#when others have written you better in other comics

[scintillyyy]

the thing is when i say that red robin #1-12 managed to age better than any other reborn title and i'm not even joking is that i know how that sounds funny because 1) i know what out of context panels did to fandom understandings of tim and dick & tim and 2) i know there's a lot of flaws inherent from the time period it was written in in it that gets it a lot of flack.

however. however. ignoring those things, i'm not exaggerating when i say that red robin #1-12 is genuinely almost a marvel in comics storytelling from a *narrative standpoint* in that it truly showcases what the strength of comics as a long-form but at the same time ever changing media *could be*.

because red robin starts at a issue #1--it's a change to the status quo that means you need to quickly introduce the concepts, characters, relationships and their dynamics for new readers to catch up while telling a new story that doesn't actually require knowing the past 80 years of continuity. and despite what fandom says sometimes, red robin is actually fairly competent at that--it lays out a new narrative challenge, quickly reviews how we got to the current narrative challenge, showcases the protagonist overcoming that challenge, & lays a cleanslate groundwork for storytelling beyond it. someone could, in fact, go into it as a first comic & get the gist of things. it does all that fairly well, actually. (yes, even the dick & tim & the resolving of their conflict--the key is actually reading it)

but at the same time, it is an absolute reward if you *have* read the previous 20 years of tim's comics/tim from the start. yost clearly knew a lot about tim & his history--when he was tasked with creating a story arc for tim to transition from robin to red robin he *did his fucking homework*. yost drew from tim's past themes, arcs, relationships & relationship dynamics. he looked at how tim initially transitioned from boy who figured out who batman & robin are to becoming robin. it's not a coincidence that tim's transition from robin -> red robin when read in his relation to his transition from tim -> robin has a lot of similar themes and motifs while *still managing to be a new intepretation of them*. it's not a coincidence that tim in identity crisis i has self hatred from his mother's death that manifests in anger & ultimately tim deciding that he has to do something to save bruce, even if it means he doesn't deserve to be robin and he undergoes a similar arc in red robin with bruce's death. it's not a coincidence that yost was tasked to write an arc where tim comes into his own as a hero as he decides tim needs to travel the world (including paris), the way he's sent away to paris for further training before he can *really* feel like he deserves to be robin like he does in robin i. yost knows that tim sends himself away when he needs to find himself. it's not a coincidence that yost decides to use the league of assassins for a story that flirts with tim having to make compromises like tim dealt with in robin i with lady shiva & king snake. it's not coincidence that he calls back extensively to a lonely place of dying and resurrection of ra's al ghul and prodigal with dick and tim and trust and falling and everything. it's not a coincidence that he has tim blow up the league computers in a way that references tim doing something similar with league computers in legacy. it's not a coincidence you can find parallels to knightfall era dynamics in there. it's not a coincidence that tim almost giving up in the desert can be read in tandem to tim almost giving up on his life in contagion & legacy and fit together very interestingly.

also consider how yost adds in new characters of pru & tam as tim side characters as tim is a character meant to play off others and gives them personality & their own motivations outside of tim like his friends have always historically had along with harkening back to tim as a team up guy who will give anyone a chance. there is so much history yost wove into the very structure of the entire story arc in a way that shows absolute respect for eveything that came before while *still managing to do his own thing*. it is genuinely everything that people want comics to do--carry over important themes and story arcs while still being fresh & not too derivative or just re-telling the same story over and over again. it respects continuity and character history while progressing it. despite its flaws--and it does have them, don't get me wrong--if you look at it from a *comics storytelling* perspective, it manages to achieve what the ideal fusion of respecting the long-form history of comics while creating something that is also a viable, new jumping off point. red robin #1-12 has a lot of respect for *what comics can be capable of as a narrative storytelling medium* and the things you can achieve while respecting both a long, convoluted narrative history & that comics as a medium requires soft resets to make things easier for new fans to jump in to reduce the gatekeeping load.

