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samsaintjames · 3 years

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okay so: fic recs

So this is gonna be really long and rambling (I'm sure), but we start with the basics.

If you're only ever going to read one and only one fanfic in your entire life you have to read Increments of Longing. It's a Jaina Proudmoore/Sylvanas Windrunner fanfic, but it's AU enough and so well written, that you probably do not actually need to know anything about Warcraft or World of Warcraft and the respective lore and backstory to enjoy it. Just look at it like a very good fantasy novel about an arranged marriage. [...]“But you would tell me what you want?” Sylvanas asked in a voice that was far too controlled to be truly nonchalant."[...] I could not even tell you why, but this line there from the second chapter? It gives me feels (and I could not even tell you what exactly I'm feeling, but yeah).

Anyway, read it (I've read it twice now)!

Okay, from the same author I also whole-heartedly recommend you search the mountain. Which is another Jaina/Sylvanas story, again AU, with Jaina being Drust. You do not necessarily need background info - there even is a map of Kul Tiras included - but you'd probably benefit from it. Particularly the early chapters, when you get to know Arthur, made me laugh and giggle quite a bit, even though the story itself is - since it's about the Drust and a civil war - a bit of a horror story/military fiction crossover I'd say. Good read.

And my kinda guilty pleasure (also from the same author) is no end in sight. It's a story about Suramar (and healing). And when I started playing WoW towards the end of Legion, shortly before the Argus patch, I absolutely fell in love with that region/city and the Nightborne - probably because I wasn't stuck on the repetitive content of it for forever lol. So this story about Thalyssra and Jaina and the other Nightborne NPCs is awesome. I was actually considering to also write about Jaina/Thalyssra, simply because just imagine the insane magic those two could do when working together (I mean they kinda do in Nazjatar), but knowing me, this will probably never get past the conception stage.

Inevitability is also absolutely amazing (it's another - you probably guessed it - Jaina/Sylvanas AU, with both of them being professors - considering I've been working in academics for the last 15 years that's kinda my jam). And I have a lot of thoughts about it, which for the sake of not boring people to death I'm gonna abbreviate (but well I'm ready to talk people to death if they are interested). One: I'd love to meet this Sylvanas. Two: I'd never have the guts to talk to her, but I'd totally want her to take me home lol (and I'm not even sure I'm gay). Three: life at universities around here is very different from - I'm assuming - the US.

(Also if you're into AUs, go check Fearless - which features witches and ghosts and is fun.)

Okay, so now we're coming to how I actually fell into the whole Jaina/Sylvanas thing. It's because of Daugthers of Sea and Snow. Which is a Frozen/WoW crossover featuring Jaina/Elsa I found by looking through Frozen Fanfics when I was bored around the time Frozen 2 came out and then completely forgot - it was still work in progress then; I found the still open tab in my browser like four to three weeks ago, saw it was finished now and devoured the whole thing. And while I was there, I looked at the other things that author had written - and that's how I stumbled upon Jaina/Sylvanas, like two years late. Which is probably kinda ironic, since I played BFA a lot (mythic raiding beginning with Uldir), loving the Storyline in Kul Tiras and being absolutely enamoured with Jaina especially after her Warbringers vid (I still sometimes humm the song) - and liked Sylvanas since Warcraft III. Sometimes life is weird.

So and after that I jumped down this particular rabbit hole while doing a thrilling backflip. There is an assortment of other stories that I very much enjoyed.

A Touch of Arcane - the first fix of political marriage AU for Jaina and Sylvanas that I got (I think it was actually the first Jaina/Sylvanas fic I read period). And boy did I get hooked to that.

Along the same lines but different are Worth the Trouble and Two Rooms.

If you're into AUs for that pairring, you'll find a lot of intereseting ones from the Author katofthenorth. The one about diving is really cute.

Stories not yet finished that I thoroughly enjoyed so far (most of them political marriage AUs - lol I'm a sucker for those okay, it's not my fault!):

Ink and Honor is amazing. I came for Jaina/Sylvanas, but I love the Thalyssra/Vereesa storyline just as much - it's sooooo cute, like even Genn ships them ^^.

threads of silk.

climb the walls.

Measure of the world. They aren't married (yet, it's a possibility though I'd guess and I haven't even reached the end of the so far posted chapters yet, but enjoyable read nonetheless).

The Lighthouse. Amazing AU, I love the idea - and it's not political marriage! I cannot wait for the next chapters.

I've dug too many holes into this thawing ground. This story gave me a lot of feels too.

Honorary mentions for stories that I'm assuming might never be finished, but are amazing reads.

Shot in the Dark. Fuck that is awesome! Secret agents and spies - okay technically snipers, but it's the feeling that counts, right? (and Tyrande in a suit is a nice bonus).

Trust in Me. Sylvanas as Jainas bodyguard AU.

Okay so... I still have like 250 tabs or something ridiculous open in my browser (that's not overstating it, it's fact, in fact I might be understating it at this point and it could already be 300) and I haven't obviously read all the amazing Jaina/Sylvanas fanfics out there yet, particularly short ones or one shots or series might have gotten lost, since I usually filter for high wordcounts only. So, if anyone feels stuff is missing, it does not mean I didn't like it, it could be I've just not read it yet.

And now for something completely different.

I want to point towards one of the coolest crossover stories/series I've ever read: Felicitas. Which is an Arrow/Highlander/Raven crossover that imagines Felicity as an ancient immortal. And it's just soooooo good, I've been following it for years. (That being said, I never watched Arrow past season 2 and I probably never will considering what I know about how the story of the show continues, I've been burned once with Bering and Wells, I'm not going there again. But that's totally fine, because Felicitas also only goes as far as Season 2.)

And then there's still waters and quiet men. I'm not even sure what to say about it. The sheer lunacy and the insane escalation present in this story should not have amused me as much as it did I think, but I remember laughing tears when reading this, because while it's actually really sad that some people might find this kind of behaviour of male characters in fiction normal, it was abso-fucking-lutely hilarious in my opinion. (That said, I've probably only read it halfway, but still, it's hilarious! Well if you have the same maybe weird sense of humor I have anyway.)

New Beginnings is a FemShep/Liara crossover with Stargate SG-1. So it's combining my favourite TV show with my favourite Videogame of all time. And it's brilliant.

So yeah that's my fic recs for the time being. If you just want a tl;dr, go read Increments of Longing. (I just cannot stress enough how amazing that story is.)

I'm only tagging Jaina/Sylvanas since most fics are about them.

#fic rec #fic recs #Jaina Proudmoore/Sylvanas Windrunner #sylvaina

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palmett-hoes · 4 years

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this was originally meant to be a response/follow-up to @i-did 's post about race in the aftg fandom (that you should read). i ran it by him first and asked permission to add, but then we decided it was too long so i should make it its own post

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i want to talk about fandom's take on the twins' race because it's rather glaring in the fandom that andrew (and then aaron by necessity) are often portrayed as the only white characters on the team and i have to question why?

there's nothing in the backstories that would mean writing them as POC would fling them headlong into offensive stereotypes that the fandom hasn't bypassed over to make another fox a POC.

they have a history of addiction? but it's okay for matt and seth to be addicts and be brown.

they're violent? but it's okay for renee to be non-white and a former gang member.

they're blond and 'pale'¹? but allison can be a WOC and bleach her hair without saying it explicitly? renee can have white rainbow hair no matter the AU? neil can be a blue-eyed redhead and still be drawn darker skinned half the time?

'pale' in and of itself is a very vague word that's only brought up in the context of comparison to notably dark skinned nicky. it's completely relative, and multi-racial families where people look wildly different from each other exist (pretty commonly). or if you're prescriptivist how about the multiple ways a POC can still be a natural blond including but not limited to pigmentation conditions or being mixed race? similarly, i think less than a quarter of the FCs i've seen for andrew over the years have been natural blonds themselves.

so if our holdups aren't about racial stereotyping and they aren't about the incredibly vague character descriptions, then why are the twins always white when it's approached as a good thing that no one else is? when i've seen multiple different posts lauding the fandom for adding diversity where nora didn't write it, except for here?

to be completely, bluntly honest, it's because we as a majority-white fandom are uncomfortable when we are not the central characters. or maybe we are uncomfortable when people of color ARE the central characters. i don't think there's much of a difference.

we are comfortable writing and drawing nicky, the upperclassmen, then kevin (in that order) as poc because, simply, we use them as background characters. they are rarely the main characters of fics, or have their own storylines in them; it all revolves around andreil.

additionally, while i've used neil up to now as an example of the fandom being OKAY with writing POC, let's also admit that it's an,, imperfect representation, as he will often be racially ambiguous with no explicit ethnicity, he will be the lightest skinned of the foxes of color, and he will still have eurocentric features. also it's genuinely a toss up as to whether he's drawn brown or not, there are still plenty of white neils, much more than there are white dans and matts and renees (not an attack on anyone who draws white neils, simply a statement) and FCs and edits of him still tend to be white people.

he's a bit of a schrödinger's person of color, not really any one thing or another, very few people being willing to take a hard stance on him and do the work of taking that decision under consideration when writing and drawing him.

(quick shout-out here to @hi-raethia for making content about an explicitly chinese interpretation of neil).

(additionally, to be as clear about my intended message as possible, this isn't a statement on the politics of passing or undermining the ethnicities of lightskinned poc, this is about a lack of detail being put into making a character a character of color in any thoughtful, meaningful, or significant way)

so when i talk about the centralization of white people in fandom, neil gets to be included, perhaps with a footnote indicating that this is somewhat of a more complicated statement than it is with lily-white andrew minyard.

nevertheless, i feel comfortable saying that 75% of fandom content revolves around andrew and neil, major exceptions only being jerejean which are often stand-alone from the foxes, and the rising branch of kevaaron shippers. however both of those ships are actually subject to this exact same criticism, as ships between a a flat-out white character and a dubiously "non-white" character who can also be white sometimes. it varies.

conspicuously, content about the UPPERCLASSMEN tends to revolve around andrew and neil.

fics where the upperclassmen are the pov character are often outside-perspective fics on andreil.

HC posts about the upperclassmen, especially matt, will devote major portions to his time spent helping, hanging with, and thinking about andrew and/or neil.

secondary ships like danmatt or renison tend to be just that, secondary ships moving in the background of andreil-focused works. they get more of a,,, scenic shout-out than a storyline

it is only comfortable for us to write these characters as characters of color if they revolve entirely around white characters

so after all that? what should we do, as a white-majority fandom? what should YOU, specifically, as a white person, do?

i hate to talk about a problem without also talking about solutions, and i try not to carp on something i don't want to be an active part of fixing. public criticism without an action plan only leads to hurt feelings and guilt, and that's never my intention when bringing this up. my goal is to address a general problem, not anyone specific's personal failings.

in all honesty leaning completely into all of the foxes being people of color, though i think neat and i certainly support, is not the best solution, and would be more of a hollow action than anything else without addressing the underlying problems that lead to the development of this dynamic.

i think the best thing to do would be to 1. do some research on writing poc, usually by following some writing-specific blogs like @writingwithcolor or @pocinmymedia . look up the 'black best friend' trope and really spend some time tjinking about it. spend an hour seeking out a random assortment of blogs that interest you that are also run by people of color. checking through tags like drawingwhileblack or blacktober may be good kickoff points.

tumblr is great because with an hour of active work to find these blogs, you can then go months passively seeing content from them. try not to interact, actually, simply watch and listen and become familiar with general trends and concerns in different communities. remember that every blog is run by an individual person, not an elected representative of their race, and always keep this in mind.

you are teaching YOURSELF that people of color are individuals, they have interests and inner lives that don't revolve around whiteness, that don't revolve around YOU

at the same time, 2. challenge yourself as a creator to make more content about the upperclassmen, specifically. make art about them doing stuff as a group separate from neil and andrew's group. find a compilation of 'draw the squad' memes and draw/tag the upperclassmen only. make jokes where they talk to each other. write some meta about their character motivations. write a fic where andreil isn't even mentioned, it can be super short, you can even use a prompt generator.

as a reader, reread their backstories in the extra content. reread son nefes. use ao3's filtering system to read some fics about JUST the upperclassmen, few and far apart though they may be.

if we've decided that the upperclassmen are people of color then lean into that, and learn to CARE about them on their own merit, because they are the most underutilized characters in the fandom. we need to make content centralized around them to combat the fact that fandom centralizes whiteness

#txt #fandom #the foxes #dan wilds #matt boyd #renee walker #seth gordon #allison reynolds #my posts

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unforth · 3 years

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Hello unforth! Thank you for your wonderful blog, and the the untamed art blog!! I followed you years ago for destiel, and you were one of the people that got me into the untamed. I watched it last summer and have been binging various cdramas ever since!! I had a question for you about reading. After watching the untamed I read the novel, and didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. I think you’re someone who prefers the show, but if not, sorry if I’m remembering wrong… hoping you understand. I want to try reading other novels but I found the romance in mdzs to be kinda off. I guess I’m wondering if you have a recommendation for the best novel you’ve read so far? It would be great if it’s one with fanfic but if not I’m still curious to try! I hope this didn’t come off as rude about the untamed, it’s just a personal preference. Thanks in advance, and thanks again for all your work in fandom!

