas, Aziraphale is the child who would willfully sacrifice himself to keep the people he loves safe.

[mageknight14]

I loved how NEO pulled the rug out with Rindo’s character. At first, he generally seems much more sociable and outwardly friendly compared to Neku and then the game quickly goes "yeah, nah, he’s a huge fucking mess too." He’s a good kid fundamentally at his core but he can also be whiny, hypocritical, passive-aggressive, and kind of insensitive at times. He has a tendency to be judgemental and harsh to the people around him while not acknowledging his own faults, like when he complains about Beat joining the team even though he saved their lives beforehand because he’s not Neku or when he gives Fret shit for fawning over Eiji Oji and Kanon while falling for Motoi’s BS. He’s so pessimistic about himself and others that not even a death game that heavily emphasizes the value of teamwork can get him to fully come out of his shell, which is where his time-travel powers come in AND EVEN THEN it’s a double-edged sword since on one hand, it forces him to actively step up to the plate and survey the situation to find the best possible solution, which leads to him slowly growing out of his shell, but on the other, it also leads to him becoming overly reliant on his time travel so that he can walk back from potentially life-changing decisions without having to worry about it since he has a magic reset button. Which ends up biting him in the ass. Hard.

He’s one of those types of people who is ultimately a thinker and planner instead of a do-er, but his being young and overly impressionable takes this personality quirk to such an extreme that he's foundationally useless to most groups. He’s the type of person who you have in a group project who sits around and does nothing, but then complains with the project does poorly because he couldn't be bothered to speak.

He's so unconfident and directionless that he uses effectively Instagram as a means to listen to someone who sounds like some 2deep4u philosopher post dumb flowery bullshit that effectively has all the meaning of "Drink water when you're thirsty." and he admits to finding such "deep" meaning in these posts that it supposedly helped him through life. Because he's 15 and doesn't know anything.

However, all of this makes him interesting as a character because he’s, again, still a fundamentally good kid at his core. While he’s shown to have a fuse, he is also the kind of person who has the ability to think his emotions through. That's what we ultimately see when he and Fret finally talk and drop their beef. The game depicting Rindo's capacity for self-awareness and emotional reflection is a positive revelation of his character strengths. He proves that he's capable of recognizing when he's in the wrong and knows how to apologize, a trait he shows quite a few times throughout the story, while also doing everything he can to set things right as well as be more understanding toward how his friends feels.

He’s kind of the guy who will drop everything to help a little kid out, even when there’s no tangible benefit to doing so and he and the others are shown to be on limited time, shows empathy to his friends/fallen enemies, and feels massive amounts of guilt for his actions, even if he didn’t know better at the time.

Hell, the entire endgame is fueled by his selfish yet understandable desire to save the people he cares about most from total erasure, to the point that he’s willing to risk thousands of lives to do so. But not only is he shown to be internally grappling with himself regarding his decision but he’s also willing to take responsibility and ensure that EVERYTHING goes right not just for himself and his friends but the people of Shibuya in general, in a parallel to Neku’s own selfish if understandable decision to put the bonds he formed in the original game (particularly with Joshua) over the actual city.

Characters aren't interesting simply by switching between 2 different character traits. They're interesting when all those traits are being expressed at the same time for reasons that are consistent within their internal logic. You gotta be a good writer to pull that off and you gotta know when to show off these dimensions during your story to achieve proper dramatic effect when the time calls for it and NEO I feel does this pretty damn well.

[em-dash-press]

6 Tips for Writing an Underdog Character

People love reading about an underdog. There’s something within all of us that relates to persevering against the odds, even when they’re crushing. Anything becomes possible—but how do you write that kind of character successfully?

Here are a few tips to get you started.

1. Create Their Disempowerment

Underdogs need to lose something or have one thing less than those they fight against. It might be something they hope to gain back or something they hope to gain at all.

Let’s use The Hunger Games as an example for this post. Katniss comes from District 12, but she’s already at a disadvantage when she volunteers as tribute. Restrictions on her district kept her from food security for most of her life. Without a lifetime of basic nutrition, her body is already at a disadvantage in the physically-demanding games.

District 12 is also one of the less appreciated districts in her country. She doesn’t think anyone will care about sponsoring her in the games, which makes survival much less likely.

But we still root for her! She volunteered to save her sister, which is heroic. There’s so much potential for more heroic growth that we keep turning the page, even though she’s not the most likely person to survive.

2. Make Your Protagonist Likable

Getting excited to see a character grow might be something you feel as a creative writer, but the average reader also needs an underdog protagonist to be likable in some way. Katniss will do anything for her family, including hunting where and when she isn’t supposed to. Many people would feel the need to do the same for their families.

She also feels deep compassion for people, which she covers up with her gruff demeanor. We’ve all felt like we got hurt because our hearts opened too wide for someone. We can relate to her building defenses into her personality, which might make her likable to more readers.

Katniss also has the core value of loyalty. People always seek loyalty in new connections. It’s how we trust new friends. It’s also how readers trust characters.

This site has a few more tips on crafting likable characters. Part of that happens while you’re creating the characters during your planning process, but you can also do it while you’re writing. As your underdog becomes more of a real person in your mind, you’ll know which primary character traits make them most likable to readers.

3. Plan Their Rock-Bottom Moment

Underdogs always reach a point where they feel they’re at their lowest. Even when they feel crushed or defeated, they choose to find strength and continue with their journey. It makes readers support them even more, but it’s also the defining moment of an underdog’s arc.

Your underdog’s rock-bottom moment will be the scene where they resist the temptation to give up, change their dream, or change who they are. It will be the choice that keeps them moving toward their end goal, instead of taking the easy road.

You could argue Katniss has a few rock-bottom moments. It might be when she hears her sister’s name called at the Reaping. It could be when Rue dies and she chooses to spearhead a revolution.

There could be multiple moments for your underdog too. It depends on the shape of your narrative arc and how many acts your story has.

4. Show Them Trying and Failing

It’s time for an important caveat—underdogs also fail. If they were perfect, they’d be god-like figures that readers couldn’t personally identify with.

Maybe your underdog achieves their ultimate goal, but they experience failure along the way. Their failure helps them grow or makes them pursue their goal with more conviction and determination.

Katniss begins her journey with a mindset of self-preservation. That makes her slightly selfish and automatically distrustful of people. She makes some choices readers would probably disagree with, but then she learns from them. By the end of the series, she’s as selfless as a human can get. 

Characters don’t grow if they don’t make mistakes. Even underdogs should fail. However, that failure shouldn’t make them quit. It should either motivate them to keep going or give them a new perspective on how they can achieve their ultimate goal.

5. Train Them Along the Way

Underdogs start out as unlikely heroes because they don’t start with everything they need to succeed. That might be a societal problem, like coming from an economically disadvantaged family or a biased society. Maybe they don’t have the skills they need, like the ability to fight in hand-to-hand combat, outsmart their antagonist, or solve mysteries.

Usually, characters learn these things during their arcs. Your underdog will likely pick up what they need to succeed through the relationships they make and experiences they have. 

Katniss already knows how to hunt when she volunteers for the games, but Haymitch mentors her to win over much-needed sponsors to survive. Peeta teaches her how to soften her heart and think outside the box. She wouldn’t have made it through the series without the people in her life. Other underdog characters can’t either.

6. Reward Them at the End

Underdogs work hard and transform themselves to achieve their goals. At the end of the story, they often gain a tangible reward, power, knowledge, a new title or a new community. Your underdog should get what they set out to achieve, plus a few extra things they didn’t expect.