so when i say red robin #1-12, aged best out of all the reborn comics *this is what i mean*. despite the surface flaws, narratively it achieved so much of what comics with a long history are inherently capable of as a medium. it is a story that is new, yet fits so well with everything that came before it. compare that to morrison's batman and robin, where morrison only cared about how characters could service their grand vision for a story in a way that shows no respect to the past 30 years of dick's storytelling & completely isolated him from the greater universe, because they wanted dick grayson the concept as batman, not dick grayson the character as batman. compare that to how bqm ignored bascially all past steph characterization to turn steph into a 2009 cw "awkward but hot new girl" type protagonist (seriously, she would not be out of place as the protagonist of hellcats. the dynamics of the new girl who just doesn't fit in with the sorority girls of her campus is also not out of place for a cw show like hellcats. the side characters as one dimensional strawmen is peak cw. i would argue red robin didn't treat female characters fantastic, but it did somehow manage to do better than batgirl on this alone lol). red robin #1-12 demonstrates a lot more longevity and solidity as a narrative piece within the greater universe because of all this. imo.

[missabnormal]

Tom Taylor purposely not mentioning that after this punch Jon goes to make a speech about fascist Superman’s inner good man and conveniently having Jon peace out of the Injustice world while fascist Superman looks like “oh wow, could my son have a point?? Should I have considered morality while I’m currently acting as a dictator that has killed innocent people and has permitted his allies to do the same??”  

Sorry, Mr. Taylor, Superman should have sat down with Hitler and talked about how Hitler was doing bad things, but Superman hoped that he would take a better path and stop committing genocide xoxo your buddy Superman ❤️❤️❤️ 

[bearstuck]

one of the upsides of new homestuck fans being around in an era where media literacy and critique is encouraged in fandom spaces is that the chance of fat vriska re-emerging as a fandomwide joke is slim. rest in hell fat vriska jokes you were rooted in a fatphobic rant and you should die in hell where you belong

[bmpmp3]

in theory im very good at reading but in practice i cant read SHIT unless its in the perfect font with the perfect spacing so buying physical non-comic books is So difficult. why do online listings never put a picture of the page layout. i need to know how bad your paragraph spacing is. can i email my local bookstore and ask if they can take a pic of a page. is that allowed

[pears-trinkets]

everything sucks so hard rn idk

[maemil]

God, I was getting annoyed with some choices the writers started making a bit after the halfway point of Batgirl (2000), only to be informed that this was pretty much exactly when Kelley Puckett stopped writing.

[demilypyro]

So I've seen a few too many people on twitter talking about The Kiss Scene from the new Scott Pilgrim anime. People saying it's fetishistic and indulgent, people calling it male gazey, etc. And while the kiss itself is certainly a bit exaggerated, I felt like writing a bit about why I disagree, and why context is important, like it always is. But it basically turned into an extended analysis on the metatextual treatment of Roxie Richter. So bear with me. It's a long post.

What really matters about this scene is not the kiss itself, but what precedes it. Not even just the fight scene just before it, but what precedes the whole anime series, really. And that's the Scott Pilgrim comic book, and the live action movie. Because in both, Roxie is a punchline.

She's a joke. Her character starts and ends with "one of the exes is actually a girl, I bet you didn't expect that." Jokes are made about Ramona's latent bisexuality, the movie especially treating it as funny and absurd, and her validity as a romantic interest is entirely written off by Ramona as being "just a phase." There's a fight scene, she's defeated by a man giving her an orgasm which implicitly calls her sexuality into question (come on), and the movie just moves on. It sucks. It really, really sucks.

The comic fares a little better. It never veers into outright homophobia like the movie does, and while the line about Ramona having gone through a phase remains, Roxie actually gets one over on Scott when Ramona briefly gets back with Roxie. But Roxie is still only barely a character. Like all the other evil exes, she's just a stepping stone towards the male protagonist's development. She barely even gets any screentime before she's defeated by Scott's "power of love." But Roxie stands out, since she's the only villain who is queer, or at least had been confirmed queer at that point (hi Todd). In a series that champions multiple gay men in the supporting cast, the single undeniable lesbian in the story is a villain. She's labeled as evil, made fun of, pushed aside in favor of the men, and then discarded. Her screentime was never about her, or her feelings for Ramona. It was about the straight, male protagonist needing to overcome her. And that was Roxie Richter. An unfortunate victim of the 2010s.