Howdy! *waves*

You have not misremembered, I definitely prefer the Untamed to the novel of MDZS (and I'm with you, no shade on people with different preferences, of course!). I also didn't enjoy the novel of MDZS as much as I thought I would, though I think some of that was because I read the Exiled Rebels Scanalations translation which - again, no shade, translating that was a HUGE job and kudos to them - but I do here from native speakers that some questionable translation choices were made, which can detract from some people's enjoyment of the novel (and can enhance other people's, it just depends how those translation choices relate to each person's personal likes and dislikes).

Now, I can tell you what I've read and what I've thought of each one, happily - I don't know what turned you off about MDZS specifically, beyond an aspect of the relationship dynamic, so it'll be hard for me to say which of these might appeal to you more? But, here's a list of which danmei novels I've read, and my opinion. The list is shorter than you'd think - danmei novels are long and I read slow, lol.

Note that all of these end happy, for various definitions of "happy," and the main ship is canon in all of them. Also note that I tried to avoid spoilers, but sometimes it's hard to even talk about the ship dynamic without some mild spoilers.

These are (roughly) in the order I've read them; I just finished the last a few days ago. All art is by the official artists, but I'm not always sure what their names are, sorry - I've tried to figure them out for my art blogs but it's REALLY hard.

1. Mo Dao Zu Shi, by MXTX.

(since I'm writing this post for you, and you're already familiar with it, I'm not putting in TW and plot)

My take: I figure knowing my opinion of MDZS will help you assess all this? There are things I loved about MDZS, including the book, but MDZS is still obviously trying to figure out pacing. Whereas in SVSSS, the storyline doesn't always flow that smoothly and the ending is rushed, in MDZS in my opinion the biggest issue is that she clearly didn't plan some things ahead. For example, Miangmian and Wen Ning are both introduced within a few pages of when they'll be needed to Do Shit. It shows that she hadn't quite worked everything out as she was going, and every once in a while was like, "shit shit I need a character for this thing" and hastily added them. The plot itself is better paced, though, though I could have wished for a less talky denouement. When it was the only one I read, I also often thought, "this author doesn't understand consent," and, "this author has kinks I don't share." Now that I've read all three of her books, I completely retract the first one. MXTX absolutely understands consent, and was intentionally playing with it in MDZS. Not sure if the evidence of that got lost in translation, or what, but...yeah.

Relationship Dynamic: ...the second of those opinions, I still kinda feel. The consensual non-con is just not really my thing, like I'm okay with it in small doses? And I don't love some aspects of Lan Wangji's domineering attitudes and Wei Wuxian's act of bare tolerating it. And don't get me wrong, now that I'm more familiar with her work, I think it was an intentional writing choice and I also think they're both largely roleplaying it a lot of the time...but I still don't personally enjoy it much.

2. Scum Villain Self-Saving System, by MXTX.

Genre: modern transmigration into a fantasy xianxia world.

Where to find it: English translation by BC Novels | donghua season 1

Trigger warnings for: graphic descriptions of suffering, non-con of the "fuck or die" variety, and body horror...I can't think of anything else rn?)

Plot: SVSSS is MXTX's first novel, and is a satire of classic stag harem novels. Shen Yuan, the protagonist and half the main ship, is reading a serialized web novel by "Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky" about a demon named Luo Binghe who has a harem of over 3,000 women and has done all kinds of ghastly awful things. He hates this novel but has read all, like, 3 million words of it or something, and trolls every chapter...until one gets him so angry that he dies...and then he wakes up in the book right around when the book starts, in the body of one of the early antagonists, a cultivator named Shen Qingqiu who abuses a young, innocent Luo Binghe physically and emotionally and, ultimately, is horribly tortured to death. Shen Yuan, in Shen Qingqiu's body, thus sets out to not be horribly tortured to death by Luo Binghe. Hijinks ensue.

My Take: In terms of my opinion of it...SVSSS secured for me that MXTX is a much more brilliant author than I thought when I'd only read MDZS. She understands tropes and subverts them brilliantly throughout the story, and from a writing standpoint, I was impressed with her. However, from a plot standpoint...she's got all the ideas but hasn't, imo, yet figured out how exactly to bring them all together. The pacing is off at times, and the ending felt abrupt to me. It's also the only danmei I've read where I ship a side ship more than the primary one (which is, of course, Shen Yuan (as Shen Qingqiu)/Luo Binghe. (also, oops...I read SVSSS after TGCF and just put them in the wrong order, oh well, not gonna change it now.)

Relationship Dynamic: In terms of relationship weirdness...it's hard to sort in that regard, because, like, it's supposed to be weird? I think it's a really interest book but I'm not sure I'd recommend it in your situation. Bingqiu's main dynamic is...uh...tolerance and obsession? They're kinda hard to describe. Shen Yuan often seems like he's just kinda putting up with Luo Binghe, whereas Luo Binghe is...god. So hard to describe, lmao. He's a big clumsy ox in a museum full of porcelain dishes and he really, really loves his Shizun. (also note that Shen Qingqiu is Luo Binghe's teacher. They don't get together until after they're not master/student, but if that's not your thing, another reason to avoid.)

3. Tian Guan Ci Fu, by MXTX.

(art is by Starember)

Genre: historical China (loosely), xianxia (note that I'm still figuring out exactly how stuff gets classified so sorry if I get one wrong, but I think I kinda get it???)

Where to Access It: English Translation by the astonishing yummysuika | manhua (this is an official translation by Bilibili! It's a few chapters behind the actual release, but still...) | donghua season 1 is on Netflix | a live action adaptation is juuuuust getting started on script reading and filing

Trigger warnings for: MCD, temporary MCD, body horror, graphic violence, epic levels of mind fuckery, uh...genocide?...again, racism/colorism, probably other stuff, sorry, I can't take as long as I'd like to for this post so I'm not being as thorough as I oughta be.

Plot: TGCF is about Xie Lian, an 800 year old man, and it commences at the moment when, unexpectedly, he ascends to godhood...for the third time. Unfortunately, when he ascends, he accidentally does some damage in Heaven, and he has to repay that, so he gets sent back to earth to deal with a ghost who's been causing some problems. Hijinks ensue...and then fucktons of angst ensue...then more hijinks...then more angst...and basically it broke my heart like four times and I am grateful for it every day? The main ship is Xie Lian and a ghost named Hua Cheng, but it's hard to even talk about without some spoilers because of some identity shenanigans. (they're VERY mildly identity shenanigans, but still).

My Take: So, you asked what my favorite of the danmei novels I've read is? It's TGCF. TGCF is one of my favorite novels ever, and it has a growing fandom, a donghua that's on Netflix, and a live action that's just starting to film. TGCF is the culmination of the skills MXTX developed through her first two works, imo. She clearly plotted it out all from the start, and while Book 1 especially often seems kind of random - lots of elements are introduced and then kinda...apparently...forgotten? And never explained? But she actually DOES bring it ALL together and it's flat-out masterful. I'm a big fan, obviously.

Relationship Dynamic: it again depends on your preferences and what you didn't like about MDZS, and there's no way to talk about it without spoilers, so consider yourselves warned. Xie Lian ascended to godhood first at the age of 17, and right around then he also saved the life of a 10 year old boy...and that boy is Hua Cheng. Hua Cheng is a follower of Xie Lian's, in that Xie Lian is literally a god, and Hua Cheng is literally one of his followers. However, they're separated for almost 800 years, so the age difference is largely irrelevant, and while some people complain about Hua Cheng's behavior being stalkery and obsessive, I honestly think they're dead wrong. It's more like when you read a celebrity/fan AU, and it starts weird, and then they really genuinely fall in love. Like, the fan may have been in love the whole time, and how they felt about the celebrity before they really met might feel slightly ooky, but it's how they act AFTER they meet their idol that matters more, and...yeah, Hua Cheng is great, they're both great, antis fight me. Xie Lian is easily one of my favorite characters EVER, he is all my favorite tropes in one horribly, wonderfully fucked up martyristic idealistic sweet kind laid back package. I would kill for him, lmao. In terms of their relationship dynamic...they love and respect each other? There's really nothing that weird about it other than the aspects of the "fan" Hua Cheng that get revealed over time - and he's always terrified that when Xie Lian realizes what a fanboy he was, Xie Lian will be upset or disgusted, but of course Xie Lian never is. They adore each other. It's glorious. Highly recommend. :D There's also no explicit content in TGCF (unlike MXTX's other two books).

4. The Husky and His White Cat Shizun (aka 2ha) by Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat.

Genre: original world, xianxia, time travel, dimension hopping, it's so many things, 2ha is so hard to describe lmao

Where to Access it: English Translation by the amazing yummysuika (things are complicated, though, and it's not finished) | a manhua is in the works and should be out this year | a live action called "Hao Yixing" or "Immortality" is already filmed and could theoretically air literally any time cause it's completely ready, but when will it actually come? Who knows!

Trigger warnings: all of them. Literally. MCD, temporary MCD, murder, suicide, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, rape/non-con, abuse, manipulation, gas lighting, torture, graphic violence, body horror, literal graphic onscreen horrible blood murder of a small child (I had to skip that chapter), teacher/student relationship sort of but not exactly, probably other stuff, this book is dark as fuck, and a lot of these tags apply to behavior of one half of the main ship toward the other, but...it's complicated, and there are reasons things happen, and those reasons aren't "well they're just a bad person."

Plot: This is another one that's hard to describe because there's sooooo much mind fuckery going on, but I'll try. 2ha is about Mo Ran, who rises to be the Emperor of the World, Taxian Jun, but slaughtering all who oppose him...and who is so miserable that he commits suicide, only to wake up in his 16 year old body. This is pretty much perfect from Mo Ran's point of view, because he's gone back so far that the love of his life, his fellow disciple Shi Mei, is still alive. He has a chance to fix everything that went wrong, starting with preventing his awful evil Shizun, Chu Wanning, from letting Shi Mei die.

Spoilers: the main ship in this book is Mo Ran/Chu Wanning.

Hijinks do NOT ensue. There are no hijinks in 2ha. It is all pain all the time (but I swear it ends happy).

My Take: ...well, from a structural standpoint there are some pacing issues. The book is incredibly long (over 300 chapters, over 1 million words) and there are definitely some chunks that could just be excised and it'd still be fine. However, other than that, it's pretty amazing and absolutely masterful how it's plotted. As a reader you'll spend 100+ chapters thinking you know what's going on, and who the good guys are, and who the bad guys are, and how they relate to each other...and then Meatbun starts in on revealing what's ACTUALLY going on and she then spends 200 chapters repeatedly punching you in the face! Like, I went in knowing a LOT of spoilers, because the tags were so dark that I felt that for my mental health it was important I have a general idea what was going on, and I STILL ended up sobbing my eyes out (and I am NOT an easy crier and don't usually cry at books) over something I knew was coming.

