#this is a little experiment to see how the new editor works

[staff]

Hello, Tumblr. 

If you joined us before November 2022 and predominantly post on web, you will be familiar with the two post editors—the legacy editor and the “new” web editor (formerly known as the “Beta editor”).

Beginning May 15, we’ll gradually be working to remove the legacy editor as an option for creating new posts. New posts created on web will be created in the new web editor. We hope to complete this change by July 15. 

This change only affects accounts created before November 2022. Newer accounts already default to the new web editor.

This will not affect posting on the apps because we switched to this new editor on the apps about four years ago. If you use the apps, you’ve been using the new editor all this time!

This will not affect what you can include in a post, only how you get there: You can still include all the different types of media in a post, only now, you’ll do that via the new web editor’s content blocks instead of selecting a post type from the post type bar at the top of your dash. So, if you’re halfway through a text post, and you decide that what this post really needs is your pet reptile, then click on the little red image icon in the post editor, select an image, and voilà. Lizard boy steals our hearts.

If you still prefer to post on web using the legacy editor, please keep reading because the rest of this post is for you.

How can you prepare for this change?

Once we have completed this update, you won’t be able to create posts using the legacy editor. You will be able to edit posts made using the legacy editor, at least for now. 

Start using the new web editor ahead of the switch. This will help you help us troubleshoot any issues you might encounter. It’ll also mean you’ll already know the ropes before the switch is final. 

Talk to us. Send us feedback. Especially if you’re switching from legacy to the new web editor. We want to hear about your experience: Are there any specific workflows or features in legacy that you want to see in the new editor?      

If you use a theme, make sure to check whether it supports posts made using the new web editor, and update it if that’s not the case. 

For those of you trimming reblogs: @rpschtuff has created an incredibly detailed master post that gets into the nitty gritty of that practice in the new web editor.

XKitters: XKit Rewritten was explicitly designed with the new web experience in mind. This means that you will need to use XKit Rewritten when creating posts in the new web editor.

That’s all for now. Remember, you can always get in touch with us. If it’s regarding the new web editor, then Support is the place for you. If it’s about something else, @wip is your guy.

[art]

Creator Spotlight: @66sharkteeth

66 is a comic artist and the creator of City of Blank, a WEBTOON original series. They worked in the game industry at companies such as 2K Games before entering the field of comics. They began their career in comics at Tapas, where they worked as an editor and lead typesetter, before being signed to create their own original series on WEBTOON.

Check out our interview with 66 below!

Have you ever had an art block? If so, how did you overcome it?

The short answer is yeah, I’ve definitely had one. Overall, I feel like doing a lot of style studies during that time and trying to use new brushes helps a lot. In addition, because I’m a comic artist, I feel like writer’s block is in the same field, and with that, I’m really fortunate that I have an editor that I can work with, who helps me a lot there. Whenever I am stuck at a plot point in my comic, I can always go to my editor, who helps me hammer things out.

What medium have you always been intrigued by but would never use yourself?

Animation. Of course, everyone loves animation. I went to school for game art and design and even did some animation courses, and I am just not cut out for it. I don’t enjoy the process, and I am not good at it. Animation is beautiful, and I admire people who can do it. I’d love for my work to be animated some day, I’m just not capable of being the one to do it haha.

Warm tones or cool tones?

It really depends on the scene! Especially in my comic, I really go with both of them, just depending on the moment in the comic. There was a major character death, and that scene was almost black and white. But normally, the comic is very vibrant, and people really like it, so when I switch it to a more cold tone, it makes the scene that much more impactful.

What is a recent creative project that you are proud of?

Honestly, my current comic, City of Blank, takes up 100% of my time. But recently, I did a plushie campaign where I worked with Makeship through Webtoon to design the plushies and do a little bit of marketing for them. So that’s fun and different from what I normally do!

When planning a comic or a story, what do you do first, character design or character outline?

Normally, I have a design, and I fall in love with the character design, and then I find a role for them. That’s how a lot of my characters have started. Also, that’s how I’ve been tackling new projects that I want to work on after City of Blank. I just came up with a character, and I’m trying to make a story around them.

What is a convention experience that has stuck with you?

Meeting readers and realizing how much my work means to some of them. Some of them have started their own comics, having been inspired by mine. Learning that I’m part of the reason they started their own comic journey, the same way I looked to other inspiring comic artists to start mine—it means the world that I’m in that position now.

Top tips on setting up an Artist Alley booth?

Let’s see…bright, sparkly colors! I think just trying to make sure that the booth is eye-catching. I ended up making a big shiny banner for New York Comic Con, and I know many people stopped by because it caught their eye and they’re curious about what it is. I know a lot of people are selling merchandise of popular media. Even just a banner of your brand to get them curious about who you are and maybe interested in seeing what you make and taking a business card so they can look you up later. It’s better than someone just buying a pin and forgetting you exist. Lastly, put out a tip jar. You never know just how generous your fans are feeling.

Who on Tumblr inspires you and why?

I’m mostly involved in the webtoon sphere! I am definitely inspired by my fellow Webtoon creators, @lark-wren, who created the series Woven. I love their work and seeing them interact with their readers on Tumblr. Same with fellow Webtoon creators, @miranda-mundt-art and @astrobleme-enterprises, who created Lovebot.

Thank you so much for stopping by and sharing, 66! Be sure to check out their Tumblr blog over at @66sharkteeth and follow their webcomic, City of Blank, over at WEBTOON.

[2kmps]

ROACH KING

trust-fund baby!gojō satoru x tabloid journalist!reader | 1,046 words

summary; you're a tabloid journalist on the brink of finally reaching the spotlight after an unsuccessful career. gojō is a self-serving trust-fund baby with nothing better to do than to see you crash and burn. it doesn't go well.

warnings; mc punches gojō in the face, gojō is a super shitty trust-fund baby, mc is a plagiarist, unwanted kiss, implications of manipulation on both sides, brief mention of blood at the end, not proofread.

thank u @stellamancer for the request!! 💙

a/n: my header for gojo needed to be as annoying as possible. I hate him. reblog this if u think it's cool ig.

“You're a goddamn roach, Gojō.”

The Usurper King sat at his throne in perfect leisure, reclined in an ergonomic chair swathed in supple violet leather, long legs propped at an angle so anyone walking through the door would see his gleaming black oxfords—one new purchase among many others, and a white smile with elegant, symmetrical teeth. He had witnessed you enter his new office with a grin; a self-assured, imperturbable one that was immediately meant to put you in your place once you saw it.

It was rare that anyone saw his eyes as they were oftentimes hidden by a pair of blackout sunglasses. Gossip was a common topic at a tabloid firm, even more so internally than what was fabricated and published for soft-brained readers to chew on and shake around like a dog with a toy that cried when it’d get mean enough.

Most speculation was that he came to work high on something since he never liked to mingle among the peons on the main floor, a testament to his role in life as a trust-fund baby living the lavish lifestyle with the kind of time to put shit up his nose and in his veins. However, you'd seen the blues and whites of his eyes on occasion—pristine, but always a little dry from Japan’s seasonal agitators, so you knew that it wasn't the case.

It was simply that it fed into the perceptions he wanted people to have of him. Mysterious. Handsome. Rich. Those instead of the qualities you truly knew him for being: A lowlife, a roach, a fucking thief who’d never have to worry about the consequences of anything in life because he had money and half of the Japanese government on his side. It wouldn't do for the idolized poster boy for the country to fall into something so obscene such as a scandal or jail.

“You stole my article,” you said, leaning back against the door once you had it shut and locked behind you. “How dare you. That article was going to be my big break. But, instead you steal it and publish it. Why did you get Ichiji fired? He was the best editor-in-chief we had ever had. Did you do it to make yourself feel big, Gojō? Is this some double-whammy for getting back at me because I wouldn't sleep with you?”

That wasn't the case because Gojō hadn't slept with anyone, despite all the rumors proposing otherwise. The only reason you knew that was after an entirely too intimate dinner where he'd drank too much wine and not enough of his meal. He had confided that truth to you in the same manner as you had when you revealed to him that the article you were going to publish—your singular spotlight moment—had been someone else's idea.

A nobody. A new girl fresh out of graduate school who was bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and brimmed with audacity to try to stand apart from the other tabloid journalists.

Miwa had wanted to change the trajectory of gossip; focus it on full-truths rather than the convoluted circuit of half-truths and exaggerations. She aimed for gossip to be pure and honest, extinguish those vapid fires of tried and true to experiment with something fresh.

She was intending to derail you before you'd even had your chance to reach the top. That was just something you couldn't have, so you pulled a few strings, finagled some things and ultimately ended up with her article in your lap instead, your name ready to be printed instead of hers.

Unfortunately, your repertoire of qualities lacked stealth and common sense, as Gojō had intercepted this early on and had decided that this would be easy entertainment to beat all the usual mundanity.

“Why are you getting mad at me?” Gojō slipped his feet off the desk and got out of his chair, posture slouched in a way equally cool and sloven. “You're the one who stole the article. I just gave it back to that girl you took it from. Don't you feel just a little ashamed?”

You lifted your chin as he got closer, tried stacking your spine as tall as it could go just short of standing on your toes to match up with him. “Don’t you feel bad that you kicked out an innocent, hard working man because you were bored and wanted to see how my life would explode?”

“This ain't about you, y’know?” Gojō was inches away now, black sunglasses tucked away in his chest pocket so he could see you uninhibited through those stellar blue eyes. You hated how he looked at you with fascination, a little thing he wanted to keep and bat around with his hands. “You're pretty self-centered, but I think you know that.”

You flattened to the door, feeling the slippery varnish against your fingertips as you tried to think of what to do with your hands while he studied you, leaning in closer.

Since this entire thing had begun, from the moment he injected himself into your life, you'd never known a moment of peace and be made sure you didn't. In a way, you thought this was God’s retribution for sacrificing every principle and ethics in favor of recognition in a career you'd never been particularly good at. What better way to smite than with a force veritably worse than you?

Gojō leaned into a stilted, passionless kiss, one completely different from others you had shared. But, those had come before you knew what he had planned to do to you, that his plan had been to steal away the glory that awaited all because he wanted to see how things unraveled.

You waited until he got his fill or was dissuaded, whichever came first, before winding up your arm and launching the peaks of your knuckles straight into the right side of his jaw. A slap wouldn't have sufficed, not with how pissed off you were, not for this asshole. So, you threw as much of your momentum and weight into that punch as you could, enough to catch him off-guard and send him crashing to the floor in a clamorous heap.

You licked your lips where he kissed you, where you saw blood trickle from the corner of his mouth when he looked up at you, for the first time ever, in pure shock.

“I'm gonna get fired anyway,” you said, flinging out of your hand and flexing each finger. “Might as well have made it count.”

[satorusugurugurl]

I Think He Knows: (Chapter Two)

Summary: When your novel takes off and becomes a best seller, doors of opportunities open for you. You can work on the series you have dreamed about all your life. And you’re also given the chance to stay in a tiny cottage in Europe for two years to help with inspiration! Your best friend, Geto Suguru, shatters at the news. How could he possibly tell you how he feels when you’re leaving him? His opportunity appears right before him when you confess that your editor thinks a change of scenery will help with your not-so-steamy romance scenes. They’re lacking a particular spice because you’re a virgin. So, Suguru does what any best friend would do. He offers to teach you how things work. Will you cross that line as friends? Or will you both say goodbye?

Pairing: Geto Suguru x FAB!Reader

Word Count: 4,065

Warning: Language, suggestiveness, grinding, neck kisses 🥴 wet dream, making out

A/N: I loved this got me all hot with several parts. Ugh, I fucking love Geto!!! If you want to be on the tag list you MUST have your age in bio!!

Part One Part Three

The alcohol must have gone to your brain. Or maybe it was laced with something! Could alcohol expire? Because there was no way, no way in hell, you heard Suguru correctly.

“I'm sorry.” The smell of earthy musk and mint twists around you like tendrils. “I think I misheard you. Could you repeat that?”

Suguru places his hand flat against the wall next to your head, leaning in closer, his breath teasing your lips. “You heard me loud and clear. I offered to teach you.” Both of you are breathing heavily as your eyes dart from hungry gaze back to his lips.

“I-Is this a joke? Did Satoru put you up to this?”

Your blatant dismissal of his proposal almost hurts. Were you just not into him the same way he was into you? Or were you just shy? There was a possibility that you weren’t sure how to act in a situation like this. Suguru would not manipulate or push you into doing anything you didn’t want. Regardless of how he felt, you’re still his best friend. He didn’t want to ruin your friendship.

“No one put me up to it. This is me, wholeheartedly offering to help you out.”

“T-This is sudden, and you’re drunk.”

Suguru can see a look in your eyes. The subtle way your eyes dart from his eyes to his lips. How you shift your legs, and how your breath comes as heavy exhales against his mouth. You smell like sweet fruit with a twinge of alcohol. He can only imagine how good it would taste if it smelled this good. God, he wants to taste you so fucking back. And from all the ways your body moves, it seems you might like it too. But he wasn’t going to force it on you.

“I’m not drunk, but if you are, we can put a pin in this conversation until later.”

Your fingers grasp his shirt, gently playing with the fabric. He wonders what’s going through that pretty little head of yours. You hadn’t rejected the idea of kissing him, but you hadn’t said yes. He didn’t know that you were buzzed and currently contemplating what you wanted to do.

Having your first kiss in a dark alley with your best friend was tempting. You’d always imagined what it would be like to be kissed. In all the movies and books you’ve read, people make it out to be this extravagant thing. It’s a mind-blowing experience; it could make or break a relationship, which is why you were so hesitant.

Was Suguru offering to ‘help’ you, or was he wanting to lose himself?

Whenever he had nightmares about Riko, he did one of three things. One, he’d throw himself into his art, forgetting to eat while he painted his feelings out. Two, he would find some girl at the bar, take her home and fuck her stupid. The third option was that he’d shut in on himself and ignore calls and texts until you had to intervene, but he hadn’t done that in a couple of years.

Knowing the state that he was in, you were uncertain if he was offering to ‘help’ with research or if he was seeing you as a girl to take home and lose himself in. The alcohol and warmth of an early summer night weren’t helping the situation. You needed to think about this clearly, but he was complicating it.

His mouth was so close; the smell of sake and the mint gum had you melting, inching closer. It was just for research; one kiss wouldn’t hurt, would it? It might help you with your writing; god, just having him so close his hands on either side of your head against the wall, how good he smelt, it had your brain buzzing with inspiration.

“You smell really good.” The breathless words that leave your mouth have Suguru shuddering. “Like really good.”

“Yeah? You smell good, too.” His head is no longer facing you. Instead, his face is in the crook of your neck, and he inhales, taking in your scent. “So good you make me dizzy.”

“O-Ooh.”

Suguru’s eyes are focused on your soft, delicate skin, and then he does something that will probably cross the line, a line that he’s so desperately wanted to run across. His lips gently against your neck, a jolt of warmth between your legs. The tiniest gasp sounds from your mouth, but Suguru notices it’s not a sound of apprehension or displeasure. No, that tiny gasp was one he had heard from several of his past partners. Hearing it leave, other girls had clued him that they were feeling good. Perhaps they might want to take it further.

But hearing it come from you.

The self-control it took for him not to slam his lips against yours at that moment was wavering. He wanted to stay strong, and he had to do it for you and your friendship. By some miracle, he managed to pull himself away from your neck, giving him a chance to take you in.

Your lips were slightly parted, and your chest heaved with the heavy pants escaping you. Seeing you like this in a new light, fuck, this was so intense. Suguru’s lips inched closer, almost touching yours as his breathing quickened to meet yours.

“What do you want.”

“I-I want—” You gulped, gripping his shirt tighter, “I want to—“

“Yo, Suguru!” The side door to the alley opened, and Satoru popped his head out. “Nanami and Shoko just got cut off; they’re ready to go—ooh, oh shit.”

His annoying blue eyes glanced over the two of you. You were pinned against the wall, trapped by his best friend, while Suguru was inches from your face. His sudden appearance had Suguru grumbling in annoyance and you a stuttering mess. The fingers that so delicately held onto Suguru pushed him back, freeing you from his larger frame.

“T-They’re ready to go!?” Your voice was too high as you tried to play it cool but failed miserably. “Great! Let me go wash up real quick!”

Suguru watched as you ran back inside, shoulder-chucking Satoru in the process. His other best friend followed you with his eyes, only stepping out into the alleyway until he lost you in the crowd. When he looked at Suguru, he chuckled nervously. He witnessed him gently bumping his head against the wall.

He could have done that forever if it wasn’t for his friend's hand gently grabbing his shoulder. “Sorry, man, if I knew you two were getting handsy back here, I wouldn’t have barged in like I did.” Suguru exhaled through his nose, letting out all the pent-up frustration that encouraged him to beat the shit out of Satoru.

“Nah, it’s fine; we weren’t even doing anything.”

“Well, we have very different ideas of ‘anything’. Having her caged in by your body, lips inches from each other, did not look at all like anything. That looked like you were finally making a move!”

“A move that you fucked up.” He scrubbed a hand down his face.

“So you’re mad—great uhm—I’m going to wrangle up Nanamin and Shoko.”

While Suguru stood in the alley, trying to calm the almost murderous rage that boiled in his chest, you were splashing water on your face in the bathroom and ignoring the knocks from drunk women outside as you rang your fingers over your lips. The heat of his breath still lingers there, aching to have felt him against you. You found yourself imagining what yanking your best friend in and kissing him would have felt like.

Just imagining it had your body all tingly. Your heart felt as if it had run a marathon. All of these sensations were new and strange, and you liked it. There was excitement about how close Suguru was and how he’d almost kissed you and your neck. Your fingers ran over that spot, trying to imagine what several kisses against your surprisingly oversensitive kin would feel like. One kiss alone had heat pooling between your legs.

Getting turned on by reading books, fanfics, or movies was something you were familiar with. Another thing was getting turned on by another living human, your childhood best friend! Books could only go so far, to actually feel the warmth of another person, one you were familiar with; it had goosebumps rising against your skin.

You could lose yourself thinking about what could have been and how things would have gone down if Satoru hadn’t interrupted you. Would you have let him kiss you? Let his lips, which looked so soft, brush against yours for research? Or would you have chickened out? Several scenarios could have gone down, but you would never know because your dumbass friend had interrupted you both.

Now that you were sobering up, would you even be able to let a situation like that happen again without completely freaking out? Suguru had said he wanted to help improve your romance scenes. But what was it you were so nervous about? Was it just because of the fact you were a virgin? Or was it because Suguru was your friend, and you didn’t want to ruin that? It was most likely a combination of both.

Several things could have happened, and you could stand in the bathroom imagining different outcomes, but that wouldn’t help. The best thing to do was to sober up entirely and process about what the fuck had just happened. You could decide what to do once you wrap your head around it.

Either allow Suguru to teach you things or try to improve your writing on your own.

After several minutes of clearing your head, you left the bathroom, ignoring the glares from the women in line. Suguru was waiting for you at the table where you’d been. Biting down on the inside of your cheek, you waited to see if things were awkward or weird between you.

Much to your relief, he just smiled as you joined his side. “Ready to go?”

“Yeah.”

Things were strangely normal as you and the group crowded in Satoru’s car. The music blasted as Satoru drove to a drive-thru for ice cream. Satoru and Shoko sat in the front, followed by Haibara and Nanami, while you and Suguru sat in the back. Your hands rested near each other, maybe an inch apart.

With the music blaring and the drunken conversations yapping, now might be a good time to talk to Suguru about the almost alley kiss. Turning your head so you could face him, you watched his eyes struggling to stay open. He shut them before shaking his head, trying to keep them open before they ultimately shut again. The nightmares Suguru suffered were the worst. They felt so lifelike, putting him back in his second year, right before the accident. So when he had them, he had issues falling asleep, which was why he’d been up since three.

While the kiss that almost happened was eating you up, begging to be discussed, to happen, Suguru was far more important. You gently eased his head down, allowing him to rest it on your shoulder. He hummed softly, a tired sound of approval or an incoherent thanks before he rubbed his face against you. You rested your head against him, staring forward at the cars in front of you.

But your attention is quickly drawn back to the seat between you as Suguru hooks his pinky around yours as he falls asleep. You could have easily pulled away, freeing yourself from his loose grip, but you twisted his finger around his. That simple gesture resulted in Suguru humming happily.

While he relaxed, you felt tense. Here you were, being a pillow for your best friend after he offered to teach you things. Now, you acted casually with each other as if everything was normal. Was he waiting for you to mention it, or was it that he was just so overcome by exhaustion that he was waiting until later when there were no remains of alcohol in your system?

You should’ve been thinking about what you wanted to do yourself, whether that was allowing him to teach you things or to remain friends. But the warmth of his pinky wrapped around yours and the slow, shallow breasts that escaped him had your eyes feeling oh so heavy. You blinked hard, trying to stay awake, but you were a goner once you rested your head fully against his.

Your dreams whisked you off to the world you had built in your mind. A mystical kingdom full of magic and wonder. You found yourself wandering the village square, looking at vendors, before you were suddenly yanked into an alley, much like the one Suguru had pulled you down.

“Oaklynn.” The man with a hooded cloak, most likely Ilsan, your main male protagonist, whispered.

“What’s wrong, Ilsan? Is there danger? One of the Reverians?” You glanced towards the bustling street you had just left, watching people walk by.

Suddenly, his hand's cage around your head, drawing your attention to the knight. “No, there’s no danger.” His voice is smooth and rich, making you shiver as he pulls in closer.

“Then what is it?”

The knight leans forward, pressing a hot kiss against your neck. The sudden sensation leaves you gasping, your back arching off the stone wall. “You just looked so delectable.” His breaths out, knocking your legs apart with his foot. “I just had to taste you, please, princess.” You surprisingly oblige, spreading your legs wide, allowing him to bunch up your gown in his hands, pooling the fabric around your hips.