Fast forward to current year, and the new anime series is announced. Everybody sits down to watch the new series expecting another retelling of the same story, and.... hang on, that straight male protagonist I mentioned just died in the first episode. And now it's humanizing the villains from the original story. And there's Roxie, introduced alongside the other evil exes in the second episode, and she's being played entirely straight, without a punchline in sight. No jokes are made about her gender, no questions are made of her validity as one of Ramona's romantic interests. The narrative considers her important. In one episode, she already gets more respect than she did in either of the previous iterations of Scott Pilgrim. And this isn't even her focus episode yet... which happens to be the very next one.

The anime series goes to great lengths to flesh out the original story's villains and to have Ramona reconcile with them. And I don't think it's a coincidence that Roxie gets to go first. While Matthew Patel gets his development in episode 2, Roxie is the first to directly confront Ramona, now our main protagonist. This is notable too because it's the only time the exes are encountered out of order. Roxie is supposed to be number 4, but she's first in line, and later on you realize that she's the only one who's out of sequence. She's the one who sets the precedent for the villains being redeemed. She's the most important character for Ramona to reconcile with.

What follows is probably the most extensive, elaborate 1 on 1 fight scene in the whole show. Roxie fights like a wounded animal, her motions are desperate and pained. Ramona can only barely fight back against her onslaught. Different set-pieces fly by at breakneck speed as Roxie relentlessly lays her feelings at Ramona's feet through her attacks and her distraught shouts. And unlike the comic or the movie, Ramona acknowledges them, and sincerely apologizes. And the two end up just laying there, exhausted, reminiscing about when they were together.

Only after this, after all of this, does the kiss scene happen. Roxie has been vindicated, she has reconciled with the person who hurt her, the narrative has deemed that her anger is justified and has redeemed her character. And she gets her victory lap by making the nearest other hot girl question her heterosexuality, sharing a sloppy kiss with her as the music triumphantly crescendos.

It's... a little self-congratulatory, honestly. But it's good. It's redemption for a character who had been mistreated for over a decade. And she punctuates the moment by being very, very gay where everyone can see it, no men anywhere in sight. Because this is her moment. And then she leaves the plot, on her own accord this time, while humming the hampster dance. What a legend. How could anything be wrong with this.

[jytan2018]

I read the comic in one sitting less than an hour after finishing the movie, and wow I have many Thoughts™.

- It's very obvious the two versions were meant to cater to different audiences AND tell different messages. I don't get why people are going "But the comic was better! It had more nuance!" just because Nimona was easier to root for in the movie.

- The comic was written back when ND Stevenson was still trying to process a lot of stuff, so all the characters are morally grey/straight up evil and the climactic battle is between a Ballister who regrets turning against Nimona, even if it was to save others vs. a Nimona who's too hurt to care if her lashing out was going to hurt innocent people.

- By the time Nimona got a movie adaptation, ND was a lot more secure in his sexuality, so the climactic battle was Nimona vs. the Director, the symbol of religious oppression and bigotry. It's not just about your friends turning on you because you're "too much" for them anymore, it's also about a society that would rather bring itself to the brink of ruin than coexist with you.

- (I totally get why people were upset about Ballister's surname change, though. Like come on, the media dubbing him Blackheart just to be mean was RIGHT THERE).

- Nimona's metaphor for not shifting is such a neurodivergent thing. Even in the comic, Nimona's parents insisting she's a monster who replaced their daughter is reminiscent of the changeling myth, which is what many parents thought their neurodivergent kids were—changelings who replaced their "real" children.

- Ambrosius being trained to cut off HIS BOYFRIEND'S WHOLE FUCKING ARM instead of merely disarming him is a very cop thing to do. As much as cops claim they're trained to de-escalate situations, their training still teaches them to treat everyone as a potential threat, and that level of constant vigilance can turn anyone into a trigger-happy/arm-choppy bastard. Even the Director, who can use a sword but probably hasn't actually fought someone in ages, STILL can't see Ballister reaching for the squire's phone without assuming he has a weapon.