Relationship Dynamic: That's about the only thing that the title accurately conveys about this book. "The Husky and His White Cat Shizun," sounds so soft and fluffy, right? That's how they get you, ha. But, Mo Ran is absolutely a big dumb husky who wants to do the right thing (well, sometimes he does) but just completely fails depressingly often. When he sees someone he likes come in the front door he WILL jump all over them and bark in their face as his way of trying to communicate affection. And Chu Wanning is equally absolutely a cat. He is emotionally constipated, poor at expressing himself, uptight, touch starved, desperate for affection, and so lonely my chest hurts when I think about him. And for how they relate to each other...well, picture that big dog greeting a loved one at the door...except that loved one is the most hide-bound proud white cat you can imagine.

That's their dynamic.

(However, also...there are multiple timelines at play, and Taxian Jun does some truly awful things to "his" Chu Wanning in the original timeline, and many of these things are graphically described, and while it's ultimately all explained, it still all HAPPENS, so if you're going to have trouble reading fucktons of abuse between the main ship, I would not recommend this book)

5. Thousand Autumns (Qianqiu) by Meng Xi Shi.

Genre: historical China (like, references actual people, as far as I can tell), xianxia

Where to Access it: ...reading Thousand Autumns is HARD, it's split over like four websites/translators. This Carrd can kinda help? I can get you the rest if you want | donghua season 1 | I heard there's a live action in the works? But I don't know more than that.

Trigger warnings: graphic violence, mentions/threats of sexual violence (but it's all stopped before things really go wrong), starvation, description of child death (from starvation), near-death, emotional/mental abuse, major semi-permanent character injury, god, minor character death, they're major characters depending on your pov, I can't actually think of others, after writing about 2ha it feels positively fluffy). Note that there's not really any explicit content, just implications of smut, and not til basically the very end and extras.

Plot: Yan Wushi, sect leader of a demonic sect, has just come out of an extended seclusion to improve his cultivation when he and one of his disciples come across a man who is wounded to the point of near death. This turns out to be Shen Qiao, the sect leader of Mount Xuandu. When Shen Qiao awakens from his wounds, he's lost his memory, AND he's blind, and Yan Wushi decides it would be great fun and an excellent use of his time to fuck with Shen Qiao by trying to turn him evil - because Yan Wushi is certain that ALL people are inherently evil, and shattering Shen Qiao's veneer of righteousness will just help prove that.

Spoilers: it's not a veneer.

Not spoilers: Not many hijinks ensue, but there are a few hijinks, and even when it's not hijinxed, it's still not that painful...usually.

My Take: despite that synopsis, a lot of the plot of Thousand Autumns is actually political, and I like political plots, so I liked that aspect of it. However, it has some serious pacing issues imo, and it's also hard to read in English atm because it's not fully translated; it's close, now, much closer than when I read it a few months ago, so it'll be easier to read soon. Or maybe I shouldn't say it's pacing problems, but rather, it's more of a sequence of multiple major plots, strung together, with the growing relationship between Yan Wushi and Shen Qiao playing out in the background. I think if I'd known there was no "one big plot" that would have actually helped me, because it kept feeling like, "Oh, THIS is the main thing," but it never was. Things would feel climactic...except then there'd be more. So it's probably better to actually think of it as more...episodic? And the episodes/stories build, and interrelate, and do have a culmination, but not all of them directly tie in, and not all the threads end up coming together/getting resolved.

Relationship Dynamic: early on, Yan Wushi is definitely abusive and manipulative, intentionally so, and I would argue that, imo, Shen Qiao falls for it. However, mid-way through, there's some big reveals, and after that when they're reunited Shen Qiao no longer takes any shit and Yan Wushi continues to act like he doesn't care even when he clearly does. They're not a typical ship in ANY WAY, and I'd say their relationship is more founded on mutual respect than on love. Indeed, in the author's notes at one point MXS actually says they doesn't see them as the kind of couple to ever exchange love declarations, and I thought that was really interesting and it really helped me to understand how they worked together because I'll own I struggled with at times. Yan Wushi is self-interested, often cruel, and ethically and morally dubious. Shen Qiao, on the other hand, could probably ascend to Daoist godhood, he's so pure. Yet...they DO work. I'd say "opposites attract" but that's ALSO not their main trope, not exactly. They're a VERY hard ship to explain, and I know some people who've read the whole book and still don't really...get them...and I've had to really think about them to wrap my head around them...but the more I've thought about them, the more I like them.

6. Those Years in Quest of Honor Mine by Man Man He Qi Duo.

Genre: historical fiction set in either actual China or make-believe China, I'm not sure if this is directly incorporated any real people

Where to Access It: English Translation by Perpetual Daydreams | manhua (untranslated, I'm not sure if there's anyone translating it into English) | I think there's a live action in the works? Not sure beyond that though.

Trigger Warnings: suicide attempts, suicidal ideation, drug addiction, drug abuse, chronic illness (different character than the drugs), manipulation, abusive, awful parents and parental figures (not all, but definitely some), some homophobia (but way less than there could have been), probably other stuff

Plot: After 7 years away, Zhong Wan returns to the capital of the Empire with the three children of his benefactor, the seven-years-dead Prince Ning. Prince Ning was executed for treason against the previous Emperor, and Zhong Wan has done all he can to protect and raise the three kids, but he's got a lot of worries about returning to the capital and what could happen to his charges if they get pulled into the politics surrounded the Emperor. But, even worse, he's got even more worries about being reunited with Yu She, nephew of the Emperor, with whom he has more than a little history...and about whom he has been lying for the past 7 years, claiming that he is Yu She's lover, in a bid to help use Yu She's reputation to protect Prince Ning's children.

Hijinks ensue.

And so does a political nightmare.

My Take: TYQHM was a hard book to get into because there are just so many characters and it's all about politics - this is NOT a xianxia or wuxia novel, and these characters are NOT cultivators. There's basically nothing supernatural in the whole book; instead, it's about Zhong Wan and Yu She figuring out their own histories, and accepting each other, while trying to survive in a political world that increasingly wants both of them dead. However, I adore political plots, and when all was said and done I really enjoyed it, and I'm trying tooth and nail to claw other people into the fandom with me, so far with basically no success. It only has like 15 works in English on AO3. And so not only does it not fit that requirement of yours...

Relationship Dynamic: ...I think you would also probably not like the relationship dynamic? Zhong Wan is a bit like Wei Wuxian-as-Mo Xuanyu, except more...genuinely? Like, it's his actual personality, not an act, in quite the same way. I don't mean the "flamboyantly gay" part...usually...he definitely has his moments...but he's just...like, he's been through so much that he'll basically say anything, and drag himself entirely through the mud, to distract people who might hurt the three kids (they're like 16, 13, 13, now I think? It was never THAT clear to me, tbh...certainly, all are at least 10...) and, later, Yu She. He has zero face, and doesn't mind having negative face when he feels the situation demands it...and Yu She, on the other hand, has MAJOR depression issues, is sure he deserves nothing, and mostly wants to destroy everyone around him and then kill himself, at least until Zhong Wan starts giving him a reason to live again. But, more than that...Zhong Wan is like the fucking epitome of a bratty subby bottom. He wants to get fucked SO bad. And Yu She is an incredibly reluctant dom, hilariously so at times, uncomfortably/manipulative so at others. When all was said and done, I was pretty fond of them both, but there were definitely moments that made me grimace, and given what you say of how you felt about MDZS, I think this one is less likely to be to your taste?

Bonus 7: Guardian by Priest. I never finished the novel version of Guardian because the translation had some issues that caused me not to enjoy it, so I won't get into it too much, but again, Guardian is a very different book than any of the others, because it's modern fantasy(ish, like, it's still deeply embedded in Daoist-related tropes but it's more "magic spells" and less "cultivation." Like, in terms of what it's like, it felt more like Japanese modern Onmyoji style stories, to me, than it felt like the ancient Chinese wuxia/xianxia cultivation stories.). I'm not gonna get into lots of details, because I read part of the book more than a year ago, and have seen the show (which is VERY different) like three times, so I can hardly even remember what they're like in the novel. There was definitely some weirdness, though? If you're potentially interested, I'd suggest starting with the drama instead. The plot for that is...

Plot: Zhao Yunlan heads a Special Investigation Unit in the human world tasked with maintaining a treaty between humans and the dixigren ("undergrounders") who are (in the show) aliens (in the book...it's the world of the dead). While doing this job, he keeps running into this professor, Shen Wei, who definitely knows more than he oughta.

Hijinks ensue.

And then it murders you with feels.

The live action streams from YouTube - here.

(Warning: uh, I don't want to give spoilers, but my "guaranteed happy ending" does NOT apply to the Guardian TV show...but it does apply to the book, as I understand it.)

Anyway, this was a terrible use of my time but it was definitely more fun than what I should be doing, and it's probably way more information than you wanted or needed, but since I wasn't sure what exactly you had in mind, I figured...might as well be thorough?

(Today's hyper-focus fail: this post, ha...)

#unforth rambles #i'm not gonna tag the fandoms because i give my own opinions #some of which aren't all THAT positive #i think it's best if I don't just dump that into the main tags

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hilli98215 · 3 years

Text

I am confused. I am hurt. I don’t know what to think. This is a long post. A very long post that is personal but I’ve had it in my head for a while to write. You don’t have to read this. This post has no real meaning. It’s more of a rant of how I feel in the world of fandom, my experiences, and why this posts exists.

Again, you do not have to read this.

You have been warned.

DO NOT REBLOG THIS POST!!!!

When I became an English major in college, I did so knowing several things. One of those is the fact I love literature and I love discovering why authors, creators, and artists wrote what became their most well known work.

Where am I going?

My first fandom was when I was in Junior High (about 13-14 years old) that I was a part of, meaning I read fan fiction and discovered fan art of, was either Naruto or Pokémon. To me these works were escapes of my real confusing life. Especially when I moved states and schools. I had no one. Through this, I discovered what I liked and didn’t like in the world of fiction and was introduced to fandom words/slang such as shipping, fan fiction, lemons (which I don’t think is used as often now), different types of writing, yaoi, yuri, and a few more I can’t remember. This also included the all important phrase Don’t like don’t read. This was when I was in my early teens.

But I was in a phase where I could find what I found interesting and that was that.

When I got to high school, I was still this awkward quiet kid with no friends. But I did have marching band so that was something.

At this point was was interested in Ouran Highschool Host Club, Death Note, a series called Beauty Pop, Fullmetal Alchemist, and a few others. This was also around the time where I began writing fanfiction for OHSC and even began buying manga. Anyway, this was my introduction to fandom as a teenager. And this is before Tumblr.

All I had were my friends, videos on YouTube, and my own interests. No one really understood why I loved all these things.

Then came the very first fandom I became fully obsessed in my sophomore year: a small series called Hetalia Axis Powers. I was completely invested in this fandom. So much so I wrote fan fiction, bought merch, and read a lot of fan fiction myself. I think it was because, at the time I thought it was because the art style was cute, the voice acting wasn’t half bad and it had to do with history. But this is where things got interesting for me and learning about fandom as a whole.

As a teen, I hadn’t known about AUs and this series had a lot of them. From the usual school AUs to odd ones. I usually stayed in my bubble and kept up the mantra Don’t like Don’t read.

But why talk about it?

Well, let’s just say a lot of the content later on became weird and new. I learned a lot about new terms like de-aging and ABO. But this leads to interest which once again let me know what genres of fan fiction I like.

I continued on with this fandom for about 3 years. And what broke it was the drama and how people were finding a sudden moral compass for personified countries. I mean there are other problems with that show that I recognize now as an adult and didn't see as a kid but that’s for another time. But I quietly left because I was beginning to understand that the drama wasn’t worth a tv show.

I would say the next fandom I was invested in and loved and I think had the least amount of drama was Fairy Tail. Now I fell in love with this series because of the story, characters, and the welcoming fandom. Overall there was rarely any drama because I think we all knew that we had to be civil with each other and respect our ships. While I’m not part of that fandom anymore a lot of people on Tumblr and FFN were very welcoming. The main series kinda fizzled out but that was one of the few positive fandom experiences I had.

I was at that point in my life where I was in college, created my Tumblr and posted regularly to escape life.

Coming off that fandom, I was part of the Yuri on Ice! fandom from beginning to the end. I mean it’s a sports anime that’s about men's figure skating and how it can affect athletes just to get a gist of it.