Katniss wins the Hunger Games. She gets her primary objective: to continue living. She also protects her sister. In addition to surviving, she has her (albeit rocky) relationship with Peeta, a new mentor in Haymitch, a comfortable living in the Victor’s Village, and an audience of fans who are another layer of protection against President Snow’s desire to kill her.

The extra rewards propel her through the remainder of her storyline. They also set her up for more success with the new lifepath she sees for herself: aiding the revolution to end the games for good.

A new goal is sometimes a reward in itself. It depends on if you want to continue writing about your character or if you want a one-off story.

-----

I hope this helps gives you a new perspective on future protagonists! Adding one of these factors into your character’s growth could remove your writer’s block too. They set up a path forward for your protagonist and help shape their journey.

You can also use these resources to learn more about the underdog archetype:

Character Archetypes: The Disruptor and the Underdog

Writing the Underdog: Effort Matters Most

7 Tips to Writing Underdog Heroes

[wutheringheightsfilm]

I'm wondering how the progression of wx will look in odd geometry compared to canon (as in, they get together sooner? different dynamics?), and if/how the elemental magic is used in complementing each other. sorry this is super specific im just like. what about the wangxian 👀

HOT DOG. well :) let me crack my knuckles here this is gonna probably be a long answer!! i'll go bit by bit here...

to be honest, odd geometry is a huge divergence from canon. i have four fundamental things that change the story in absolutely huge ways, being:

elemental magic (obvi)

wei wuxian wasn't raised in lotus pier/as part of yunmeng jiang

wei wuxian doesn't die at the siege of the burial mounds thus isn't dead for 13/16 years and have to be resurrected

i have the sunshot campaign begin later than it does in canon. at the start of the story, all of the characters are slightly older; as in, i've aged all of wei wuxian's generation up to be closer to my age (most of them are in their early 20s) and adjusted their older siblings/the older generations accordingly (so, for example, jiang cheng is 20, wei wuxian is 20, and jiang yanli is 22)*

*so this means that classes at the cloud recesses still would have happened when everyone was 15, but the sunshot campaign just doesn't begin until jiang cheng, wei wuxian, and lan wangji are 20

which, it is so fun to play around with the implications of all that but it's also challenging. SO, how all of this impacts wangxian...

so just by virtue of what's going on here (namely wwx not being dead for over a decade) they definitely do get together sooner. since wei wuxian wasn't raised in lotus pier, he doesn't attend the classes at gusu when everyone in his generation were teens, he doesn't meet lan wangji until they're both 20 at the wen indoctrination camp (which through a series of events, wei wuxian gets roped into sneaking into attend).

as for their dynamics, there's layers to this!

because of how wei wuxian has grown up, there are two things: 1) his personality is not the exact same as it is in canon--how could it be, when he's grown up in such different circumstances?--however, his core traits are the same: he's still inventive, clever, and creative, he's still extremely compassionate and cares deeply about justice, especially for those who are disenfranchised, he still has an extremely strong (to the point of, at times, it being debilitating) sense of duty and a habit of putting others before himself, and being secretive and at times repressive about his emotions. he just doesn't act as...idk, childish? as he might in the show or the novel. he's a bit more grounded, a bit more serious.

because of that, i think it's maybe a bit easier for lan wangji to be more open with wei wuxian, or to accept his friendship sooner. they aren't such polar opposites as they seem in early in the show/in the novel.

2) there are slightly different class dynamics here that actually make a huge difference: wei wuxian didn't grow up in lotus pier and was not raised within polite cultivation society. no matter how much of an outcast madam yu made wei wuxian feel by trying to alienate him from her "real" family, he still was generally accepted by Society at large and was looked at and mostly treated with respect. he still gets called gongzi, and within yunmeng jiang called da-shixiong,--though, of course, coming from some people it can be read as sarcastic... i highly doubt wen chao was calling him wei-gongzi out of any sort of respect--and is overall accepted. of course, people still try to ostracize him for his status, but the cultivation world at large doesn't actively bully him much (and in all honesty, they don't really bully him at all while jiang fengmian was still alive) until he does something they don't like. apart from a few scenarios, wei wuxian wasn't given the disdain that you might expect the son of a servant to receive---honestly, i sort of wish class was talked about more in regards to mdzs and cql because it really does fascinate me. wei wuxian occupies such an interesting space within the cultivation world and i wish people discussed it more.

in my fic, though, since he wasn't raised within lotus pier and was never brought into the yunmeng jiang sect, he doesn't have the fallback of jiang cheng and jiang yanli being able to officially call him their brother--not yet, anyway. he doesn't have a sect leader to point to and be like, "i've been accepted by someone of experience and reown" and have the support that can come from that. he and lan wangji have been raised in very different spheres, and it changes how they interact with each other. there's an extra layer of formality that they now have to chip through. it's no longer lan wangji being extra formal towards someone of exactly equal standing towards him, there's now an extra layer that they have to reckon with. of course, wei wuxian is still lan wangji's equal in every way that matters--they are still the same age, they are still both incredibly talented with their areas of cultivation and respective fighting styles, they both have a mutual respect (and eventually love) for each other etc etc, they just don't belong to the same circles of society and this has to be dealt with.

of course, when the sunshot campaign is over and wei wuxian will have assisted the rebellion against the wens in winning, his status changes. he will be respected, if not feared, because eventually the cultivation world will figure out what he's able to do and fear it being used against them.

which brings us to their elemental magic and how that affects their dynamic as well !! AHHH!!!

so, wei wuxian can control qi (i can clarify any questions you or anyone else might have about this if needed) and lan wangji's affinity is water. at the beginning of the story, wei wuxian pretends to also have an affinity with water, and claims he heals with it--this backfires on him hard during xuanwu cave, when he has to heal lan wangji's broken leg and obviously, as someone with an affinity for water, lan wangji would know what healing someone using water is like and this is not it.

ultimately, wei wuxian is a healer. that is his favorite thing to do, it is what he prefers to do---despite having the powers he does (which, for a while, even he doesn't fully understand), and the demonic cultivation he will be able to do, he doesn't actually enjoy using his qi controlling abilities negatively on people much. he will do it if he has to, and will definitely enjoy using it to enact revenge on people who deserve it, but at the end of the day, he just wants to help and heal people.

i honestly think this suits lan wangji's temperament quite nicely--they would make a very good team, what with lan wangji's habit of going "wherever the chaos is" and helping people out with resentful spirits and night hunts.

even in the original odd geometry from 5 years ago, they were never opposing elements--though that would certainly be interesting LMAO!!!

as a reward for getting thru all of that... i shall leave you with... A SNIPPET <3

(from chapter 5, time is the movement of grief. context: this is at lotus pier, post xuanwu cave) He looked up, and saw Lan Wangji. Wei Wuxian moved over on the dock to make room for him to sit, which he did, cross-legged so he wouldn’t get wet. They sat in comfortable silence for a while, listening to the crickets. The golden light of the setting sun made Lan Wangji look devastatingly beautiful. It took Wei Wuxian’s breath away. When Lan Wangji turned his head and met Wei Wuxian’s eyes, there was nothing Wei Wuxian wanted to do more than kiss him in that moment. It was a startling thought. He looked away as calmly as he could. 

THANK YOU FOR ASKING COR I REALLY LOVED ANSWERING THIS!!!!!