- And on that note, the Queen getting killed simply because she was trying to reform the Institution and allow commoners to become knights? That's the best "no such thing as a good cop" metaphor I've seen. Because even if there ARE good cops and they ARE in leadership positions, the system will crush them before they make any meaningful change. It's not a good institution that turned rotten, it's an institution that only exists to spread its rot and refuses to be good.

- That's why Ballister's characterisation is so different in the movie vs. the comic. Comic Ballister had 15 years to come to terms with his trauma and the Institution's evildoing, while Movie Ballister is still freshly traumatised and hasn't found a way to define himself beyond the role he was assigned by the Institution.

- Not to mention Comic Ambrosius was not very noble to begin with and genuinely believed Ballister was better suited to villainy than heroism, while Movie Ambrosius never wanted the glory that came with his lineage in the first place and only antagonised Ballister because of indoctrination he needed to unlearn (which he did, all by himself, after witnessing the lengths the Director will go to just to kill Nimona).

- It really shows how important it is to surround yourself with loved ones who are open to change. Comic Ambrosius can love Ballister all he wants, but he'll still blast his arm off because he thinks Ballister deserved it anyway. Movie Ambrosius will stop to question what "the right thing" even means, even if he didn't love Ballister enough to defend him unconditionally.

I have so many more thoughts bubbling beneath the surface, but I'll probably address them some other day. In conclusion:

[ID: A pink-haired Nimona grinning evilly while holding up a knife.]

Watch Nimona. This is not a request.

Edit: Added more thoughts!

[celtic-crossbow]

Skin You With My Tongue

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x Fem!Reader

Setting: Alexandria

Warnings: Poorly written smut, p in v, fingering, oral (fem rec), brief hand job

Summary: What has gotten into Daryl? It doesn’t matter because you like it!

A/N: I haven’t been feeling great but I wanted to finish this before taking a break. Then I’ll work on my last request. Once again, I don’t think it’s great but ah well. I’m trying to just be thankful to be writing again. I hope some enjoyment comes from it!

You had no idea how you’d ended up in your current predicament: flat on your back, naked, with an equally naked Daryl Dixon devouring you like a man starved. You weren’t complaining by any stretch of the imagination. Though he had claimed to have little experience, the man deserved medals for the sounds he was wringing out of you with his tongue.

Anyway, back to the question of how did you end up here?

The day had started like any other. Your group was still new to Alexandria. While most had been given jobs, you and Daryl had not yet been set to work by Deanna. So, Rick had easily agreed to letting you both go hunt. Daryl had refused to give up his crossbow when you had first arrived in the community, but you had to sign out a weapon.

“Bullshit.” Daryl growled from where he leaned against the doorframe of the armory. You couldn’t say that you didn’t agree with him.

Regardless, you played by the rules, got your gun, strapped the weapons to the back, and climbed onto Daryl’s bike. He had decided the two of you could go further out today, not having much luck the past couple of days in the direct vicinity.

Daryl was your closest friend in your tight knit group and had been since you all had been forced to wander around in the cold before the prison. He was difficult to read and his emotional walls were high and thick. Somehow, you had been able to scale those walls, if not shatter them completely. You accepted him without question but you didn’t take any shit from him either. You weren’t afraid to call him out. In fact, the first time he had willingly come to sit next to you by the fire was just after you had asked him if he was “violating the Georgia sodomy law by having his head that far up his own ass.” You’d been close ever since.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his stomach and rested your chin on his shoulder, making kissy noises at him when he glanced back at you.

“Stop.” He grumbled before starting up the motorcycle. You simply gave his midsection a squeeze and could practically feel him roll his eyes as you headed through the gate.

The first part of the day was uneventful. Daryl stashed the bike before you walked and walked, finding nothing to track. About midday, the two of you came across a gorgeous lake. The water was clear and having only crossed two walkers on your trek there, you decided that a swim was an excellent idea after lunch. You didn’t ask Daryl, truly figuring he wouldn’t mind and that, hell, maybe he’d even join you.