That’s when my experience with fandom became interesting because these characters were being paired in a way that made me feel like they can’t be paired with anyone else. Like, there was a pairing we were all cheering for to happen by the end.

This is the first series I was highly interested in as an adult where the ages of the characters were defined. There were a few in their teens, some in their early to mid 20s, and a couple in their 30s. Now this was a historic anime for several reasons. The main being there being a gay relationship being shown in a positive light and mental illness being shown in a way that wasn’t patronizing and negative. I loved this show for those reasons. But I also quickly learned how people would take these characters (especially those with huge age differences) and pair them up. That was my first introduction to criticism of how ‘gross’ it would be for a 15 year old to be paired up with an 18 year old. But I saw a problem that made me second guess my thinking. When I was in high school, I knew someone who was a sophomore at 15 and dated someone who was 18. Why was there a problem?

I knew if I voiced this that I would be shamed and told that I was disgusting. Eventually I had enough and left shortly after the series ended.

Then came the Voltron: Legendary Defender series. Oh boy.

Now that series came out while I was in college and I often viewed it in a critical perspective similar to one would a piece of literature because my major was in English and that was what I was taught. Like YOI I was part of this fandom day 1 because it was so different from the original Voltron series from the 80s. I loved how the fandom dissected everything in every episode. There were watch parties, analysis videos, and even skits at conventions. It was a fandom I knew I wanted to be a part of. But then there was fanfiction that I found odd and knew that I never wanted to read that. People were writing about topics that made me uncomfortable and I didn’t know how to deal with it. After a while, I questioned why I was forcing myself to read them in the first place. So, I stopped reading them. This was also around the time where I discovered AO3 and their amazing tagging system. Because if the tagging system was not there, I probably would have stopped reading fanfiction all together.

But then there was drama, shipping wars, morality wars, and I had enough. I was there until it ended and left quietly. Which is sad considering I loved the experience but it was ruined by what people thought was right for fictional characters.

Now you may be asking “What was the point of this post?”

To answer your question, I don’t know.

I have loved reading since I was a kid. And when I got to high school, I had this AP teacher who told us something that has stayed with me to this day.

‘As a reader we are detectives. We want to know why the author wrote this book. We want to know what influenced them.’

I took that saying to heart and approach everything through a critical lens. Which is difficult in a fandom. It’s hard to have a critical approach to a series that everyone takes for a grain of salt.

I have been exposed to a lot of books and pieces of literature that have been considered controversial because of their content. When I left high school, I began to realize what genres of books I like in the YA genre and in literature.

I experimented.

And when you think about it, that’s what you do with fan fiction and fandom. We are always experimenting. We are always finding what we like and don’t like.

But recently I’ve noticed a new fandom term that makes me wonder where I fall in all of this craziness we call fandom.

Pro-Fiction/Pro-Shipper

It wasn’t until last year I saw this word thrown around in a new fandom I am in. I tried to do some research but I couldn't find anything. Nothing. And then I learned it’s a new term in itself.

I won’t go into detail but it reminds of the ‘video games are violent so that makes so-and-so violent’ argument parents made when Mortal Kombat came out.

Well you still didn’t answer the question.

And you’d be right. I saw a post from a follower that saddened me and honestly freaked me out. Why announce that you hate a specific group? It felt like a call out post without saying any names. A warning that states: Block me or out yourself. Or rather: Block me or else.

Do I identify as this? To tell you the truth, I don’t know. I think critically and see things differently. In fact everyone does.

We are always going to be influenced by the media whether it be a movie, television, a book, or a video game. We will always love these storylines and characters. We will always take the messages to heart. We will always cheer for the hero and maybe the villain too.

I do want you guys to remember this, make your own fandom experience. Block those who make you feel uncomfortable and make you feel like you don’t matter. You do.

You are your own person. No one can tell you otherwise. If you feel uncomfortable, then maybe you need to leave the fandom. Or find a space in the fandom that you can be yourself. Or don’t care what people think and do what you always do.

It’s all up to you.

#rant #long post #sorry for those who decided to read this #i just cant stay silent anymore #fandom #fandom toxicity #fandom discourse #fan fiction #personal #i mean #this is getting out of hand #where do i fall in all of this

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magewardensurana · 3 years

Text

Dear Creator Letter

Under the Cut!

First of all thank you so much for taking on my prompts, I’m looking forward to seeing whatever it is you create for me!

Okay, general DNWs:

Racism, homophobia, misogynistic language, incest or pseudo incest, sexual content outside of what would be canon appropriate, pretty much every kink going, imbalanced power dynamics, soulmates, rape, animal or child abuse, animal death, AUs (coffee shop, no powers, highschool/uni etc), Avengers Endgame-Complaint fics.

Now onto my Do Wants

Found family, angst with a happy ending, casefics, bisexual ladies coming to their bisexuality later in life, bisexual ladies who knew all along, bisexual ladies who chose men over women (a given for this event), AUs that take canon and make it a little different.

My writing on AO3 is a good indication of what I like, and feel free to check out my tumblr for a good idea of my kind of jam.

Fandom Specific (honestly though these are just prompt ideas. If you have something else in mind go for it)

MCU

I’m not a big fan of Endgame, or most of Infinity War, so if you want to go��‘to hell with this, everyone lives’ then I am more than okay with that. If you want Thanos to have been killed shortly after GOTG2 because Nebula tracked him down and stabbed him in the dick until he died from it then I’m also okay with that.

Carol/Maria - I’d love something pre-canon with these two. Their backstory is so interesting, especially when you factor in they were co-parenting and dating under DADT. I’d also love lots of interactions with Monica&Carol and Mar Vell and Carol. if you want to go for a casefic then, since I do love Natasha, Carol vs a Red Room Loyal Black Widow?

Carol/Valkyrie - Anything post-Ragnarok with the Asgardians (all of them, even the dead ones. Canon is dead and we killed it) on Earth, Would love: a lot of Carol interacting with the Revengers and Valkyrie interacting with literally any female characters because the MCU is bad at that.

Sarah/May - So much potential with these two. Blended families! Second loves! Dating while older and with kids! I know Sambucky is a logical sistership to this pairing but I’m not a fan of that ship.

Dragon Age

Cassandra/Literally Any Of The Female Protagonists - Big fan of ‘Cass should’ve been bi’ so I’d like something exploring this. I’d like something set during DAI (so after the death of her boyfriend) with Cass coming to realisations about her sexuality. However you want to write the Warden/Hawke/Inquisitor is fine but my preference is for Surana, Sarcastic/Aggressive mage!Hawke and mage Adaar. I don’t like Anders so if you ever want to throw in some Anders hate then I’m fine with that.

Josie/Bela - I’d love something post-DAI with Josie taking Bela home to meet her family, or Josie as a member of Bela’s pirate crew (and putting her diplomatic skills to good use)

Marquis of Serault/Well Read Pig Farmer - I just want anything involving my favourite former Tevinter magister.

Fire Emblem

Three Houses - my preference is for the Crimson Flower route, but if you want to go the angst route of Byleth and El are fighting against each other then Golden Deer is my favourite path. I also love AUs where the three Lords (or four, counting Yuri) team up with each other to fight against TWSITD. Other than that I have no preferences for what you want to do with any of the ships.

Blazing Blade - I’d love to see post FE7, pre-FE6 stuff, with Lyn and Florina being involved in their friends’ lives. Lyn teaching Roy swordfighting, Florina teaching Lilina how to ride a Pegasus. Plus, lots of interacting with Farina and Ninian (especially if you want to build on the Ninian and Florina friendship). Or if you want to do what they were up to during FE6 I’d love that too.

Awakening - No preferences here.

Resident Evil

Rebecca/Claire - AU where Rebecca is still in Racoon City and teams up with Claire and Sherry? Vendetta AU where Claire is there too? Chris and Jill are getting married and neither Claire or Becca have dates and go together? I don’t really mind. For RE2 canon I prefer the 1998 storyline (Claire A/Leon B) but if you only know the remake then that’s fine, or if you want to mix canons that’s also fine. For past relationships I love the angst Burnfield gives Claire but Billy and Rebecca I see as completely platonic.

Jill/Ada - Normally I’m a strictly Valenfield and Aeon kind of woman but I have a weakness for this ship. Jill is heavily associated with the colour blue, has blonde or brown hair depending on the game and is completely on the side of justice. What I’m saying is: she’s Ada’s type. I love the idea of Ada being at the police station early and running into Jill while she’s there in RE3. I’m also a fan of Ada trying to save Jill in RE5 when she realises it’s her actions in Spain that led to Jill’s brainwashing.

Ace Attorney

I don’t have any preference just as long as there’s no Franmaya, which is my NOTP or the Bad Cykesquill (Simon/Athena. Not only is the age difference too high, but they have a sibling relationship and Simon is clearly gay). I tend to headcanon Klaiver and Ema used to date but Mia and Godot never did. Background Wrightworth is always a plus.

FMA Manga//Brotherhood

Oliver/Maria - Honestly it’s not hard to see what I like when it comes to this ship because the AO3 tag is 99% written by me. Put Olivier in suspenders and holding a sword and I’m a happy woman.

Rose/Paninya - a woman whose town was destroyed in riots and a woman who has found a love of doing repair work? And they’re both friends with Winry who is more than happy to play matchmaker? The pairing writes itself. I know that the 03 anime gave Rose a dead boyfriend, but the manga never specifies. They’re lesbians, Harold.

Dishonored

Emily/Alexi - Wyman? I don’t know her! I love AUs where Alexi lives and is on the Dreadful Wale during the events of the game. Also a big fan of Jess Lives AUs if you want to have Emily attempting to court her childhood best friend/bodyguard while her amazingly embarrassing parents cheer her on. And I love the AUs where both Corvo and Emily are the co-protagonists (especially marked!Corvo, flesh and steel!Emily). I ignore the canonical age difference between Corvo and Jess and put them both as being in their late teens when they met. Basically anything where Alexi is still alive and not going to die is a good fic. If you want to include Wyman at all my preference is for female Wyman since I see Emily as a lesbian. Either she and Emily are exes on good terms or have always been just friends.

Anyway, I think that’s everything. Thank you again!

#dear creator letter

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takaraphoenix · 3 years

Note

Hello! 💙 First, thank you so much for the advise :) It still won't be my main focus, but you are right, this is an easier way to write smut.

Second, for the ask game:

😐📥🏅😈💻 (it's hard to choose between the questions, but I leave the remaining for the others ;))

You're welcome, I'm glad it helped, even if just a bit. ;)

And thanks for playing! ^-^

😐 What embarrasses you most about your own writing?

Okay, so, quite frankly, at this point, nothing. I am immune to embarrassment about my writing.

Being embarrassed was why I hoarded my fics on my laptop and didn't post them. And then I did and there were people who genuinely liked it and since then, I've elected to focus on that side of things.

There are people who genuinely enjoy my writing, mistakes and imperfections and all. And I enjoy my writing, I mean that is why I write because I enjoy doing it. So, I don't see the point in being embarrassed about it.

📥 What is your fave fic to receive comments/messages on?

That is actually a constantly changing thing. Depends on what fic I am currently most obsessed over and enjoy writing the most, I mean, obviously. While I am in the middle of writing an ongoing project, getting comments is the best, duh, so it changes depending on what stories I am currently working on (that is, obviously, not to say that I don't like getting comments on closed fics ;D).

So, right now that'd be a tie between Keeping Up With the Scoobies and my Earth-304d series. They're both bigger projects and also more... out there. I mean, one's my first venture into BtVS and a huge rewrite project, the other is literally me overhauling the DC universe and creating my entire own world with lore for all my favorite heroes, I have multiple charts for that one to keep the timeline straight. These are both huge passion projects for me, where I am highlighting two of my biggest OTPs for the first time respectively.

And receiving enthusiastic comments about something that's a real passion project just always gets me. I mean, when you're ten years into writing, many fics are fun experiments or just new AU takes or different spins on old tropes, but finding something you really plan out in great detail and where you really have to construct things at length and put a lot of work in because it's the first time you're doing something like that? I genuinely haven't felt that way since I wrote Chasing Fireflies and to have people I can share the enthusiasm I have for this with is amazing.