“I-Ilsan,” his hips attached to your neck, “oh my gods~!” His lips suck, his teeth nip at your sensitive skin, leaving you feeling weak and hot. “Ilsan.”

“Oak,” his knee suddenly slides between your spread legs, pressing firmly against your clothed cunt. “Huh~ look at that.” He rubs his knee back and forth over your sex. Making you cry out, only to have him clamp his hand firmly over your mouth. “Soaking wet~ how shameless my princess.”

You whimper against his palm, which is so warm and smells like earthy musk. Your hips roll, dragging your clit perfectly over his thigh. It feels so good; your pussy is hot, so hot it feels like it’s on fire. You arch, rolling faster and faster.

“You're so wet I can feel you through my pants.” The cloaked man licks at your pulse, nipping it gently. “I can help you~ teach you how to feel this good~.”

His voice you know his voice. The character in front of you pulls away, allowing you to push the hood of his cloak back. The man with his knee between your thighs was not the auburn-haired Ilsan with emerald eyes. No, it’s long black hair in a bun, the rest cascading down your best friend's back. His dark eyes darken as you roll your hips against him.

“Princess,” he grunts, “you feel so good. Let me touch you. I wanna make you cum~.”

“S-Sugu~ oooh fuck!” You cry out, tilting your head back. “I-I’m gonna~ gonna~!”

“Yes~ cum for me, baby~ cum all over my thigh~”

“I-I’m cu—!!”

Your eyes open, and you gasp. Your hips stop rocking against the pillow you’re hugging. Your shorts are wet, so fuckin wet, leaving you confused as you slowly sit up in bed that’s not yours. Confusion doesn’t even have a chance to settle in as the bedroom door flies open.

Suguru stood there, chest heaving as he looked around, searching the room. “What happened?! What’s wrong?!” He turns the light on; his hair is damp, still wet from a shower.

“S-Suguru, wait, why—” Glancing around the room, hung up with different paintings and photos, you came to the harsh realization that you were not in your apartment. You were in Suguru’s. So that meant the pillow you were rocking against was his.

“I heard you groaning and moaning.” He relaxed once he realized you weren’t in any danger. “I thought something was wrong.”

“I-I’m fine!”

“Are you sure? You’re flushed.”

“Yep, just fine!!” He tilted his head, dark strands of hair falling over his shoulder. “Yep! Well! Uhm, why am I here?!”

Suguru rubbed his neck, darting his gaze towards the wall. “Well, we both fell asleep in the back seat. Satoru woke me up with his stupid flash from his cell phone when he dropped us off. I was so out of it and carrying you that I forgot to grab your purse and keys.” You already saw where this was going. “So I figured I’d let you sleep in my bed while I took the couch. Are you sure you’re okay, princess?” Suguru watched you stiffen, pulling the sheets up to cover your hips.

“Mhmm, yep, never better.”

“Is that why you’re stiff as a board?”

Damn, his perspective gaze. “Yep, uhm, I just—”You were wet, and you were almost certain there was a wet spot on the pillow between your legs. If he were to see that, you might die of embarrassment. “Had a dream,” Suguru observed the way you sat. Your face was flushed, your pulse raced in your throat, and you were panting slightly.

“Uh-huh,” he grinned, “a wet dream? Want me to grab a pen and notebook so you can take some notes?”

“What?! No! I didn’t have a wet dream!” Suguru barked out a laugh as you failed to convince him otherwise. “A-And I wouldn’t need a pen and paper! I don’t hardly remember it!”

“So it was a wet dream.”

You grumbled, covering your face with your hands; there was no point in lying now. “I hate you sometimes.” Suguru laughed softly, shaking his head as he sat on the bed before you.

“Nah, you love me.” You both chuckle as he plays with the sheet on your lap.

The gentle caress of his fingers has you thinking back to the alley and how gentle he was, how he had asked what you wanted. In the heat of the moment, you weren’t so sure how to reiterate what it was you. From the suddenness of his actions to the alcohol that was making you dizzy. Now that you were sitting in his bed with him across from you, what you wanted was clear.

It made sense, from your reaction in the bathroom to how badly your body reacted to being near him. Even your dreams all pointed in the direction that your subconscious wanted to go. Two years in Europe was a long time. And while you desperately wanted to see the sights and improve your writing, being away from all your friends and family for that long would be unbearable if there was a chance that your best friend helping you with your romance scenes would allow you to stay in Japan.

What was the harm in trying?

You placed your hand on him, Preventing him from moving his fingers over the sheets further. “You okay?” He asked, taking in the flashed look on your face. “I was just teasing. Everybody has wet dreams sometimes. If you made a mess, I don’t mind. I can easily change my sheets.” Suguru expected you to playfully smack him on the cheek or punch him in the arm. Instead of doing either of those things, you gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

“I was thinking about your offer. You know how to teach me stuff.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah, and seeing that I’m not buzzed anymore, I finally decided what I wanted.”

“And what is it that you want?” He inched in closer, crowding you against the headboard of his bed.

You spread your legs wide, allowing him to sit between them. “I want to improve my writing. I don’t want to be gone for a whole two years.” Suguru just nodded as you spoke. “And I don’t want to go out and fool around with anybody. I would rather learn these kinds of things from somebody that I know and trust.” You grip the fabric of his t-shirt.

“So, you’re going to take me up on my offer? Is that what you’re trying to say?”

“Yeah, I guess I am.”

“So, I have your permission to kiss you? I think that’s the best way to start this off. Seeing that you’ve never been kissed before.” All you did was nod your head, and his hands cupped your face instantly. “If you want to stop, just tell me.”

A final nod was all of the consent he needed. He leaned in and gently pressed his lips against yours. They're warm and soft, and you press your face against him. Pulling back just an inch once he smiles against you

“What?” You ask, your grip tightening on his shirt.

“Nothing, I just—I’m happy to finally,” he sighs, “to finally help you with your book, is all.” Suguru exhales against your mouth, mint toothpaste still fresh on his breath. “Now that the first peck is out of the way, let me give you a real kiss.”

“A rea—mph!”

His lips are against yours in a heated kiss. Once, that was full of passion and fire. The smell of mint intensifies as his tongue flakes out against your bottom lip. He was asking politely for entrance. You release the gentle grip on his shirt to wrap your arm around his neck as you allow him entrance into your mouth. His tongue gently moves against yours and his symphony of minty flavor. He’s pressing himself harder against you, caging you in against the headboard.

Your tongue moves hesitantly against his, and your movements are gentle and unsure. The sheer innocence has Suguru groaning into your mouth. Hearing sounds like that escape him has your pussy throbbing in delight. You moan back, and Suguru deepens the kiss now that he knows you’re into it. He places a hand on your hip while the other gently cups the back of your head, pressing your mouth tighter against his.

Kissing was a lot of fun. The way your mom’s mailed it together, eagerly exploring each other with your tongues, how do you tingle in all the right places? There was no way kissing like this. This couldn't get any better. But it does when he presses his knee between your legs gently against your clothes core. The sudden sensation of his knee firmly pressing against you was way better than your dream.

You shiver in both excitement and hesitation. That shivering has Suguru breaking the heated kiss. “You good? Need to stop?”

“N-No, I just.”

“You just what?”

“It reminds me about the dream I had.”

“The not a wet dream, dream?”

If he weren’t so goddamn hot right now, you would’ve walked out. “Yes, that dream.” Suguru hums, trailing his lips down your neck.

“Do you want to try what you were doing in your dream?” Your best friend is fully anticipating for you to say no. That all you wanted to do was continue to kiss.

“Yes.” That is the last thing he expected you to say.

Tag List (TO BE ADDED AGE MUST BE IN BIO)

@lemonintrovert01 @spankmydepression @renttheannihilator @witchbybirth @missmuffinr @lialia3945

Forever Tag List:

@darkstarlight82 @pandoness @nealeart @simp-plague @sugurubabe @chilichopsticks s

[jaegeraether]

Sunsets and footballers (Part 36)

Lucy Bronze x Reader (34)

Masterlist (other parts here)

YFN enjoyed her morning and flight back, still trying to comprehend what was happening. She’d wished she had time to go through Edinburgh itself but had been swamped all morning with emails relating to the expansion of staff. Lumos management were also a lot more vocal with her now that they’d all met and decided she should be directly involved with their meetings and decisions.

Once she’d landed, she’d Ubered to her and Jordan’s house to pick up Miles and give Blu a pat before she drove to the conference room in town. She’d arrived just after midday and was delightfully pleased to see the entire team was already there with canapes just working and bantering away. She greeted them all as she entered and as she walked to her seat, she realised there were a large bunch of flowers sitting in her space. She was a little confused. Was this from Catherine? From the team for the first round? From the hotel the conference room was in? She looked around for an explanation and only received a few grins in response. She gently touched one of her flowers and leant in to smell them before taking the card out of the top.

Hi little one,

Well done on your first round of women’s football!

I’m so proud of you, always, in everything that you do.

I can’t wait to see you soon in Spain.

I love you.

Lucy x

She blushed as her heart fluttered, again finding a few of those grins, yet now they were teasing. She didn’t mind being teased for it. She was proud of her relationship with Lucy. She moved the flowers more central in the table and took her seat, setting up her laptop and notes before sending a quick photo and text to Lucy.

She knew they had a lot to cover and made sure to text Jordan, asking for a heads up when she was headed home. She wanted to be there for her. She put her phone on the table and they began. They spoke about the first round, each team member talking about their experiences and ideas. They spoke about the interviews, the posts, the equipment, all of it. When they were done, YFN made sure they were all comfortable and confident with their roles and then dropped the bombshell. They were expanding. Already. She told them how happy and ambitious management were. They’d expanded from ten including YFN to fifty. This was a shock to everyone of course, however YFN managed to ease them.

“Fifty?!” Ruby almost yelled. “How much money does this company have?!”

“The company has a lot of faith in us…and they were very impressed with the first round.”

“But that’s mainly because your interviews were amazing…” Ethan countered.

“No, we all did amazing work.” Bridget disagreed.

“Fifty sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t,” she assured. “We have six games a week. Fifty is our new number so that we can have three videographers, three photographers, one editor and one interviewer per game. That’s forty-eight people. The extras will be Noel for IT as our posting and editing becomes even more sizeable, and myself.”

They thought this was definitely a lot more reasonable when it was put like that.

“Management are throwing money into us to not only expedite the process of growth, but to make sure we’re training and preparing for the international fixtures as well,” she explained. “We won’t just be doing WSL the entire time. Plus, there are the other leagues in Europe, and the other minor leagues in the UK.”

“But the training…” Emily almost whispered.

YFN nodded, running a hand through her hair a little stressed. “Oh, trust me, I know. We need to be fully prepped and confident for our games so we make the mistakes in practise rather than onsite.”

“Prior planning prevents piss poor performance.” Sam quoted.

“Exactly and I have a plan for that. Now we’re all new here but we’ve all been in the field, we’ve researched and prepped and decided on how to best create a product that suits our brand image. It’s because of this that my plan is to have you all in supervisory roles for the new team coming in. The new hires will arrive next Tuesday which gives us time to prep with them prior to our third round. I’ll put you into game groups and you can work together to prep during the week, with this group supervising each game group and taking a bit more responsibility. Teach them what you’ve learnt. Next week is going to be a long week, but we can do it. I’ll expect progress reports also as I can’t monitor fifty people. If someone is excelling, or not quite up to scratch, I expect to be told so we can sort it out prior to our game. Also…” she looked around the conference room. “…we’ve just acquired an office space in London. I understand that not everyone will live there, and I just want to state that when we’re up and running more comfortably, the people who live further away will be able to zoom our meetings instead if they choose. In the meantime, we’ll continue with our face to face meetings, though don’t neglect yourselves. If it becomes too hard to travel; let me know. We’re going to have enough people to cover each other, it’s okay.”

The rest of the meeting was fairly better as YFN had decided they would only start to worry about the new hires later on. Right now, it was about prepping for the next games.

Their schedule set out for the upcoming week was as such:

Man United vs West Ham (Leigh Sports Village, Manchester): 12th Nov 1200 – YFN and Ruby.

Spurs vs Liverpool (Brisbane Road, London): 12th Nov 1230 – Sam and Olivia.

Everton vs Chelsea (Walton Hall Park, Liverpool): 12th Nov 1300 – Ethan and Daniel.

Man City vs Brighton (Joie Stadium, Manchester): 12th Nov 1300 – Bridget and Emily.

Bristol vs Aston Villa (Ashton Gate Stadium, Bristol): 12th Nov 1400 – Matt and Noel.

Leicester vs Arsenal (King Power Stadium, Leicester): 12th Nov 1845 – YFN and Ruby (relocate from United vs West Ham); Matt (relocate from Bristol vs Aston Villa in Bristol est arrival: 1900).

The scheduling was tight because all of the games were on the same day, and she needed to be carefully logistically to make sure she didn’t have people driving out of their way unnecessarily. Luckily, Matt lived in Birmingham and would be able to get to the Leicester vs Arsenal game for YFN to get some good interviews of the players, one she was hoping would be Kyra and Courtney.

Before she knew it, the clock had ticked over to 5pm and Jordan had messaged.

Dory: Training just finished. I’ll be home in 20.

YFN: I’m coming. I’ll get take-away for us. What would you like, Dory?

Dory: Anything I’m not supposed to eat.

YFN: You’re amazing. See you at home soon, roomie x

YFN walked through the front door, pizza in one hand and flowers tucked under the other arm, her work bag slung over her shoulder. Regardless of this, Jordan was on her from the moment she opened the door, wrapping arms around YFN’s waist. After a cute little hug, YFN spoke when she felt Jordan getting emotional.

“Okay, firstly, I love you. Secondly, we’re eating before we talk. We need to get this comfort food into you before it goes cold.”

They settled onto the couch and devoured the pizza quickly, having to snatch it away from Blu at times. Then, Jordan spoke.

“I’m so embarrassed.”

“Why? For having sex with someone you love? Someone who knows you and loves you too?”

“I guess it does sound better when you say it like that…”

“What happened? Tell me everything.”

Jordan sighed. “We dropped you off and came back home. We didn’t speak much in the car. She put her hand on my thigh, but I think it was more of a reassurance thing than a sexual thing. Then we spoke when we got home. I did exactly what you said, I sat far away so I wouldn’t be tempted by anything. She said the nicest things, YFN.” Jordan began to cry. “How much she loved me and missed me and how badly she’d screwed up. I couldn’t help myself, I cried and I couldn’t stop. I tried to hold it together. She comforted me and…” She put her hand on the back of the couch, presumably where they’d been sitting.

“Did you have sex right here?”

Jordan’s tears paused as she gave a cheeky, embarrassed smile.

“Ooookay I’m going to pretend I didn’t ask.” She reached out and brushed some of Jordan’s tears away. “Was it…bad?”

“No,” she admitted. “No, it was incredible. Probably the best sex I’ve had in my life. It was so desperate and passionate. I don’t know what happened, I missed her touch, I just melted.”

“Ah…and you cried after it?”

“No, I cried during it. It felt so good and to have her back so close to me. I missed her so much, YFN. I think after we’d been…doing it a while…the lust faded a little, and I just got scared. Scared that she made me feel so happy, made me feel so loved and then I got scared she’d leave again. I panicked and cried. She didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to do. I told her to go.”

“She tried to stay?”

“Yeah of course but I was just a mess, I needed to be alone.”

YFN hesitated. “You pushed her away before she could leave you…”

“Is that what I did?” She whispered.

“Oh Dory, come here.” YFN pulled Jordan into her lap and wrapped her arms around her, stroking her supportively. YFN and Jordan were both very, very affectionate people, especially physically.

“I don’t know if I can trust her again. I th…thought I c…could.” Her crying increased and she clung to the front of YFN’s shirt.

“Did you tell her why you wanted her to go?”

“That’s the worst part…she begged me to stay. She was on her knees at one point. On her ACL torn knee…but I couldn’t look at her. I wanted her to go. I knew she had a long drive back to London. I knew it was late. I still kicked her out.” She shook her head. “She begged me all the way out of the door to explain what was happening. I just remember telling her, “I can’t handle you leaving me again.””

YFN’s stomach dropped for Leah. She finally got close to Jordan again. Close enough for sex. For intimacy. She must have been so happy…and in a split second it was all taken away from her because of that insecurity she’d planted in Jordan with her previous mistake.

“It’s okay…it’s okay. Leah will understand, trust me. Has she messaged you?”

Jordan nodded into her. “She’s sent me multiple messages since.”

“And have your feelings changed?”

“That fear of her leaving? It’s not going away anytime soon.”

“I think she needs to win your trust back. You two made a mistake by diving into sex.”

“I know,” she whispered quietly. “I couldn’t help myself.”

“You need to let her know that if she wants you, she needs to build that trust back. She needs to know that it may take a long time but it’ll be worth it because she’ll get to have you back.”

Jordan nodded. “You’re right…”

“If I’ve learnt anything over the past few days it’s that communication is key…”

“I just need a little space.”

“Okay…look, I’ll be at the Arsenal game on Sunday in Leicester. I’ll talk to her if you want? Explain a little…”

“I think that’s for the best.”

“Okay, I think you should message her asking for your space for the moment.”

“Can you do it?”

“I think this one is best coming from you, Jords.”

 She sighed but took her phone out and texted Leah without reading the messages the other woman had sent her.

“You won’t be at the Aston Villa game this week?”

YFN shook her head. “No, I’ll be covering Untied vs West Ham and then Leicester vs Arsenal.”

“But aren’t you going to Spain?”

She ran a hand through her hair. “Yeah…I was planning on going Friday. Lucy has a game Saturday and then I’d fly back for the Sunday games.”

“You’re not staying for long, then? Lucy’s going to be upset.”

“I know,” she sighed. “I know, I planned on doing zoom for my meetings next week, but we’ve just expanded our employees by five hundred percent.”

“What the-”

“Oh, please don’t ask anything. I’m stressed and besides, tonight is all you, Jords. I think a phone call with Lucy and then with Katie and Caitlin may be just what you need, hm?”

Jordan agreed. “Yes, please! I’ll get rid of this rubbish and get us drinks while you message them.”

YFN opened her phone, hovering her finger above Lucy’s message before she remembered their phone call from last night. She bit her lip as she opened Instagram. Sure enough, the first posts were of Lucy boxing and YFN could feel her skin getting hot, and she squirmed as she also felt herself getting wet for her. God damn. Lucy. Those biceps. Lucy. That determined look. Lucy. She groaned.

“You okay?” Jordan asked from the kitchen.

“Yeah!” She called back and liked the post. She considered commenting and decided against that. She was worried how forward she would be in front of Lucy’s 750k followers.

YFN: Hey Luce, are you free for a call with Dory?

Lucy: Hi, little one. I’ve been waiting for your text. I smile when your name pops up on my phone. Yes, I’m free whenever you want me.

YFN: I always want you. And you’re always busy.

Lucy: Lies.

Jordan passed her a drink over the couch and she took a sip.

Lucy: Come to Spain and fuck the busy out of me.

She choked on her drink. Jordan gave her a look before she rolled her eyes as she made her own drink.

YFN: Behave. I’m barely hanging on with your Instagram posts.

Lucy: I hoped you’d like them…can we have a late-night call tonight when you’re free?

YFN: Yes, please.

It’s crazy how naturally they fell into teasing each other. She sent another message to the messenger with Katie, Caitlin and Jordan.

YFN: Hi! Are you all free for a group call with Dory and I in the next hour or so?

Caitlin: KEEN.

Katie: Only if we see your faces.

YFN: Done. I’ll message you soon!

Jordan joined her on the couch then and she called Lucy, giving Jordan the phone. Obviously, Jordan had Lucy’s number, but this was more convenient. She watched as the two old friends spoke, Lucy not failing to make Jordan grin and laugh. Of course she could. At one point they were even speaking about her, and YFN rolled her eyes, working a little on her laptop while they had their talk.

Their talk ended after about forty minutes, Jordan hanging up before YFN could talk to Lucy. She frowned. Lucy immediately texted.

Lucy: Call me in bed?

YFN: Okay, I’ll be about an hour, love. Thank you for that, she really needed it. You managed to cheer her up a lot.

Lucy: I know her too well. You’re welcome, though. Talk soon. x

YFN messaged the girls back then telling them to call whenever they were free. Apparently, that was immediately. Jordan and YFN on one end, Katie and Caitlin on the other. It was a hilarious conversation after Jordan had been honest about what happened with Leah to them. They’d given her support and told her to take her time which reassured her a little bit more. Katie had changed the mood of the conversation after that by introducing Coopurr by holding the cat up to the camera. Jordan responded in kind with Blu, of course. Then Caitlin surprised her fellow Australian with a question.

“Hey chicken, do you know what’s happening with Kyra? She’s been a bit off and we figured you might know…”

YFN hesitated. She didn’t want to keep anything from them, but knew it wasn’t her place. “Uh…yeah…it’s not really my place to say though…”

Katie turned to Caitlin. “I told you.”

“You were right,” Caitlin rasped. “It’s about Courtney then.”

They watched as YFN practically glued her mouth shut. Of course they knew. Courtney was a Matilda. Caitlin was a Matilda.

“Is that why you’re coming to our game now?”

“Oh, that's right! You two were so obvious when Kyra asked what game you were going to.”

“Mmnhmn. Yeah, look, all I can say is that I plan on interviewing them together. We’re going to start interviewing players in groups more, and also interviewing opposition together. So this weekend I’ll do a young interview with those two if I can catch Courtney, and then I’ll do an-”

“An old person interview? Rude.” Caitlin laughed.

YFN rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, we’re happy to do an interview with you, but I assume you want someone you haven’t talked to yet?”