You didn’t look at him as you stripped down to your bra and panties, mismatched as they were. If you had, you would have seen him comically fumble and drop the piece of dried meat in his hand.

“The blue hell ya doin’, girl?” He snapped after righting himself.

“Cooling off.” You gave him a smile over your shoulder before mimicking his frown with added exaggeration. “Maybe you should do the same, you old grump.”

He scoffed, keeping his eyes averted. “You’re bein’ careless. Careless gets ya dead.”

“I’m not going in unprotected!” You spun toward him, drawing his gaze toward you before pointing to the small knife tucked securely between your breasts. You couldn’t help but laugh when his face reddened and he looked away so quickly that you could swear you heard his neck crack. “I won’t be long.”

And you weren’t. Barely twenty minutes later, you were sitting down next to him, fully clothed albeit damp, but feeling much better.

“Ready to head out?” You asked cheerfully.

He did not share your enthusiasm, scowling as he stood and secured his crossbow to his back. “Been ready.”

“Well, aren’t you just a bucket of sunshine?” He had already stalked off by the time you gathered up everything. You had to sprint to catch up.

After a couple of hours, Daryl finally caught the trail of a deer and began tracking it. You followed quietly, watching his methods and learning everything you could. You knew how to hunt, thanks to him, but you were always eager to sharpen your skills. When the animal was finally within sight, the archer kneeled after signaling for you to stand still just beside him. He was lining up the shot when something caught his eye to the right of where you stood.

“Get down!” He whispered sharply, grabbing your arm and pulling. The sudden jerk caught you off guard and you were thrown off balance, crashing into him. He fell flat on his back with you on top, your palms on either side of his head with your chest almost directly in his face. With half a dozen walkers shuffling into the area, you couldn’t move lest you be detected.

The deer sensed the danger and ran, the group of undead following mindlessly. As they passed where you and Daryl hid, you instinctively lowered, feeling his breath against your shirt. It took several minutes for the threat to move far enough away that you felt comfortable to lift yourself up and sit back, effectively placing your ass on his stomach.

“Well, that sucks. That was a big doe.” You complained. When he didn’t comment, you looked at him. He was propped up on his elbows, looking anywhere but at you. His face and neck were flushed all the way to the tips of his ears. “You okay?” You queried with general concern.

“M’fine. Can ya get offa me?”

“Oh. Right.” You stood quickly, as did he. His back was quickly turned to you.

“We’re done. Let’s go.”

Your head tilted, brow creased in confusion. “We’ve got hours of daylight left. Shouldn’t we—”

“Said we’re done.” He was already walking away, leaving you staring at his back and wondering what you’d done wrong.

The ride back was tense and silent. You even chose to just lightly place your hands below his ribs and keep some space between your bodies instead of how you would usually have a tight hold on him.

When you entered Alexandria, Daryl parked the bike and got off, leaving you there, confused and more than a little upset. He passed Rick by without a word, the former sheriff turning to look at you with an eyebrow cocked. You gave him a shrug.

“I have no idea.” Shaking your head, you grabbed the gun from where it was secured to the back and went to sign it in before returning to the home you shared with Daryl and Carol. He was nowhere to be found on the first floor, leaving you to assume he had retreated to his room in the basement. With a heavy sigh, you went upstairs to shower.

Evening was upon you before you knew it, the sun having only set a few minutes before Carol invited you to walk to the other house for dinner with the group. You weren’t feeling all that hungry so you told her you’d be there in a few minutes. It was a lie. You had no intention of leaving your room.

Turning over onto your side, you closed your eyes. You had just drifted off when there came another knock. “Ugh.” You groaned and threw back the blankets, remaining in just your tank top and underwear since you didn’t plan on leaving with her. “Carol, I really don’t—” Once the door opened, you screeched to a halt, meeting the impossibly blue eyes of your favorite bowman. “Daryl.” You blinked at him blankly.

“Hi.” He nearly whispered. “Can I, uh—?” He gave a vague motion toward the inside of your room.