😈 Is there anything you enjoy doing that you think your readers hate?

Honestly, I feel like if there is something I enjoy doing - which means I will be doing it a lot - and someone hates then maybe... they should stop reading? Because then you're not the intended audience, you're not meant to be the reader for this if the thing I write is something you hate?

Like, one person came into my comment section when I started Legacy of the Big Three and complained if I'm not growing tired of "always" having Percy not be in the know.

And, quite frankly, no I don't. Because whether I had him not know that he's a merman, or not know that he's an alien, or now not know that his parents are two of the world's greatest superheroes... the stories couldn't be more different? The secrets entail entirely different genres and storylines.

Also, I take the "and Percy didn't know growing up" literally from canon. Like, that's the whole shtick, Percy is twelve and thrust into this world and has to discover it. I like keeping structures from canon when I write an AU.

If that seems repetitive, feel free to not read the story, even though superheroes are not the same as merpeople or aliens.

I do feel like I'm pretty up-front about what to expect, I mean heck I always diligently tag all the kinks or sex-constellations too, all the major tropes and things I think people might want to seek out or avoid and I try my best to make my summaries reflect the story.

Like, I'm aware that many in the PJO fandom are probably not keen on the Jason and Piper as siblings angle that I'm really enjoying these days because I like the idea of Tristan/Beryl working off them both being actors and thus sober!Beryl and Jason with a happy childhood. But it's a big canon ship and I'd guess those who ship it don't really like reading about them as siblings, but that's why I specifically include a tag saying they're step-siblings in the fic at hand and from thereon out, it's really up to the reader to decide whether they hate that element more than they want to read the fic itself.

That's the point in general. I write what I like and if it's not what someone likes, then no one is forcing them to actually read the story. I don't care if there are hypothetical people who hate it, I don't write for them, they can go and find other writers who do write what they love.

💻 Do you do research for your fics? What’s the deepest dive you’ve done?

The deepest dive might be currently for my Earth-304d project, because I'm actually reading comics to get a better grasp on some of the characters that I have only met on a very surface level but would like to include, I've also been diving into wikis for background information on the characters, including ages in the Arrowverse to make my timeline work out and see how the characters fit together.

I don't want to go full OoC Elseworlds on this, I do want them to be the beloved characters, just give the world around them a different spin.

But I'm generally not big on doing actual research, like... writing a historic AU and researching real historic facts and such? I'm not doing homework for my hobby, that sounds disturbing.

Fanfic Ask Game

#Writing #Fanfiction #About Me #Fanfic Ask Game #send me asks

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gretchensinister · 4 years

Note

also TDoP Blacksand and whichever of the NDU ships strikes your fancy

For TDoP (that’s The Doors of Perception, for those who don’t know, a long human AU on Ao3—my username there is the same as my url here) I think I will only do a few, since quite a lot of these questions get answered in the fic itself!

5. Who says ‘I love you’ first?

Sandy—so early Kozzy has trouble believing he means it as seriously as he does. Sandy’s parents and all of the Guardians characters living in the house that’s the main setting say I love you far more freely than anyone in Kozzy’s family.

6. Who would they ask if they ever had a threesome?

After a lot of discussion, the answer to this is, in fact, “no one.” The conversation came up during the ‘60s part of the AU, and even though it wouldn’t have been too difficult to arrange, then, they never agreed on any particular person to ask. Later, however, in a purely hypothetical discussion, they did agree on Aragorn.

17. When they find a time machine, where do they go?

The future. The future, always and forever.

26. Why do they need to have a serious chat?

The thorniest part of writing and thinking about this AU is that I’ve tied it so closely to the real world (there are small offshoots that link it to more fantastical worlds, but the main fic is a real world human AU). Sandy and Kozzy are 73/72 this year. They don’t want to do nothing, but they can both get very paranoid about the possibility of losing the other/the other being in danger. So the chat they need to have is how they can help other people without doing things they think are intolerably risky for each other.

For NDU (that’s Nightmare Dork University, for those unfamiliar, a college AU collectively built upon by a number of authors and artists that puts a whole bunch of AU Pitches and one Jack together—more of a mood than a single storyline) I will go with Nightmare Galleon, because I think I’ve really got my own particular variation of the pair now, so why not work through some headcanons?

1. Who makes the first move and how?

Pitchiner makes the first move, very straightforward, he just asks for Pitch’s number. Pitch refuses and immediately retaliates by asking for his. To Pitchiner that’s six of one, half dozen of the other, so he agrees.

2. Who is the most insecure and what makes them feel better?

Pitch is more insecure by far, but it mostly has to do with Piki rather than Pitchiner. What Pitchiner realizes, though, is that Pitch appears to feel much better when he’s doing the things that he’s good at that Piki doesn’t do. These things include costume and set design, costume construction, lighting, sound design…but if Pitch stops to think he sometimes can throw himself into a funk about how none of these aspects are as prestigious/relevant/important as being The Prodigy Playwright like Piki.

3. Who is the most romantic?

Pitchiner, but he’s also not going to be very romantic unless Pitch can stop acting like any romantic gestures he’s given are his due and taking them for granted.

4. Who can’t keep their hands to themselves?

Pitchiner is very grabby, it’s true, and the things he does are more obviously affectionate/sexual, but Pitch is also incredibly physical with Pitchiner, even if it is in a somewhat haphazard/almost violent way. He gets better with time, though the process gets set back every time he visits home, and also once when Pitchiner compared him to a rescue cat.

5. Who says ‘I love you’ first?

Pitchiner does, however it’s not in a really sweet moment, it’s more like a WTF moment, like, I’m still here because I love you? Oh shit that’s true! This strikes Pitch as reckless behavior and he doesn’t say he loves Pitchiner until much later. He’s very lucky that Pitchiner is more perceptive than he gives him credit for and recognizes the signs of Pitch’s growing love.

6. Who would they ask if they ever had a threesome?

NDU doesn’t always have a Sandy, but I don’t think there’s any harm in putting one in one of Pitch’s creative writing classes who embodies “it’s always the quiet ones” and has a wit that runs around Pitch’s in circles. This infuriates Pitch, but in a confused way, as unlike his brother, Sandy is not trying to be a better writer than him, in particular. He just is. That’s how Pitch feels, anyway. He’s not at the point where he can understand that art doesn’t need to be ranked. Anyway so this Sandy decides to respond to antagonism with flirting, and it’s not as though Pitch thinks he doesn’t deserve to be flirted with, he’s got a hot boyfriend after all, and Sandy knows this…Sandy does know this, because he and Pitchiner are both in the honors program. And when Pitchiner meets Pitch after class one day Sandy is perfectly happy to flirt with both of them. The audacity in itself is appealing. So in this scenario it’s less them asking and more someone else asking them.

In another branch of the NDU story cluster I think they would ask Jack Sickle, not particularly to spite Piki even, but because Piki is being weird about sex with Jack and Pitchiner thinks that Jack should have his first experience of gay sex with less baggage attached to it. Pitch is not 100% sure that a threesome involving the twin of the man who’s obsessed with Jack counts as LESS baggage but sometimes in college you make decisions that seem obviously bad for reasons that aren’t really clear.

11. What do they hide from one another?

So, these things are kind of all the starting point state for my NDU boys. They wouldn’t remain static if I actually did write the version of the big long NDU story I have in my head.

On the mundane side, Pitch hides almost everything he can about his childhood with Piki, because while they weren’t perfectly harmonious siblings, they still had a pretty strong bond and their relationship didn’t start to turn sour until about high school. Pitch isn’t sure how to explain how it all happened to himself, much less anyone else, so he does what he can to avoid questions. He also tends to hide his family dynamics from everyone in general, because he’s from a money-poisoned environment and the more people know about him, the more likely someone’s going to say, “you know that was/is fucked up, right?” and he does NOT have time to think about that right now. He also hides the fact that he occasionally has idiopathic seizures, because that would mean he’s weak or something. However this last thing was revealed to Pitchiner very dramatically and resulted in a lot more panic than it needed to, because of the surprise.

Pitchiner, on the other hand, habitually hides any worries and fears he has about anything. He shoves all that down and tries to change all that energy into things that could be possible solutions. Not feeling strong enough? Never tell anyone, just work out more! Worried that you can’t take care of your loved ones? Learn how to cook! Worried that you really are just a meathead and that you’re wasting your scholarship? Study more! But alone! So no one will know! Pitchiner also hides from himself and anybody else the fact that he’s thought about and is aware of the way his size/strength can be intimidating/scary and not just a hunk/himbo trait. He’s deeply worried that he’s an inherently dangerous person, and so he tries to act like he’s just too dumb to have thought about it…but he has, and he’s wondered if this aspect of himself is a tool he can, should, or would use in different aspects of his life.

On the non-mundane side, both Pitch and Pitchiner hide the fact that they’re having weird, possibly supernatural visions/encounters with terrifying entities that they nevertheless seem to have some kind of deep kinship with.

12. What first changes when it starts getting serious?

Pitch falls asleep around Pitchiner. Pitchiner starts paying a lot closer attention to what he can or cannot casually needle Pitch about.

13. When do they realise they should get together?

Well, at first Pitch is like, Pitchiner won’t worry about me, that’s GREAT. And Pitchiner is like, Pitch doesn’t have any expectations of me, that’s GREAT. So they first get together because they think they won’t care about each other…which is incorrect.

14. When one has a cold, what does the other do?

When Pitch has a cold, Pitchiner has got the somewhat homemade chicken soup ready! He’s got the tissues! The immune-system-boosting vitamins (hey, he may be in the honors program but he still can’t perfectly detect bullshit)! He’s got a huge bottle of water with times marked on it for Pitch to drink all of! Which is good, because otherwise Pitch would just wrap himself in a quilt, take swigs of nyquil at random times, and sleep until he either died or felt better. When Pitchiner has a cold, Pitch is the one who reminds him (none too gently, though) to stay in and fully recover. He will also bring canned soup and huge water bottles upon request. Not the vitamins though, they smell weird. He will argue with Pitchiner to take actual cold medicine and usually succeeds.

18. When they fight, how do they make up?

The glib answer to this is sex, and that works for their arguments and spats over minor things, but when a major issue comes up it’s different. They fought over Pitch keeping his seizures a secret, for example, and it seemed like they’d never be able to resolve that, though they both knew they didn’t want to break up. So…they tried to bring in someone neutral as a moderator. Fortunately or unfortunately, the only person who was around was Proto. Who said some insightful things and some bizarre things and soon enough both Pitch and Pitchiner wanted him out of the conversation. And then they were just like, “Are we breaking up? No? All right, let’s try to forget the whole thing.” Actual apologies and vulnerability are a few years away.

21. Where do they get nervous about going with one another?

Pitchiner is nervous about going to see his family with Pitch, because he’s worried that someone’s going to be like, “hey, he’s pretty bad for you, you know that, right?” and he can’t fully explain their connection and he doesn’t want to have to. Pitch is nervous about going to see his family with Pitchiner because he knows they’ll look down on him and won’t believe that Pitch could actually care about him as more than just a body, which will force Pitch to admit to himself how much Pitchiner means to him and it’s a whole mess (for Pitch, mentally).

22. Where does their first kiss happen?

Pitchiner goes for a cheeky, casual kiss after they have lunch together one day in the school’s main dining hall, like it could be a Bugs-Bunnyish joke unless…But then Pitch is like, what? How dare you? And yanks Pitchiner down by his t-shirt for a much deeper kiss that leaves both of them kind of flustered as they have to hurry off to their next classes.

24. Where do they first have sex?

Pitch’s dorm room. He’s got a single, he knows he’s planning to be discreet, and he’s very clear that he’s making a booty call to Pitchiner.

25. Why do they fight?

On a serious level, they fight because they try to keep so much from each other, but their relationship develops enough that they things they try to hide eventually come to light. And then both of them get mad because it’s like “we could have worked this out sooner!” but unfortunately it doesn’t work out that way. They fight because they care about each other but are squirrelly about deserving care/being cared for.

On a less serious level, they squabble because they can. Pitch is zero percent scared of Pitchiner, and Pitchiner doesn’t expect Pitch to be emotionally controlled at all times and he doesn’t compare him to his brother. Having a raised-voices argument about bananas or Stephen King or whatever is freeing.