[indigochromatic]

quick thoughts on a metaphor for median-ness: My headmate S sometimes has some fluctuating median subsystem stuff going on, and for him, a quick answer to "so what's that like for you?" is the metaphor of a video game character with a lot of in-game cosmetic skins: - on one level of fundamental identity, it's still all the same character: the gameplay mechanics themselves haven't changed, after all, and even the base character model is usually the same - however, the aesthetic and "overall vibe" can be wildly different, even including flavor text/lore differences that involve pretty major aspects of personality-- an edgy assassin character having a harmless "coffeeshop AU" skin, a normally heroic character with a supervillain outfit, etc. - often, a handful of base, "core" personality traits are shared, and the differences are, in a way, reflections of how a different environment might shape a person differently, and provide different outlets for similar motivations--they're like a commentary on each other, and on the base character concept.

This actually fits pretty well with a lot of his experiences on this front: across all his facets, he still consistently feels connected to a shared underlying sense of identity, and although the internal appearances of his facets can be strikingly distinct--the pastel goth, the biker guy, the trans dude with some draconic aspects, etc--they're all still visibly 'versions of him', too. However, his facets do tend to display differences in perspective, opinion, "degree of trauma"/what issues feel most present for them, involvement in shared hobbies, etc., and can "feel" very different when I talk to them internally. (Note: he generally doesn't feel much facet distinction when he's fronting, with only a few instances otherwise. Why? Not sure!)

It also could just be the case that this metaphor feels natural to him because he actually is a video game fictive, and this "ready-made framework for me-but-not-exactly-me, complete with neat official artwork to draw from" just...made sense to his subconscious as a way to represent his median-ness? (Several of his facets do actually take their appearances and bits of "personality shifts" from cosmetic skins in his source game, in a way that feels less like introjection or splitting and more just subconsciously leveraging them as "lenses for understanding himself"). Does this metaphor resonate with other systems out there, or do your median/median-like experiences feel completely different? Would love to hear!

[allthoseotherworlds]

Just for the record, not all people who dislike the bigeneration thing also dislike the timeless children or the idea of pre-Hartnel Doctors.

And also I'm getting kind of tired of people saying that complaining about the implications of the bigeneration for the fifteenth Doctor means you didn't properly appreciate Ncuti Gatwa's performance.

Ncuti's performance was great! I am not saying that he didn't do a good job, he was very striking and had great energy and as far as I can tell everybody I've seen has been able to recognize that and be excited about it!

I also am in what I think maybe the minority in that I really liked the Timeless children stuff. I thought it was interesting and enjoyed it.

My complaint about the bigeneration stuff is specifically that they need to make it clearer that the 15th Doctor is *the Doctor*, the original Doctor, the same one who has been through every regeneration so far.

I am aware there are a few lines in the special that can be interpreted in that way - doing rehab out of order, and so on.

But it isn't clear enough for me to trust that this is specifically their intention, and it does matter to me whether or not they're the same person. Maybe it shouldn't, maybe I'm pedantic and nitpicky and care too much about the details, but nevertheless it is important to me.

I think maybe a relevant thing here is that a lot of people discuss regeneration and the different Doctors as though they're all different people who are loosely connected by shared memories?

Whereas I tend to see them as the same person, consistent through each regeneration even though appearance changes and surface level personality traits get reshuffled a little. Every personality trait that any Doctor displays is one they all have, just in different quantities and displayed in different ways. To me they're all still the same person, just like I'm the same person now as I was 5 years ago, even though I look different and interact with people differently - my core identity, personality, and values haven't really changed that much.

So it matters to me whether or not be bigeneration is just a time travel thing, where 14 and 15 are fundamentally the same person and 15 is just brought back in time sort of,

Or whether the original Doctor was essentially killed and replaced with two copies,

Or whether one or the other of the two is the original and the other is a copy.

I *know* this doesn't need to matter, but it still feels important to me. It's the kind of existential crisis that shows up in these sorts of stories a lot for a reason- even though there may not be a practical difference, it's still something that feels important at least to some people.

And I just hope that the writers understand that this is something that's important to people, even if they don't explicitly address it.

Anyway, I just wanted to say all of this because I feel like I've seen an increasing number of people complain about other people disliking the bigeneration stuff with the assumption that they dislike it for a reasons that are not the reasons that I have.

To summarize: I like Ncuti Gatwa, I think he's doing a great job and would like to see more, I intend to watch his stuff and support him in the role. I'm not against weird backstory changing plot things in Doctor Who and I liked the timeless children. My issue with the bigeneration is pedantic lore related existential crisis stuff and the implications thereof. I'm aware this is a very nitpicky autistic thing to care about, but I am a nitpicky autistic, so (shrug emoji)

[blog-of-hubris]

I really liked your analysis on sakurajima I thought it was really good I just wanted to ask you something these are some criticisms I’ve heard on the arc and I would like to know what you make of them these ones are a little different though

What do you make of these objections

Hello Joker, thanks for asking me a question. I usually hate commenting on negative feedback that I disagree with or better yet lack the ability to understand. However, I will give you a thorough answer for your time.

There are a few points I disagree with. I will say, I think OP has a skewed perspective on what Maki represents, and this opinion seems to be lost in the route of Maki being Toji's second coming. I think a common mistake with the fandom right now is seeing the connection to Maki and Toji to be focused on their similarities when really it is their differences (i'll mention this more later).

They mention the Zenin Massacre as a moment of tragedy and loss for Maki and that's only in the aspect of losing Mai. Killing the clan was her beloved sister's final request. Also, Maki is much more separated from everyone else since this happened. She is extremely straightforward (even more than she was before) which I see as an aspect of her experience killing the clan. I think OP is underestimating how much weight came off Maki's shoulder with the clan gone. Also, the weapon that she has is a memento to Mai and connected directly to her soul. I don't think Maki feels like Mai is entirely gone due to having the blade, and also her moment in the culling game was a reflection of that. I think a major focus of her moment was to show that she was still holding onto what happened psychologically.

Maki was the character that hide the aspect of wanting to change the Zenin Clan for Mai's sake, so it surprises me that OP is expecting some super heartbroken traits to be shown by Maki. She's like Toji in the way that she is a brute and would want to handle things physically than psychologically. The big difference with Maki is that she had Mai and only Mai. She felt the need to change the clan for Mai’s sake, while Toji saw escaping the clan and renouncing their existence was the best way to disconnect from them. Losing Megumi's mom sent him down on a spiral, but like I said before — the big thing about Maki and Toji's character is their differences. Yes, maki is the second coming of Toji with the physicality but remember she had a whole twin who held back her potential. She had the support of Gojo to fall back on, and her personality is kind-hearted at its core. I just dislike the idea that Maki's character revolves around Toji so much, it just isn't the case to me. Nobody said she was the return of the Sorcerer Killer, people in the fandom just assumed that.

I just thing this OP has a fundamental misunderstanding of Maki's role in the story. I think they also misunderstand the level of depth behind Mai giving up her life for Maki to achieve the passion she always had. Mai made the conscious decision to give up her life to create the ultimate weapon she could for her sister, ultimately giving her the perfect tool to seek the revenge they both wanted. Yes, the situation is a tragedy, but this is a world of cursed energy. Mai's "Curse" unto Maki was to kill the clan and then find happiness in life thereafter. At the end of the day, Mai the type of passion and drive that Maki had, she did not want to deal with curses or be a sorcerer. She was fine being a servant/stereotypical woman for the clan, but that wasn't what Maki wanted. Yes, Maki may now (more likely than not) see her past selfishness as a mistake, but this adheres to the same theme that has been a core value for JJK since Vol 0: “Love is a Curse”; while also representing Sukuna's perspective on weakness showing through love as well. Maki now is not tied down to Mai, and Mai is not tied down to the confines of the Jujutsu world.