“Yeah, you know, I was thinking Kim or…” She stopped herself as she looked at Jordan.

Jordan frowned. Leah. There was a moment of silence.

“That’s okay, you know.” Jordan reassured. YFN gave a grateful smile.

“…or Jen Beattie?”

“Are you in those little sleeping shorts of yours?” Lucy asked.

“Yes,” she almost whispered.

Lucy hummed. “Good. Take them off.”

YFN did as she was told, wriggling them off and turning back to her phone propped up against Lucy’s pillow.

“Shirt too.”

She pulled her shirt off, now fully bare beneath the sheets besides her socks. Lucy knew she loved her socks, though.

“I wish you could understand how much I want you right now.” She said a little exasperated.

“Tell me…” She whispered, looking at Lucy through the camera. She allowed herself to begin playing with one of her nipples and Lucy noticed, groaning.

“If you could feel between my thighs, you’d know just how much I miss you.”

“I can’t stop thinking about you…I can’t seem to get you out of my mind.”

“Good.” She said almost harshly. “That’s where I belong. Inside your mind. Inside you. Now I need you to touch yourself. I need your hands to do what I wish mine were right now.”

“Guide me where you want me, Luce.”

“Put your free hand around your throat. Good girl. Squeeze a little. Argh…yes. You like that, hm? Two days and that’ll be my hand.”

“God I need you, Luce.”

“I have no idea how I didn’t fuck you silly the other night.”

“Because you love me,” she whispered, her hand moving down over her body and under the sheets. She knew Lucy would enjoy that visual.

“Did I tell you to do that?”

YFN paused. “No…”

“Hm.”

“Can I…?” She trailed off as she saw Lucy’s darkened eyes through the screen.

“Use your words, love.”

“Can I touch myself?”

“Yes, but don’t go inside. Not yet.”

She felt through the wetness of her body, not realising just how ready she was. She was tempted to slip a finger in, but Lucy told her she couldn’t just yet, and so she didn’t. Her fingers found her little bundle of nerves and began to play.

“That’s my girl,” Lucy groaned. “T…that’s my girl. Feel that.”

Lucy stuttering a little was proof to her that she was also touching herself. Her eyes rolled back at the thought and her body was twitching and getting tingly at the stimulation of her clit. They worked themselves up like that for a while, both moaning and shakily breathing. Hearing Lucy losing control was one of her favourite things. She just wished she were right there, rather than across a phone.

“Luce, c…can I go inside?”

“Tell me who you belong to.”

She bit her lip and her back arched at the question, her fingers speeding up. She whimpered. “You, Luce. I belong to you.”

“Yes, you do. Don’t you ever fucking forget that. Two fingers inside, now.”

YFN eagerly thrust two fingers inside herself, her body jerking and her legs automatically widening.

“I want to hear you.”

YFN released one of her nipples to drag the phone down and place it on her left thigh. She could hear Lucy groaning from the other end. She threw the sheet off so she could hear her better.

“God, you have no idea what you do to me,” she repeated. “I’m so lucky to have you.”

“I’m yours, Luce. And I…I’m the l…lucky one.” She had no idea how she managed to get the sentence out. She was so wound up, her body arched into her hand, hips automatically thrusting against her fingers.

“I want you to come like this, fucking yourself. Don't move the phone, I want to hear it.”

YFN did as she was told, and sped up her assault, her body becoming a shaky, uncontrolled mess. It didn’t take long for her to get right to that edge, and she could hear Lucy getting closer. Lucy wasn’t very vocal, that was something they were still working on, however her moaning and panting betrayed her. She was close. She just needed to be tipped over the edge. So YFN gave her that.

“Arghh…Luce…Lucy…can I come?”

She knew asking permission would be Lucy’s last straw.

“Y…yes,” she gasped. “Come.”

YFN sped up her efforts once more as her body unfolded and that electric shock of ecstasy shocked her body into a tense spasm. She heard Lucy whimpering on the other end of the phone and that just made it last longer.

She let herself come down and reached for a tissue near the bed to wipe herself clean. She took the phone and put it back up near her face as she rolled to the side and looked at her girlfriend. Lucy pushed the glasses up her nose, giving a satiated grin. She couldn’t help but return her own.

“This is becoming a regular thing for us.” YFN said.

“I need this just to be able to think during the day about something other than fucking you.”

“Ah, but I thought you liked thinking about me.”

Lucy laughed incredulously. “Yes, but I also have a profession I should be thinking about. Mapi managed to kick a ball into me today while I was zoned out thinking about how good you look under me.”

The visual was hilarious. “You’re insatiable.”

“It’s never been a problem until you. I feel like I’m losing a battle of urges.”

“Keep talking, please, you’re making me feel very loved right now.”

Lucy laughed and YFN continued. “But if it’s any consolation, I also can’t stop thinking about you. The one time I managed to not, was when I was walking into my meeting but then I saw your flowers…”

Lucy grinned. “You liked them? I thought it’d be romantic.”

“Oh, it was. And just so you know, your surprise will be there tomorrow also.”

Lucy’s eyes widened with excitement. “You sent me something?!”

“Last night. I just wanted you to know that I sent it BEFORE I received your flowers.”

“Who’s the romantic one, now?”

“You, always you. I may be a romantic, but I’ll never have anything on you, Luce.”

[class1akids]

Do you think there is any way of fixing what happened in the next chapter? I don't think Horikoshi is a great writer but I don't understand how could he have flumbled so bad when the set up he wrote himself made obvious what should happen. Everybody knows that a big motif was to save the villains and then that's not what happens with the MC and main antagonist? That is kind of like insulting levels of misdirection. I'm foolishly hoping that the next chapters fixes it somehow.

I've been trying to think circles around it, because I do agree with those bloggers who say that it's WILDLY OOC for Deku and it makes them suspect it's a fakeout.

Unfortunately, I only see plausible options with this set-up along the following lines:

Tomura "awakens" the missing Overhaul reconstruction component and rebuilds himself and goes to fix his dying villain buddies. -> Great. It delivers on Tomura's goal to be a hero of the villains and maybe he can turn a new leaf with a healing quirk to try to start fixing the damage he caused. It's sort of an answer to Tomura's arc, but Deku's arc is still destroyed, because he still killed the guy for all he knows and never in any way engaged with his complaints about society. Nothing changed except AFO is dead.

Deku punched TomurAFO with Vestige Magic BS he unlocked offscreen with the exact amount of force to reconstruct Tenko's body out, save the crying boy and give him a second life -> obviously total asspull, but fandom will be happy because who is not a fan of a cute crying child, and "look we told you that Deku is the greatest". Imho, this kind of solution would basically ruin Tomura's development, disregard his progress with the LoV, and would not be good for Deku if he decided that the "crying child" gets to live and told Tomura that he's unforgivable and he needs to die because he never engaged with his villain, only with a ghost of a past that normally doesn't exist anymore and is not a feasible solution to save other people like Tenko this way.

Tomura transferred OFA back to Deku and his vestige as Tenko will live inside Deku so "he'll be a hero" -> I see people getting excited with this, but the vestiges don't "live" there with his "oba-chan". Being a ghost, being trapped inside someone else, never be able to make a decision for themselves is not a life. I don't see it as a good ending for a character who didn't experience much freedom in his entire life. I also think Deku should be rid of the vestiges - it's not healthy to have them yap in his head. If you want this kind of ending, might as well write that Tenko got to join Mon, Mom, Hana etc in heaven and is living there happily in the afterlife.

Deku has brought along Eri's horn and it being in the blast zone of OFA - AFO collision it's fractional rewind turned into a mass rewind effect and he did this in purpose and knew it was gonna work out this way and was totally gonna save everyone with it, including Tomura. And their "farewell scene" was just a clumsily written misdirect. -> OK. Got MHA trending. Editors happy.

Basically Option 1, but AFO being defeated is not the end of the fight, because the Alien Parasite that infected his mom and is the source of all quirks takes form and then the LoV come in to help defeat it. Everyone loses their quirks, no more quirk society. Tomura and Spinner start a gaming youtube channel. Deku becomes a cop.

I mean, I can sit here, come up with these wild, wild BS scenarios that "undo" Tomura's death. But I don't really see a way that salvages both Tomura's and Deku's arc and makes them both deliver on the promise of their arc. Like linkspooky wrote - Deku's entire journey is what would have mattered. Him engaging with villain stories, especially with Tomura's story, trying to empathize, trying to change the root cause. But it feels like in the end, precious little changed compared to the All Might era.

I feel like both Ochako and the Todoroki family confronted Toga and Toya more at both levels - not just at the level of the cute kid whose life went off the rails, but also at the level of the person they grew into: Ochako by offering blood to Toga and the Todorokis by wanting Toya back in his current damaged form and willing to go through hell with him (unlike Toga's folks, who immediately disowned their child). But Deku only embraced crying Tenko. He really didn't offer anything to grown-up Tomura and that's where the problem lies for me.

[bloodynereid]

hello!! (2nd request of the day let’s goo). i was wondering if you could do something with a gn reader and either jordan, rooster, phoenix, or hangman?? it’s completely up to you. reader comes from a rough household with like a lot of yelling and swearing and door slamming (from parents and younger siblings) and at one point ____ (insert character here) yells and they kinda just freak out and cry or something because it reminds them of home?? and lots of comfort after?? - 🧚🏻

Sorrys & I Love Yous

pairing: bradley 'rooster' bradshaw x gn! reader

tw: bradley is sort of an asshole in this im sorry but it fit with the fic, screaming, crying, trauma response

description: memories and feelings of your past resurface after an incident regarding dinner.

a/n: hii🧚🏻anon! sorry that it took me so long to write this and also sorry that this is so short i'm trying to get back into writing! also i hope it was ok that i chose rooster, he just made the most sense (i was thinking of the jake and bradley fight in the briefing room) and this is good ?? idk i think im having imposter syndrome with my writing haha. also as someone who has had this sort of thing happen to them i hope i wrote this okay, it's based off my own experience but who knows.

It had been a good day at work. You had been able to finish a piece your editor had been nagging you about and you were actually happy with the final product. It seemed like it was the opposite for Bradley though.

You arrived back to your shared house on the coast later than usual, you had stayed back to chat with some of your colleagues about the new issue of the magazine and time ran away from you. You had parked your car next to Bradley’s bronco and felt a surge of happiness at seeing the familiar blue vehicle.

“Hi honey!” You called out into the lit house after dropping your keys on the little dish beside the door.

“Hey.” Bradley called back to you from the living room, where the familiar sounds of a football game blared out.

You smiled and kicked off your shoes before ambling over to the couch and giving Bradley a quick hug and a peck on the cheek.

“How was work?” You asked as you sat down next to your boyfriend.

“Shitty.”

“Jake being an asshole again?”

“Hmm.” He hums back in assent and you nod in understanding before getting up and walking over to the kitchen. Usually the first person who comes home makes some kind of dinner but as you stare at the empty counters and unlit stove a pang rang through your heart.

“Bradley, honey, did you make dinner?”

“What?” You cringed slightly and turned to look over your shoulder to your distracted boyfriend.

“Did you make dinner?” You repeated.

“No.”

“Uh, is it okay if I just order something?”

“Sure, whatever.”

“Right.”

You went to grab your phone from your discarded bag and started to scroll through the usual restaurants.

“Bradley, honey, what do you want to eat?”

“Huh?”

“What do you want to eat?” You repeated in a slightly annoyed tone, he wasn’t acting like himself and it was getting on your nerves.

“Whatever.”

“Whatever?” You asked incredulously as the man finally met your eyes and a twist of his mouth made a shudder run down the length of your back. It reminded you of your father right before he started yelling in your face.

“Why the hell are you on my case? You’re the one who’s fucking late, what the hell were you doing anyways?!” Bradley yelled out, his voice escalating as his fist clenched around the beer bottle. After a few tense moments it was like your brain went on autopilot.

Your nerves seized up, your vision went white and a whimper escaped your throat. You felt rivers of water start to fall from your eyes and you felt completely and utterly powerless.

When Bradley realized what he just did he quickly let go of the beer bottle and moved to scoop you up in his arms but you still weren’t totally there. Your body seized up and you were suddenly running away from him and into the downstairs bathroom.

The loud bang of the door hitting the frame echoed through the house as you turned the lock and slipped down until your legs were against the cool tile.

Shivers racked your body and sobs fought their way out of your throat and lungs.

“What the fuck is happening to me?” You muttered out loud in between sobs.

“Honey? Y/N?” Bradley’s now soft voice, the one you were used to, bled through the wood. “Are you okay?” At that a loud sob escaped from your gasping lips.

“Please open the door. I- I’m really sorry. I, fuck, I shouldn’t have reacted like that. It’s my fault, I should have made dinner and instead I screamed at you when you didn’t do anything wrong… sweetheart?”

“Yeah?” You whispered out.

“Oh there you are. Can you please open the door?”

Taking a deep breath in, you carefully pushed yourself up from the floor and stared at your reflection in the mirror. Swiping your hands against your cheeks you let out another sob before turning around and turning the lock before opening the door.

You were met with the sight of Bradley who had a bereft look on his face. He looked like a puppy who had just been left behind for the first time.

“Oh sweetheart.” He gathered you up into his arms and you encircled yours around his body, clutching him tight.

“What you did was wrong.” You muttered into his shirt as tears continued to run down your face. “You hurt me Bradley.”

“I know and I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that. You don’t deserve that and you’re free to break up with me if you want. I was being a total asshole.” A teary laugh left your throat and you broke your embrace to look at his face.

“I’m not breaking up with you, you idiot! But I do agree with you being an asshole.”

“I deserve that.” You snorted before Bradley leaned over and placed a peck on your forehead.

“I’m really fucking sorry.” He said again and you nodded.

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“And I love you.”

this was only re-read like 2 times so sorry for any grammar/spelling mistakes <3

[dduane]

Hi! I don’t know if you’ve seen but someone on Tor wrote a lovely post about Deep Wizardry and how great it was, and it made me remember reading it for the first time when I was an adolescent. I’ve since read it a number of times, but I won’t ever forget how I felt reading it for the first time. I was (and still am!) a voracious reader of sci-fi and fantasy, but I had never read anything like it. I felt…honored reading and experiencing it along with Nita. She said yes to something without reading the fine print as so many of us do, and where other books would have had her back out or made the stakes not quite so high you trusted us (just like the fellow wizards trusted Nita) to do the right thing even though it was an impossibly huge thing. And at the end wasn’t some horrible deus ex machina but something that fit both the character and the story. By trusting Nita with these hard choices you in turn told me as the reader that I was old enough to handle the truth of the world. Or at least some of it. And as a child who was not trusted I felt the solemnity of that. The preciousness of that. I was slightly more of an adult after reading that book than I was before it. In any case, sorry for the long ramble I just wanted to thank you for writing Deep Wizardry and all of the Young Wizard books. I’m in my 30s now but they’re still as impactful to my psyche now as it was back then. And I still feel honored to know your work.

You're really, really welcome: thanks for letting me know.

That particular set of plot issues caused a little friction between me and my editor (gods rest her), as she was concerned about the general message the plot was sending. So was I... and in almost exactly the opposite direction.

The disagreement was low-key, handled quietly over the course of a number of editor-to-writer, writer-to-editor letters; as (then as now) I dislike getting overly confrontative when there are other ways to produce the result. And DW being one of my first books, and I still then being pretty new at the publishing game, I was nervous about rocking the boat too much.

But there are some things you have to dig in your heels about. And in this case, the issue of agency was key. Because what kind of heroism is it when you're only as much a hero as other people let you be? (And my previous experience with younger medical/surgical patients in crisis situations had taught me that a whole lot of children are way more heroic than the adults around them.)

At the end of the day, you find out whether you can trust somebody by, well, trusting them. Relationships are, inherently, a proving ground (for one of the older definitions of "proof:" shoot a gun at something and see if the protection the something offers holds up under fire...or buckles). Without daring that test, the relationship in question is at a stalemate. I walked Nita into it, and sure enough, she didn't disappoint.

Anyway: I'm glad to have been of service. Thanks for the kind words about the books. :)

[the-conversation-pod]

The Pillars: The Return of OffGun and TayNew

And we're back!

NiNi and Ben bring Shan back to the recording booth to discuss how BL is not just a young man's game. We break down why we enjoyed Cooking Crush and Cherry Magic Thailand so much, and what makes OffGun and TayNew so special.

Come and join us for a healthy mixture of simping, genre appreciation, examinations of conflict writing, and love for queerness in BL.

Timestamps

The timestamps will now correspond with chapters on Spotify for easier navigation.

00:00:00 - Welcome 00:01:15 - Intro 00:03:58 - Cooking Crush: A Surprisingly-Good Romcom 00:08:02 - CC: Comedy Ain't Easy 00:16:59 - CC: Dynamite’s Queer Writing and Ten as a Rare Romantic Lead 00:32:08 - CC: Final Comments and Ratings 00:41:14 - Cherry Magic: Beating Expectations and Simping for Tay Tawan 00:54:13 - CM: Relationship Development and the Powers 01:02:15 - CM: Other Characters 01:13:51 - CM: Ratings 01:19:34 - The Pillars: Overall Thoughts

The Conversation Transcripts!

Thanks to the continued efforts of @ginnymoonbeam as transcriber, and @lurkingshan as an editor and proofreader, we are able to bring you transcripts of the episodes.

We will endeavor to make the transcripts available when the episodes launch, and it is our goal to make them available for past episodes (Coming soon thanks to @wen-kexing-apologist). When transcripts are available, we will attach them to the episode post (like this one) and put the transcript behind a Read More cut to cut down on scrolling.

Please send our volunteers your thanks!

00:00:00 - Welcome

NiNi

Welcome to The Conversation About BL, aka The Brown Liquor Podcast.

Ben

And there it is. I’m Ben.

NiNi

I’m NiNi.

Ben

And we’re you’re drunk Caribbean uncle and auntie here sitting on the porch in the rocking chairs.

NiNi

Four times a year we pop in to talk about what’s going on in the BL world.

Ben

We shoot the shit about stories and all the drama going into them. I review from a queer media lens.

NiNi

And I review from a romance and drama lens.

Ben

So if you like cracked-out takes and really intense emotional analysis…

NiNi

If you like talking about artistry, industry, and the discourse…

Ben

And if you generally just love simping…

NiNi

There is a lot of simping on this podcast…

Ben

We are the show for you!

00:01:15 - Intro

Ben

And we're back. Welcome to the second spring outing with The Conversation. Shan is here with us today. Say hi, Shan.

Shan

Hiii.

Ben

And we're going to review the GMMTV pillars.

NiNi

So, Ben, what are the pillars? Let's do a little GMMTV history.

Ben

So when we refer to the pillars, we're talking about the original BL ships at GMMTV. The two we're going to talk about today are Off Jumpol and Gun Atthaphan, and we're gonna be talking about Tay Tawan and New Thitipoom, who've been together four times now — soon to be five.

Shan

I think what's important in the BL context about these two pairs, OffGun and TayNew, is that they have been at this for years at this point, like nine years, I think this year?

Ben

Nine years? Yep.

Shan

They have been at GMMTV, leading BLs, for almost a decade. And they have aged with the genre. They are now in their 30s. It's great, in my opinion, to see them continue to make shows and come back. 

There was this idea that Thai BL was only for very young actors, that actors, once they exited their 20s, would also exit the genre, to move on to, quote-unquote, “mainstream” work that was heterosexual. And I think that these pairs sticking around and coming back to make new shows in their 30s is really important because it just shuts that whole line of thinking down: that BL is only about and for young people, that it is a phase of a career that actors need to quote, “move on from.” And also it gives us the opportunity to actually see adult stories in GMMTV BL, which is not something that we've gotten much of yet. To see stories about adult characters actually played by adults who are the right age for those characters is really refreshing. 

So it's been really interesting to see these pairs come back into the public consciousness and to see that the fans are actually happy for them to stick around. I think that's been pretty cool.

Ben

I think what I enjoy the most about these two pairs coming back together is, both of the shows they're attempting have a more grown-up feel than their previous work. And in both cases, I think the fact that these actors are experienced and know each other really well genuinely benefits the work that they're doing.

00:03:58 - Cooking Crush: A Surprisingly-Good Romcom

NiNi

So let's dive into the first of the pillars. We're going to talk OffGun, and we're going to talk Cooking Crush. So, Ben, what is Cooking Crush about?

Ben

Cooking Crush is about how the most effective way to introduce a new actor at GMMTV is to slide them in around a bunch of other veterans.

Shan

[laughs] That's what it's about for you, for sure.

[all laugh]

Ben

Cooking Crush is a college-set BL about a team of culinary students who are trying to win a cooking competition, and the complications in their romantic lives around them. This show is actually really simple. Like, our protagonist, played by Gun, is named Prem. He lives with his grandmother and his sister. His grandmother runs a formerly very popular restaurant, and he has a goal of helping his grandmother's restaurant become more successful, and he wants to open a chef's table type of restaurant in the future. 

He and his two friends, Samsee and Dynamite, are kind of the oddballs in their culinary school? They're considered the lowest ranked students. They get kind of picked on a bit. Prem is considered kind of clumsy; Dynamite is just really young, because he's kind of a prodigy; and Samsee is just picked on because he's old, because he's pursued three different degrees without completing them. 

They're having some difficulties with school and Prem ends up having an interaction with Ten, played by Off, who is a med student who was a little bit overworked at the time and has accidentally starved himself to be pissy with his dad. The two of them have a very cute moment and a little relationship starts to build between them, originally off of Ten wanting Prem to teach him how to cook more, and Prem basically scamming that man because his little sister lost her tuition money.

NiNi

I think that's a good explanation of this setup. Shan, I want to come to you first. What's your headline on Cooking Crush?

