Hey! I just recently found your Magneto fic and I am absolutely obsessed. Any updates coming in the future?
i’m super glad you enjoyed magneto! this ask has gotten me to finally put a discontinued in the description of magneto. it’s not at ALL because of you in particular, but i’ve realized by putting off adding it to the description i’ll keep giving people false hope. forgive me if i use this ask for a tediously long post describing why exactly i will never update magneto, so i can link it easily for anyone with similar questions in the future. 😭
so. short answer? no. magneto will probably never be updated. i’m really sorry for that. my interests have changed since graduating high school and i don’t really want to write bnha anymore.
long answer?
i started writing magneto pre-pandemic during my junior year of high school. i had seen there was only about a 100 self inserts for bnha at the time and thought “well, if i post something it’ll probably get a lot of attention, since the fandom is growing in popularity a lot and there’s a scarcity here!” 2019 was an interesting year for fanfic in bnha, since it didn't have enough content for the growing eyes looking for it.
i ended up being very correct. too correct. i actively updated magneto over the course of half a year, roughly, and in that time it rapidly climbed in attention. since 2020 ive only updated it about twice(?) and that hasn’t deterred the new readers it’s gotten. i get comments every other day asking about updates.
magneto is currently the most kudo-ed bnha si-oc on the entirety of ao3. which is fucking insane. i don’t think it deserves it, but popularity is rarely about deserving. usually it’s about being just good enough, just novel enough, and being posted at the right time.
but i digress: it doesn’t feel possible for me to update magneto for a variety of reasons.
1) my disinterest in the setting would make any future update disingenuous.
i haven’t been actively into the bnha fandom in about four years now. i don’t really read bnha fic aside from the very occasional si-oc, nor have i kept up with the manga or anime. the only fic i’ve ever written for the fandom is magneto, and it’ll probably always be my only fic for the fandom. (watch me say that and be wrong in the next few years LMAO)
it would be really rude of me to stomp into a space i don’t even like anymore and post something lackluster and lacking in passion. especially with the express intention of gaining more engagement from readers. like it or not, magneto IS the most popular si for bnha, and i think i drive attention away from better books by updating and inadvertently preserving that position in the ranking.
I can't believe no one has written any "self-insert as Bakugou" fanfics yet what a bunch of cowards by the_incidental_author and i have jostled back and forth for that #1 kudo-ed spot for the past five years. which i admit has been fun, but i would very much like for them to overtake me. it’s clear (to me, at least) that they actually enjoy writing bnha more than me and update more often to boot.
i fully welcome ANY fic to take magneto's position at this point, if only so that less people comment how poorly written it is. which leads me into my next point.
2) my writing style has SIGNIFICANTLY changed over the past five years.
when i do my yearly reread of magneto i actively cringe and have to resist the urge to rewrite every chapter in a separate google doc. in any hypothetical world where i do add to magneto, i do a complete rewrite. in no particular order, the things i would change are:
kenzo being defined by three character traits and nothing else. her exhaustion, her mild spite for her father, and her aimless wandering through the plot
better grammar. dear god the grammar errors. dear god the SPELLING ERRORS
the pov characters being more developed and feeling more like Individual People with their own personal motivations and histories that are not defined by what the plot needs from them (cough, reacting to how cool kenzo is)
not just recapping each anime episode and stating what kenzo would do in that situation
placing greater focus on the way quirk society discriminates against those with undesirable quirks and backgrounds. what does it really mean to be the child of a criminal in a world where people assume that sort of thing is hereditary?
kenzo's classmates should've been more classist in general, especially in relation to quirk discrimination. UA is a school only the most wealthy and powerful get into, there's no way there wouldn't be social disconnects that create tension between a dead eyed daughter of a villain and more than a few nepo babies.
if you have any interest in naruto, skyrim, asoiaf or dragon age you've probably read my more recent fics. fluffy clouds and a tinge of wonder, the fic i have updated the most this year, is a really good example of how significantly my writing has evolved since starting magneto in 2019. my technical skill and style have changed enough that it just would be tonally jarring for me to update magneto without outright rewriting everything.
like. im being so fr with you right now, i didn't learn how to start outlining until about a YEAR AGO. magneto was written on a chapter by chapter basis with little idea of where exactly it was going. i implied that there would be a future confrontation between kenzo and her father, but i didn't have any idea of HOW that would occur or even what the consequences of it would be.
adding to magneto as it is would be like trying to add a sleeve to a shirt that's missing it's entire back panel and most of it's front. i'd be playing catch up with the plot and end up having to rewrite previous chapters anyways.