26. Why do they need to have a serious chat?

Because the evidence that supernatural stuff is real and taking an interest in them and a few other people close to them is accumulating and talking probably won’t solve that but it might help them get through it all alive.

27. Why do their friends get annoyed with them?

Over the top public displays of affection and stupid loud fights about things like bananas or Stephen King

28. Why do they get jealous?

Pitch gets jealous of the way Pitchiner seems so comfortable taking up space. Pitchiner gets jealous of how quick Pitch’s wit can be, especially in arguments.

29. Why do they fall a little bit more in love?

Pitch falls a little bit more in love with Pitchiner for what seem like contradictory reasons. As they’re together in their years of young adulthood, Pitchiner learns the skill of pausing before reacting, how to be more effectively compassionate, etc., and Pitch learns to accept that Pitchiner really does love him for him. But as Pitchiner is getting more mature in this way, he’s also gaining confidence in being implacable/unstoppable when he deems it necessary. Like the fact that Pitchiner is able and willing to intimidate people is maybe a red flag, but it also lights him up like nothing else. Pitchiner falls a little bit more in love with Pitch as Pitch learns to appreciate the things he himself can do, and care less about what Piki says or does. He also falls a little bit more in love with Pitch as he becomes more and more refined and precise in how manipulating or cruel he can be. Again, not good, but sometimes it’s just impressive, you know? But AFTER this point…they both get a chance to see each other respond to being offered power that very very few people are ever offered, and see each other recognize the strings attached, and recognize that they cannot deal with this on their own. And they come out of this without losing themselves, and without becoming truly monstrous, either. And that inspires more love than skillfully being terrible.

30. Why does it work (or not work) between them?

It works out between them partly because of the horrifying supernatural stuff they’ve both experienced. These experiences are something they share with Proto, Piki, and Jack, but as far as they know, no one else. To have a long-term partner that doesn’t have that kind of supernatural heaviness in their past is, at least subconsciously, totally unworkable to both Pitch and Pitchiner.

But it’s not just the supernatural shared experience. They do like each other, they do love each other, and, most importantly, they’ve seen each other grow and change over their years at college. Sometimes it was for the worse! Eventually it was for the better. Now, in the kind of overarching story I would create, at the end of college Pitch and Pitchiner might break up because of the weird events they went through and now feel like those are something they want to be done with and put behind them, plus a worry that being around the others will cause more of it to happen. But they can’t lose contact completely, and let’s say Proto eventually arranges for them to randomly meet again. And basically it’s like—“You loved me when I was terrible. So I know I can be myself around you, and it can be okay even if I fuck up while trying to go through life while being less terrible.”

#blacksand #marypsue #NDU #nightmare galleon #meme #the doors of perception

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pairup-squareup · 4 years

Text

why r u ep 2 thoughts

small gripes to get out first!

the massive amounts of side characters that i have no idea about increases. i wish zon’s little squad was maybe two people.

also the editing. there were scenes that needed to be chopped much smaller to flow better. if the first ep was a bit fast, this ep dragged its feet

now...content

wonderful to see tharn and type. type being unpleasant and combative from the beginning? perfect. i love one bastard man.

type and tharn ending up as some sort of relationship advice source in their own series is still so funny to me, and it continued here. zon’s reaction to them, is how i often feel when confronted with type, a sort of awe and horror. (fyi, im big type fan, but i also want to fight him 24/7. i hold multiple and equal opinions)

don’t like the rp shipping plotline, but to get to the reward of saifah and zon, we must experience the mortifying ordeal of Extreme Trope plotline and apparently that includes people shipping others openly.

mentioning saifah and zon, their interactions make this show for me. zon’s absolute determination to bodily intimidate saifah? amazing. wonderful. perfect. their height difference caters to me, lmao.

and i like that what we see now of saifah is that he’s kind of a goofball. it makes the oncoming romance much more enjoyable an idea for me.

fighter and tutor? hmm. the show isn’t selling me on it as a whole, but they had their moment in the bar which i liked. again, fighter was goofy. i love it, that’s neat. give me goofball over aloof jerk anyday.

i get that fighter is pining, and in denial, and doubling down on his mistakes because he fucked up once and doesn’t know how to change that. i just...i don’t feel the same thing from tutor. i haven’t felt that he has the same level of fascination. he just seems kinda annoyed. and that can’t sell me on a relationship.

but they do have chemistry, and as the story progresses, i’m hoping to change my mind

so in summary

+ zon tried to bodycheck saifah. phenomenal work, my son

- zon and zol’s super hot mum was not present in this ep

+ i like the cast, i like their overall vibe with one another

- so many boys. lets get rid of some of these extraneous boys, there isn’t room for them in the storyline

+ look as a queer woman, let me say a+++ on the beautiful women cast in this. babe city

- fighter lets put that name to the test for using hwahwa as your beard, basically

+ tutor not being soft is good. he’s an angry boy, and i appreciate that

- in no universe will the AU i dreamed about come true. what if tutor just started setting fires, and a subplot behind all this BL magical realism was...who is the arsonist burning down loan sharks and debtor’s offices?

i’m going to continue to watch. i didn’t have to fastfoward anything due to second hand embarrassment, and that’s a positive in itself. it’s nonsense but it’s nonsense that i am enjoying, for a large part.

#why r u #why r u the series #im just very into saifah's smug amusement at zon's everything #hard out there for a boy who wants to bite the kneecaps of one (1) lanky tree

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the-final-sif · 5 years

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Do you think it will ever be made "canon" that Bakugou was abused? Like an official plotline? When do you think Uraraka is gonna have an actual storyline? Do you have any ships other than todobakudeku (and the ships in that ship)? What's your opinion on Aizawa choking Monoma w/his scarf? Do you think Best Jeanist's behavior in the anime is any better than Mitsuki's? Opinions on female adult heroes hitting on teenage boys in the series? Or the ua girls being over sexualized?

I’m honestly not sure if it will every be seriously addressed in canon as abuse.

The initial scene with Mitsuki is played at least somewhat lightly/jokingly. All-Might does note that the family is dysfunctional, but it’s not treated like it’s a super serious issue that the teachers need to do something about.

However, we’ve had it happen a few times now, particularly with Katsuki, where something is played off as a joke only for canon to revisit it with a more serious tone. Almost as if get the reader to assume something is okay and then double back and be like ‘holy shit no this wasn’t.’.

I think the best example of this was the sports festival incident. When we see Katsuki on the podium, it’s played off super lightly. Oh haha, Katsuki’s so angry he had to be chained and muzzled to the podium. Then he’s upset about it and he brushes his teeth angrily. The readers aren’t meant to think something’s really wrong there.

Only, then we hit the kidnapping plotline and we go back to that incident with fresh eyes, and holy shit, they chained and muzzled a teenager to a podium in front of thousands of people. Now all of the sudden it’s not a joke anymore, Tomura has a photo of Katsuki chained to that podium which is really clearly shown to be why he thinks Katsuki will join the league of villains. We also see that the incident has warped the public’s perception of Katsuki to the point that a reporter, directly after this 16 year old child has been kidnapped by an extreme dangerous group of villains, feels comfortable asking his teachers if they think Katsuki will become a villain. Going so far as to call the again, child who is currently kidnapped, mentally unstable. At that point Aizawa apologizes and states what happened at the Sports Festival was his/the school’s fault. It’s taken very seriously even though it was originally played as a joke.

Since that initial scene with Mitsuki, we have gotten two hints about Katsuki’s home life. During Katsuki vs Izuku 2 he mirrors her words very closely when blaming himself for the kidnapping.

To quote from the official viz translation:

“We wouldn’t be in this mess if you hadn’t been so weak and gotten caught in the first place”

(Note the use of the word we, meaning she’s blaming him for more than just the kidnapping itself, she’s including the media disaster UA is facing. As if, it’s somehow his fault the school is being criticized for having a student kidnapped)

Then during Katsuki vs Izuku 2:

“If only I’d been stronger.. If I hadn’t been kidnapped by those stupid villains.. everything woulda been fine!”

Katsuki, a character who didn’t cry while he was actually kidnapped by villains or fuck even during/after the slime villain bullshit, has been driven to tears having emotional breakdown blaming himself for All-Might’s retirement. Using words that sound just like what we heard his mother say.

The second hint is the line from Katsuki in the remedial courses where he wants to fight the kids and doesn’t see an issue with it saying he was raised with violence. We’ve also seen his teacher acknowledging that they fucked up and didn’t watch his mental health after the kidnapping. We still haven’t exactly seen them doing shit to help him, but canon has acknowledged Katsuki has been failed by the adults in his life for the second time.

So, I’m not sure if canon is going to try and address this more seriously. It’s entirely possible given what we’ve seen so far. I do think it’s noteworthy that we’ve seen almost nothing about Katsuki’s personal life despite him being such a major character. We don’t see his dorm room, we don’t really see his bedroom, we don’t see him interacting with his family outside a grand total of 2 scenes (only actually seeing them in 1), and we’re missing a ton of info about him compared to the other main characters. I wouldn’t put it past the author to be purposefully hiding a lot of this so he can pull a more serious storyline regarding it later. Given the current push in Japan against child abuse (they finally made it illegal to hit kids at all, it’s a pretty serious issue right now since there was a string of kids who died from abuse), I would say it’d be quite clever to purposefully play those scenes like jokes, subtly drop hints to the readers that something’s up, and then after awhile hit the readers with a “actually, no, this had serious implications and impact for this character”. In a way it mirrors how a lot of emotional/more “mild” forms of child abuse can go unnoticed irl because people try to laugh it off. It’s also possible it will never get addressed. Who knows.

God I hope like hell we get more development for the female characters soon. On some level the bar is already so low I’m just happy Uraraka purposefully put her crush to the side to focus on being a hero, and that she’s working on improving her Murder Capacity. I’m definitely bothered by the amount of over-sexualization for basically all of the female characters. Actually Foraged By Nitroglycerin and Sparks will have a little after-fic one-shot addressing all my issues with that.

Actually, that kinda leads me into my stance on Midnight. Her hitting on teenage boys is gross af, but I think it’s symptomatic of cultural issues behind her character more than anything else. She’s the only female teacher at the school, so I understand why some people basically take her character and rewrite her to be, you know, not a pedophile. I think it’s really important that we acknowledge that what we see her doing (hitting on teenage boys) is not okay, but I’m not going to give people shit for liking her. Particularly the fanon version of her.

I’m going to assume you meant Shinsou and not Monoma? Honestly, I wasn’t really bothered by that scene. For one, it’s directly called out out by the background characters of the scene (”That’s corporeal punishment, alert the PTA”). Shinsou’s got the artificial vocal cords on under the scarf guarding his neck, and he’s not spluttering or shaken afterwards. He doesn’t even seem upset by it or out of breath, he just looked surprised to me. I think it’s intended as Aizawa cutting him off when he’s putting himself down instead of Aizawa choking him. This is more of what I’d consider ‘slapstick anime jokes’ than anything else. It’s also important to remember, despite fanon, Aizawa is a mentor figure who taught Shinsou how to fight, and not Shinsou’s parent (yet). Different relationship, different boundaries, different general behavior to expect.

I actually haven’t seen the anime, but going off what I’ve seen from that scene, no I don’t think Jeanist is as bad as Mitsuki. For one, context is important. One of the reasons I take such issue with the scene with Mitsuki is Katsuki was just kidnapped. By villains. And held for 2 days. He’s in a very fragile place mentally, and he’s been through a highly traumatic experience. Beyond that, Katsuki wasn’t doing anything before Mitsuki hit him and started in on her lecture, he was just,,, sitting there,,, looking upset. He cannot/doesn’t fight back, and his childhood hero and teacher are in the room. Compared to his scene with Jeanist, Katsuki makes an aggressive first move before Jeanist restrains him. Jeanist is also a mentor figure, while Mitsuki is his parent (at least in canon). Which, again, are very different things.

Oh! And finally, ships!

Honest to god, I’m on board with almost any ship. I don’t tend to talk about a lot of the female characters because we just don’t have much (if any) development for them and I’m more attached to Katsuki rn, but Jirou is amazing.