At the end of the day, what both of the twins wanted was to be together forever, but their approach did not align. With Mai's soul being in the blade, it gives her a sense of peace while also being by Maki's side. The moment between the sisters was a moment for Maki to truly recognize the sword as Mai's soul and not just a tool she left with her. I struggle to understand how this isn't seen as a moment of light in the darkness that has followed. Maki has something that literally connects her to her sister's soul, and due to them being twins, who knows how deeply the connection with the soul splitting sword can be for Maki.

I also think that OP confuses Noritoshi Kamo's “screen time for distress” with us just getting more insight on who he is as a character. We see Kamo think about his circumstances and reflect on his life through flashbacks. This isn't Gege taking away from Maki's character but showing us that Kamo is a character of introspection. We knew that from Goodwill arc, but in CG we just get a deeper vision to understand his motives + see how he processes his existence as a person. We have gotten all of this from Maki through Perfect Preparation. Maki isn't a thinker, she moves through action. That's why her over thinking against Noaya was a hindrance to her, and she needed the sumo spars to get her mind back on track. In perfect preparation, we get Maki's past via other people bringing it up because Maki just pushes forward, and only through others does her past come to light. This has been happening since we got introduced to Maki in 0, and in the main series we get a glimpse of Maki's past through Mai's eyes only. We only get a glimpse of Maki's POV of the past, but it was a quick flash of her thinking about Mai right before the massacre starts. This is because she isn't one to look back but to look forward and Gege has stayed consistent to that.

My last point will be that I abhor the idea that a character has to display some overexaggerated or dramatic traits to show they have experienced trauma. I find people who have this view point to ignore the fact that trauma is displayed very differently with each person, and common symptoms are not the end all be all. There are many people who get through trauma by moving forward and letting time be what helps heal as they process what they have been through. For JJK specifically, it is said constantly that being a jujutsu sorcerer is hell. I think Gege has stayed so consistent to this, to the point audience members get confused when the cast members actually understand this, lol. The cast members aren't unaffected by loss, they process it differently. Not everyone needs to have a mental breakdown like Geto.. And even for Geto his situation was a collision of circumstances leading up to a change in his thought process. Even then, Geto's choices were to change the fact that sorcerers were so used to loss. He wanted to end that cycle because he felt he was strong enough to. He felt it was his role in life to pursue this in order to be happy, while Maki's “happiness” lied in destroying what stripped her of her truest form of happiness.

Sorry for the long response, if you have any more questions about what I said please feel free to ask!

[biconickyoshi]

I finished your fic in college the other day while working on a group project for the BBC and it made me flop around like a fish I LOVE, your writing so much. Like I love AUs in general when it comes to ATLA when the story changes in a small way since so much happens, but your fic makes me laugh, gasp, lots of emotions JEJFJWJF I just can't wait for the next chapter!!!!!!

Aww omg thank you so so much for the kind comments!! I say this all the time - comments/messages like this are what inspire me to keep writing :) I both love and kinda feel bad that my fic was distracting you from your project lol! I’m so glad that you are enjoying it that much!

I really wanted this AU to feel “realistic” (to a degree, obviously I’m taking some liberties) in that if Zuko did discover Aang first in canon, the events that are occurring in my AU would believably happen. I also have been trying to make sure that everyone is in character while at the same time accounting for changes that occur in their personalities as a result of the timeline/events being different. Especially Zuko - he’s the character who is probably the most different from canon, so I have been trying to make sure to show that while he has definitely changed for the better in that his innate good personality traits are shining through (kindness, loyalty, empathy), he still retains some of his core “negative” personality traits (impatience, irritability, impulsiveness).

I hope you continue to enjoy the story as I write more!! The next few chapters are going to be adaptations of actual episodes - I’m really trying to make them different enough that it doesn’t seem like I’m just copying and pasting the episode and throwing Iroh and Zuko in there lol. I really enjoyed writing the more original chapters (i.e. the SWT arc), but there are pros and cons to completely fabricating stories from my head instead of having an episode to base things on lol

Sorry for the long-ish response - sometimes I get carried away talking about the things I’m passionate about (and this fic is definitely one of them, which I suppose is a good thing haha)

Thanks so much again!! :)

[capricioussun]

To kind of differentiate/clarify, I decided to start a little "chart" explaining the characterizations of Invertedfell as opposed to a swapped au

The baseline I've been working from is essentially: the characters are the same at their core, but all of their main characteristics are the linear opposites of those traits. So like, opposite ends of the same spectrum kind of deal

I haven't finished it and it's just been sitting in my wips, but since I'd done a few, I decided to post at least those

Flowey, Toriel, Sans, & Papyrus below the cut

Flowey

UT - sarcastic, bitter, lonely, OG Flowey is the reincarnation of a child whose final days caused significant enough trauma he believes himself emotionless and regularly participates in self destructive actions.

⬇️

UF - scared, resentful, exhausted, the way I generally interpret uf Flowey is the reincarnation of an anxious, yet feebly hopeful child who's greatest fears were realized and had what little innocence he'd retained stripped from him violently. He'd struggled with acceptance initially, but over time, was worn down into someone just as desperate and tired as everyone else...

⬇️

IF - calm, quiet, avoidant, instead of sinking into despair and resentment, he'd swayed more toward despondent. Overwhelmed and afraid of experiencing hope only to be let down again, instead of anger he is averse, wishing to abandon his world the way it'd abandoned him. Yet he can't entirely let go all the same...

~

Toriel

UT - kind, self righteous, isolated, Toriel is shown to be a very motherly person, but it is made clear quickly that she's been through much and it has affected her deeply.

⬇️

UF - fearful, manic, desperate, with the stakes much higher than in UT, I imagine her UF counterpart's experiences splintered what meager stability she'd originally retained. At times unpredictable, she does still care, but the way she shows it can be dangerous.

⬇️

IF - detached, withdrawn, despondent, falling less into the brink of madness, she shut down instead. Cold and aloof, she tries to sever her own feelings to maintain her sanity, and actively avoids others to the best of her ability, no longer wanting to play a role in this twisted game.

~

Sans

UT - laid back, weary, secretive, most think of Sans' humor as his defining character trait, but we can see throughout the individual runs, Sans tends toward being passive aggressive, pessimistic, and outright sad. He’s weighed down by responsibility and a stubborn attachment to hope he seems to resent at the worst of times, yet it's what enables him to endure despite.

⬇️

UF - disingenuous, anxious, miserable, the way I interpret uf Sans is essentially just Sans but with significantly worse depression. Not only has he accumulated the same perceived failures as his original self, but he’s bogged down by many new ones, too. He’s beyond exhausted, deflects with dark humor often, but aside from coming across more tense and a little more cruel, he’s not all that different from his original counterpart.

⬇️

IF - aggressive, unstable, stubborn, under similar pressures, he instead swayed more toward desperation than apathetic acceptance. Paranoid and willing to do whatever it takes to protect himself and his brother, he’s given up that stubborn shred of hope in a ditch effort just to keep surviving.

~

Papyrus

UT - boisterous, optimistic, indecisive, Papyrus might come across as naive and conceited, but it becomes clear quickly that he’s more aware than he lets on. He is fickle, changing his opinions and goals often and frequently throughout the game, yet stubbornly remains upbeat and positive, no matter what.