Shan

Ohh, Cooking Crush is a warm hug of a show. And I love it. And it's not perfect. But it left me with such a good feeling and I intend to rewatch it, many times.

NiNi

OK. Well, Ben, I think we got your headline: Cooking Crush is about Aungpao.

Ben

That's about him.

[all laugh]

NiNi

Cooking Crush for me… what is my headline on Cooking Crush? That everybody in this is really good at comedy! Except maybe Gun, who's a little less good than everybody else, but everybody that they put in this is a very funny person, including Gun’s real-life sister, who I laughed my ass off at several times.

Shan

It's surprisingly good comedy. This one has been kind of a weird one in terms of the way it's been received by fandom. It didn't really fit the mood of the moment, I think. I think right now Thai BL fandom is very much paying attention to like, these more high-concept shows that are doing really fancy shit. Crazy visuals, supernatural, and mystical stuff. Cooking Crush is just a sweet romcom that wants to be really good at being a sweet romcom [laughs] and that's kind of it. It has kind of modest goals, but I think that people underestimate how hard it actually is to make a romcom that is actually sweet, and actually funny, and actually makes you want to support the couples in it—and this show succeeds at those things.

00:08:02 - CC: Comedy Ain't Easy

Ben

I think that's probably the biggest thing I would want to highlight about this show. Comedy is not easy. [laughs] At all. Comedy and comedic timing is really difficult to do, and Gun’s admitted that it's not his strongest skill as an actor—that he needs a lot of help from the crew and his cast mates to do comedy well.

Shan

Whereas for Off this is where he thrives, and he hasn't gotten to do it before in a BL.

NiNi

I think that they had the right idea in making Gun’s character Prem sort of the straight man of the ensemble, so to speak.

Ben

A great joke unto itself.

NiNi

[laughs] And surrounding it with a bunch of really good comedic actors who could sort of take up the zip and the zing of it all. Like I think that was the right idea. And I did enjoy, like, all that sort of zany, madcap stuff that was supposed to be happening around him from a writing standpoint, and the shape of what I saw it was supposed to be. I absolutely enjoyed that. My little niggle about it was that the direction doesn't zing enough for me, in terms of how I feel like this was meant to go. 

It's really surprising for me because this was directed by Golf Sakon, who did my nemesis Fish Upon The Sky, but [laughs] Fish Upon The Sky, for all that we could say about it—and trust me, I have said plenty—it was visually interesting, it was zippy, it was well directed from that standpoint. And I feel like Golf’s direction in this was a little bit flat. It didn't have the zing. That sort of is my main complaint about the show, but the show itself is really, really good. I just wanted it to zip a little bit more.

Shan

Yeah, I agree with that critique, NiNi. I think the directing and the editing—[laughs] cannot forget the editing—is definitely the biggest ding on this show. There was some weird stuff going on in the production. The most notable of course being right in the middle of the show when we suddenly had an episode that was mostly reshoots, which was extremely obvious because Off got a haircut after they finished wrapping this show, a very obvious haircut, and then they had to come back and do reshoots. There was some really hinky editing throughout the show, like some dropped beats, some confusing scenes, some flashback sequences that didn't make sense as flashbacks… They were trying to do some stuff in the editing booth that I just think didn't work, and sometimes really undermined the good work that the writing and the acting was doing. 

In terms of overall production, this show was not quite at the level it should have been. In the end, that didn't get in the way of what was a really strong story and really good performances from the cast, and so it still came together well enough, but it's a definite ding.

Ben

I want to talk about the writing portion. Shan, you're usually really good at detailing conflict writing. How about you go through the various major beats of this show and how this show executed them?

Shan

Obviously, we had the main romance, which was between Ten and Prem, and that was a pretty straightforward, simple romance, that actually worked amazingly, because what this show did extremely consistently was it set up all of these really annoying like classic drama tropes for the romance, and then every single time it just knocked them down by having the characters communicate with each other. An obstacle came up for the couple that would normally cause a one- or two-episode conflict. Instead, Ten would insist on talking to Prem about it, coming to some kind of alignment and understanding each other, and they would sail through it. That was kind of the consistent throughline with their relationship, and it was really strong and really lovely to see. 

We also had a side couple romance that was between Fire and Dynamite. That one was a little bit more contentious. It was tied to a couple different things that were going on with Fire, with internalized homophobia, with some struggles that he was having in being his authentic self in his family with his mother. Dynamite was someone who kind of pushed him, and kind of made him aware of the things within himself that he was stifling. And so they had a very adversarial dynamic when the show started: Fire was very committed to kind of trying to be the son that his mom wanted him to be, including dating a woman, and so really fighting against what he was feeling for Dynamite. Dynamite is a great character, who I'm gonna let you talk about more, Ben, but I think their dynamic really pushed both of them along a good character growth arc through their relationship. 

Alongside that, we had a couple big threads about the friendship between particularly Prem and Samsee and Dynamite. They were working together on this cooking school dream, they were trying to get through their classes, they entered this cooking competition and there was a lot of story about them as like a group of people who are kind of considered losers within their cohort, trying to get to a place where they were a good and efficient cooking team who could actually play at the level of some of these other folks that they were competing against. 

We also had another big thread for Ten’s family situation. His mother had passed away some time ago. He had a lot of anger and resentment with his father about the circumstances around that, and a lot of trauma around his mother's death, and he was kind of working through that as he was falling in love with Prem. 

So we had all of these different things flowing into the same story, and one of the things that was so impressive about this show is that they actually did all flow together. The writing was very consistent. The characters were figured out from the beginning of the story. It's one of those things where, once you have all the context of who these people are, you can look back at all their previous behavior and it totally makes sense, and everything tracks. And all of these plot threads came together in the final three episodes through an actually pretty well executed conflict arc, which is something that doesn't happen very often in Thai BL—usually that's where Thai BLs completely fall apart. But here all of the conflicts were well laid throughout the show and built to kind of come to a head at the same point, and then we had them converge in the final arc. 

Not everything about the way they played out was extremely perfect or satisfying, but most of it was, and the characterization stayed true the whole way through. So it was some pretty strong writing for a show like this.

NiNi

I have to concur that the writing was really strong on this show. It's logically laid out. It makes sense, the characters behave like recognizable human beings, which I can't always say [laughs] is the reality of a lot of these dramas that we're watching. For example, Dynamite, who is a complicated character—with the mix of the writing and the acting, I could see underneath where his pushing of Fire was coming from, and why it was something that he felt like he needed to do? 

We find out through a flashback later, which—was a weird way to get this information—Fire was the one who made Dynamite who he is. He made Dynamite feel like he had to stand up for himself and be out there, and all he's doing is trying to do the same for Fire. It just plays out in this way that I think made some people uncomfortable, but I could see it once the context information was there. This is where [their] editing got hinky, because clearly the character was written this way. The hinky editing needed so that it took almost 2/3 of the show for the motivation to meet up with the character. That's not a writing problem, that's an editing problem. 

I found the writing on the show was incredibly strong, everything logically follows on from everything else. There was a lot of surprisingly deep writing around Ten’s whole issue with his dad about his mom, and his feelings about his mom. Around Samsee's feelings of potentially getting left behind because he's older, and they're getting into these relationships and he's starting to feel like, ‘what is there for me? It took me so long to find my people, and I feel like they're leaving me.’ And that was a particularly strong thread that I really enjoyed. I enjoyed Metha, who is Fire and Ten’s friend—hilarious, played by Tum, super good actor. I love him, very, very funny. I really enjoyed the writing on this thing, and I can't always say that for, particularly Thai BL… it was delightful.

00:16:59 - CC: Dynamite’s Queer Writing and Ten as a Rare Romantic Lead

Shan

All the characters in this show are great, but there's a couple that really, really stood out, and I think we should talk about them. And Ben, you should definitely lead us with some Dynamite talk. Tell us why that character matters so much to you.

Ben

Dynamite has the great honor of getting The Conversation’s first blorbo of the season award.

Shan

[laughs] So early in the season, too.

Ben

I know. He is the winter ‘24 blorbo for me! I love this boy. Here's the thing. With Dynamite: he is canonically young, he's like 17-18 in like his third year in school. And his only friends are played by Gun Atthaphan and Dome Jaruwat, who… create this very visibly queer friend group dynamic? This communicates a ton to me almost instantly, very early in the show, particularly with Dynamite living in some sort of like tenement housing, and then having really no one else to rely upon when someone died in the apartment above his, and contaminated the apartment he lived in, so he ends up moving in with Samsee. 

It’s a very obvious story to me as a queer person, that he had to finish school early because he could not stay home. And he has no one else to rely upon except his closest friends when he's in trouble. Samsee is communicated as a person who is like ‘I don't want nobody in my house,’ but immediately opened up his house to Dynamite when Dynamite was in trouble, because where else was that kid gonna go? 

And so, with Dynamite, we eventually learn that he was kind of getting picked on when he first got into the school with the rest of them, because… obviously he's a kid, and boys suck. And Fire saves him from this bullying instance, which almost read as a bashing? And this clearly rearranged his view about who he is in his life, where he recognized that he was gonna get clocked regardless. And so he was just going to be who he is. Fire gave off this whole fuck-you aura that he was clearly drawn to, and so he didn't go at Fire timid, because that's not what he saw in Fire. 

Dynamite spends the early part of the season determinedly pursuing Fire, who feigns annoyance about this, but is eventually revealed to… not want Dynamite to stop pursuing him. When he gets drunk and calls Dynamite out to come hang out with him, he tells him very directly: ‘even if I say no, don't stop.’ Which, very familiar to me dealing with my own closet issues and a bunch of other closeted folks growing up. 

Fire and Dynamite work really well for me, because familial acceptance is something that they're both struggling with. When Dynamite reveals his story to Fire, he tells Fire that he's okay with Fire not being ready to come out. Even if it's something he would prefer they do, he has lived through the worst things you can experience when you come out, which is losing your family support network. I really like that Dynamite’s understanding and belief in him is clearly what allows Fire to rebuild his sense of himself when he finally tells his mom that he cannot live up to this ideal that she has of him. That's built out from him recognizing who he is, because Dynamite has helped him figure that out. 

Dynamite hits a really specific queer note for me, because they create a character who I think is genuinely funny to watch, but you can feel a lot of his queer angst running underneath him the whole time, and they don't overextend it and make it be [laughs] way too melodramatic. Like his character’s just not gonna behave that way. I really like the way Dynamite has accepted the reality of his world, and has decided to build his own space in it, and it started with his friends. 

Most of these shows often get queer characters wrong in that they don't have like a reliable queer support network around them before they go rushing into some fuckin’ romance with some guy that's supposed to be the romance of their lives. Very glad that in this particular case, Dynamite has rock solid besties as he's pursuing Fire.

NiNI

In terms of other characters that I really responded to—and Shan's gonna like pick up the torch and run with it here—I loved Off as Ten.

Shan

Yeah!

NiNI

I am a recent Off convert. I really started getting into Off around Not Me, because the roles that I was seeing him play, from Not Me and continuing, I could see the growth that he's had over the years, and I really liked the energy that he was starting to bring to his roles, the maturity and the gravitas that he was starting to bring, whether it was something serious, like playing Sean in Not Me, or Mote in Midnight Motel, which I really enjoyed—or even, especially actually, playing Ten in a comedy like this. I mean, I just bought it 100%. They put Off on screen in those glasses, and the first thing we saw him do was argue with his dad, and I was like, yes absolutely, I am here, let's do this. 

I love the character of Ten. He's such a combination of tightly wound ball of stress and also incredibly fun and relaxed human being. I don't know how those two things work in one character, but they do, and Off plays both sides of him, I think brilliantly. I really enjoy getting into why he wanted to be a doctor, and the little mini arc that we had towards the middle of the series where he gets to recommit to being a doctor because he had sort of slid off course slightly. And he gets to recommit to, ‘no this is really what I want to do, I want to save people.’ Really loved that. The angst that he had around his mom dying, the angst that he had around his dad moving his girlfriend in, apparently it seems not too long after that… there's just a lot happening with Ten, but through it all he's just so delightful as a character. He saw Prem, he decided: ‘Yep, that's the one for me.’ He pursued him openly, he was just very forthright and honest at every step of the way, communicating all the way through… just love it. Love the character, loved Off in the role. I know. Shan's gonna, like, take that and run with it. [laughs]

Shan

I just want y'all to know—

NiNI

Shan is a babii, Shan loves Off.

Shan

I am living. I am getting my whole life right now. I just want you all to know, all of you listeners, that I was pretty much the lone babii around here until very recently. [laughs] I have always been an Off girlie, I have loved him since way back in the Puppy Honey days, I've always found him so charming. 

He started out as a pretty untested untrained actor and we've seen him grow across his roles, and so a lot of people have only kind of recently, in his last couple of shows, like fully come on board. But I have always been an Off girlie. I know that this show has turned Ben into a full blown babii, finally, [laughs] and that NiNi has come around on Off, and it's been very amazing to see. 

For my money, Ten is Off’s best character. They found the perfect character at the perfect time for him to play to all of his strengths. What's great about Ten — everything that NiNi just said is true, he's a very well written, very well-rounded character, and I love him specifically as a romantic lead. He has some really important qualities that you typically don't see in romantic leads, and that's why so many romcoms and romances are frustrating. Ten is a very honest person. He's a straightforward person. He is loyal. He kind of insists on building trust and on talking things through. 

One of my favorite things that happened in the final stretch of episodes was, Ten found in Prem’s room this sticky note that Pang had written, that said something like ‘the money from scamming Doc’ or something like that, basically making a joke about Prem scamming Doc for money. Ten found this sticky note and… he got his feelings hurt about it. He was like, ‘wow like, this kind of seems like you all were mocking me, this hurts my feelings.’ And in a typical drama you would see that turn into a big conflict. You would see the person who found the sticky note not saying anything about it, maybe be passive-aggressive, probably leave and go sit in their hurt feelings by themselves and then later it would blow up into a big fight. That's not what happened here, because Ten wouldn't let it happen. He takes the sticky note directly to Prem and he says ‘I found this, it kind of hurt my feelings, can you explain what this is about?’ And then he actually listens to Prem. And Prem apologizes because it was kind of mean-spirited, and he admits that. And then Ten says ‘OK, thank you for telling me. I forgive you, I'm gonna let it go.’ 

And I just love that! You don't see that kind of mature communication very often in romance at all, let alone in BL that's typically centered on younger characters. That was what Ten was like through that entire arc. He was just so honest. He wouldn't let silly misunderstandings get in the way. He always made sure to be very clear with Prem about what he wanted and what he was feeling. And he was respectful when Prem wanted space, but he always made sure that Prem knew that he was waiting there for when he was ready for more. Such a good model for a romantic lead, and because of those qualities in him, he and Prem ended up becoming a great couple that just—were a team. They faced things together. Our friend Twig called them a battle couple. They faced challenges together and didn't let things come between them. 

We haven't really mentioned Chef Chang Ma, who sucks and we hate him.

Ben

Sorry, Victor, your character sucks.

Shan

Your character sucks! He's a mentor to Prem, but he's also trying to hit on him the whole time. He's super inappropriate, he's always crossing boundaries, he's kind of a piece of shit, if I'm being real honest. But that guy was not able to get between Ten and Prem at any point, because every single time he tried, they communicated with each other, and figured out how to get back on the same page, and worked around him or shut him down. 

This couple's gonna stick with me in that they were able to work through so much together, and that they really sincerely made each other happy and made each other more confident and better at the things that they wanted to be better at. It was just lovely. I really loved this romance.

Ben

I'm going to continue behind Shan and continue praising Off Jumpol on this one, because I have not been kind to that man for the last decade. [laughs] He has not always been necessarily my favorite ambassador for BL. He's come a long way. This is definitely his best BL role. 

I'm making a Venn diagram after we're done with this recording, and it's just going to be Patts from La Pluie and Ten from Cooking Crush, because these characters have a lot of great crossover traits I really like. They're really kind with their partner and their friends, but… they have a temper, and it comes out with people they don't like. Off is funny, but also he's really good at playing… kind of pissy characters, and I'm really glad that they were like, ‘we gotta have Off be pissy with somebody. Let's make the correct choice for once, and not make it Gun that he's gonna be pissy with.’

Shan

[laughs] The crucial change!

Ben

Let's make him be pissy with his dad!

Shan

Mhm.

Ben

An excellent choice. And why is he pissy with his dad? Because his dad's a doctor. He didn't save his mom. That's a fairly valid reason to be pissy with someone about. And I think it works in terms of the family dynamics they go into. The dad's not going to tell his son that he's hurting because he feels like he failed to save his wife, the only woman he says he'll ever marry. He clearly cares about his son, because despite the way his son’s always talking out his fucking ass at him, he's not really punished him in any way. Despite the fact that Ten is clearly upset about the mom, and the dad in relation to that.

Shan

Yeah! Ten’s scenes with his dad were intense, and he was not being respectful and backing down in those scenes, ever. In this finale, he, like, took a power pose across the table from his dad, sat down at the other end of the table, planted himself firmly, and was like, ‘this is my boyfriend, and you are gonna fucking deal with it.’ I love that shit!

Ben

This is what I mean with the implied writing, because the way the stepmom is playing, she is way too familiar. It's very clear she's meant to be read as younger…

Shan

Mm-hmm.

Ben

And is trying to figure out what line she's supposed to take between being the partner of an older man, but also being closer in age to the kids. And like they mirror the positioning, she's sitting next to the dad, at the same position that Prem is sitting next to Ten. And there's this whole, ‘you brought this woman here. I wasn't consulted. This is my boyfriend. You're not getting consulted.’ And so I think the conflict between Ten and his dad is really great. Off needs to have, like, hostile conflict with other characters, because that's what we want to get out of him as an actor [laughs], directed in useful ways at his dad and at Chang Ma, and not at Gun's character, which is usually the problem I have with them in their shows.

00:32:08 - CC: Final Comments and Ratings

Ben

I was really glad to get a solid romcom out of OffGun. They also gave us some really ridiculous hilarity moments, like, they got that shot with their hands in the oven glove, twice? [Shan laughs] Unhinged. Holy shit.!

Shan

The interior oven glove shot? Amaaaazing. 

NiNi

Off getting hit in the face with Chinese kale? Not something I ever knew that I needed, but oh my god, I needed it.

Shan

Ten—he’s a big-ass goofball, which we saw with his fantasy sequences! Every time they were having cooking lessons, he was having fantasies in his head about Prem and various food items. [laughs] And they were the wackiest shit. Listen, I wish GMMTV would stop playing these games, but there was a YouTube version that had a lot of scenes cut from it and a WeTV version that had the full scenes. A lot of these food fantasies got cut from the YouTube version, but these sequences just really let you into Ten’s head, how wild and weird he was getting in there, and I just loved seeing that aspect of his character.

NiNi

It was a lot of fun. I have some dings, I have some critiques. The final episode went a little bit flat. They did round out and complete every single arc, except maybe one. But it did feel a little pat at the end? And out of left field, Pang and Samsee getting together in the end of the final episode.

[all laugh]

Shan

That was quite a choice—I was shipping Metha and Samsee for the whole show.

Ben

I was—

Shan

I was kind of disappointed.

Ben

I was disappointed.

Shan

I didn’t expect to actually get Metha and Samsee, but I kind of hoped that they would have left the door open for it. Firmly closing that door with having him get together with Pang at the last episode? I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it either.

NiNi

It was a choice. But. It did kiiind of work, and the only reason that it kind of worked is because of my first nominee of the year for the Mark Pakin 6th Man award, and that is Dome Jaruwat.

Shan

Mmm! Dome was great.

NiNi

Dome is a great supporting actor.

Ben

You wanna know how good Dome is? I've been half joking about rewatching Until We Meet Again since we started doing this show. I haven't actually started until recently, because watching Dome every week reminded me that he sang on the Until We Meet Again soundtrack. And I had to go back and start watching the show.

NiNi

Yeah, cause Dome is primarily a musician, you do forget, but he is actually a very good supporting actor. When he shows up, I am always delighted anew by how good he is.

Shan

I've seen other shows that had him in it, but this is the first one where I really sat up and paid attention to him. He was fantastic as Samsee. And he got some real shit to do. One of the big conflicts in the final run of the show was about the way that these new romances were affecting the friendships. Dynamite and Prem were paying attention to their boyfriends, they were blowing Samsee off, they were missing cooking practice, and he was feeling some kind of way about it. He was kind of feeling a little bit abandoned. And it was just awesome that the show actually took that seriously, not just in letting Samsee express his feelings and get mad and have the other characters take that seriously and care? But they actually very deliberately, in the narrative, prioritized the friendship reunion and makeup scene over Ten and Prem getting together and making their relationship official. They had Ten approach with the intention of asking Prem to be his boyfriend, and stop and see that they were repairing their friendship in that moment, and back off and walk away.

Ben

It felt really important for BL, because BL friends are so ridiculous. BL friends are basically shippers half the time. Like, if they see, like, one of the boys is possibly getting with another boy that becomes the only thing that that character cares about.

Shan

Everyone's a fujoshi.

Ben

I like that that wasn't the case here! I like that Samsee had genuine beef with his friends deprioritizing him, when they were in the midst of something really important to them as a group that they've been working towards for a long time. Like, are you all fucking up our big project for dick? Come on!

Shan

This show really let its side characters shine. It was a really good showcase for a couple of actors: I think Dome and Aungpao, in particular…. Tum also got great stuff, Neo got to do great stuff… We haven't even mentioned Prem's grandma, who was also awesome.

Ben

She was great.

NiNi

Amazing. She was so good.

Shan

Fantastic, no nonsense, cut the bullshit, but at the same time, very loving and supportive. She was awesome. I loved her.