“Right. Uh, yeah, right, sure.” You stammered while stepping aside. He stepped in and you turned to push the door closed, a gasp leaving your mouth when you felt him press himself against your back. “D-Daryl?”

“First, the lake. Then your tits in my face when the walkers came. An’ now—this?” His finger was tracing the outline of your panties over your hip.

“What? I didn’t—”

He growled, a low sound in his throat, as he spun you around and pressed you back against the door with his body. He grabbed your chin to force your gaze on him.

“Didn’t what? G’on. Tell me.”

“Daryl, I didn’t mean anything by any of that.” You gulped, though you weren’t afraid. Exactly the opposite. Heat and wetness was pooling at your core, your skin feeling electrified where he was touching you. Nevertheless, you couldn’t lie to him. “I really wasn’t trying to fuck with you, I swear.”

There was an instant change in his eyes and it broke your heart. He released you with a muttered “shit,” his hand rubbing at the back of his neck. The dim light of your bedside lamp was enough for you to see his face reddening and the slight tremble to his frame.

“Y/N, I—fuck—m’sorry.” He quickly attempted to sidestep you and reached for the doorknob, but you were faster and blocked his path. His head shot up, eyes wide and panicked. He had absolutely misread the day’s happenings but he wasn’t wrong on one thing.

“I wasn’t intentionally fucking with you.” You repeated, your tongue snaking out to wet your lips before you continued. “But I would have if I had known it’d end with you here like this.” His arm dropped away from the knob and you entered into his space, pressing your chest against him to hover your lips over his. “I’ve wanted you for so long, Daryl Dixon.”

And now you were here.

“Fuuuuck!” You moaned, pressing the back of your head into the pillow before raising it to look down at the man between your thighs. Your fingers twisted and tugged his hair as your hips rolled, grinding your cunt against his tongue. Daryl growled against your clit, the sound vibrating against the swollen nub. His large hands pressed down on your inner thighs, holding you open while also effectively rendering you immobile.

A whine slipped past your lips when his tongue once again pressed tightly against you, sweeping up and down before he closed his lips around the bundle of nerves and sucked. You tried to lift your hips but he pressed down harder, his nails biting into your skin. He removed his mouth from you, dark eyes glaring from just above your mound.

“Be still.”

His gravelly voice was even lower, darkened with lust and demand. You found you couldn’t help but obey. Breathing through your nose, you nodded eagerly. He kept his gaze locked on your face while his right hand lifted from your thigh, fingertips whispering over your flesh to dance down to your core. He ran a single digit through your slick once…twice, never breaking eye contact.

Your hands left his hair and fisted into the sheets of your bed, but otherwise, you remained frozen in place, panting through the pleasure of stretching around his middle finger breaching your opening. He slid in to the first knuckle, then the second, pausing only briefly before pushing in all the way. The sound that left your throat was positively sinful. You dropped your head back to the pillow and focused on not moving.

“Good girl.” He praised you, rewarding you by drawing his digit almost all the way out before sinking back inside, thus beginning a steady rhythm of which he continued. When you remained unmoving, he lowered his head once again to lavish attention onto your clit.

Who was this man? This was a completely new Daryl. In control, demanding, vocal, and positively panty-dropping. A new part of him for you to accept and adore. A part of him that, to your knowledge, only you had seen. One that you definitely hoped you would see again and again!

“Daryl, fuck!” You cried out when his index finger joined the first. You shivered almost violently when you felt him smile against your pussy.

“In a minute.” He purred, pumping into you faster.

Your hands moved from the sheets to the headboard, palms flat to keep the thrusts of his hand from pushing you upward. The moans and cries were constant, his mouth and fingers igniting a fire low in your belly. The knot was twisting tighter and tighter, and you grit your teeth when you felt the sparks of it begin to shoot down to your toes and up into your chest.