⬇️

UF - brash, uncertain, defensive, the way I interpret uf Papyrus draws mostly from his reflectiveness, that despite still being optimistic and wanting similar things to his original counterpart, he’s learned to mask or disregard these things to better his chances of surviving and taking care of his brother.

⬇️

IF - standoffish, deceitful, driven, with the shift in everyone else, again, Papyrus reflects. As his brother became less predictable, the person he had to become instead is a pillar. "Ruthless" and interested only in what will keep him and his brother safe.

~

And as always, this isn't carved in stone. The more I work on this au these characterizations may change some as I grow more familiar with them, but! Feel free to ask questions abt these guys or anything else for this au ✨

[justanotherfanfolks]

Shouting Into the Void #3: The Cangst is Real (TWST)

My guy got justice in that Heartslabyul manga.

Twisted Wonderland characters have this certain level of depth to them. Usually when you watch someone's vignettes, you learn a lot about them (except for Malleus, that guy is still kind of an enigma in his, what-). However, someone I always had my eye on was Cater. When I first got into the game, the first thing I heard someone say about him was that he was kind of a dull character. His initial personality trait is being a social media fan, which they found annoying. I didn't share the same opinion since I didn't know anyone but the Scarabia Duo, but it put him on my radar. 

I like Cater. He's funny, he's got a great dynamic with the dorm, and he's basically the vice-vice housewarden. He doesn't like sweets, which my sugar addicted self can respect despite not relating at all. The main thing I knew in terms of Cater Lore was that he had two older sisters that he had a complicated relationship with. Also they were the reason he didn't like sweets. But I felt I was missing something. There was more to this guy.

Cater's wish (Wish Upon a Star my beloved). That went off on my radar. Trey comes to collect Cater's wish (also I could go off about their dynamic, I love it) and Cater wishes for more followers. Same as last year. Trey calls him out, so he changes it to having a good school year. Trey gets suspicious, cause this dude is great at reading people and terrible at using this information. Cater won't tell Trey hid genuine wish, even though I'm pretty sure Trey is his closest friend. So I thought, oh, Cater Angst exists, or Cangst if you will. I wanted to explore this. I ranted to my sister that it existed. Secrets?! I wanted that Cater Lore. Also dude's labwear vignette. Plants that project your core emotions and he shows three surface level ones and stashes the "rejects," don't think I didn't see that sir-

Then, about a month before the Halloween event was released in English, I read the subbed version of Cater's Halloween Card. And OH THERE IT WAS. THERE'S THE CANGST!

I'll be discussing it now that the English version of the game just introduced the card. Cater is trying to be contacted by an old friend and he is just shrugging it off. We learn his dad is a banker, so his family moved around a lot before he came to NRC. He tells the Light Music Club he had fun going around seeing new sights and people (chronic liar). He says he loves light, casual friendships, which is why he likes Magicam. Lilia puts two and two together and Mr. I've Been Alive For Hundreds of Years says it must be lonely not being able to stick around to form meaningful relationships. Cater, internally, doesn't take Lilia seriously because what does he know? He's part of the Diasomnia Family of Four, they've known each other their whole lives (if only he knew). Everytime he has to move, he loses every connection he has and has to start over. It hurt too much, so he just stopped trying to have those connections. He keeps everyone at arm's length. He'd rather have thousands of casual connections than a few strong ones he could lose. Trey's probably the longest friendship he's been able to have, and he still keeps him at arm's length. He acts like he doesn't have any close friends, but I'm calling him out on that.

He's part of the Heartslabyul Five. I don't know about you, but those five have one of the best intradorm dynamics. Those five are at their best when they're all together. That call Cater got after that Diasomnia family fluff showed they're all pretty close (also the way that call came after he reflected on Diasomnia's family dynamic, yooo-). Either he hasn't noticed or he's just in denial. He's got close friends, he just won't admit it because he thinks they'll just drift apart when he graduates. Which is just sad. Also Cater's an EXTROVERT which makes everything worse for him, he's supposed gain from social interaction not walk on eggshells.

Cater has a lot more going than people give him credit for. Those Halloween Cards FEED. The Juniors are really interesting. They've gotten used to the chaos that is NRC and barely bat an eye when the freshmen are freaking out. They seem tired. Anyway, Cater's cool. I spent too much on his Halloween card. Ready to see this guy do more. I just wanted to ramble.

[ms-parkinson]

General Information

Birthday: June 2, 1956

Height: 5 feet, 1 inch

Pronouns: She/Her

Sexuality: Bisexual

Zodiac Big Three

Sun: Gemini

The irony of the twins being born in Gemini has never been lost on Andressa. While she does embody many of the more positive traits, the weaknesses of The Twins are what get to her the most. She cannot be alone for long. She never has been. Ever since she was created, someone else was with her. Actually feeling her feelings (other than the more positive ones) can be hard for her. Don’t even get her started on actually processing her trauma. She’ll simply change the subject.

While the negative traits describe her, so do many of the positive. She’s smart. Annoyingly so at times. This was made even more obvious when her brother sorted Ravenclaw. Though Andressa always preferred the power her knowledge gave her over her actual learning. She has a great ability to read people. Within a few minutes, Andressa knows who someone is. Though her blind loyalty to those she loves sometimes gets in the way. The trait that has become the handiest is the ability to make friends with anyone. Her success at the Grave is proof of that.

Rising: Leo

Ferociously proud and somewhat vain might as well be the Parkinson family motto. Andressa embodies her rising sign’s biggest traits to a t. She’s a natural leader, if not made obvious of how she handled her family after her mother’s death. She has a very strong sense of dignity, self-respect, and personal honor. If someone disrespects her, you are dead to her. End of story.

Moon: Taurus

There is not much Andressa values more than loyalty and her moon sign highlights it. Once she has determined someone is worth her loyalty, that is it. It will take more than most to let them go. Material comforts, such as a nice house and her clothes, are necessities to her. Some might find them frivolous, but she cannot be without them. She’s a romantic. If it wasn’t made obvious by the collection of Jane Austen first editions she keeps in her flat, it would be by her need to make everyone feel loved. Her friends know this by the flowers and a nice handwritten notes she always has delivered. 

Wand Information

Core: Dragon Heartstring.

There was no doubt in anyone’s mind her wand core would be the dragon. It holds power, something Andressa is always vying for. There’s a loyalty to her core that does not go unvalued by her, knowing any spell she tries will be successful. The rumors of the wand turing Dark have not fallen on deaf ears but Andressa is not worried. Not yet anyway.

Wood: Cherry.

She remembered the look on Olivander’s face when the Cherry wand was placed in her hand. She still remembered his words, “A Cherry Dragon….you must make sure to keep your mind strong and your emotions in check. I would hate to see what happens otherwise.” It made her feel special, chosen in a way to have a Cherry wand. The handle has small cherry blossoms carved into it, another special trait of her special wand.

Flexibility and length: 11 inches and sturdy.

While a little long for her height, it makes sense when thinking of the power her wand possesses. She likes to think it’s a match for her personality, which is much larger than many would expect from someone like her.

Amortentia

Her amortentia has changed over the years. While at school, it was the smell of a fire in the Slytherin Common Room, fresh parchment, the garden at her home in full bloom, and her perfume mixed with a more masculine scent, usually that of whatever boy had her eye at the moment. Now, it’s her mother’s perfume, the mix of scents she has for the Grave (amber, aged patchouli, bergamot, black vanilla, sandalwood and pink peppercorn), the smell of the fabric store, and Lucius’ cologne.

