#this is a gross oversimplification BUT

[tangledinink]

So I had a question,

What kind of parents are Leo and Donnie?

[ ✩ the gemini ✩ ]

[cynovelox]

no one understands how important Thaniel is to me

[anorlondos]

Messmer doodles because I love him. Peak fight peak music peak character etc etc

Idk how to draw snakes don't make fun of me. Anyways I expected him to be the devil from the bible but nah he's just kinda sad. Miquella, on the other hand,

[avelera]

Ok, I feel like there's three writing concepts that Tumblr needs to get reacquainted with when it comes to understanding fiction:

Catharsis - Sometimes, fiction engages with horrifying, disgusting, painful, or scary concepts in order to bring about a positive experience for the reader. This can be through the hero defeating a disgusting evil, like defeating an abuser for example. One might also get catharsis not out of the defeat of something bad or uncomfortable, but simply from the experience of living it vicariously, such as joy at successfully hiding the body of a murder victim. There are literally countless examples of catharsis in fiction, but most importantly it must be understood, it is completely harmless to real people whether you're experiencing catharsis at something good happening or something bad happening that you get to live vicariously because it is literally fiction. Indeed, there's a lot of evidence that getting to experience catharsis through fiction at evil things, say, living vicariously through a fictional character committing adultery, even if you would never want to cheat on your own partner, actually helps purge the desire to do evil things oneself.

Pleasures of the genre - some genres have expectations that go with them. If you, as a writer, don't include those pleasures, you might turn off the audience. For example, the Western genre has a certain expectation of being set in the 19th c American West. There's usually cowboys and horses involved. If you write a story that's advertised as a "Western" that takes place entirely in a New York City apartment, it might be novel for the genre, but it might also piss off a bunch of readers who were expecting horses. You can do it, obviously, but don't be surprised if readers are confused and perhaps disinterested in the work. More salient to Tumblr perhaps - Marvel believes it is creating action/adventure superhero stories. If a Marvel movie suddenly became a psychological exploration of the internality of a character's relationships, without a single laser beam or fight scene in sight, Marvel expects its audience to be confused and unhappy. We, as fanfic writers and readers might be dying for that story, but that is not the pleasure of the genre that Marvel thinks its audience wants when it walks specifically into a superhero film.

Power Fantasy - this might be one of the most misunderstood or perhaps narrowly applied terms. Yes, sometimes a power fantasy is a 16 year old boy watching a superhero dude with 8 pack abs destroy the bad guy, get the girl, and save the day. Living vicariously through that character is definitely a power fantasy. BUT, a power fantasy can also be fantastical things that the audience wishes would happen in a way that would empower an audience member or make them happy. For example, a billionaire industrialist merchant of death like Tony Stark getting hit by his own weapons and deciding to become a crusader for justice in a way that actually helps normal people is, in fact, an audience power fantasy. We want to believe that if the right bad guy like a billionaire got the right comeuppance like a near-death experience at the hands of their own evils, they'd learn their lesson and become a better person. This is a power fantasy. This is not a thing that actually happens. It's honestly not that different from the power fantasy many gun owners have that if they own a gun, they're more likely to stop a crime in progress with their perfect marksmanship, rather than that they're more likely to kill or be killed by a member of their own family. Understanding the application of power fantasies in terms of good things you hope would happen happening in fiction is not only important for dissecting fiction as an intelligent viewer, it's also important in terms of recognizing when you're being influenced by certain stories and choosing what lesson you take away from it and what lesson (if any) you want to take away from it.

I just feel like these 3 terms are what I see most lacking in a lot of "discourse". Fiction is trying to engender emotion in the audience. Great fiction engenders a wide range of emotions in the viewer, not simply good emotions. Thoughtful fiction might (but not always!) try to impart a lesson. But great fiction can also just want to give you great emotions and make you think outside the usual box of your usual experiences. It's also completely fine for great fiction to just want to give you a great emotion experience like catharsis, or the thrill of a power fantasy. And I really wish these three separate but interrelated concepts were discussed more when it comes to dissecting fiction here on this site.

[renarines]

i am simple to please

[len-tilsoup]

WHERE IS THAT ONE POST

THE ONE THAT WAS LIKE "WHAT IF YOU WERE THE EVIL TWIN, AND YOU MEET THE VERSION OR YOURSELF THAT SHINES LIKE THE GODDAMN SUN" OR SMTH

ITS ALL I COULD THINK OF THIS EPISODE

[iforgotwhaticalledthis]

In retrosepct s1!centross is very funny because hes not even controlled by Enderian. His obsession with endstone is just because he's Like That tm

[foreverunraveling]

That awkward moment when love completely alters your perception of time.

Just, like, in very different ways.

[iztea]

OMG VNC ART???? I LOVE IT?? HOW AM I ONLY LEARNING YOU'VE DRAWN VNC NOW?????? OUTRAGEOUS

i did it one time last year and i haven't posted anything since but i love vnc it's so underrated😭 and the anime adaptation is actually sooo pretty and well done compared to a certain other manga thats under the same studio 😒

i definitely want to draw more fa of it!

[despazito]

its crazy how the black plague actually created favourable labour conditions + higher wages and gave the peasant class more bargaining power on account of, well, a lot of the workforce suddenly vanishing

[fridayyy-13th]

the magnus archives season four, or as i like to call it: Jon’s total eclipse of the heart era,

[spitblaze]

weird how so many antagonistic interpretations of others’ lifestyles/cultures involve the assumption that something you personally don’t understand is clearly some weird sex thing. almost as if theres some weird cultural assumption that sex is bad and people who talk about or otherwise publicly acknowledge sex are bad, so the people who are bad must clearly be doing weird sex stuff.

[eruverse]

Someday I will write 90s Amerus fic. That day isn’t now (biggest writing block rn), but someday. Many of the 90s fics in the English fandom are too incorrect in my opinion when it comes to historical contexts — and I know why, but it is 😄 grating

[fate-defiant]

I can't believe they put my boy Mytho "does fucked up shit to himself because his entire identity and self image relies on being loved(in the right way by the right people)" and my girl Rue "does fucked up shit to everyone else because her entire identity and self image relies on being loved(in the right way by the right people)" togehter in the same show and never did anything to meaningfully juxtapose and explore All That

[microwavedmetal]

I love canon hilson so much, because either what they're having is queer-platonic (yay), either they're so dysfuntional that when given the choice of directly addressing 15+ years worth of pent up sexual tension or doing a morally/legally ambiguous fuck-up, they'll choose the second option.

[corvidholly]

your grace is wasted in your face

(your boldness stands alone among the wreck.)

————

my silliness cannot be contained sorry gamers

anyways in-universe this is probably an actual painting depicting when kel won the rat olympics