Ben

There's a little bit of a dropped bit that happens in episode 11, that I kind of wish the show hadn't cut out as much. Fire and Dynamite go back to Fire’s place and the mom comes out of Fire’s room in this very weird jumpscare, and Fire has the closet panic and ends up kicking Dynamite away from him. And he kicks Dynamite hard enough that he goes flying across the room and gets hurt a bit. And I kind of wish they had followed up on that scene. Because… I feel like Fire, recognizing that he actually hurt Dynamite is probably one of those things that tilts him on to the other end of ‘I'm going to come out now.’ And I kind of wish the show had followed up on that properly and let us see Fire make the decision.

Shan

Yeah, I do wish that the pacing of the Fire and Dynamite plot had been a little different in the final episodes? I think that it ended up feeling a little bit rushed at the end, and I think that was just about the timing of the beats. If a couple things had shifted back a little bit, I think it would have worked. As it was, it kind of all got shoved into the finale, and so it felt a little too quick, a little too easy. I like where it landed… like NiNi said earlier, the way that all of these story arcs ended felt correct and felt right. They rounded everything out. It's just that some of the beats in the final stretch got kind of weirdly compressed.

Ben

It was a little bit frustrating for me because Dynamite and Ten are both very forward and overt pursuers of their romantic interests, and I kind of wish that the two couples’ romantic pacing had been better aligned across the show.

NiNi

And again, that goes to the editing. It's a good show, it's incredibly well written and incredibly well acted, but I think that the direction and the editing let it down a little bit, and that's why for me, it got an 8.5.

Shan

I gave it a 9. The show was such a positive experience. I was so excited every Sunday morning to watch it, it was such a great way to start my rest day, to like, have a good vibe to take me through my Sunday. The writing was so strong, and that's the thing that I tend to care most about in shows. If the writing is strong, if the characters feel right to me? That is what I prize most in a show. The editing, the directing, definitely had some flaws. There are some things that I would change, but the most important parts of the show held up really well for me and I definitely will be returning to it often.

Ben

I think I'm going with a 9 because they got the gay portions of the show right, and I really liked the character drama of this. All the big moments for the characters in this show land correctly for me. This show held together the whole way through. And that's kind of what's good about the writing. Like when you're noticing editing issues in a show, it's because you're following the writing, and you see the editing stumbling to try and not let it down. I think the character writing is really strong and holds together for the whole show. I think the conflict writing that comes out of who these characters are is really good, and I just really like the way these characters work together. When I see these folks together in the ‘It's been years later! Let's go to Prem’s restaurant!’ it doesn't feel like a ridiculous impossibility.

Shan

I loved that flash forward. I love a time skip when it's used to tell us that everything is still good in the future, after all the conflicts have been solved in the present. I hate a time skip when it skips over conflict, but once all the conflicts are solved, yes! Take me to the happy epilogue. I love that shit.

NiNi

So that's a 9 for Cooking Crush from The Conversation.

Ben

It's a good show, it's an easy recommend.

Shan

Thank you for coming back, Off and Gun, and thank you for sticking around for The Trainee in 2024. We look forward to seeing you again.

00:41:14 - Cherry Magic: Beating Expectations and Simping for Tay Tawan

NiNi

OK, so moving on, and it's time for us to talk about Cherry Magic Thailand! Now, I am not so big an original Cherry Magic girlie as a lot of other people. I enjoyed it, I had a great time with it, but I'm not a stan of the original Cherry Magic live action from Japan, in the way that some other people are. 

Ben

I was!

NiNi

[laughs] Let's see. So, go ahead and lead us in. What is Cherry Magic Thailand about? And maybe you could talk a little bit about the original Cherry Magic as well.

Ben

Cherry Magic is about a young man, in this case named Achi, who is a low-ranking member at some sort of large corporation, who at the age of 30, because he's a virgin, gains telepathic powers. When he touches someone and makes any sort of physical contact with them, he can sort of hear their current internal monologue and what might be going on with him. He learns fairly soon after getting his powers that the hotshot salesperson in his company has been nursing a long-time crush on him, and complications ensue. There's also a very great supporting cast, which also in one portion features the same power.

NiNi

So this is an adaptation of an adaptation, or an adaptation of an original that was also adapted in another way… like [laughs] it's a little confusing. So this is originally a manga. The manga was adapted to Japanese live action. The manga has now also been adapted to a Thai live action, and then there's a third adaptation currently ongoing, which is a Japanese anime version. So there are three adaptations of this manga. We're going to talk about the Thai version in the most detail here, but I think we're going to come maybe to a couple of things to be said about the Japanese live action and the anime version. 

Shan, what were your overall initial thoughts when you heard Thailand's gonna adapt Cherry Magic and it's going to be done by GMMTV?

Shan

I was so skeptical. I am a TayNew girlie, I love them. I loved Dark Blue Kiss back in the day, so I was really excited to see Tay and New doing BL together again — I was not at all excited to see them doing Cherry Magic [laughs] when I first heard about it. I did have an affinity for the original Japanese live action. I don't think it's a perfect show, I have my own notes on it, but I did enjoy it a lot, I thought it was really well done. And I was just unsure of why GMMTV and Thailand needed to do their own version. 

That said, I was also hoping that if Thailand was going to do this, that the main purpose would be to address the biggest shortcoming of the Japanese live action, which is that in this narrative about a virgin who acquires magical powers, and then falls in love and then loses those magical powers via having sex with the person he's in love with, there was no sex! There wasn't even a kiss on screen! That was a huge flaw of that version that I hoped to see Thailand correct. And honestly, what I thought was going to be the main thing they could bring to the table in tackling this adaptation, was kind of finishing that narrative in a more sex-positive way that Thailand is kind of known for that Japan doesn't always do, particularly when they're doing their lighter BLs.

NiNi

Ben, what about you? When you heard about this adaptation, what were your thoughts?

Ben

Opposition. I was deeply opposed to this. [everyone laughs] I was not keen on a Thai attempt at this. I was kind of curious about what Thai humor would look like for this, and I was interested in the adaptation because I don't know what corporate culture in Thailand was like. So I thought that there was a real opportunity there. I was interested in a TayNew comeback, particularly because Tay hadn't really lost a step—even when he was doing other work—and I thought Newwie had gotten a lot better. And so I was excited about the two of them getting back together, and I thought that they were the best choice at GMMTV if GMMTV was going to do this. But I was not looking forward to it. 

How about you, NiNi? Did you have any initial feelings or concerns about it?

NiNi

I had no intention of watching this. [laughs] I was gonna give it a pass. I love Tay Tawan—I'm just gonna spend a few seconds here being a simp. That man is gorgeous.

Shan

He's so beautiful.

NiNi

He is so beautiful. And he is such a good actor. The first thing I ever saw Tay Tawan in was 3 Will Be Free, and I literally remember thinking, who is that? I think I might have said it out loud. Since then I have been a devotee. He can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned. Tay Tawan is everything to me. 

I have not been a big fan of Newwie. When I watched the parts of the Kiss series that I watched, loved Tay, was into Tay, Newwie I wasn't really feeling. I came around on Newwie a little bit last year after watching him in The Warp Effect—I thought he did really well there. And so I was not as down on him as before, but I still didn't feel like Cherry Magic was a story that I was interested in seeing Thailand adapt necessarily? 

A, it felt like an incredibly Japanese type of story and B, the director, X Nuttapong, is not one of my favourites. I do not tend to like his work. X did Vice Versa, Theory of Love, neither of those are my favorites. So I was saying, ‘OK, I'm only now kind of starting to feel like Newwie could maybe do something. I don't really like X’s work. I think I'm going to give this a pass.’ And I did give it a pass initially [laughs]. And then all of you started watching it and getting incredibly excited about it. Somewhere near maybe episode 10, I was like, ‘ahh! Fine!’ and started watching it. And I'm glad that I did!

Ben

So Shan, since you are the TayNew girlie—I don't remember their fans are called—of The Conversation—

NiNi

Polcas, they're polcas! How do I know that? I don't know.

Shan

Yeah, I don't know what polca means, but that's what they're called. I do not identify as a polca, ‘cause I hate the name. But I do love TayNew.

Ben

Why don't you break down why this was such an excellent viewing experience for us?

Shan

I mean, you heard all that skepticism that we were all bringing to the table, right? And this show, just, like, blew us all out of the water. It was such a good adaptation, it was so impressive. There's a lot of reasons for that, and we'll get into all the things that this production did well, but right at the core of it, the most important thing, is that Tay and New just killed it in these roles. They were just absolutely perfect as Karan and Achi. 

If you're familiar with the story of Cherry Magic, you know that Karan, or Kurosawa in the Japanese version,  is meant to be this kind of otherworldly perfect man, like he's excellent at his job. He's kind to everybody. He's beautiful. His very presence is just intimidating, because he seems too perfect to be real. And of course, he's not actually perfect, he's a human being. But that's kind of the image that he has. And so Tay Tawan [laughs] honestly, is a perfect casting choice for that role.

NiNi

No notes, no notes whatsoever.

Shan

Right? That man is beautiful. Every single time he is on screen in this show, I just got to get a hold of myself, and it's difficult every single time. Seeing that man and his beauty properly appreciated by the camera, wardrobe working, hair working, everything working for him… it was just such a good role for him. Not only on the looks either, but on his performance! 

He really nailed the inherent kindness of Karan, but also the inherent loser goofiness of him, which is the part of him that you don't see on the surface, and that's the secret. He seems like this cool, suave guy, but he's actually a total simp. He's super in love with Achi, and real fuckin nerdy about it. I think Tay Tawan was really able to… balance those aspects of him so well, so that they came together believably as one person. 

And then New as Achi, I think brought a really interesting dimension, because in some versions I think that character can feel a little bit self-contained, to the exclusion of being able to empathize with others. And Achi didn't feel like that. He felt like someone who had self esteem issues, he felt like someone who was intimidated by others and wasn't always sure what he could bring to the table, but who was interested in other people, and kind, and really wanted to learn how to communicate better with others. 

I thought they both did such a great job, both as their individual characters, and then together. We already knew they had awesome chemistry, but they really brought their A game to this show in terms of developing a believable chemistry between these two characters. We got to really see, over the course of the show, Achi's awareness of his attraction to Karan build, and his feelings genuinely grow, from kind of liking him in kind of a generic way, to actually getting to know him as a real person, taking him off that idol pedestal he'd had him on in his mind, and falling in love with him genuinely, and learning how to return his affection and develop a mutual relationship together. 

This Thai version really hit all of those really important landmarks in a romantic relationship, including the physical intimacy, with perfect pacing, such genuine emotion… they just really, really sold it. They did such a good job with this show, and I'm just so happy to eat my words and to have all my skepticism proven wrong. They did awesome.

Ben

I think you're right about Tay Tawan being a good choice, ‘cause Kurosawa slash Karan is… eminently charming in a really accessible way. The big part that works for him as a character is the fact that he's such a fuckin dork! And Tay Tawan is a dork. [laughs] That is a… important piece of his public persona, that he's really charming in a way that's not always intentional on his part? It's funny when it is intentional, and it's hilarious when he trips over himself because he's like, wait, did I just do that? It's great. It works really well here. Tay Tawan.

Shan

What a man.

Ben

I say like, these boys are beautiful, like every week, but he really is gorgeous. He's just absolutely stunning to look at all the time and he is just so delightful as Karan. This is probably my favorite role for Tay. I don't think, like, it's Tay’s best work, but I think it's my favorite role for him.

NiNi

I understand exactly what you mean, because I think that his best role is Shin from 3 Will Be Free, but in terms of like a great just nailed-on role for him? It's exactly like you said: he's gorgeous and the camera loves him. And so every time the camera turns on him and shows you Achi looking at Karan, and the camera is Achi in that moment—he takes your breath away! 

When Karan goes to see Achi during Songkran and he has to basically wash himself, there's a slow-motion thing when he starts throwing the water on his face, and I just kind of literally was watching that with my chin in my palm, and just like, wowwww, full zone-out moment. The camera loves that man. And it spent so much time on letting us see how gorgeous Karan is, but especially how gorgeous he is to Achi. I thought there was some really clever camera work and it was a good use of Tay’s good looks.

00:54:13 - CM: Relationship Development and the Powers

Ben

Speaking of Tay Tawan being a dork and being perfectly selected for this: at the end of episode 3, when they are returning from the company trip, and [laughs] Achi falls asleep and ends up leaning on Karan and wakes up because Karan starts screaming in his head—

NiNi

[laughs] Screaming internally, that's so funny.

Shan

That was so perfect. There has never been a more perfect moment on television. I don't care.

NiNi

It was amazing. It was incredible. It was delightful. It was fantastic. I can't even describe it well. Like you just have to see it.

Shan

It's the way that he keeps his face so controlled…

Ben

But like you can see like his mouth opens slightly, his eyes widen a little bit.

Shan

His eyes are screaming, while his face— 

Ben

Ahhh!

Shan

And then you see the “AAAAHHH” Like on the subtitle, which is perrrrfect perfect perfect. They did so well. They had so much fun with the mind reading jokes, and there were so many of them.

Ben

There were, they got a lot of traction out of it, it was great. Like, even after that moment ends and he wakes up Achi, Achi leans against him again, and he's like, ‘I wish I could fight all of Achi’s nightmares.’

[laughs]

Shan

Every time we heard his simp thought it was so perfect, it was always something so cheesy, or he's having a fantasy about like wiping Achi's nose or something, or like dreaming of their future together. Or he's singing a love song off-key in his own head. It's just so good! [laughs]

NiNi

I actually really like the way that the Thai show used the mind reading power. I like the jokes that they made out of it better than the Japanese version.

Ben

I think that's one of the things that they had extra time for, and I think they calibrated the humor for the Thai approach really well.

NiNi

Just simple things like, after Achi tells Karan about the mind reading power and Karan decides to use it to A) get Achi to move in with him, and B) once Achi has moved in with him to quote-unquote “test” the mind reading power at every potential opportunity by saying, ‘can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?’ And just like touching him randomly… [laughs] He touched his ankle and I was just like, oh my god, ok, this is ridiculous.

Shan

My favorite—he stuck out his elbow. He stuck out his elbow like a huge dork, leaning on his shoulder. And he was like, ‘can you hear me? Can you hear me?’ It's like, it was just so charming!

Ben

My favorite thing about Karan is he was never embarrassed about how deeply attracted to Achi he was. There was a toothpaste moment, where he started having a fantasy and Achi was like ‘oh my god, bro, please step back,’ and he's like, ‘wait, you see those things, too? So you saw… oh! ok.’ And then he walked away giggling to himself.

Shan

He just thinks it's funny. Actually that is an under-discussed, really cool thing that this adaptation did. Once Achi confesses to Karan that he's been able to hear him the whole time, Karan doesn't get upset. He actually thinks it's awesome. Because to him it's so meaningful to know that this whole time, Achi has known how he feels, and Achi has decided to be around him, he's OK with it. Karan, he’s someone who seems very confident on the surface, but he's very insecure about his feelings for Achi, because he doesn't think that they're returned, and he's always very worried about whether or not he's being a burden to Achi with his feelings, whether or not he's pushing something on him that he doesn't want, he's very conscious of that and respectful of boundaries.

Ben

It's an excellent gay choice.

Shan

Right? And so for him to learn that Achi has known the whole time how he feels and has been comfortable being around him anyway actually really made him happy. He was delighted to know that he didn't have to hide himself in that way.

Ben

Achi called that out, too. He's like, ‘why is the real beneficiary of my powers Karan and not me?’ That's actually a source material joke that they brought over really well. Kurosawa learns about the powers and starts actively flirting with Achi at work. And he's like, ‘why is he better at using my powers than me?’

NiNi

As much as we love the use of the powers, I actually want to talk about the moments that he chooses not to use his powers and instead to, for example, use his words. Because part of this story is about Achi coming more into himself and learning to be bolder and to be more open with himself and his feelings. And I really enjoyed that story happening alongside the powers. One of the things I found in the Japanese version was that Adachi really, I felt, leaned on his powers perhaps a little too much, in his relationship with Kurosawa? Achi, in this version uses his powers more sparingly, and also more accidentally? Whereas in the Japanese version he uses them more deliberately.

Shan

I thought they were so intentional about it. Achi confesses earlier about having the powers in the story. He expresses clearly to Karan his fears, about how their relationship will stay intact when he doesn't have that crutch to lean on. They talk about it directly. They do their really silly practice long-distance thing because Achi's feeling so nervous about whether they'll be able to maintain their communication while they're apart and he can't touch Karan to hear what he's thinking. 

Like you said NiNi, in some really crucial moments in the later stages of their relationship development, he's not using his powers, and he doesn't even think to, because he has grown to be so comfortable with communicating with Karan, using his words and listening to Karan and trusting what he's saying. We saw that evolve over time, so that in the end, when they finally decided to have sex, it really wasn't about the powers at all. That had already been resolved and they were already on really solid footing, Achi wasn't even using them anymore in that way. I like that they did it that way, that they separated those things a little bit. They had sex when they were ready to have sex and it wasn't related to wanting to get rid of the powers; the powers were not a barrier for them.

NiNi

I really liked how they went about the whole progression of their physical intimacy.

Shan

I think it felt…really right. I felt like I could trust this show to address it in a way that not only tied off the plot of the story and the narrative, which was rooted in sex or lack thereof, but also to make sure that it felt emotionally authentic to where the characters were, that any moment of intimacy between them was building their relationship development arc. And they pulled that off so beautifully.

Ben

They have their first kiss in a way I think is really satisfying, because Achi initiates it. Which I think is an excellent choice for Achi compared to Adachi.

Shan

And it felt very earned because their relationship was already so deep at that point, and you felt like Achi was ready for it. And of course, the build to them deciding to have sex for the first time. I like the way that that played around their temporary separation. Achi went away, and they hadn't gotten there yet in their relationship—not because of any big reason, it's just the natural progression, hasn't happened yet. And I like that when Karan went to visit him, things just felt right, and they progressed. I like that the story never felt like it was artificially holding that up to get to a certain beat. It really felt cathartic to finally see these characters get there in a way that felt so, so correct.

Ben

I thought every moment of intimacy between these characters was really well calibrated for the moment, and that the two actors involved understood what they were trying to accomplish in the scene. It was really nice to see two actors with experience, who trust each other, really deliver good emotional and intimate scene work, and that is supported by even all of the non-kissing they do between their characters. Just overall, I really, truly enjoyed watching Tay and New work together with these characters.

01:02:15 - CM: Other Characters

NiNi

Let's talk a little bit about the characters outside of Karan and Achi. I really enjoyed the way that these particular versions of the side characters were done. I particularly enjoyed Pai and Dujdao from the office. Dujdao is me, I am Dujdao. She is my fave. She is the one, I love her. Pai in this version is Fujisaki in the Japanese version, and then you've got Rock who is Rokkaku, you've got Min who is Minato, and you've got Jinta who is Tsuge. 

I really liked the way that this adaptation played with those characters, and I like how they intersected with the Karan and Achi story. I always like to see the wider world of these characters and the friends and family that they have, and how their relationship fits into their relationships with their friends and their family. Watching, particularly the little office family that formed with Dujdao and Pai and Rock, and then the friendship between Achi and Jinta, which I felt a lot more strongly about in this version than I did about the friendship between Tsuge and Adachi—it's a different kind of relationship. And I personally enjoyed Achi and Jinta’s relationship a little more than I did Tsuge and Adachi’s.

Shan

I really, really loved Min and Jinta in this story. I thought those actors did a great job with these characters, I felt like they fit in really well into the narrative. Jinta and Min in their own romance, as well as Jinta's friendship with Achi—both of those threads that they were carrying complemented the main story so well: supported the themes, helped move the plot along, they were just really well integrated into this story. 

Jinta is a great character: he’s awkward and kind of introverted and weird, because he spends a lot of time alone, but he's also a kind person, and he has a generous spirit, and I think that all of that came through really well. I loved that he and Achi kind of came into their powers in parallel and then worked together to figure out how to use them and what they meant. They got a lot of good additional mind reading jokes and humor out of Jinta, both in his scenes with Achi, where they would slyly touch each other and then have mind conversations, which eventually Karan caught on to, and that was also hilarious [laughs]. 

With Min and Jinta, I liked how much in this version that was about Min figuring out what he wanted to do with his life, whether or not he should continue to pursue his passion of dancing, and through his relationship with Jinta, getting encouragement, finding new confidence, and figuring out how to do that in a way that he felt like he could make a living from. And I thought that nicely supported the themes that were going on with Achi and Karan, also learning to communicate with each other and care for each other and support each other through new opportunities. 

This show also did something really interesting with Pai and Rock. One of the big reservations when this adaptation was announced was that in the Japanese live action, Fujisaki was an aro-ace woman. She explicitly identified that way, it was plotline of the show. And I just knew that in Thailand, they were gonna put the same character in a romantic relationship, cause Thailand loves side couples and they just can't let anybody end the show single, even people who are supposed to be single [laughs] according to their identities. And so I was dreading that, honestly, I was like, ‘they're gonna have Pai get into a romance with Rock, I'm gonna hate it.’ 

But you know what? I didn’t hate it. The way that they got them together in the end was really sensitive, I think, to the fandom that they were clearly aware was out there hoping to see this character retain some of that aro-ace rep that was so meaningful to people in the Japanese live action. So I thought they were really respectful of it, I thought they did a great job with it. I think even though they got together in the end, there's still a very clear aro-ace read on Pai, and I like them together. Their scenes were fun, they have a good easy chemistry and charm, even if it doesn't feel particularly sexually charged. 

And I thought that Rock and Pai were both as well, great supporting characters in the narrative. Their connection supported the story when it needed to. All of these side characters came together really well in a way that never distracted from, and always bolstered the main narrative, which is the most important thing to me for side characters.

NiNi

When Sing Harit picks up Tay Tawan and runs off with him while he wais at the client —

Shan

[laughs] It was perfect!