Boggart

Her boggart has been the same her whole life. Cristiano dead. The idea of him no longer being by her side is enough to send her spiraling. The first time she faced a boggart in her home when she was seven, she screamed so loud she lost her voice and fainted. He has been the only constant in her life. Her other half. It was her job to make sure this never happened. No matter what the cost. 

Patronus

It took until Andressa’s seventh year at Hogwarts to produce a Patronus. It was the one spell she couldn’t do on the first try. A rather sore subject if she was being honest. But she knew she needed it to past her NEWTs and the last thing she was going to do was not master something some had mastered years ago.

 The memory was a simple one. All her friends and her brother at their childhood home, sitting in the garden at night. It wasn’t one she thought would work but then….the whisps of smoke formed. She shouldn’t have been surprised it was a crow. They were loyal, clever, traveling in packs and fierce when needed. Some of her classmates weren’t surprised, she was a Slytherin after all. But she knew the moment the bird flew around her head how fitting it was. 

[badmusejail]

Since he made his first appearance on his blog, let's talk about WD

(WD is specifically Gaster's sci-fi/space variant.)

WD does share a few traits with classic Gaster, but a lot of things have been adjusted in accordance with the AU.

First of all, this is not a Spacetale or whatever you want to call it where monsters were exiled to space instead of the mountain. This is a simple space AU.

Monsters and Humans still exist and still quarrel and fight; almost certainly with wars over the years but nothing so extreme as in Undertale.

There's also a third classification which is simply "Alien," referring to non-human, physical creatures. (As opposed to Monsters, which are still non-human magical creatures.)

Again, the exact relationships between these are complicated and probably worthy of a few books and outside the scope of this post.

WD can speak normally as opposed to his classic version; in this AU, wingdings is a reference to exactly what it is in real life: an esoteric font used to print symbols. Its not exactly a strange name; the time and era results in a lot of abnormal names, many people picking from a large variety in order to try to be more unique.

WD's past starts just the same as it normally does; a person who just wants to help improve society, and working on technology under King Asgore was the best way to do it.

At this point, his name was simply Wingdings Gaster, Doctor if you want to be polite, as he has no shortage of credentials to his name.

His specialty was engines and warp drives; making ships as efficient and powerful as possible. His CORE technology is still commonplace in a variety of ships across the universe.

Warp drives were his biggest interest, however; the technology existed prior to him but had a lot of potential for improvement and he felt the benefits would be monumental.

And for years, everything was fine. He gained a reputation as one of the Federation's brightest, pushing warp technology beyond what was thought possible.

Until one day he vanished.

It was a routine experiment--practiced and safe, even with a backup drive should the new one prove unstable. Gaster and four of his co-workers departed on a newly built ship.

The experiment shouldn't have taken long; they were expected to return in about ten minutes.

They never did.

The strange occurrence resulted in no shortage of theories about what happened, but the accepted outcome was that there was simply an unrecoverable error and the crew perished on the trip. As much as attempts are made to minimize such chances, it was always a possibility.

Most days, Gaster himself doesn't remember what happened. He remembers waking up, face down on the cold floor of the ship, laying in a sticky, black substance, emergency alarms blaring. The other crew members were gone and the ship was severely compromised.

Something was wrong and there was no evidence what.

In his terror, he never returned to the place he called home.

That was a long time ago. How long depends on the flexibility of my partner, but typically several hundred years ago; which as per canon isn't abnormal for monsters.

After the ACCIDENT as its simply called, he changed. Both physically and mentally, and while he still holds the name Gaster, he rarely if ever uses the name Wingdings, instead shortening it to the initials WD which would become known intergalactically.

This Gaster is larger than his past self; standing at just over six foot five, and though he's still, well, bony, he's noticeably thicker than before.

His mental state is tricker to pin down. He's still compassionate, caring, and loving; and his primary interest is helping people, but unlike other versions of himself, he has absolutely no qualms wiping out dozens of people at a time if he deems it necessary. He's fair and just, but has absolutely no sympathy for those that willfully attempt to deceive, cheat, or steal from him, and rarely offers second chances. He clearly sets the terms of his agreements and expects them to be followed, lest consequences strike true.

What happened? What caused these changes?

Truthfully, these are questions that WD himself refuses to dwell on, answers that he doesn't want to have. But, sometimes, in the corner of his mind, he remembers that day; being struck down without mercy, pinned to the wall of the quivering ship and screaming in agony as something forced itself into his SOUL. Sometimes he wonders if he's really the scientist known as Gaster, or if he's the parasite wearing his shell.

While standard Gaster is a person that was pushed to the eldritch and is trying desperately to be normal again, WD is instead a person that has fully embraced the eldritch and has no problems using the power that comes with it.

He's uncertain of the exact reason he never returned to the Federation. Maybe its because he knew he was different now and knew they would react poorly. Maybe its because he was aware of the corruption and didn't want to contribute to it anymore. Maybe something new was growing in him, a thirst for chaos, a hunger for danger.

Whatever it was, his empire started humble as most do. After all, he was just one person, even if he did have vast powers to simply create things and destroy them just as easily.

He reached out to the isolated planets; the far off places, the backwater worlds that had been deemed unworthy by the Federation, left to fend for themselves. He came to these worlds, he offered them technology beyond their wildest dreams; he offered them opportunities, a chance to be equal to the giants in the universe.

And for what?

A single condition: If I need your help, you will come.

Of course, some places were too skeptical, too cautious, too xenophobic to accept his offer. That was fine; there were hundreds, thousands more. There were those that greedily accepted his offer, those that thanked him with tears in their eyes. There were those that saw him as a god.

He wasn't trying to be a god.

He was just trying to be a decent person.

His faith and optimism was too high. It didn't take long before people attempted to take advantage of his gifts; now, people using his technology to defend themselves was understandable and even intended, but he did not condone people starting wars with his machinery.

It wasn't a problem, though--with a tsk and a snap of his fingers, each of those ships they sought to abuse exploded without a single warning.

He added another condition to his deals: Do not start conflict with my tools.

What started as a one-man operation slowly grew; becoming a haven for all sorts of individuals that were on the run or looking to start a new leaf.

WD started as a callsign to identify himself outside official transmissions, but over the years, it became associated more with the entire enterprise.

Most, if not all, of his parts and equipment are serialized somewhere in the format of WD-XXXXX, clearly designating equipment that came from his business.

WD is traditionally known as a criminal arms dealer--but in his eyes, its a vast oversimplification of the situation. For one, to be criminal, you have to be under some sort of legal system, and he is his own legal system. He prefers the designation of independent supplier. The fact that his business goes against the Federation's regulations is beyond his concern as he's not part of the Federation. That being said doing business with him is illegal in all Federation aligned organizations and planets. He doesn't care and will still do business with these individuals--with a disclaimer that under their jurisdiction, they're breaking the law.

As the enterprise grew and the amount of clients grew with it, it became necessary to adopt a more formal structure, hiring mechanics and assistants to process, analyze, build, and ship the orders they receive.

As such, the vast majority of orders never personally come into contact with Gaster himself--either mass-produced or handled by the assistants for more custom work.

The orders that Gaster himself takes up tend to be odd or technologically demanding; very specific tech meant for a very specific job and highly specialized for the specific contract in mind. The nature of the work results in a lot of negotiation and close contact with the client--a situation that has lead to some unfortunate "accidents."

Projects that Gaster himself takes on usually have the following mark on them:

Colloquially, these projects are referred to as ODs or "omega-diamonds" or, for the ones who want to be cheeky, OGs for Original Gasters.