I like Momojirou, Mina/Tsuyu, BakuKiri (honestly almost any ship w/Katsuki I’m down with), Miruyumi (I don’t care that they haven’t met, I’m gay and I want them to be gay too), Shigadabihawks, Miritama, Kamishin, Fumikage / Katsuki for Goth Solidarity, Camie / Toga as a more AU style one, tbh Toga / Uraraka and/or Tsuyu too, Vaguely Itsuka/Mei because I love unstoppable chaotic lesbian / unmoveable force lesbian. In even more AU of a setting I think Inko / Mitsuki is cute af and despite my distaste for her in canon, I adore AUs where Mitsuki is a bamf lesbian mom.

Platonic ships I really like are Katsuki and Ochaco where the two of them have a friendship built of their general desire to piss off the other. Ochaco doesn’t take any of Katsuki’s shit and actively goes out of her way to fuck with him in Chaotic Gremlin Fashion, and Katsuki returns the favor. I also really like platonic Bakukiri with them just being Good Damn Bros. Platonic bakudeku with Adoptive Sibling Energy is Good Shit too. Jirou and Denki both being gay messes together is a Mood. Same for Jirou and Mina. Bakusquad in general.

Honestly though, I’m down for most relationships tbh.

#sif speaks #sif answers #my headcanons #bnha #long post #Anonymous

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softlywithhissong · 5 years

Text

I’m calling bullshit on your hate.

STOP STEREOTYPING SANGWOO FANS!

I am a Sangwoo fan. I am also a Bum fan. A strange dichotomy, I know.

Both of these characters exhibit problematic behavior, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be a fan of them, either individually or simultaneously. Does being a fan of either of these characters mean that you support these damaging behaviors in real life? NO. Calling out people who support REAL LIFE crimes is fine, but calling out people who are trying to enjoy being a fan of a FICTIONAL character IS NOT OKAY. You are clearly not helping real life people by doing so. You are being judgemental and self-righteous, shaming people to feel superior and patting yourself on the back for it. You not only contradict yourself several times, but you also act entitled to hate real people for liking something you personally don’t, have the arrogance to proclaim what the author “better not” do, and wish ill on real people. The hypocrisy is appalling. Do you not see the irony? You are not protecting people from real life abuse BY HATING ON REAL LIFE FANS of a fictional character. You are in fact engaging in verbally abusing real life people. It doesn’t matter what the character does; it’s fiction. Are there real people existing out in the big wide world who do crimes or support criminals? Yes, but to generalize, stereotype, and basically accuse FANS of being as bad as the people who do this or to conflate us and lump us together is disgusting, illogical, and highly offensive.

How can we “still stan his ass / this ship”? We can because the beauty of fandom is that you get to pick and choose what you like. You get to twist it up, turn it inside out, and make it into an AU parody of itself. ART IS SUBJECTIVE. It’s about what individual thing each and every one of us found gut wrenching or what pulled at our heartstrings. Don’t invalidate what other people found or resonated with just because it’s not the same thing you did. People fear different things. People emphasize, magnify, and conversely minimize different things based on what concerns each of us individually. That’s okay and people shouldn’t be shamed for having a different opinion. After all, being a fan is a form of opinion. And opinions are not facts. Don’t confuse the two; you holding an opinion does not make your opinion a fact.

Fiction is about emotional catharsis. It doesn’t matter that stealing a car or killing a dog are not crimes worthy of the death penalty in real life - I wanted to see John Wick kill all those fuckers for killing that little puppy.

And NOT ALL MEDIA should have a healthy or happy ending. Was Romeo and Juliet’s double suicide a healthy ending? NO. It was a tragedy! Tragedies have an important place in media. They often serve as cautionary tales. If you want another cliched boring “bad guy dies/goes to jail” ending, WHY ARE YOU SHAMING FANS WHO WANT SOMETHING DIFFERENT? You have an endless supply of your preferred ending. Go watch one of the thousand CSI/detective/cop procedural shows. They are everywhere. While I enjoy psychological thrillers (AS RARE AS THEY ARE), I am also a fan of some great detective shows and murder mysteries. I could recommend so many fantastic ones. But some of us want a unique ending for Killing Stalking, even if that means something “unhealthy” by real life moral standards. It was labeled a psychological thriller, after all. Not a mystery. Not a detective story. It was also labeled BL, and even if it gets a twisted/unhealthy ending because of the psychological thriller genre, it still qualifies because twisted BL is still BL.

I do not excuse Sangwoo’s abusive treatment of Bum. I’m often disappointed and angry on Bum’s behalf. And while I find it difficult to believe canon Bum would be in a healthy relationship with anyone (and I would love to make a post about how I see his fondness for frogs as symbolism for his relationships), I still have the ability to enjoy the possibilities of a healthy fanon-based relationship or even appreciate the grim take of a tragic and/or twisted unhealthy ending. This is how I still ship Sangbum in certain contexts, but not always, because context matters and it depends. I know that sentence sounds ridiculous, but that’s how it works! Because it’s OKAY TO SHIP FICTIONAL UNHEALTHY SHIPS. Because it’s fiction. And if people can vent their issues through the written word in order to not do so in real life, good. Many people find reading/writing therapeutic. Some authors write a lot of problematic behavior as angst. Do they deserve hate? NO. There are plenty of instances when I have shipped a healthy ship but not shipped it (and in fact wanted them not to end up together) in certain fics because I felt the fic had portrayed an unhealthy relationship. But did I send hate to the author of that fic when that ship ended up together anyway? NO. Just because it ended in a way I didn’t like didn’t give me or anyone else the right to spread hate or shame over a fictional story.

Also, as a Bum fan, I do not appreciate seeing any victim blaming of Bum. There’s some out there (including your despicable “Bum better not” comment), but at least this hate is not anywhere near the amount of Sangwoo hate. As a fan of both characters, I can see that there is clearly so much more Sangwoo hate out there. And it’s fine to criticize, dislike, or even hate Sangwoo as a character, but it’s NOT OKAY to hate on his fans. He is a fictional character, but his fans are real people.

I am a fan of Sangwoo because he is an intriguing, complex, and well-written character. He’s got flaws. All characters do. And I understand his flaws are pretty damn big. But I understand that he’s a fictional character. I would never support a real person committing such crimes or abuse. So, frankly, while you may find my being a fan “annoying” - I will not be shamed or hated upon.

To quote my sister, “In the safety of fiction, we can deconstruct the complexities of what’s morally gray.”

In other words, exploration through FICTION, discussion, and debate are welcome. Hateful posts are not.

This is a long post, so I’ll put my further calling bullshit on arguments made by haters behind a “Keep Reading” link:

Also, the criticisms for being a fan because of “fetishizing gay men” are bullshit. Firstly, anything anyone finds hot could be labeled “fetishizing” which is ridiculous. Secondly, some fans are gay men who are not “fetishizing” - they are simply enjoying the story even if it is twisted. (It’s okay to be a fan of a story that portrays an unhealthy relationship; not every story is meant to be a moral standard.) But also, this bullshit argument is just reducing people down to a ridiculous stereotype used to stifle women in fandom. This has been used through the ages and it is wrong. Are there possibly straight women out there objectifying gay men the way straight men would objectify gay women? Yeah, there’s probably some. But I’ve been in fandom a LONG time and this is not representative of fans in general, let alone all female fans. How about you let women consume all forms of media they find identifiable, cathartic, containing unique storyline with complex flawed characters, or even (gasp) entertaining? Stop shaming people. And maybe especially - don’t resort to misogynistic tropes to do so. I think it’s safe to say that fans (including female fans) generally tend to be a fan for more than just a character’s appearance and body parts. There’s usually character traits, personality quirks, things that draw you to go beyond casual reading/watching into becoming a fan.

Personally, I identify with stories portraying gay relationships equally as much if not more than with stories portraying heterosexual relationships. Maybe that’s because I’m bisexual, but I don’t think so. I believe that straight people can also find themselves identifying with the story and the struggles portrayed - no matter what the sexual orientation of the pairing portrayed.

You think I only like portrayals of gay men rather than women? No, I like both. Killing Eve is a fantastic example of a fandom that I would love to see grow! I despair at how small the fandom is compared to my usual fandoms, but it’s new! It can grow and I can’t wait for season 2. The harsh reality, though, is that f/f ships tend to be smaller fandoms. This may be due to so few well-written female characters in general throughout media - though, this is improving and having more female writers in media helps. Killing Eve has great characters and really great writing, so hopefully they can buck this trend and grow a decently large fandom featuring f/f ships. Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe from Legends of Tomorrow are a pretty big ship, which is heartening, and Xena/Gabrielle from Xena Warrior Princess were an absolute juggernaut back in the day (kudos to anyone who recognized Xena from my main tumblr’s icon).

You think I only like hot men? Or that I excuse the actions of killers who are hot men? NO. I watched The Fall with Gillian Anderson and Jamie Dornan, where Jamie Dornan played the serial killer and NO - I was not a fan of his character, let alone attempted to excuse any actions by his character whatsoever, even after they explained his tragic backstory. And You on Netflix is just too obnoxious in my personal opinion for me to even watch. But I’d never take time out of my day to hate on any fan who enjoys it.

Calling out problematic stuff in media is fine, but don’t use it as an excuse to spit vitriol and hate at fans who you disagree with.

P.S. Seriously, ask me for recs of good detective shows/murder mysteries. I’ve got so many I could recommend that are way better written than most. Want a female detective? I’ve got plenty. Want a gay male detective? Got it. Want a murder mystery twist where the murderer wins? Got that.

#Dear Antis #sangwoo #killing stalking #i'm not tagging that hateful poster #because if they don't frequent the tag they spewed their hate in it won't matter #my post wouldn't stop them #but if i can reach the ks fans who do #and encourage this fandom to be nicer to each other #that matters

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pottersqay-blog · 5 years

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about the au

a touch of serenity (atos) is a harry potter social media au centred around the eighth year at hogwarts. few students have returned for the eighth year, and as a result, are forced to become cohabitants and interact -- which is difficult for some. this au will have a strong focus on character development and realism (as real as can be, when set in a world with magic i suppose).

is there a structured storyline?

i do have vague ideas of what i want to achieve in this au, but in a sense, the story will be writing itself. there will be plenty of storyline’s to follow as each of the characters are explored, and as they get to know each other. couples will form, break up, fight, get back together. relationship dynamics will shift, with some becoming friends, some enemies. people will make mistakes, have achievements, etc. but as i said, all this will depend on how the story goes, as characters often tend to write themselves.

what are the ships?

the two ships that will definitely be appearing are drarry and deanmus. drarry, because the potential they have to be amazing is just too much to ignore, im a drarry enthusiast, and deanmus because i’ve already made them canon before starting the au. the idea of this au is that ships will hopefully form along the way, some might work out, some might not. depends on the characters themselves! in saying that, i do have some ideas that i would like to explore -- ginny x luna, ron x blaise x neville, pansy x hermione. but if, for example, romione were to become a thing? heck yeah!

ps. some characters may have past relationships, canon or not. for the sake of realism ok :)

are you open to suggestions?

yes yes yes! please send in plot ideas, ships, anything you’d like to see and i’d love to try and include it somehow!

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taecheeks · 5 years

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Annual Writing Self Evaluation 2018

I wasn’t tagged in this but I wanted to do it so here we go

ALL FICS MUST HAVE POSTED ON AO3 IN 2018

1. Number of stories (including drabbles) posted to AO3: 10

2. Word count posted for the year: 774,856 lakdjflkjfladklf

3. List of works published this year (in order of posting): (my wips are in order of when I last updated, not when I first posted)

Through Time I Found You (I feel like I posted this 9837473 years ago, I can’t believe it’s been less than a year since i posted my last ziam fic)

Enticing

play with me

Greedy

Wandering

media naranja

Kinktober ‘18

Maybe

Home For Christmas

Nodus Tollens

4. Fandoms I wrote for: One Direction/Zayn, BTS

5. Pairings: Liam Payne/Zayn Malik, Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung, Park Jimin/Min Yoongi, Park Jimin/Min Yoongi/Jung Hoseok, Kim Namjoon/Kim Seokjin, and Kinktober has multiple pairings.