NiNi

[laughs] He literally just picked him up off the ground and just runs away!

Shan

He was so good in this role, he was perfect.

Ben

I'm glad we get to keep Sing. I've been watching that man for nine years.

Shan

He always brings something great to every show he's in.

Ben

So, I am a fan of original Cherry Magic adaptation Tsuge and Minato. I like how extra Tsuge is. Asaka Kodai: I like the way he played Tsuge. I like how he focused on how weird Tsuge is, and how passionate he is about things. I like Jinta as a take on that character…I appreciate why people like him more. I don't think I like him more? But I like them both specifically. 

I like the Tsuge character, and I like how in the three versions of him I've seen adapted now, each adaptation has approached him. I genuinely enjoyed the version of Tsuge and Minato we got in Jinta and Min. I really liked the way they played together. I don't necessarily think Mark succeeded at all of Min, but I really like the way he and Junior work together. 

I like Rock in this version because Rokkaku is an aggravating character, intentionally, in the Cherry Magic story. He is far less annoying in this version than he is in Japanese versions of this character. 

I liked Pai in this one, I like the corrective fujoshi behavior that they were doing with her. I was worried at first when they leaned into the fact that Fujisaki is a shipper who has been shipping Adachi and Kurosawa for a very long time [laughs]. I like the way the Thai show ends up using that. I like the presentation of her as, ‘you can help your ship when they need to overcome an obstacle, but their moments don't belong to you.’ I loved her, genuinely. And I liked — what was her name? The manager's character?

NiNi

How could you forget my girl Dujdao?

Ben

I really liked the way they made the office manager kind of like a…auntie figure to a lot of them.

NiNi

I love how Achi accidentally brushes against her, and hears her positive thoughts about him. Because that's not a moment that they had to put in there. But I thought that it was really nice and important that Achi got to hear how much she truly cares about him.

Shan

We didn't mention the other coworkers who came at the very end of the story, when Achi traveled, but there was a whole new crew of colleagues that he got to meet on his one-month assignment at another branch. They started that episode with a little bit of anxiety around, you know, are they gonna be mean to Achi? Are they gonna pick on him? Do they think he's a snooty city person? Are they going to be homophobic? 

I love that they just turned out to be like, a good group of dudes who were pretty good at their job, needed a little help getting set up, and once Achi proved that he was there to help them and he was competent, they completely accepted him and they were lovely to him. The show is just like—everybody was trying their best all the way through and I really like that. With one exception.

NiNi

Let's talk about that exception now, let's talk about the dreaded episode 8.

Shan

Dreaded is the right phrase.

Ben

My thing is, if you're going to add to Cherry Magic, why would you add workplace sexual assault? Why would you make the boss worse? The boss is really good prior to episode 8 and he's really good after episode 8. I don't understand why in episode 8 they would have him put some sort of bullshit ‘employees can't date each other’ rule into play, and be like, ‘Alright gays: if you can prove that you are economically viable to me by hitting an unrealistic sales target and whoring yourselves out to shitty clients, maybe then I will consider letting you two homos date each other.’ 

I hated that. I hated that Karan felt like he had to go face her again, I hated that the boss knew it, and sat with Achi to be like, ‘how do you feel about that, bro?’ And then there's like, this whole sequence where she further tries to embarrass him, but then the boss decides to be like, ‘No, I have morals.’ Where were they 40 minutes ago? I just did not like the inclusion of any of that. 

It sucked too, because it was a holding pattern episode for Achi and Karan and the crew around them. Nobody really grew as a result of the events that happened there, and it just made me really resent the boss as a character. After that episode, he has a completely reasonable professional response to Achi clearly being frustrated with his role at the company. Achi, who—Karan has shown him through the course of the season—is actually a really good and really valuable employee whose efforts have gone maybe unnoticed, but that's because he's shy. And so when he recognizes that Achi is struggling professionally and wants to maybe do more, he gives him a very reasonable opportunity. Has very reasonable expectations about it, does not withhold how difficult the position may be, and has a reasonable expectation for Achi to make a decision about it. 

It was really frustrating for me to try and reconcile that version of a fairly sensible boss, who is trying to give an employee an opportunity to succeed professionally, with the guy who we got in episode 8.

Shan

It felt wrong, it didn't feel like it was of a piece with the rest of the story. We found out pretty quickly that it was not from the source material, and it was an original episode that they've decided to write because they think they needed to fill a little bit of time. It's the one blemish on the show which was otherwise so wonderful, and so it just kind of sucks that they made this choice and tarnished things a little bit by doing such an ugly extra subplot, that just wasn't needed and didn't do anything for the story.

NiNi

In the end, I'm glad it was just a subplot. And it is, to my mind, pretty easily excisable.

Ben

We just deleted the episode. Boop!

Shan

Just pretended it didn't happen and carried on, and that worked great for me personally. [Shan and Ben laugh]

01:13:51 - CM: Ratings

Ben

I will say at this point, before we get to rating that this is now my default Cherry Magic version.

Shan

Same.

Ben

I think the Thai show feels complete in a way that the Japanese experience didn't. And that's…honestly, for me, reinforced by the anime that's running simultaneously right now. What I am enjoying with the two active adaptations right now is the very different approaches to the characters. 

Karan is really sensitive to Achi and Achi is really sensitive to him in a way that I find really useful in the story, but there's a chippiness to the Japanese anime version of these characters. They are not as emotionally intelligent, they have a temper about them, there's a little bit of selfishness. Like, I think Adachi’s kind of a dick in this one, he complains about people being irritating normies a lot in a way that I find very amusing. And Kurosawa’s far more possessive—internally, he doesn't express it externally that often—in a way that I find lands more correctly for him, in comparison to maybe the way Keita Machida played Kurosawa and the way they presented him. 

I really like the Thai localization of the Cherry Magic story here, and I think it exists very peacefully alongside the current Japanese anime version and the source material, and I think it sits favorably against the original Japanese version. 

The intent of the powers to enable greater empathy and better communication between people lands far more consistently in the Thai version. I am really, truly glad that they actually did this and did a good job with it. We did not have high hopes for this motherfucker when they told us about it, and this ended up being one of the most pleasant experiences we've had in genre in a really long time.

NiNi

So, ratings. Shan, you go first: what's your rating for Cherry Magic Thailand?

Shan

I gave this show a 9.5. Could have been a 10 if not for that episode 8, but episode 8 exists, unfortunately, so it's a 9.5 for me. I found it to be such a good time, such a well-executed story. I think it was a masterful adaptation. It did such a good job taking this Japanese story and translating it into something that felt of a piece with Thai culture. The performances were excellent. The whole production was great. I loved how thoughtful everything was. It was such a good show for me. I wish I could go back to before I watched it, and watch it again and be delighted anew.

NiNi

Ben, how about you?

Ben

Similarly, I gave it a 9.5; I think this was an excellent experience. I think it was really enjoyable week to week, and this is what I want out of my BL TV viewing experience. I got to look forward to it every week, and I walked away from it satisfied. One of my favorite TV experiences is when a show is really good, without me instantly yearning for more. I had a really great anticipation of it when a Saturday morning rolled around, and I felt really good for the rest of the Saturday after watching it, and I didn't feel like I was missing something all week because it wasn't on. It was something that I really looked forward to on Saturdays. That is the ideal TV show experience, for me. And I don’t get to have that very often. I really, truly appreciate it that this show was one of the better or best week-to-week viewing experiences I've had for years. 

9.5 for episode 8.

NiNi

I scored the show a 9.75.

Ben

Oh my god.

Shan

[laughs] Wait, are we allowed to do .25?

Ben

We're not. She can do it, though. [laughs]

Shan

She’s cheating!

NiNi

I am calling producer privilege to give it a 9.75! No, but the subplot in episode 8 really is a ding, but also I really loved this show. The ding had to be dinged, but I will find it very easy to excise that subplot from my memory of the show and move on. Also, I didn't have to sit in it for a week like you guys did because I was binging it, so it's easier for me, I think, to just kind of be like, pfft! Over that.

Ben

Let me tell you, that was a difficult week for us.

Shan

It was a bad week. We were scared.

Ben

We have been in this position with Thai BL where things are going great, and then episode 8 rolls around and like, oh, here we go. That was not a great week with this show’s experience. We were not really anticipating—we were hoping it wouldn't be shit, picking up with the cliffhanger of Achi revealing his powers to Karan. That was a good choice, that allowed us to focus on the future, not the past.

NiNi

And then you were immediately rewarded in episode 9 with the kiss!

Shan

Sure were!

Ben

And then they reminded me of the boss's bullshit in the finale. He's like, I'm throwing away my stupid policy. I'm like, ‘why would you bring that back up?’

Shan

Don’t bring it up! We’re trying to pretend it didn't happen!

Ben

I had just forgiven you, you motherfucker. Shut the fuck up. [all laugh]

NiNi

All right. All right. [laughs] OK, so 9.5, 9.5, 9.75 fine, it gets a 9.5 from The Conversation.

Ben

We highly recommend it! It is a good viewing experience.

Shan

Everyone should watch it. 

NiNi

Fantastic show.

01:19:34 - The Pillars: Overall Thoughts

NiNi

OK, so we've just spent the last — I don't know how much time this is going to be edited—

Ben

It's going to be a long edit for you, that's for damn sure. [laughs]

NiNi

We have just spent the last maybe two-ish hours talking about our OGs, and the stuff that they've been in this year. OG to new G, so to speak. Let's talk a little bit about the pillars, about the experience of watching these people do what they know how to do really well at this point. Shan, what's your experience been like?

Shan

It was so lovely for me. I am an OffGun and a TayNew girlie. I have been a fan, I love those pairs. I am not a big fan of the branded pair system, to say the least—I think that it can be really damaging sometimes in the Thai media landscape, but I think that these two pairs have worked together for a really long time and they've figured out what works well for them. And they have also gone off and done other things, they don't only work together making BLs. All of these four actors have very full careers. And so I'm very happy that they were able to bring them back and pair them with such great projects. 

Candidly, these are my two favorite Thai shows of this entire season. They knew what they were about, they executed them really well, and they used the pairs at the center of them to all the best of their abilities and their strength. I'm glad to see that they're planning to continue to work together. Both TayNew and OffGun have announced their next projects already for 2024, and I'm excited to see more adult BL from these guys.

Ben

To be clear, we are not certain that Peaceful Property or whatever it's going to be called is actually going to be a BL.

Shan

I don't need them to make out to enjoy their presence together, so I'll be happy either way.

NiNi

I don't care if it's a BL—I would prefer it to be BL, but Peaceful Property just looks like a good-ass time, so I'm going to enjoy that. I wasn't planning to watch The Trainee, but after Cooking Crush I'm gonna watch The Trainee. I've dialed in to the OffGun of it in this particular direction. I just like Off doing comedy.

Ben

He is good at comedy.

Shan

So good at it

NiNi

I really enjoy it. Not only watch him doing comedy, but watch him doing comedy now. Because he has improved, he has grown, he's really dialed into what he's good at, and he can portray it in a way that I don't think he used to be able to. So, I am looking forward to watching The Trainee definitely. 

News news, apparently the third of our pillars coming back is a possibility? So there are three OG pillars for GMMTV. Like we said, OffGun, TayNew, and the third OG pillar was Krist and Singto. We got word recently that Singto’s coming back to GMMTV? So that's an interesting thing. I don't know necessarily that there's going to be new KristSingto stuff, but…

Shan

Krist has already teased it on social media.

Ben

Krist has teased it, but he said that they won't tell him information because he usually leaks it.

Shan

Right. But he said he wants to do another project with Singto. They've put it out there, maybe as a little bit of a test balloon to see if people are interested in it. So I wouldn't be surprised if we find out next year that they're going to be doing another BL together.

NiNi

I wouldn't be surprised if we find that out in April, when the Part 2 of the GMMTV thing comes out.

Ben

[sigh] OK, I'll talk about this. We need to own that has not been a good run for Singto, for about three to four years now. He hasn't really had a solid win in a while. And I don't know that I want him and Krist back together. This is such a weird choice to make, coming off of Be My Favorite where I was like, ‘OK, Krist, you've grown as a performer. I thought you were used well here, I thought your reputation, whether it be right or wrong was used well here. And I'm willing to put all this aside and move forward.’ 

And now I'm feeling triggered [laughs] by the news that he and Singto will be back together. I'm not necessarily thrilled about it. Like, yeah, we had a lot of skepticism about Cherry Magic, blah, blah, blah, coming into this. And that ended up being fine. But like… [sigh]

Shan

None of my reservations were about the pairs, though. It's all about the material. Here, Krist and Singto don't have good chemistry.

Ben

I don't think they do at all.

Shan

We know that. They did two, three shows together over several years of working together. Did not manage to produce believable chemistry as a pair.

Ben

I'm not keen on it.

NiNi

OK, so here's what I'm gonna say.

Ben

Go ahead, bestie.

NiNi

I have been wrong about all of their recent projects. I haven't watched any really old things or stuff since he left GMMTV, but in terms of Be My Favorite, in terms of Cooking Crush, in terms of Cherry Magic Thailand, I have been wrong. And so I am willing to give any new KristSingto project a shot.

Shan

Oh I'm going to watch it. If they make it, I'm going to watch it. I need to know.

Ben

It's not about whether or not we're going to watch it.

Shan

Yeah.

NiNi

[laughs] They're all like, ‘oh, no, we're watching it! Nobody said we weren't gonna watch it.’ [laughs]

Shan

We will be watching it and we will be having takes! That is what we will be doing. I continue to be skeptical about the two of them being able to generate believable chemistry together. Maybe they could do a show that's not a BL. Maybe they could try that.

Ben

I won't watch that, that's for sure! [Shan laughs]

NiNi

We're talking about OG to new G. Maybe we could do some mix-match merry-go-round with Perth and Chimon.

Shan

I'd be OK with that!

Ben

Oh my god.

NiNi

Get some new pairings out of it.

Ben

There are no more—I—why are we giving Perth and Chimon another ch—Why would you bring them up in this conversation?

NiNi

Mix match merry go round! Mix up the pairs! Maybe they'll work better with other people.

Shan

I think Krist and Singto both need to be paired with strong screen partners who can bring that chemistry piece, because neither of them is particularly good at it on their own, and together it just doesn't happen. I don't know how much of this we should even allow to air. We're going to get shot by their fans.

Ben

I do not care about them. You can be mad.

NiNi

I don’t care [laughs].

Shan

What is their fandom called?

NiNi

It's Peraya.

Shan

Peraya that's right.

NiNi

Peraya ask me how I know. I don't know how. I know. I just pick up these things by osmosis.

Shan

I am not a Peraya. I want this to be very clear.

Ben

I am not either.

NiNi

But like, OK, so we've established that Perth needs a good lead and Chimon needs a good follow, and Krist is, I think, a better follow than a lead, and Singto is a better lead than I think a follow. So maybe they mix them up, maybe they get something good out of it.

Ben

Mm, anyway. So. [laughs]

NiNi

Y'all are mean to my baby Perth and I'm not having it.

Shan

NiNi I appreciate the spirit of this brainstorm. I think it's worth a try [laughs]

Ben

I don't. [laughs]

NiNi

Perth, if you ever listen to this, don't listen to the mean people. It's OK. I love you.

Ben

Look, I love Perth. But it's not been a good year for him. I'm sorry, baby boy.

Shan

I think it's been very cool, though, sincerely, to see the OGs come back around. I like that we're no longer saying [laughs] that BL is a young man's game, you gotta get out when you turn 30. I like that we're letting some of GMMTV's older talent headline these shows and that we're getting some shows about adults. That's all super welcome, and I think it's really nice too, to see pairs like Tay and New and Off and Gun, who are real veterans with handling all of this stuff around making BLs together—handling the BGP, handling all of the fan attention, they do it with a lot of grace and very professionally, in a way that I think is helpful to see a model for for some of the younger pairs. 

I think it's helpful for fans also to be reminded of how they should engage with actors who are doing their job when they're making these shows. GMMTV is going to continue to dominate Thai BL for the foreseeable future, so I think it's good that they're bringing these veterans back and doing good work with them.

Ben

I agree. I think OffGun and TayNew have been on the forefront of the development of Thai BGP for a long time, and it's really good to see them seem confident and comfortable about it at this point. Both of these pairs have had some negative experiences with fan behavior, so. I'm very glad that those two pairs were able to continue working together, continue to make projects together, and in this particular case, deliver two of the most satisfying viewing experiences we've had in the last three to four months. I'm pleased.

Shan

They killed it. Amazing work.

NiNi

I, too, am pleased. I wasn't in the OG thing. I wasn't shooting with y'all in the gym then, but I'm here now and what I saw this time around I truly enjoyed. I'm never going to be a babii. I'm not going to be a a polca. I'm never going to be a peraya. I'm just not a fan like that. I fan, I don't stan, I always say, except for, [laughs] you know, the large ones.

Shan

For a couple exceptions.

NiNi

Except for the bigguns. The pillars thing has always been like the super weird thing for me, and this is the first experience that I've had with it that it wasn't weird and slightly creepy for me, which I truly enjoyed. So yeah, good job, boys. Excellent work, 10 out of 10, no notes. 

So, that is going to wrap us up on our pillars episode: we out! Say bye to the people, Shan.

Shan

Goodbye people.

NiNi

Ben, say bye to the people.

Ben

Peace!

[magical-wishies]

To love or not to love, that is the questio-

Ok whoops wrong reference. Happy Valentine's Day everyone! I made a MV of the song "Darling Dance" by Kairiki Bear featuring my favourite little tricksters for the occasion!

I'd rather you go straight to Youtube to watch it because Tumblr always finds a way to cut the quality, lol.

Eng subtitles are available too!

Here it is! Hope you enjoy my pride and joy. Basically like a hopeful child but in video format. Reblogs are specially appreciated because Youtube sucks at promoting new channels!

This also acts as a behind-the-scenes post, so let's get straight into that, shall we?

MV Project 1 "Darling Dance"

Illustration time: 37 hours

Editing time: Approx. 30-35 hours

Total: 70 hours

*Cough* Holy freakin' moly does making an MV take so long. Before you roll off your bed, I'll say that part of the reason making the art took so long was because I have trouble drawing Marx consistently.

Here's some unused assets! Look at them, they're all salty over not making the cut.

In all seriousness though, a lot of times I don't really see a lot of editors/ MV makers getting appreciation for their efforts. And now that I've personally experienced making an MV for the first time, it's also increased my admiration to the people who dedicate their time to this! All the kudos to them.

Now, I'll go scene by scene then comment along the way! Spoilers ahead!

Verse 1

Pretty good for what it is. In the first image, you see that heart behind Magolor? I discovered the motion of it on complete accident lol. Capcut is hard to figure out..

I also really like the color palette of 2nd image. That art of Marx was the last one I did during production (aka I drew it this morning), and just look at him. He's such a bastard he's the best.

Pre Chorus 1

Mmmm yeah it sure is the pre chorus! I put a bar behind the text in the middle because I didn't want people to stare into their soulless eyes for too long. That probably worked!

1st Chorus

When I first added in the expression change, I fangirled over it a little on the first rewatch. Like, come on! They suddenly look mischievous, and the color change on the background! I know I drew it but still!

For the rest, I experimented a little with all the "Nah"s! I think it ended up well. Most of the lyric editing in this MV is completely original, so I had a couple of things to try out!

Verse 2

This song is horrifically outdated because it says Twitter instead of X!! (/sarcasm)

This scene is my second favourite. I'm really proud of the details on the tabs and the editing at the beginning! Wish I could put more images but the app only allows ten. Bummer.

Pre Chorus 2

I think it's cute, and I used it as my pfp on YouTube! That's about it though.. image limit is killing me I can't put anything here :(

Chorus 2

...Not gonna spoil it! I like how I drew them, but there ain't anything notable. Unless you look at the last image I put right before the bridge. :)

Bridge

This is where my editing comes in freakin' clutch. Ooooooh it's so satisfying to look at. Chef's kiss. Also those Marxs (Marxes?) are really cute.

The second part of the bridge is nice as well! I tried to make the lyrics snap to the rhythm. Glad I added that tv effect in the bg too!

Chorus 3

This scene is my favourite! Wanna know why?

This sequence right here. I think I will etch it into my brain forever... I love me some snappy editing. Like a lot. Like a lot a lot!

The second part of the chorus is like the original song's MV! I loved the hearts popping in and out whoever thought of that is a genius. Putting it into the MV was a good decision!

And that's a wrap! Hope you enjoy the MV as much as I enjoyed making it. And, stay tuned for next time! I have a feeling a certain jester is getting his own solo MV...

Feel free to leave your thoughts either in the Youtube comments section or here. See you around!

[munson-blurbs]

hiii i've gone through your whole masterlist and i'm obsessed with your works <333 an idea popped into my head and i just know you'll be able to bring it to justice because you're so talented hehe would you be down to write a friends to lovers fic about grooms man!eddie x bridesmaid!reader, like maybe it's nancy and steve's wedding, and everyone in the party just teases them like "oh so are you guys gonna be the next ones to get married" just so they'll admit their feelings to each othee once and for all hahaha sorry if it's too specific! love you <333

Eep this was so fun!

Warnings: some angst, language

WC: 2.6k

Divider credit to @firefly-graphics

“There we go.” You gently weave the clip of Nancy’s veil into her hair, fluffing the tulle so it brushes her shoulders. “Nance, you look stunning.” Her curly hair is perfectly coiffed, falling in soft waves. Her dress is classic and elegant; an off-the-shoulder bodice with a full skirt. Even her makeup is perfect, with eyeshadow shimmering on her lids, lips painted a soft baby pink.

“Seriously,” Robin agrees as she hands the rest of the bridesmaids their bouquets. “Steve is gonna lose his mind when he sees you walk down that aisle.”