Somewhere along the line, he created Sans and Papyrus; as children or assistants; maybe a bit of both--whichever it is, he does love them both very much, even if Sans has gotten a bit skeptical of what Gaster really is and Papyrus decided to join the Federation.

(Gaster and Papyrus still love each other very much and are still on the same 'side,' Papyrus was simply attracted to the idea of the Federation; unbothered by the fact his father is one of their wanted criminals. Funnily enough, Papyrus has explicitly stated on numerous occasions that WD is his father--people just don't listen. Undyne usually just tells him to knock it off.)

It's definitely not the life Gaster would have imagined having some years ago, but he can't say he's not satisfied. He works on fascinating projects, meets interesting people, and in his own way, helps the world.

(As for the encroaching darkness inside of him...well, he'll worry about that another day.)

Links

WD's Federation File Dr. Gaster's Portrait About the Voidling Narrative Territories / Associated Locations Appearance

[the-rat-house]

💖 - What’s something you like about your muse?

💔 - What’s something you dislike about your muse?

Said muse being all of them owo

posting this on the wrong monday but hey. it still counts.

under a read more cause there are many of them lol. Also I realize I touch on a lot of stuff more related to canon than my personal interpretations on here so... whoops

LIKES

Daroach: He is just... so fun. Even with how little we get in the games, he just was fun to see and battle - and the fact we get to actually see him fleshed out in a silly but actually sort of in depth way via his dialogue in Mass Attack just makes him all the more endearing; he's a ladies man while being a fucking dork.

Spinni: Gremlin energies. She is small and fast and throws ninja stars and how can you not love how she manages to be cool and chaotic at the same time?

Storo: I want to hug him. But also the damage he deals. Delight cannot describe how happy I am when I get to show him stomping the shit out of enemies when summoned in Star Allies. Look at him go! And he is canonically called a softie.... so he is strong AND kind.

Doc: They really looked at the cute little Squeakers and went "what if one of them was a mad scientist?" and then did it. Well, as much as we can get with limited lore anyways. Really just the fun bit of variety he adds!!

Galacta Knight: His story is so fucked up. So fucked up. I see him and I am so driven to explore everything about him because THERE IS SO MUCH THERE JUST HIDDEN AWAY!!!! The drive and inspiration this orb inspires in me!!!! Living in my head rent free always!!!

Patch: My baby. My beloved. I'm biased cause I created them so like, picking one or even a few things is hard. One thing I suppose would be the fact that even though over the years there definitely have been changes, they are still very much the same at the core. I've tried many different things with them outside a Kirby setting but I always come back to them being this chaotic neutral to evil entity with the same things driving them and like... I guess that just feels comforting, almost? That the character has remained the same despite a bunch of changes... I like that. Like feeling like I'm on the same page as my creations.

Morpho: Morpho is still so mysterious that I am discovering them as I write them; nothing about them is solid and that is fun. I can make shit up and do what I want (this is also my dislike but I'll touch on that in the dislike section). I just have this weird little dude in my hands and that mysterious nature is so fun.

Magolor: I want to marry this egg- In all seriousness. He's cute. He's mischievous. He's smart. He actually got a redemption. I cannot truly tell you one thing I like or love because I adore everything about him. He is by far my favorite character in the series and the bias I feel is unreal. He is my little meow meow. My problematic fave. He can and will commit crimes and I will support him.

Bon: No thoughts head empty. Baby.

Dark Taranza: Ngl one of my top favorite things about DT is how they look. Like, I want them and want to be them. And I definitely write them with that in mind. Obv I don't want to be an arguably evil ruler but like, the vibes, yknow?

Dark Meta Knight: He's an evil asshole that does not give up and I respect him for that. I love edgy characters and he is no different. Exploring the mirror world starts with him and I'm sitting here holding in my hands all these ideas and lore thanks to him existing!!!

DISLIKES

Daroach: He is... so hard to write consistently. It's mostly a skill thing, but he exudes confidence that I naturally do not have so I'm constantly at odds when writing him like... am I appealing to this somewhat pompous but still caring leader or am I writing an asshole that is clearly faking it to make it? I Can't Tell. And like... the fact that he has such conflicting vibes sometimes leave me sitting there squinting at him.

Spinni: She shares a lot of personality traits with Patch at times but... it feels more obnoxious, almost, coming from her? And like, that's the point, she is supposed to have her times being childish and obnoxious. And I enjoy that she is! Again, this is a issue with my own writing confidence.

Storo: He is kinda... boring, almost? Just because he is a mostly normal dude. Kind and caring and the big muscly guy... but it is really hard for me sometimes to go deeper than that. Part of my skill, and lack of canon info, and overall just struggling to gain a lot of inspiration with how little I am given from a design perspective... mind you, I still absolutely love him and wouldn't write him if I didn't want to! Just sometimes I sit here looking at him and go... yeah you sure are existing, bud.

Doc: Similar issues with Storo and most characters I like in that I just have so little to work with coming from canon. I like this sometimes, but other times it makes things really really hard. At least he has an interesting design but also,,, in that I have a guy that I don't feel smart enough to write orz

Galacta Knight: Grabs him. He's a fuckening.... idiot sometimes and another consistency issue cause we get So Little in canon (the most we get is in a non canon game AND REALLY BEYOND HIS INCLUSION IN STAR ALLIES WHERE HE GETS EATEN BY MORPHO HE IS NOT A CANON CHARACTER WHICH AAAAAAAAAAAH-) despite his potential and I'm just. Shaking and vibrating cause I want to make him cool but realistic but he's so old and out of touch and it all mixes to make this fucked up man whose existence is really really hard for me to grasp coherently cause I have so many thoughts all the time!!!!

Patch: Literal problematic fave. Patch, with their canon story but even on here, has some very bad things that they do and I cannot express them to their full extent without getting in trouble and it just. Shakes fists. I wish I could be attached to an OC who isn't like them but I just can't. It's boring. But I still feel stifled when writing them cause of that.

Morpho: Everything about them is vague and my ideas, while some solid, are also mostly vague and fluid so while I enjoy writing them, I am super nervous about it because you guys are getting surprises at the same time I am. There is so much possibility which is fun but also frustrating.

Magolor: Taps my fingers together.... genuinely cannot think of something I don't like about him. Even his bad traits I love. My dislike is I cannot write how much I love him or portray him the way I see him because if I did that it'd be insufferable.

Bon: They are listed as a muse but... that's mostly because they act outside of Patch sometimes? So I guess a dislike is that... I dunno where I rank them in regards to muse or NPC. I need more time to flesh them out in my mind. I gotta rotate them in the microwave for awhile, let em cook, yknow?

Dark Taranza: I have very little to go with with them since their place in canon (non canon?) does not line up at all so I get frustrated trying to come up with stuff sometimes cause I am just... battling my own self doubts about telling canon to fuck off (despite me doing a lot of that with my interpretations in general) while trying to keep to whatever the character is... even if what we have isn't a lot.

Dark Meta Knight: Similar with Patch in that I'm never gonna be able to write and express him the way I want because it just... isn't palpable to a lot of people. And again, I still get most of what I like about him across and enjoy him and am excited to write him more since I haven't really had a chance to.. but I know that I won't get to be as mean with him as really fits.