3) bnha commentors have been kind of really mean to me compared to other fandoms i've written for LMAO
ok. please don't draw and quarter me for this. MOST commentors have been extremely complimentary, and kind. besides the occasional bomb of like seven comments in my inbox of ten hearts from one user (which, sweet, but please don't do that) the bnha fandom has been totally fine.
but a very small minority have been really pushy about making me update a fic i have clearly not touched in two years, and realistically haven't actively updated in four. from comments just saying "wow this is great. update soon." to DETAILED reviews of how bad my fic is and how they can't believe how garbage like magneto is so popular.
which like. i don't feel personally attacked by? i fully agree that magneto is bad for the previously stated reasons. i wouldn't read magneto if i were a casual reader and hadn't written it. usually the second kind of comment really annoys me because of it's presumption of importance and for how soul crushing it would have been for sixteen-year-old me to read.
bnha as a fandom, especially in recent years, has felt more and more like they treat fic like something that is created in a vacuum. souless content that exists for readers to consume. the comments don't go to an inbox, they go to a void, so really it doesn't matter if i say something really belligerent to an author i don't know about a Self Insert Fanfic They Wrote In Between Rehearsals For Their High School Play.
but whatever. if it had just been me experiencing that i would've written it off as like just my fic, but a close friend and frequent cowriter of mine Reavv has dealt with this a lot more than me.
they wrote It's a like a time travel comedy, without the comedy, another very popular bnha fic, and had to private it because people were going to their other UNRELATED fics and badgering them to update it. people still go into their comments insisting they unprivate it, oblivious to the fact that every time they ask it adds another year to reavv's internal timer for when they will.
a combination of my own experiences and reavv's have completely put me off of writing bnha i'll be fr. even if i was still in the fandom, the majority of my fics will always be about fucking dragon age and skyrim. i do not want random bnha fans coming into my dragon age fics and, AFTER NOT READING THE FIC, saying that since im active i should clearly update my bnha fics. that's a nightmare scenario for me.
in conclusion
i am so glad that people like magneto, i'm glad that i wrote magneto. the initial jump in readers i got from magneto gave me the confidence to write other fics, and the alternating pov format is a staple of most of my writing now. some of the comments i got for that magneto when i was a teenager were the only things that kept my ass going.
but magneto is never being updated. i don't even think it's gonna be rewritten. i really am sorry about that, but it is what it is. thank you for reading it, thank you for loving it, thank you for feeling ambivalent about it. good talk.
btw to the original asker, again. this is NOT a rant directed at you, you just inspired some Thoughts in me and i had to let them loose.
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hi! thank you for the kind words, i'm happy you're enjoying the fic. but i also want to use this message as an opportunity to talk about something/set a boundary that i haven't really known how to discuss, and i've blocked out your name because even though i'm not angry or upset with you, i want to make sure i'm not sending any hate back your way.
i know that this message is well-intentioned, and i know you likely think it's nothing but a compliment to ask me to write more--after all, you're only asking me to write more because you enjoy the story so much! shouldn't that be a nice thing for me to hear?