Max pipes up from behind her. “I’ve started taking bets on how long it’ll take him to start blubbering.” 

“Personally, I think it’ll be as soon as he hears the music,” Holly adds, smirking. This makes everyone giggle, and no one can disagree. 

Once the laughter dies down, Nancy beams, looking at her bridal party. “I can’t thank you girls enough for everything you’ve done to make this day so special.” Her voice breaks on the last word, and maid of honor Robin dashes over with a tissue.

“Don’t cry! You’ll smudge your makeup!” she warns, contorting her face at her own words. “God, I sound like such a priss!”

“Yeah, but you’re my priss,” Nancy teases, carefully dabbing at the corners of her eyes. She turns to you with a smile. “Y/N, could you go see if the guys are ready? I have this fear that one of them is gonna show up missing a tie or a shoe or something.”

“I’m also taking bets on that,” Max calls out. “My money’s on Mike.”

You take Nancy’s hand and give it a little squeeze. “No problem. I’ll make sure everyone is fully dressed.” 

She thanks you and pulls you in for a hug. “I’m so glad the gods of dorm assignments made us roommates,” she says as she lets you go. It seems like ages ago that you’d lugged your suitcases into the tiny dorm room your freshman year of college, greeted by the shy girl with big dreams of being a New York Times editor. The two of you had become fast friends, writing papers and cramming for exams together. After college, both of you had landed jobs at The Indianapolis Star, and the shared experience of being women in journalism had only brought you closer.

It had also brought you closer to Nancy’s friends from high school, many of whom were in the wedding party.

You rap on the door to the groom’s suite three times. “Is everyone decent?” you ask, pushing open the door slightly.

“10-4, we’re good to go!” Dustin’s voice calls back. He’s been taking his best man duties seriously–perhaps too seriously–since Steve first asked him to take on the role. You walk into the room and squeal with excitement at the guys in their tuxedos.

“You all look so handsome!” you gush. “Just wait until you see your bride, Steve. She looks even more beautiful than usual.”

Steve smiles, already blinking back tears. You’ll have to report back to Max that he didn’t even make it to the chapel before crying.

A clamoring comes from inside the restroom. “Stupid tie; won’t stay straight!” Eddie Munson grumbles, flinging open the door in frustration. “Does anyone here know how to–whoa.” He stops mid-sentence when he notices you in your lilac dress, accessory woes all but forgotten. 

“Need some help?” you offer politely, trying to calm your nerves at the prospect of being so close to him. Eddie just nods, and you pray that he doesn’t notice your trembling fingers as you adjust his tie. “There; now it’s perfect.”

“Thanks,” he mumbles. “You, um, you look really…wow.” He blushes as he trips over his words. He’d been shy around you ever since you’d moved to Indiana after college two years earlier, but he’s never been this tongue-tied. Probably just nervous about the wedding, you think, shrugging it off.

“Good wow, I hope,” you tease, finding yourself unable to make eye contact with him. His gray suit is fitted to his body and his usually unruly hair is pulled back into a low bun. If it wasn’t for the signature rings adorning his fingers, the D20 cufflinks, and the guitar pick necklace peeking out from under his shirt, you might not even recognize him.

“Y-yeah, of course!” He rushes, shoving his hands in his pockets. 

You blush at the compliment. “Well, you look very wow, yourself.” He looks more than wow; he’s downright gorgeous, but you can’t bring yourself to say it. Especially in front of a crowd.

“Okay, lovebirds, save it for your own wedding,” Dustin jeers with a roll of his eyes. “We gotta start lining up.” He reads out the pairs:Mike with Holly, Lucas with Max…and Eddie with you. 

You loop your arm through Eddie’s, waiting your turn to walk down the aisle. Steve and Dustin are already at the altar; the former has tears streaming down his cheeks, and Nancy hasn’t even started walking with her father yet.

“He’s such a mess,” Eddie whispers to you, making you laugh.

“Careful,” you warn jokingly, “you might be the same way at your wedding.” Your heart skips a beat when you imagine him in Steve’s spot; only instead of Nancy, you’re the bride.

You and Eddie part once you make your way to the front of the chapel; he takes his place next to Mike and you take yours alongside Holly. Everyone stands when Nancy enters, and you find yourself nearly as emotional as Steve. Her eyes are glued to her groom, and she can’t seem to stop smiling. 

Your gaze briefly shifts to the groomsmen, and you’re taken aback when you realize Eddie’s looking back at you. He notices the tears brimming in your eyes and quickly pokes his tongue between his lips to make you laugh. You mirror his action and he grins, looking down at the ground before he gets caught causing mischief. 

The ceremony is simple and sweet, with Nancy and Steve reading handwritten vows. After promising to love and cherish one another forever, the minister pronounces them husband and wife, and all the guests burst into applause. 

Steve places a deep, passionate kiss on his new wife’s lips, and the recessional starts. You hook your arm around Eddie’s once more and head to the cocktail hour. 

Nancy grabs you as soon as you enter the sunlit room. “Can you help me with my bustle?” she asks sheepishly. “This dress feels like it weighs a hundred pounds!”

You nod emphatically, ignoring your growling stomach. You really worked up an appetite being a bridesmaid. “Of course, Mrs. Harrington,” you say with a smile. 

You’re kneeling on the ground of the bridal suite, determined to hook the loop around the buttons dotting the back of Nancy’s dress, when you hear a knock on the door.

“Special delivery!” Eddie’s voice alone makes you blush. Nancy, always astute, catches your pink cheeks in the mirror and makes kissy faces. You swat at her playfully.

“Come in, we’re decent!” you call back, and he enters with a plate of hors d'oeuvres. 

He extends the plate out between the two of you. “Figured you ladies might be hungry,” he says. Nancy grabs a mini quiche, but you don’t want to get grease on your hands while touching her pristine white dress.

“You can just leave the plate there,” you tell him politely, jutting your head toward a nearby table. “I’ll have some when I’m done with this.”

Eddie shakes his head. “Nuh-uh. Max told me you’ve barely eaten anything all day, and I’m not waiting for you to faint. Really cuts into our dancing time if you’re unconscious, y’know?” He pinches a mushroom cap between two fingers and motions to your mouth. “How’s it?”

“Delicious,” you report. “Hit me with another.”

He laughs and obliges. This time, his fingers gently graze your lips, and you have to stop yourself from visibly shivering. 

“Thank you,” you say softly, retreating into yourself after the accidentally intimate moment. 

“Not a problem,” Eddie replies, unfazed by the ordeal. “Anything else I can help with?”

“I think we’re good here!” You finish fastening the bustle triumphantly, and Nancy breathes a sigh of relief now that she no longer has to drag the long train.

Eddie nods and steals a bacon-wrapped scallop from the plate. “I’ll see you two out there, then,” he says, but he’s only looking at you.

With Eddie safely on the other side of the door, Nancy looks at you with her arms folded across her bodice. “Now do you believe us when we say he’s in love with you?”

You bark out a laugh. “Because he brought a plate of food? It was for you, too. Is he also harboring a secret crush on you?”

“He didn’t feed it to me,” she shrugs, giving a knowing smirk. “And he didn’t mention dancing with me, either. Only you. And the way he looks at you? Come on, Y/N.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you mutter. “Let’s just get you to your husband.” You can’t let yourself develop stronger feelings towards Eddie. You’ve been through this before–everyone convinces you that a guy likes you, you let yourself get attached, and then your heart gets broken when he inevitably starts dating someone else or says he only sees you as a friend. No, that can’t happen again.

The band plays song after song as you and your friends dance the night away. Robin, four shots of tequila deep, starts a conga line to Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance with Somebody.” Between the endless barrage of photo taking and the sheer happiness radiating through you, your cheeks hurt from smiling.

Eddie’s among the group of you on the dance floor, laughing and moving along to the beat. This is probably what he meant by ‘our dancing time,’ you think; to your dismay, you’re disappointed by this realization. You could, in theory, ask him to dance to a slow song–it is 1992, after all–but you can’t stomach the idea of him rejecting you. Or worse–taking pity on you.

“Having fun?” Max shouts over the music, and you give her a thumbs-up. “How about you?” she asks Eddie, who’s sulking now that the band is playing some overdone Madonna song.

“Would be better if we could get these guys to do some Metallica or Black Sabbath,” he jokes, although you suspect there’s some truth to his statement.

Max rolls her eyes and says, “Don’t worry; you can have a metal band play when you and Y/N get married.” Your eyes widen at her brazenness, and you try your best to be inconspicuous as you shuffle back to your seat.

“Y/N!” Max calls after you. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.” Her cheeks are flushed, though it may be from the drinking and dancing.

“‘S not just that,” you mumble, slumping into your seat. “Sure, it’s embarrassing; but it’s also…I don’t wanna get my hopes up.”

“Get your hopes up?”

“Yeah, get my hopes up that…that he feels the same way about me.” You feel your voice warble, and you take a deep breath to quell your emotions.

“Are you kidding?” Max asks incredulously. “Eddie is pathetically obsessed with you; it’s so obvious.”

“Then why hasn’t he asked me out? We’ve known each other for two years, Max. Two years. And he can make me feel like the most special person in the world, but he never makes a move.”

Max is uncharacteristically quiet for a moment, chewing on a painted fingernail. “You didn’t know Eddie back in high school,” she starts, “but he’s basically spent his entire life being rejected, especially by girls.” She sits down next to you and rests her palm on your knee. “He asked this one girl to prom–a cheerleader–because he thought she was into him. And maybe she was, I don’t know. But her ex-boyfriend ‘won her back’ the day before they were supposed to go together, and she left Eddie in the dust.”

“That’s…that’s terrible,” you manage, a bitter taste settling on your tongue. “I had no idea…”

“He’s told us a hundred times that he wants to ask you out. He has all these plans: dinner and a movie, or a concert; one time, he even thought of taking you to a cooking class because you mentioned how you went to one in college and really liked it.” She snorts at the idea of Eddie using a stove without burning the place to the ground. “But every time, he second guesses himself and chickens out. And every time, we give him shit for it.”

“So what do I do?” You gnaw at your bottom lip anxiously, looking at her through your lashes. 

Max pauses, considering her options. “Wait here,” she says finally, bolting from the table and making a beeline to Lucas and Dustin. She whispers something to them, and they nod in unison. You watch as Dustin sprints outside, where Eddie is smoking a cigarette. Lucas talks to the band, who is in between songs. They’re nodding their heads and discussing something, and Lucas looks satisfied when he hops down from the stage.

Your pout softens when you hear the opening notes of “Nothing Else Matters” by Metallica. You glance over at Eddie, who is making his way towards you with a shy smile on his face. When he gets to your seat, he extends his hand.

“Can I have this dance?” he asks. You can see in his eyes that he’s nervous, maybe even more so than you.

“Of course you can,” you reply, taking his hand and joining him on the dance floor. You drape your left hand over his shoulder and his places his on your waist as the two of you sway to the music.

“It’s come to my attention that I’m an idiot,” he hums in your ear. “And that there’s someone really, really important to me that I’ve been hurting, and I didn’t even know it.”

You shake your head, hair tickling his face. “‘S not your fault,” you tell him. “I could’ve said something, too.”

“That is very true,” he teases, twirling you gently. “Maybe we can be idiots together?”

“I’d think we’d better, considering everyone’s already started planning our wedding,” you joke back. “Although I’d prefer to start with a date.”

Eddie holds you closer, pressing a light kiss to your nose. “I think that can be arranged.”

The two of you dance in comfortable silence, just holding one another. You rest your head on his chest, breathing in the scent of musky cologne and cigarettes. You feel so safe, so loved, with his strong hand holding the small of your back. “Hey, Eddie?” you murmur.

“Mhm?”

You shift your body slightly so you can look at him. His dark brown eyes are focused on you and you alone. He runs his tongue along his lower lip, and his jaw twitches slightly with nerves.

With all of the courage you can muster, you lean in and kiss him, wrapping your arms around his neck. He pulls you impossibly closer, resting a hand on your cheek and caressing it with his thumb.

“Can’t believe I waited this long to do that,” he muses. “I really am an idiot.”

“I don’t know what’s more unbelievable: Eddie Munson kissing me, or Eddie Munson in a tux.” You laugh and kiss him again.

“Well, you’d better get used to the first one,” he says with a smirk. “But the second one isn’t happening again until our wedding.”

[araekniarchive]

i'm moving!

hi all :)) it's been a little while since i've been very active on this blog, and whilst a good chunk of that is chronic illness/job related, another big part is that i've been really struggling with my own tagging systems, to the point it feels like work just to reblog something properly. this is primarily because the theme tagging system for this blog evolved as i did, and a lot of the tags i used to use on her became superfluous, or repeated, and despite how many i have i still struggled to find stuff!

in addition to that, because of the way the tumblr editor used to work, the way i added images to posts would randomly add blank image descriptions to the pictures that just said 'image' and i couldn't change them, which made the webs look very ugly on mobile and also inaccessible to people using screenreaders or with sight issues on any browser, which is the opposite of what i wanted. thankfully, this has now been fixed for new webs, but is unfixable on the older webs which is a real bummer :(

so, a couple of weeks ago i randomly decided to do something about it. and i did! a few of you have noticed that a new blog, @otheraraekni, has been reblogging some of my webs and adding image descriptions in the reblogs, but i've also been remaking some webs as well with the alt text finally working as intended. i've made a new navigation page for my blog organisation, full of some tags i've kept, some i've slightly changed, and a whole new kind of tags for those i use most often. currently all the links on there will lead to this blog (so some of them will lead nowhere, as they may be new tags) but my intention is to switch urls.

so -- moving? in a day or so (once i've got the last kinks worked out) i will be turning my otheraraekni blog into araekni, and this blog into an archive. because araekni is a sideblog, i don't really have the option to just attach it to an old email and set it adrift, and i'm hoping not to have to get notifications from it forever, so in a month or so it will be deleted.

why a month? hopefully that will give everyone time to save any webs they like from this blog that i haven't decided to move over to what will be the new araekni! obviously, a good portion of the followers on this blog are from a couple of years ago when i was posting webs much more regularly, and i am not at all expecting the new blog to reach the same level of popularity as this one did, but if anybody would like to follow the new blog this is your chance :) i'll queue this post a couple dozen times so as many people as possible see it, but if you don't wish to follow me over there, please know how much i have loved keeping this blog over the years and how wonderful of an experience it has been <3

[spotsandsocks]

Something Worth Staying For

🥳Happy Birthday to the wonderful creative supportive @cowboy-buddie who makes this fandom so much fun for me. Love ya Kels Please accept this little gift, my attempt at an enemies to friends to lovers AU. 5 chapters 1 coming at you everyday (so I have time to finish the last chapter🤣)

Chapter 1 2.4K Read on AO3

Living in a small town wasn’t for everyone but Eddie liked it. When he and Chris had settled here he hadn’t been sure but slowly the place had gotten under his skin and now he was as good as a local. Well almost, Chim still called him cowboy sometimes, but Eddie had decided ignoring that was the best plan and it had mostly worked. Chim only called him that these days when he wanted to be particularly annoying. Not that he doesn’t love Chim, the man has become like his brother. In fact he’s built a small family for himself and Chris here. It turns out taking a job at a small town newspaper was the best idea he’s had in years. He’s never quite gotten over the surprise of his new boss, the paper’s editor waiting for him with his wife outside Eddie’s new front door on the day they arrived.

Bobby and Athena had been there from the start ready with a home cooked meal for their first night in town, helping them unpack, and essentially making him and Chris feel more welcome than Eddie had ever expected when he’d nervously said yes to a fresh start  and moved himself and his son halfway across the country after his divorce was finalized. 

Now he’s made a home here and has an extended family he loves dearly. It’s almost perfect. Except, he does get a little lonely sometimes, Chris is getting older and  when he’s busy and Eddie’s all alone in his house he sometimes wishes that he had someone to share his life with, he’d dated a few of the women in town but nothing had clicked. Not that he was especially bothered by the failure, he hadn’t actually really liked any of them but it would be nice to have someone special.

He’s been here almost three years now and it seems pretty unlikely that he’s going to find his dream partner, after all what are the chances of the  perfect person just turning up in Eagle Creek one day and being interested in a thirty year old single dad holding down a quiet job writing local news stories for a small town paper. 

“Eddie?”

Eddie looks up and takes a breath. 

Whatever he’d been expecting when Bobby said his name it wasn’t to see the man standing next to him. He’s tall, well built to say the least, with sandy hair which might have been blonde or brown depending on the light, and extremely blue eyes. There’s a mark of some kind over his left eye and he wonders if it’s a bruise or something more permanent. It doesn’t diminish the man’s good looks in fact in Eddie’s opinion it enhances them. Frankly he’s gorgeous. Eddie knows he finds men as attractive if not more attractive at times than women but he’s never particularly felt the urge to investigate where those thoughts could take him. He’s not a casual kind of guy and the trouble with gorgeous people is they so very often know it and in his personal (and relatively limited) experience that does very little for their personality. 

This  guy is so pretty he’s probably a complete jerk. 

Despite those warning bells as they  look at each other the stranger smiles and Eddie can’t help how his eyes flick down then back up again almost immediately, it's a nice smile. A little shy, almost sweet even. The guy isn’t giving off any particularly arrogant jackass vibes. Eddie wants to but he doesn’t let himself look again, turning his head to focus on Bobby instead.  Actually the new guy looks a lot like Bobby, maybe he’s his nephew or something, just visiting. 

Eddie returns his boss and friend’s smile, feeling strangely apprehensive for some reason. Maybe it’s because Bobby looks guilty. Eddie recognises the slightly shifty expression on the older man’s face. What has he done?

He finds out quickly.

“Eddie this is um, Buck. He’s uh…  he’s going to be working here.” Bobby won’t look at him and is rubbing his hand across his chin nervously. 

Well that’s unexpected. Eddie can’t help the sudden sharp furrow of surprise and suspicion on his brow. Bobby hadn’t mentioned anything about someone new. Do they really need someone new? Eddie hadn’t thought so in fact he’s mildly irritated by the news. Why hadn’t he been told? He looks at this ‘Buck’ person again with fresh eyes. Maybe he does look like a bit of a jerk after all. 

Jerk or not he’s still ridiculously good looking and Eddie can just imagine the stir someone who looks like Buck is going to cause in town. Nightmare, he can expect a stream of people asking him for the new guy at the paper’s number. Urgh... Just what he needs.

Bobby’s still talking, “so Buck is gonna be helping with some stuff, improvements I guess you could call it.”

Blue eyes sparkle and the man beams.  What kind of name is Buck anyway?   And really who needs to be that handsome, it’s just excessive. And wait did Eddie just hear Bobby say improvements? A sinking feeling hits him, oh no,  he didn’t actually do it did he? Bobby’s been threatening to do something about the computers since before Eddie arrived, surely he hasn’t finally done it has he?

The scowl on Eddie’s face deepens and he fails to notice the smile slipping from his new colleague’s face.

“Buck and his sister have just moved here, Maddie’s a nurse and Buck here is…” Bobby pauses and Eddie’s suspicions grow. Bobby can’t quite meet his eye. Yeah he has a bad feeling about this, there can only be one reason Bobby’s springing this on him now. Only one thing this guy is here to do. 

Still looking anywhere than at him, Bobby takes a breath and reveals Buck’s role  at the paper.

“Well Buck here, he’s well, he’s a bit of a computer whizz and kind of a social media consultant.” He says those three words quickly and moves on. “He’s going to upgrade our IT, get us online and run the “socials.” Bobby  glances  proudly at Buck for getting the word right. 

Eddie doesn’t register the responding shy and pleased smile from the younger man all he notices are the air quotes dropping in around ‘Socials’ 

The word is unfamiliar and unwelcome on Bobby's lips. Frankly he feels a little betrayed, why hasn’t he been told? He bets Karen knew  which means Hen knew and that means Chimney does as well. They’ve all probably been very  amused about how badly he’ll take it. He also thought Bobby felt the same way about the perils of the internet as he did. It’s not that he can’t use it. He has a smart phone, he can download apps just fine thank you and while it’s a running joke around here that Eddie doesn’t ‘do’ technology he’s not actually an idiot. If he wants to, he can use computers just fine, he’ll accept that the internet is vaguely useful and if he wanted to have ‘socials’ he would. He just doesn’t choose to because it stupid and pointless and you can’t really trust the internet,  no one's ever been able to convince him his phone isn’t listening to him.

Buck draws his attention back from Bobby when he speaks for the first time with what Eddie considers an unnecessarily smug quirk of his mouth,  “I’m here to drag you all into the 21st century.”

“I’m fine where I am, thank you.” His voice sounds cold even to himself.

Despite glaring at new guy he catches Bobby's wince out of the corner of his eye. He knows he sounds positively hostile but he’s annoyed. The newest member of the team obviously recognises that too because the smile vanishes.

Eddie doesn’t feel bad for being unwelcoming. Not even a little bit.

Bobby sighs wearily, “This is why I didn’t tell you. You know we need to modernize. It’ll be good for us. We can reach more people, be faster, it’ll make things easier for everyone.”

Bobby pauses obviously hoping for something back. He doesn’t get it so he just shrugs, “It’s going to happen Eddie .”

“You’re the boss Bobby.” There that was neutral, mostly.

Eddie stands, avoiding eye contact with both men. “I’m going out to get lunch.” 

He doesn’t offer to get anything for anyone, which he knows is rude but he doesn’t care much right now..

Eddie lets the door behind him slam on his way out.

Bobby sighs dramatically next to him as  Buck keeps his expression as blank as he can; that did not go well. That went very badly indeed.

“That was actually ok, I was worried he’d take it worse.” 

Buck turns slowly to stare at his new boss a little incredulously. Bobby thinks that went well? Shit how bad does this Eddie guy get?