“Nngh, Daryl! I’m—” You panted, eyes screwed shut and legs trembling. He curled his fingers, driving them against that soft spot inside you mercilessly while his tongue and teeth tortured your clit. Just when you thought you might die from the pleasure of it all, that knot in your belly pulled taunt and snapped. Wave after wave of euphoria traveled through you, broken moans of his name tumbling from your lips like a mantra. You had grabbed his hair again at some point, holding him against your center with your thighs attempting to trap him there. He didn’t seem to mind, too busy eagerly lapping at the nectar you spilled while riding your high.

When you went limp against the mattress, he pulled his fingers from within you, leaving you to whine at the emptiness they left behind. You were still pulsing with the aftershocks of your orgasm when he pressed one last kiss against your sensitive clit before sitting up on his knees. You blinked away the haze in your vision to watch him suck on those two fingers that had just fucked you senseless, your juices still glistening on his face.

You weren’t sure what came over you but you dove forward almost clumsily while he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. He caught you easily with the other arm and pulled you against his chest, your arms encircling his neck to pull his lips to yours. The kiss was desperate, all tongues and teeth. The absolute need to be close to him in that moment was something you couldn’t explain. When you pulled back to look at him, your pupils blown wide and lips swollen, it was as if he understood before your sex-addled brain could form any words.

“I gotcha, girl.” Daryl said softly, a contradiction to how he had commanded you only moments prior. You nodded and let him kiss you again. It was tender this time, slow and deliberate. The archer began to lay you back. He caught himself with one arm while the other stayed behind your head to control your descent until you were once again on the pillows.

His mouth left yours and began to roam across your jaw. He nuzzled his cheek against yours in a way that you found absolutely adorable but then he was pressing open-mouthed kisses below your ear. Large hands traveled to your chest to cup both of your breasts, calloused fingers exploring the supple mounds before settling to roll your pebbled nipples between them. He kissed his way down, that sinful mouth eager to take over worshiping that part of you.

“Daryl,” you gasped, arching up into him when his mouth closed around your right nipple, “mmmm, Daryl, please!” You could feel his erection against your thigh, hot and hard and yet completely ignored. “Please—” you tried again, the plea coming out more like a pathetic whine.

“I know whatcha want.” He murmured against the skin between your breasts. He latched onto your left nipple with his teeth while his left hand took over stimulating the right. “Whatcha need.” You did the only thing you could and twisted your fingers into his hair, drawing your bottom lip in between your teeth with a quiet whimper. His touch left you suddenly and you opened your eyes to find him directly above you and lowering down until his lips were just barely touching yours. “But I wantcha to say it anyway.” You felt every syllable against your mouth, the simple action enough to make your cunt clench around nothing. Goddamn, this man knew how to play your body like an instrument.

His fingers were ghosting down your left side only for his hand to maneuver between your bodies. Grasping his cock, he slid it through your folds, gathering your juices in agonizingly slow strokes. Each time the tip of him grazed your clit, your back arched from the mattress with a cry on your lips.

“Say it.”

“I want you, Daryl.” You whined, anchoring your legs around his hips. You dug your heels into the skin just below his ass in a desperate attempt to pull him into you. Too bad he was much stronger than you.

He hummed in response but only began to stroke himself, spreading your slick along his shaft. “Tell me whatcha want me to do, girl.”

You couldn’t take it anymore. You were going to literally combust if he wasn’t inside you at that moment. You weaved your arms underneath his and pulled at him. “Fuck me, Daryl. Please, please, fuck me!”

He chuckled. The asshole actually chuckled but you didn’t care because he then immediately entered you in one fluid motion, burying himself to the hilt. His arms nearly gave out as your wet heat welcomed him, stretching and molding to his cock as if your body was made just for him. He groaned, dropping his head to your shoulder but you were too far gone to notice. The pleasurable burn of accommodating him brought you to new heights. You almost came right on the spot.

“Fuck.” He breathed against your neck, fighting to keep himself in check.

After you both had a moment, Daryl pushed himself up onto his forearms, drawing back his hips slowly before snapping forward and earning a broken moan from you. The feeling of him moving inside you was overwhelming, the push and pull driving every thought from your mind to leave only the ability to feel. And you wanted more.