6. Story with the most:

Kudos: Nodus Tollens and then media naranja (this one was the fastest to get kudos, so I’m adding it)

Bookmarks: the same ^^

Comments: Nodus Tollens and then Through Time I Found You

7. Work I’m most proud of (and why): Nodus Tollens because it’s a lot different than what I’m used to writing and it was very difficult plot wise and characterization wise, but I’m happy with the way it turned out. There’s things that need to be fixed because I kind of just wrote and let the plot develop itself, and I was sure people wouldn’t like the plot twists. I also love my characters, I’m so attached to them. It’s also my longest fic and I don’t feel as if it’s dragging on, so I’m happy about that.

Also, media naranja. I wrote this fic as a break from the angst in nodus tollens and I was attempting to write a crack fic, and just a stupid/dirty overall fic and I actually got really great feedback for it. It made me really happy write it and really happy to see it do well.

I didn’t think Through Time I Found You was last year but since it was, I’m going to mention that one too. That was SO hard for me to write because of the dialogue and because it took place in the 18th century. But my writing really improved because of that fic (and my amazing beta for that fic).

8. Work I’m least proud of (and why): None really. I post a lot of pwps that probably could be better, but there’s none I would say I’m not proud of.

9. A favorite excerpt of your writing: ugh this is hard did you see the WC from this year kldjalkfjda. Here’s something from NT I was really excited to share:

“The new living room is a little off putting. Taehyung’s definition of homey means a little messy - his tattered couch a big eye sore in the middle of the room but after a few nights cuddling with Taehyung on it, he’s starting to fall in love with it.

Taehyung’s a little messy too, their relationship or whatever it can be called a little messy, but Jeongguk’s past the point of falling in love with it.”

And then here’s one from Wandering bc that fic is my baby and sope are platonic soulmate brothers and I need them to be happy and finish the story okay:

Admittedly, Yoongi has never understood the phrase “seeing red” when angered.

He understands now.

It is a volcano inside of him, moments away from erupting and destroying everything around him. The only thing keeping him from yelling at the group of people in the waiting room, who never fucking called him, and the doctors who waste his time, is Hoseok.

The shallow breathing doesn’t calm his anger, but it keeps the tremble in his limbs at bay. The flinch of Hoseok’s fingers against his own makes it difficult not to squeeze on tight in a hope of waking him up.

It is too difficult to look at him bandaged up, his face so swollen and bruised he is almost unrecognizable. So Yoongi rests his cheek on their clasped hands where he sits beside him and stares at the monitor instead. He’s thankful they took the breathing tube from him, it made it too difficult to look at him.

“Never thought I’d wake up next to that face.”

Yoongi rubs his sleep ridden eyes against the soft sheets. There is a slight quirk to Hoseok’s lips as he makes an attempt at squeezing Yoongi’s hand.

“Savor the moment, it won’t happen again,” Yoongi mumbles as he sits up. It is still difficult to look at him, but Hoseok doesn’t look his way either so he can divert his eyes for the time being. “Special circumstances.”

Hoseok attempts to laugh, but he ends up groaning instead. “Don’t make me laugh. I feel like a bucket of shit.”

“You look it,” says Yoongi, but the joke doesn’t feel genuine. He knows he should call the doctor, but there is a flicker of fear in his chest at the idea of leaving his side.

“What’s the damage?”

The doctors had told him the moment he stepped inside of the room, but Yoongi couldn’t focus on anything but the sight before him and the rage he felt at whoever did this.

“They broke your face. A um - in your stomach. Stitches, lots of stitches.”

A tightness takes over his throat and he swallows it down as he finally moves to the door to call the nurse. He can’t say it. Stabbed .

“I don’t remember much. It was dark. Nari, is she okay?”

Yoongi’s heart drops into his stomach as he sits by the bed again. “Your parents are out of state. But mine are here if you need them.”

This seems like a better thing to tell Hoseok, but it makes his chest ache.

Assholes, they always have been.

“I told them I was your brother so they would get off my ass.”

Hoseok snorts. “Idiots. You’re too ugly to be my brother.”

10. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

Ah, I received so many great reviews this year. I am quite lucky. I think my favorite recently was the latest on Nodus Tollens, which says: “ WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK” x 3934 lmao

11. A time when writing was really, really hard: This year has been pretty good for writing. The last couple years, I’ve been struggling. But this year, not so much. There were times where the plot was a bit heavy and difficult and I couldn’t figure out how to get it to where I wanted, or I realized I messed up a timeline and I had to work around that, but overall, pretty good.

12. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you: Um Sope in Wandering. Like, it was supposed to focus on the romantic ships in that fic but it focuses on the platonic ones more. And sope a lot. I really, really enjoy their relationship in that fic.

Also, Bobby in Nodus Tollens. He’s a minor character in the fic, but I also get a lot of feedback about it. He’s a, bad guy but with a tortured past so you feel for him and realize he’s not really a bad guy. That trope, I’m protective of him and I’m sad when I write his scenes.

13. How did you grow as a writer this year: Specifically? Not sure. I got better at commas lmao. I’ve tested myself and wrote things I hadn’t before. I went from really dark to comical stories, I wrote different kinks. I wrote characters as bad when they aren’t in real life, which I normally don’t like doing. I’m not usually a big fan of writing characters OOC, but I’ve gotten more comfortable if it’s appropriate for the story I’m writing. I put a lot of my own self into stories, I wrote about something very traumatic that happened to me in one - something that I haven’t even talked about really.

14. How do you hope to grow next year: I can be a bit repetitive within my writing, I am working on this and I hope I improve. (Like for example, in the fic I’m about to post in a few days, I wrote JK saying he’s suffering and dying like 343 times lmao.) I also really suck at outlining and planning out fics in advance, which hasn’t been a huge issue but it’s offered me some roadblocks that I need to focus on bettering.

15. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc): Oh man, well I’ve read some really amazing fics and the writing was so beautiful that it offered me a lot of motivation. @strawberrysuga is always a huge support for me and my writing, even though ambra offers me like 9897 au ideas when I’m trying to focus on the 8979 ones I’ve already written. There’s a lot of people on twitter who come to me between updates and though I write for myself, seeing their feedback and their love and encouragement has been such a good influence on me.

16. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year: Oh yeah, every one of my fics has part of me in it whether it’s a character based on someone I know, or an event in my life. Wandering has a lot of it; the police scene, Taehyung hating cheese (me), it takes place in NE where I grew up. One of my fics has a scene based on me and my girlfriend. Umm so yeah a lot lol

17. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers: So, this year was a good year for me and I was nervous because I was in a new fandom. As much as I’ve done well, I’ve never really gotten negative comments on my fics before until this year. And none of them were about my writing or my storyline, but unnecessary/rude comments. Like someone didn’t like how often a side ship showed up. Things like that. They bothered me, not necessarily because I took it personal, but because I can’t believe people can be so rude and think it’s okay to be that way lol. I think this will always continue to happen, I think it’s best to ignore these comments and try to focus on the good ones. Because the bad ones stand out, but there were very few compared to the good ones - but the bad always stands out more than the good. And it’s important not to focus on the bad.

18. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year: I’m actually writing a fic right now I’m very excited to post. It was supposed to be a ‘I’ve never kissed anyone, please teach me’ type fic, but it’s not quite that anymore haha. There’s a lot of frog references because Jungkook’s an animal biology major who loves amphibians lakjldfkjda

19. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read: since I stole this, you can steal this from me and say I tagged you mwah

#writing #tag game #long post

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gayabeilles · 6 years

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Fam, please?

Just want to give a short explanation before this: picture some nerds sitting together at lunch. One of them, a FUCKING MEMELORD, says, after a moment of silence, “Hey guys, AU where we’re all the four horsemen of the apocalypse.” And so, because I am so prone to skipping meals, my character became Famine, the memelord friend got War, the germ-loving friend got Pestilence, and the friend who killed our souls with her writing got Death.

Full Name: FamineGender and Sexuality: seems to flip-flop between “pansexual woman who can and will hit on everyone she meets” and “useless blob with no interest in anything, least of all sex or romance”Pronouns: she/herEthnicity/Species: …does “horseman of the apocalypse” count as a species?Birthplace and Birthdate: This is a little complicated in the narrative we created… so, a young girl is born in Moravia in like 900AD, but soon succumbs to starvation and is forgotten by the world. But then, for whatever reason, she’s chosen to become one of the incarnations of the horsemen, and, appropriate to her death, she becomes Famine, and the person who claws her way out of the grave goes from monster to vaguely human (thanks to her adoptive family) back to monster (after disaster strikes). Not sure when this rebirth thing happens exactly though… maybe in like the 1500s or so?Guilty Pleasures: Famine has no sense of guilt, but if she did, it would probably be getting blackout drunk from really shitty wine with the other horsemen and then driving to random places and dropping them off to find their way home later. Something shitty like that. Famine isn’t a good person.Phobias: Abandonment. The “reborn” version of Famine before she really actually becomes the monster she is now is fucking terrified of being alone, of losing herself in the hunger she senses is going to engulf her eventually. Once it does, I don’t think she’s afraid of much, which is honestly kind of a problem? She needs to Calm Down. What They Would Be Famous For: causing the literal actual end of the world.What They Would Get Arrested For: causing the literal actual end of the world.OC You Ship Them With: used to be Death since I was dating the person Death was based on but we broke up so now maybe one of the counter-horseman characters, whose name is Vivian. Viv is a sweet angel who likes plants a lot.OC Most Likely To Murder Them: definitely 1000% War. Famine antagonizes War for no reason other than that she finds it funny. War is determined to find out if there is a way to kill horsemen just to shut Fam up for a half second, except for the brief moments when Famine is also a memelord and they’re bonding via shitty memes.Favorite Movie/Book Genre: I feel like probably horror, but the kind of horror where it’s all amateur looking and shit and then it gets super fucking real super quick and then everyone dies. Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Any romance trope between heterosexuals.Talents and/or Powers: Horseman powers: can basically evacuate moisture from anything, and the amount/range is determined by how much energy Fam puts into it. This can range from drawing the liquid out of a bottle of wine as a prank, to grabbing some fuckboy by the arm and having the arm wither away to bone in an instant, to (at one point when she has a HUGE breakdown and really loses control) turning basically a 10km radius circle into a desert. Mostly it’s smaller stuff though, and it’s frequently for self amusement. Talents include having extreme levels of charisma, and (don’t tell anyone) a proclivity for Italian cuisine. Viv’s the only one who knows.Why Someone Might Love Them: man I don’t know, honestly no one should. She’s very problematic. HOWEVER, that being said, the person she used to be was very sweet, and anyone who knew her then might still see that in her and love her for that. The original storyline focused on Death sort of bringing Fam back to herself with the power of GAY LOVE. Why Someone Might Hate Them: she’s a serial killer from the depths of hell and currently has no redeemable qualities.How They Change: she becomes more and more irredeemable over time, losing any semblance of a conscience, embracing the hand dealt to her… but wait! As she meets up with the other horsemen, she finds herself in a sort of fucked up family. Playing the role of… I don’t know, I guess the eldest sibling, softens her in some ways. After the climax of the story (an epic battle with a demon horse named Gerard Way who shoots emo music out of every pore in his body), it is revealed that there must have been some mistake, the apocalypse isn’t today after all, blah blah blah, and the anti-horsemen characters (the two angels Vivian and Benjamin, aka Plangel and Dad) sort of join the friend group. This leads to many shenanigans, and further smooths Famine’s sharp character into something more semblable to a person. Why You Love Them: I think “love” might be a strong word but as far as self-insert characters go, this has been really interesting. Famine is such a violent, reactive character, which is very directly in contrast with my own personality, so exploring that can be interesting. It’s like, what would I do, then come up with the most twisted version of that possible. More in terms of the character itself, I love her because underneath the monstrous exterior, she really is doing her best, and she is trying as hard as she can to resist what she has become. She’s just exhausted, and ashamed of herself, and terrified she’s going to hurt people around her, and (while obviously it isn’t going super well for her) she’s trying her best to be better.

#fam #lorienleylines

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