When they’d walked in Buck had been taken aback by the man sitting behind the desk. His dark hair and soft brown eyes had looked inviting for a moment. He’d smiled softly and something had tripped and fluttered in his chest. He was a damn attractive man and then when he’d started scowling at him well Buck’s always liked a challenge but he’s not stupid. He knows instant dislike when he sees it.

It’s too bad he would have liked to have made a friend. At least he has Maddie to keep him company.

“He’s not particularly friendly is he?” 

Bobby chuckles dryly,  “He is, once you get to know him. He’s a really great guy.  I think you too could be good friends.” Another sigh as Bobby looks towards the door,  “It’s my fault, I did surprise him. I’ve been putting off telling him about you. it’s just  he really does hate computers.”

Buck arches an eyebrow at the door the hot angry man had just walked out of.

“I can tell.”

“Whoah man! Mind my door.”

Chimney looks up from behind the counter where he’s just finished pouring a coffee. 

“What’s got you all twisty.”

Eddie glowers at him, “Nothing, just come for my lunch. Is that a crime?”

“Delightful mood I see?”  Karen’s voice floats over from where she’s working on her laptop at one of Chimney’s tables.

He turns, as expected she’s staring  at him, unimpressed. She fixes him with a penetrating stare which he avoids. He’s very aware he’s in a bad mood and she should know why,  after all everyone else has been told. 

He can’t help the snap in his voice, “So why aren’t you in the office to greet our new colleague.”

Karen’s eyebrows lift eloquently. He knows she knows but will she admit it?  God he’s annoyed. He doesn’t really know why he’s so upset either. Except maybe there was a moment when he looked into blue eyes that he’d felt something only to have it washed away by Bobby’s words and his rush of irritation.

Karen sips her latte coolly, “I’m a free spirit Diaz, I go wherever I want and right now I want to be here because I like it here, I get to see my wife and she brings me coffee and I get to eat Chimney’s pastries. 

She pauses and looks at him with far too much insight.

“So he’s here then.”

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Chim retreat.  

He knew, she knew! Everyone but him, his irritation rises again, he can just imagine it don’t tell Eddie, he’ll freak out! He’ll make a fuss.

He ignores the tiny voice inside him saying 'and were they wrong? You’re not exactly winning employee of the month right now are you?' He ignores that and  lets the comforting haze of indignation wash over him. 

“So you did know! Charming.” Karen’s admission really does nothing to improve his mood.

Karen rolls her eyes at  him. “Oooh you really are in a snit aren’t you? Poor guy can’t have upset you already. He’s not even been here a day.”

“And…” she says with a waggle of her finger “you can’t blame Bobby for putting it off. Every time he’s so much as mentioned going online you pull a face.” She nods at him, “Yeah that one.”

 He quickly wipes the expression away,  “and you sulk for at least a day.”

“I do not.”

Another voice joins in, “You do.”

Chimney’s contribution is as unwelcome as this ‘Buck’ back at his office is.

However Chimney is as resistant to his glaring as Karen is. 

“Ok so maybe I do a bit,” he admits it reluctantly “But we don’t need to go online and we certainly don’t need that guy.”

“I’ve heard he is very good at his job annnnnd…” Karen adds nonchalantly, getting somewhere close to the hidden heart of his discomfort  “I’ve seen his picture, online , “ he throws her yet another narrow eyed glare for that jibe “and if I wasn’t a happily married lesbian I’d say he’s hot. He’s going to be a popular boy round here!” 

She laughs at the noise he makes.

“He’s not that good looking” he lies because he can, “and I don’t have to like him.”

Karen stands up folding her laptop as she does. She looks more serious, teasing gone. 

“No you don’t but you do have to work with him. And the poor guy’s not done anything wrong.”

He hangs onto his resentment justified or not, he’s no longer so sure, and answers with a single surly word and sits down.

“Yet.” 

“Eddie,” Karen sighs his name, “You’re being unreasonable and you know it.”

“Perhaps I like being unreasonable.” He leans back in his chair and folds his arms then unfolds them because it looks too defensive and he doesn’t want to prove her right.

Karen shakes her head, “Go play nice with the new kid or Bobby will put you in time out.”

Eddie ignores her. He’s not sure why but this Buck guy is already under his skin. 

Karen moves towards the door, “I’m going to go meet him, you’ll be back soon right?” 

He mutters “Sure” and accepts the warning look he gets from his friend. “I’ll be polite, promise.”

He can be polite to this new guy, he is  a professional  after all and it’ll be fine. He probably won’t have  too much to do with him anyway. 

Eddie waits for his order and wonders how annoying can one guy be? 

[cyle]

Hey, I saw you're talking to users about this dash change, and thanks for that. I am admittedly part of the big no reaction going on, and for me, part of the problem is that as an autistic user of this site having this change forced on me suddenly, while I was in the middle of using it, actually sent me into a panic because I could not process what had happened. So I've got two questions that you may or may not be able to answer.

First, the saving grace of the new text editor was making it so I could opt in at first and it wasn't forced. I could use it at my pace and adjust to it, why not do something like that with this? Or even give a better warning for it than 1 tiny little paragraph on a blog that not everyone follows?

Second, if I have suggestions that would make this layout more comfortable for me to use where can I send them and is it even worth it?

hey, i'm really really sorry that we elicited that reaction.

it's bad how we roll out changes like this, and how every platform rolls out changes in an experiment: suddenly and without warning. the nature of A/B testing is to introduce shock, in a way, and see what happens. that's so, so, so bad for tumblr, because our audience does skew towards people who won't respond well to that shock. we really pride ourselves in being a home for people who don't want that from other platforms, and in situations like this, we're totally failing you.

the unfortunate counter-point, though, is that providing opt-in choice creates selection bias when we want to understand how a change would truly (statistically) change behavior across hundreds of thousands or millions of people. that's a huge, bad, glaring problem with how the internet operates at scale today: we try to solve for the many instead of the few, in the name of growth or profit. nobody is comfortable with that fact.

as for suggestions, please please send them to Support as feedback. we want your feedback, and it's worth it. we read all of it.

there's probably somebody out there who is working in statistics who can solve the problem of selection bias and experimenting at scale... i can't wait for that day to come. it'll make the world better for all of us.

[corpsepng]

Pls make a list of books you recommend to aspiring writers<3

Ok. Aspiring/burgeoning writer starter kit:

In writing anything you officially become a writer so that’s step one haha, no need to aspire too much. BUT. I’m going to soapbox for a bit using this ask as an excuse love u kissing u etc. So. This will barely be about books, but sort of the recipe of what I (personally and subjectively) think will help anyone who wants to grow their craft. (I know because I've been writing seriously for 14 years)

The act of writing is the best practice you can get but having a well from which to draw on creatively and skill wise in order to DO that practice is the trickier part. And sometimes we can be found lacking because we’re either NOT refilling that well enough, consciously enough, or only with the same sorts of things so it gets stagnant. This is a long one so I’ll shove it under the cut haha.

The recipe:

Study craft

Broaden horizons 

Diversify consumption

Consume with intention

Apply with reference

1) Study craft: this is the easiest to make sense of, right? I want to get good at writing so I read books about writing yada yada. Whatever you’re writing, it’s made up of a lot of moving parts, and you can dedicate time studying EACH PART, but figure out what you have the least experience with, or the most difficulty with, and start there. Also, before I go on to preach about why you shouldn’t solely stake your growth on some dusty old books, here’s some dusty old books I recommend:

The Elements of Style (strunk/white/kalman) (really quick and abbreviated advice, read every bit of this but remember: rules are important to know so you can decide which are worth following and which are in need of breaking for the pursuit of your goals. And nobodies perfect, or editors wouldn’t have a job)

Bird by Bird (Anne Lamott) (excellent work about fostering a process, important for everyone who finds themselves a little lost on how to just. Start)

Wonderbook (Jeff Vandermeer) (I haven’t read this one but knowing Vandermeers work this is on my TBR and I KNOW it’s going to be enlightening)

How to Read Literature like a Professor (Thomas C. Foster) (perfect for those who can see others stories working but unsure how to make their own work, I personally didn’t read much of this one but this will help people to more critically engage with what they’re consuming)

Save the Cat Writes a Novel/Joseph Campbells Hero’s Journey/On Writing and Worldbuilding/etc (all of these are on structure and craft in a concrete sense), I would recommend either choose one OR getting the abbreviated/digestible versions through YouTube because a lot of these can repeat themselves. I’m working on a playlist of writing craft/structure videos that I found helpful, so keep an eye out for that)

So. Studying craft should be a multidisciplinary process. Articles online, videos on niche media, books on craft or copying things from your favorites, looking for yourself in the movies you watch or fiction you read. Punctuation, prose, structure, rhetoric, character, world building, pacing, etc. Unfortunately, no matter how seasoned you become as a writer, you will always be learning new things about the craft itself.

It should be fun and I honestly feel like an enlightened little scientist when I see something that really cracks the open the magic for me (ex: scenes that serve more than one purpose are OF COURSE going to be more engaging that scenes with only one purpose- duh) (of COURSE magic systems should have a cost) (of COURSE the characters cant always win OR always lose)

2) Broaden horizons: consuming fiction and studying it is key to knowing how to reproduce it. We start with the training wheels of imitation before we ride away full speed into truly unique original storytelling. But the most impactful and thought-provoking stories are more than just fiction, so you need to know more than stories. Science, history, art, craft, math, music, cooking, psychology, religion, whatever!

Everyone always parrots “write what you know”, but what you KNOW can expand to influence what you write- so keep learning new things all the time and for fun, because you never know what could help your story. Your knowledge is not limited to experience alone, and research is your best friend. ASOIAF was so loved because George RR Martin loved not only fantasy, but British history. The Folk of the Air series is so loved because Holly Blacks special interest is faeries.

Note: this does not mean the study of OTHER PEOPLES trauma and experiences in an appropriative way, rather, become worldly. Because sure, knowing what a gunshot feels like adds realism, but I don’t care about realism if I don’t care about your characters or world. Science fiction is the best example of this: so many of those stories stick with us generationally because they’re pointing a lens back at humanity, asking big philosophical questions with science, which is something that touches us all.

But it doesn’t even need to be Big and Thematic like that. My dear friend @chaylattes has a project where she’s applied her love of plants to the world building AND plot, and has INVENTED whole plant species that enriched their work with something so exclusively Chay. No one else could write Andromeda Rogue because Chay, with specific interests and knowledge, put that specificity into the story.

3) Diversify consumption: surrounding yourself with more of the same means you’re going to regurgitate the same, derivatively. To be a hater for a moment: I can tell within the first chapter if someone only reads/watches one kind of media (m*rvel, fairy smut, grim dark nonsense, etc), and it’s distracting. When I read that derivative work, I’m not thinking about THEIR story. All I can think of is the people who did it first, and better.

Alternatively, the best work draws on the unexpected. Fantasy work taking notes from horror, science fiction including humanistic romance, romance with elements of mystery. RF Kuangs work feels so smart because she’s literally a PHD candidate who’s reading of academic writing. Cassandra Clares work is so interpersonally messy and hard to look away from because she watches a lot of reality television. 

Genre is less a set of cages to lock yourself inside of and more so the sections of a great big fictional playground- and you need to start playing. Rules, again, are guidelines that can be bent for the sake of your stories. I predominantly write scifi/fantasy/horror but some of my favorite stuff is literary fiction, historical nonfiction, thrillers, and poetry.

And if you can’t bring yourself to read different genres, it takes significantly less effort to WATCH different genres. Television and film are stories too, and can absolutely be learned from. 

4) Consume with intention: this is easier said than done. I, embarrassingly, admit that I did not have any reading comprehension skills until I was at least 19. I was consuming, but I wasn’t thinking a damn critical thought, just spitting it back out in a way that sounded smart.

Critical thinking skills (I say, on the website that historically lacks such a thing) are a muscle that needs to be exercised just as often as your writing muscle. Reading new work, studying craft, learning new shit- none of it matters if you can’t APPLY it all to a story. One can take a clock apart to learn how exactly it ticks, but it won't tell time like a watch until you put it back together.

The key is asking questions, all of the time about everything. That whole “why the curtains were blue” nonsense comes to mind, but if you want to be a good writer, (edit: a writer that cares about whether or not their work is vapid imitation of better work) learning to ask WHY the curtains are blue really does matters.

Ask why in ALL stories you consume, including your own. Why do Ghibli films make me feel calm? (Motifs of undisturbed nature, low stakes plots and quiet scenes of reprieve between action, characters that care about one another and aren’t afraid to show it) Why do I fly through a Gillian Flynn novel but take 8,000 years to read other books? (Concise descriptions, realistic but evocative premise, witty voice, contained and fast paced plot, an abundance of questions driving the mystery leading up to a satisfying crash of answers at the end) Why were the curtains blue, the coffee cup chipped, and the lipstick stain on the rim red instead of purple or pink? And why did the colors matter at all when the scene is about a father at a kitchen table? (You tell me!) Answers may vary.

You can put the work into learning the answer at the source (ie: listening to authors talk about their own work), or through the external interpretations of a critic (proceed with caution here), sure. These are even good when learning HOW to think critically if you don’t even know where to start. But your growth as a writer depends on your ability to answer your OWN questions. 

(Why do I feel tense in this scene? Is it because the character says they’re sweating and struggling to breathe? Is it because I’ve been told the monsters close? Is it because the sentences are getting shorter and the author keeps repeating descriptions of that monsters massive bloody teeth coming closer? Or is it because I know the gun in her hands has no bullets because another character already tried what she’s about to try?)

(Why do I feel sad in this scene? Is it because the characters mom just died? Is it because the character can’t even verbalize that sadness to others? Is it because none of the other characters seem to care enough to ask? Is it because of the wilted flowers in the corner? Or is it because there are daisies in the bouquet, and those were the moms favorite?)

I can nod and smile at 1000 opinions about “why X did Y and the end of Z” or “why X is Y and not Z” but how I felt when I consume something, how I was affected and how it made ME PERSONALLY answer my critical questions, that’s what’s important. That’s how we manufacture gay subtext in everything, because sometimes gay is a feeling as opposed to a fact.

Also, if those subjective answers are inconsistent among readers/viewers, the writer likely had their own intentions a little muddled. So, and I know I’m getting tangential but stay with me: romance. You know how you’re supposed to feel happy or convinced that the people falling in love are like, in love? And want to put yourself in that position or whatever? I CANNOT consume most romance media because it all comes off as categorically terrifying to me. I ask myself why the characters are doing what they do, reacting the way they react, saying way they say, and none of it feels romantic. I want to file a restraining order, and that’s the failing of the author, who did not make enough conscious choices in their work and accidentally created horror while writing their color by numbers trope slop of a “romance” novel. 

5) Apply with reference: is like taking all your ingredients and finally cooking. You want people to notice and respect when you add certain literary devices, descriptions, character choices, but not to the detriment of your work. Shows like stranger things are popular but divisive because their intertextuality and reliance on nostalgia bolster an otherwise unoriginal idea. They weren’t trying to reinvent the wheel, they were writing a love letter to Stephen Spielberg, and are riding that wave into the ground. But the fairy dick renaissance doesn’t feel nearly as palatable as season one of stranger things did because a lot of times they aren’t using the ingredients in their own way, rather, following the recipe to a T and selling it as new. Food really is the perfect metaphor and sorry in advance because I’m really going to run with it here lol. 

When I eat a meal, first of all I know I'm eating food, so don't try and trick me into thinking otherwise or I'll only get annoyed. I want to be able to taste all of what’s in front of me, spice, salt, sweet, bitter, etc and know what what you said you've fed me is really actually truly what I've eaten. One ingredient, or writing choice, shouldn’t overpower another, or surprise me so much I can’t take another bite. I shouldn’t try something you call “sauced and baked yeast patty garnished with fermented milk and smoked meat” and think “this shits pizza” because you didn’t even try to jazz it up more than what the instructions on the digiorno box said. I also shouldn’t bite into something you call a pizza and only taste bread because you really like bread and forgot that a pizza is more than just bread. 

But inversely, avoiding all ingredients gets you weird, nary inedible shit like charred milk reduction with lamb mist or whatever. Show me you have knowledge in your genre by referencing it AND remixing it, show me that you studied craft by foreshadowing properly or pacing well, show me you’re more than an AI writerbot by deepening your work with your unique and human influence, show me you read broadly by adding surprising ingredients, and show me that you mean every word you write because you made the curtains blue instead of yellow, and topped your pizza with pepperoni instead of pineapple.

Congrats on making it all the way through my rambling, hope I made sense and that this helped!

[goodboylupin]

Better late than never! Welcome, one and all, to

The 4th Candy Hearts Challenge

A fun, stress-free Wolfstar mini-fest!

(If you remember how this goes , feel free to skip my introductory spiel and check for new rules!)

They’re sold by many companies and known by many names: Candy Hearts, Conversation Hearts, Sweethearts, and Love Hearts. Whatever the brand and whatever you call them, they’re the signature sweet of the season. Sure, you could buy your beloved a box of chocolates, but that’s an option any time of year! Good luck finding these bad boys in November!

Not that candy hearts are bad! Sure, they’re kinda chalky… and they taste stale no matter how fresh you bought them… but it’s not about the taste with candy hearts, it’s about the pastel, the experience, and above all else: the sayings! Who doesn’t remember going through a pack with friends, trying to find the kookiest message? Digging through a box to find one that was just the right level of romantic to give a certain special someone? (And maybe the heartbreak when you received one in turn where the message was just a big, pink smudge?)

Now, candy hearts have been around for a long time. And with a constant rotation of messages so we always got fun variety in a box, they’ve had a lot of sayings.

Through a great deal of internet sleuthing (and a little creativity on my part), I’ve collected over seven hundred of them.

Some are a little raunchy (TEASE ME), and some are downright rude (EW NO). They range from classic (BE MINE) to contemporary (SWIPE RIGHT) to were-at-one-point-contemporary (FAX ME). Some of them are, quite frankly so hyper specific it’s a wonder they made it into circulation at all (ME JULIE BEST MUM).

And they are all, even the weird ones, ripe with potential as fic prompts!

The way this mini-fest works is simple:

From 12:01am EST Feb 1 until 11:59pm EST March 1, drop me an ask containing these emojis: 🍬💕

If you don't want to send an ask from your main tumblr account (or don't have a tumblr account), you can do so anonymously. However, you must include the ao3 handle or tumblr sideblog from which you plan to complete the challenge.

I will shake my Great Big Box of Candy Hearts and pull out a unique candy heart for you and only you!

With your message in hand, create whatever that candy heart inspires and your own heart desires! Fanfic, art, graphics, playlists, head canons, shit posts, interpretive dances, cosplay, meta essays, it’s all great as long as its central focus is on Wolfstar, the relationship between Remus Lupin and Sirius Black!

You can either directly quote your candy heart message in your work or use it as a broader inspiration.

You are allowed to use the same candy heart as inspiration for multiple unrelated works and submit all of them to the fest.

You do not need a beta before submitting your work, but I do encourage you to get one. I want this to be as stress-free an event as it can possibly be, and in my personal experience, it reduces stress to have someone else look over your completed work for at least spelling and grammar so you don’t have to reread your own stuff and psych yourself out before posting. If you don’t have any fandom friends with whom you feel comfortable sharing your fanfiction, there are also online resources to find a friendly stranger (including, hopefully, our discord server — see rule 17). But if ultimately, you’d rather be your own editor, I certainly won’t reject your work!

Include the following caption at the beginning of the tumblr post or AO3 beginning notes: For @goodboylupin's Candy Hearts Challenge. My candy heart prompt was ____. I will not reblog your work or allow it in the collection until you have included the caption.

If posting on tumblr, please make sure the @-tag of your caption is working so I get a notification! It should show up on its own automatically as you type. Also tag the work with #RSCandyHearts, preferably within the first five tags.

If posting on AO3, post your work to the collection and tag it with goodboylupin's RS Candy Hearts Challenge (this tag will show up in the suggestions when you start typing it).

As long as the rules have been followed, I will reblog every work on Tumblr, and leave a kudos on every work on AO3. (If I haven't done so on your work and you see I've been active on this blog, then both the @-notification and #RSCandyHearts tag failed. Send me an ask with a link!)

If, after completing your first work, you want another helping of candy hearts, that’s more than welcome! Since I don’t want anyone to get a sugar crash, there is a two-day wait period between submitting a work and getting a second (or third or fourth or wherever you are) candy heart.

If you find you cannot come up with anything for your prompt, you can drop out and send a new ask to get a different candy heart. However, you need to give it an honest effort for at least one week before I give you a new one.

Works are expected by March 15, but this is a low-stakes, self-posting challenge! If you need more time, just message me or drop an ask. And if you want to drop out, that’s totally fine! I’ll even delete your first ask where you requested a candy heart if you prefer. I only need to know for the sake of my own record-keeping. Let’s all just be honest, considerate, and try to have a good time!

If you need a really long extension: Your candy heart is yours until January of next year, at which point, if I haven't heard back from you with an update or request for extension in the past few months, your prompt is going back in the Great Big Box of Candy Hearts so somebody else can have a go at it. The AO3 collection closes at the same time.

I will keep a masterlist of works pinned on my blog until at least March 22.

There's a discord! Feel free to join to discuss your prompts, your progress, your love of Wolfstar, or just to have another little circle in your sidebar.

Over the past two challenges, there have been a small handful of people who requested a candy heart, did not create anything and did not speak to me any further to tell me they were dropping out or having trouble. I work hard to make everyone a custom graphic and keep this fest running smoothly, therefore: Any creators with multiple instances of ghosting are suspended from getting another candy heart until next challenge.

Since this is not the usual timeframe for #RSCandyHearts, I'd love it if you could reblog this post to signal boost!

My ask box is open now to receive your candy heart requests 🍬💕