[trackdntraild]

laurance ranting at 6 am bc im sleep deprived and i love him but he's so stupid and i could talk about him for hours

season 2 laurance is a character that i personally relate to, infinitely more than the orange haired green eyed idiot that was ripped from final fantasy to be part of a minecraft roleplay series in 2015, but i'm gonna try to be as unbiased about this rambling as i possibly can

the whole of laurance's existence is. tragedy. there's not a single good thing that this man can have without something happening and ruining that. already he shows off as a character who struggles to the extremes with his self image and his worth, and i feel like this is something that's already deeply rooted in characters that are put into a guard role, some moreso than others (especially for those that feel they were built to be a human weapon)

i mean. laurance lived a relatively normal life until he fell in love with aphmau, and following her as the series protagonist just. brings misery everywhere because it serves for a story yknow, even aphmau's not immune to the curse of having every bad thing that could happen happen to her

with laurance it's a bit of a unique case, and that's not just me being biased either. it feels like he is specifically singled out for quite a few tragic events. the worst part about it really is that he's never necessarily given the time to process things, which only further serves to bring his worst traits to light. his obsessive jealousy for aphmau begins to take presedence over his friendship with garroth and it strains his relationship with aphmau herself, his want to still be human overshadows the reality that he is a shadow knight and it only proves to drag him down even further, not only making his anger issues turn from mere outbursts to sudden violence but it begins to change some of his core values. yeah accepting that he's a monster wouldn't necessarily fix him, but it's easier to do that than to live in denial and try so hard to convince yourself you're still 'normal'

the fact it took until he committed mass slaughter to finally wake up a little was already bad enough, but by then it was too late for all that and he'd already suffered enough, and he'd began a spiral that it was difficult to recover from

when tragedy comes to the other characters they're given so much more room to process their feelings, to vent and to recover. laurance doesn't get that often, and even when he does it seems like he turns it away. he feels like the kind of character who heavily bottles his emotions, and to an extent he sort of does! holding back on his romantic advances, hiding his anger because of the fear of hurting and killing others that he cares about... you get the drill.

despite a lot of that his only good trait in these moments of vulnerability is how rarely he lies; he's very open about a lot of his thoughts even if they're bad. to an extent it's admirable, but yeah he goes too far. hence the argument with garroth...

his circumstances to an extent do at the very least give some insight as to why he acted the way he did. it's not like he was a popular guy; good looking, but, he didn't really have anything. couldn't even have a parent who could stick around because he'd always lose them to tragedy. couldn't have a sister to be around because he was always in another city, and she has her own life and responsibilities so she can't always be there at the drop of a hat anymore. when he went to the irene dimension, 15 years passed by and she changed; he didn't because he only had 15 minutes.

on top of all that he can't really have the same close friend group like he once had because one of them has a family and kids to focus on, and the other he's always starting arguments and fights with over a girl they both like. really, all of them were deeply changed by the realization of just how long the were in the irene dimension for, but seeing how laurance develops later on makes me wonder just how badly it did affect him, and how little about it we probably know.

and even admist all that he has character flaws that are rooted in him being misogynistic, primarily his rivalry with garroth. when he and cadenza had their talk, where cadenza even pushed the idea that laurance deserved aphmau for all he'd done for her with no reward, he pushed it down. he was just happy to be around her, and that was enough for him. he didn't care if his feelings weren't returned, he was just glad he got to be with her at all. but during the later half of season 2, it felt like that narrative began to shift. naturally it began with lilith's introduction, and aphmau's sudden and out of nowhere pregnancy, and we saw how all that went down.

i honestly don't know why i latched onto laurance specifically, but i feel like his tragedy is... exaggerated. at the same time, i feel like how he suffers through and deals with it is very realistic, and it does touch a personal part of me that i also try to repress. my portrayal of laurance might not be entirely accurate to the canon material, but i do feel like it's at least based on canon as close as i can make it without totally projecting. his emotional outbursts are nothing new, but some were way more uncalled for than others.

at the same time, these outbursts aren't out of character nor are they entirely unwanted. they were caused by something, and whether or not he's been open about the root cause (or we've seen the root cause for ourselves) is irrelevant. i feel like laurance is one of the better examples of how your environment fucks with you. his relationships with a lot of the main cast aren't healthy. at least, they aren't anymore. his relationship with aphmau is a prime example of one such relationship.

neither side of this dynamic is healthy! granted, laurance's side is infinitely worse (as much as i hate to admit it), but neither of them were in the right all the time. they've both had to knock some sense into eachother at one point or another, but they're always prone to relapsing because it's never a constant thing. aphmau's anger issues starting to crop up is just an example of how the stress of life has been getting to her during the season, and while it's something that laurance could relate to in a lot of aspects, he's no better at controlling his own anger and emotions than her.

and i feel like there's just a lot of resentment in the main 'friend' group anyways (that being aphmau, laurance, katelyn, garroth, dante, and travis)

honestly there are not many healthy friendships or relationships in mcd lmao, and i think that mainly comes down to their circumstances more than anything; mystreet characters don't really have an excuse for their actions they're just shit people a lot of the time because it's a funny gag. in mcd the stakes are way higher, and at least you can understand how somebody turned out to be so horrible in that world.

if i ever get back to working on my own mcd rewrite i know i would love to just give laurance a happy ending in my version of the story, but his tragedy is what makes him himself. i'm not excited to have to write his misery all over again (i know i could write it way worse than jess did, as in in a 'this thing is awful to write about but it's realistic and difficult to ignore' way not 'this is just bad writing and people can assume what they want' way)

[empiriical]

ok... a couple of other children of bottle takeaways, this time about czes, though:

more more more evidence for czes not fitting the peter pan metaphor. this is something we've been talking about a lot in the server but yeah it's just really important to me that this book strongly highlights how czes has changed so much since becoming immortal, while everyone around him as stayed roughly the same. we're told this over && over again, by czes himself, as he observes the behavior of his fellow immortals.

czes truly thinks he's a bad person. he cannot wrap his mind around being good. this is a trait that exists in a number of b.accano characters (i highlight it in jacuzzi especially, though to a lesser extent) but it's at the core of who czes is at this point in time. this feeling stems from a few different sources, but the one that really hurts is that with fermet's memories && possibly some of his personality inside him, czes figures that he must be evil too.

he initiates every first interaction with someone using his little kid persona, even if they know he's immortal. he does this to elmer right off the bat.

despite how different elmer is from him, && how much elmer's personality confuses czes, he ends up respecting him a lot. his big monologue about needing to escape && smile for elmer gets me in the gut so hard.

on that note, jumping into the fire was such a badass move && i will literally never shut up about it.

i've said this before, but the fact that czes' mind goes to the events on the flying pussyfoot && not his time with fermet when he's remembering torture he's endured... if he knew at the time that fermet was still alive, what claire did to him wouldn't seem nearly as bad. but i also really enjoyed the moment when he's comparing the villagers to fermet. that really hit.

czes is extremely protective of kids. we sort of see this in grand punk railroad, but we also know that czes just sort of gets saddled with looking out for mary, which slows down his actual pursuits significantly && becomes a nuisance. children of bottle makes it very clear that he really really cares about fil, && even ends up trusting feldt automatically, without even taking into consideration the possibility that he could turn on them. this is really important to me — i think it speaks to a side of czes we don't really get to see in any other situation.

the fact that he's been in denial about the people in his life being genuinely good, && how that scares him, because he has no real excuse to not trust them, even though every instinct in him is telling him he shouldn't, based solely on his past. the way it's explained that in deciding to accompany maiza on this trip, he was running away from those friends he made in new york... the fact that it implies he really didn't go on this trip for the same reasons maiza did. it's interesting. && i'm so happy that by the end, he's truly embraced the good fortune he's had in making friends, && is ready to go home && see them.