and like. i think that's why this is difficult for me to talk about. i don't want to come across as ungrateful or overly sensitive or like i don't appreciate the compliments, because i do. but at the same time, hearing someone say, "please write more of this fic for me, i love your writing so much!" is still hearing someone say "please write more of this fic for me!" like. 300,000 words is incredibly long. most novels are between 70k-100k words. a 300k word book usually takes years to write--years, and hundreds of hours of labor. maybe you chose that number randomly, or you're exaggerating for emphasis; but no matter how nicely you're phrasing it or how facetious you're being, ultimately this sort of message still puts pressure on me to produce a massive amount of writing in a short period of time. and even if you meant it as a compliment, it doesn't feel nice to me. being pressured to churn out hundreds of thousands of words makes me feel as though i'm being seen as a content-creation machine for the entertainment of others, and i don't like that. writing is a labor of love for me, but it is still labor--hours of time and effort that i'm putting into these works which i share for free, with no expectations of anything in return except maybe a few kind words from those who feel like reaching out. when i get messages or comments like this pushing me to write more, to write faster, it makes me feel as though my time and labor are not respected at all; as if there's absolutely no consideration for the amount of effort it takes to write the stories. which, again, makes me feel like i'm being viewed as some sort of fic-writing machine that can just pump out hundreds of thousands of words on demand for others' entertainment.
and none of this is helped by the tongue-in-cheek comment about how you're "suffering" waiting for updates. again, i understand that this was well-intended and maybe even a playful exaggeration that's supposed to be complimentary. but there are ways to tell me you enjoy my writing and eagerly wait for updates without telling me how much you dislike waiting between chapters. posting once a week is already a difficult schedule for me to maintain, and it's entirely possible that i'll need to take another break in the future or skip a week or something. i've been very clear about the fact that my update schedule is subject to change since i started writing the fic; that's just part of reading a wip. but when i get messages or comments like these with people telling me how they don't like waiting for updates, or comments directly asking me to post more than once a week, or--back when i did take a break--comments begging me not to take a break, it all adds together and builds up and creates this pressure to write more, write faster, post the new ch now now now. if you were the only person making this type of comment, it probably wouldn't bother me and i'd just respond and go "thanks lol" and move on. but the problem is that you aren't the only one--since more people have started reading the fic, i've consistently been getting comments like these, where the backhanded pressure to write more or write faster is couched in compliments. it's just so hard to wait for updates because i love your writing so much! i just want you to write more and post now and write faster because i love your writing so much! i know it's all well-intended, but none of it makes me feel good. it just makes me feel a mounting pressure to produce produce produce.
i feel like there are so many conversations happening in this fandom about how we need to treat writers better, where people go "the fandom is so shitty" and everyone goes "yeah!" but no one ever thinks they're part of the problem. and i think it's because everyone thinks the problem is like...really blatantly rude and entitled messages. and like, i get those too--people telling me they don't like a certain characterization and asking me to rewrite the fic; people repeatedly demanding that i write a certain fic for them; people just outright shitting on things i've written because they don't like it and for some reason think i want to know that. but none of that is super common. what is super common is the steady stream of comments and messages like this one, where they are so well-intended and don't see anything wrong with what they're saying because they think they're giving me a compliment. but all these "compliments" build up and create this pressure that hangs over my head to be constantly producing and writing, which is ultimately what leads to burnout and also makes me feel like i'm not being seen as a person so much as a machine.
so like. idk. i'm not gonna try to speak for every writer in the fandom; maybe there are people out there who do appreciate this kind of message, who feel like it motivates them to write. but for me, i want to make it clear: i really don't appreciate being asked to write more or write faster or to write a certain trope/ship/etc; i am not a waiter taking your order at a restaurant. writing fic is not a service i'm providing for you that you pay me for in comments or kudos or messages or any sort of attention, because i am not writing for that attention in the first place. so when it comes to interacting with me, i'd ask that you reevaluate the way you give compliments and think about what sort of pressure you're putting on me, regardless of how well-intentioned your message is. again, no hard feelings towards you--like i said, this message probably wouldn't even register as pressuring to me if not for the fact that i get so many little comments like it, all from equally well-intentioned people who think they're just giving a compliment, all of which builds up together.
anyway. all that being said. to answer your question: the fic will likely be four parts, not three as i originally intended. it will probably end up somewhere between 100-200k words based on the fact that we're already at 80k and i've only just started part iii, but i am not going to put pressure on myself to write a certain amount of words or hit a certain length. i'm just going to write what i want to write when i want to write, and share it as i want to share it. i'm happy to have you along if you want to be here, but if the cliffhangers or waiting for updates becomes too unenjoyable for you then there's no pressure for you to stay, yknow? no hard feelings on my end either way :•)
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