You clawed at his back, each thrust forward tearing a cry from your throat. You barely registered that his mouth was on yours, but responded immediately, craving the taste of him. The smoke and pine mingled with the taste of your cunt on his tongue and you couldn’t get enough. You swallowed his delectable moan when your hips came up to meet this thrusts, the sound of wet skin slapping echoing off the walls of your room. Bringing a hand to his hair, you pulled his head back, pussy clenching when the action made him hiss between his teeth.

Teeth met his skin, biting down just above his collar bone. The salty taste brought a moan into your throat. You marked him there, sucking hard until you brought blood to the surface and then you released him. “You—feel so good.” You panted before your mouth was back on his. He pulled back suddenly and you whined at the loss of his weight but then he was sitting back on his knees, grabbing your hips and fucking into you so hard that you saw stars. It was just on the good side of painful, your cunt spasming around his cock as the familiar heat began to build in your belly.

Daryl didn’t stay that way way long. He released your hips and leaned forward to use the headboard as leverage, pounding you with such force that you again had to brace yourself with your palms. Your cries mixed with his moans and grunts and you prayed that Carol was still away. The angle was intense, each thrust had his tip pressing roughly against your sweet spot, building your pleasure at a pace you wished would slow.

“Daryl, I’m—I’m gonna—” you couldn’t get the words out between breaths and moans, but he knew from the way you tightened around him that you were nearing the precipice. And he was determined to throw you over the edge first.

He released the headboard and grabbed your arms, yanking you up while he sat back on his heels. You grabbed for his shoulders and then encircled his neck, resting one hand on the back of his head and the other on his shoulder blade. He moved his hands to your hips, helping you to bounce on him, spearing yourself on his cock and driving it deeper. Your moans became pleas and then a chant of his name, mouth hanging agape between words and breaths and eyes screwed shut.

“Cum for me.” He grunted against your jaw and that was all it took. You were almost certain you screamed but you couldn’t hear it, vision blacking out as euphoria swallowed you. You came back to yourself as the waves began to ebb, Daryl continuing to fuck you through. Your body felt heavy and uncoordinated and you pulled back a bit to clumsily seek out his mouth, greedily drinking down each sound he offered as he chased his own release. His grip on your hips would leave bruises, but you couldn’t find it in you to care.

His movements grew sloppy and you could feel him beginning to twitch and pulse inside you. You pulled your mouth from his and watched him until he pulled you from his lap. You moved quickly, aware of his actions, and wrapped your hand around him, pumping him fast and hard. He pressed his forehead against yours, his hands gripping your thighs while he fought to breathe through the sensation. His teeth were clenched and his eyes tightly closed, sweat shining on his skin and you were sure it was the sexiest thing you had ever seen.

Half a dozen more strokes before you twisted your hand and he cried out, muscles freezing and face contorting into a grimace of pure ecstasy. He breathed out your name, hips jerking and ropes of cum painting your hand and both of your thighs. No, that was the sexiest thing you had ever seen.

You pulled his mouth to yours before he could come all the way down, relishing each twitch of his muscles. When you pulled away, he finally opened his eyes and swayed on the spot. He seemed dazed but when his gaze met yours, he leaned forward to kiss you. It was gentle, almost hesitant. As if he didn’t know whether or not you’d welcome it.

“That was amazing.” You whispered, finally catching your breath.

“Yeah.” He replied quietly.

You brought a hand to the side of his face, watching all the courage melt away. His already flushed face was growing impossibly redder. You couldn’t help but smile. He had been dominant and commanding only to morph right back into the Daryl you had fallen in love with.

Your eyes widened.

Shit.

You were in love with him.

You were actually in love with Daryl.

You didn’t move when he got up to grab a towel, slipping on his boxers while he was at it. You still didn’t move as he cleaned you up, his mouth moving once he was done but no sound registering. He snapped his fingers in front of your face and you flinched.

“What’d you say?”

“Ya okay?” His brow was drawn inward in concern. He looked so, so nervous and you just wanted to pull him onto the bed and hold him.

“Yeah, I’m great.” You beamed.

He nodded and worried his bottom lip between his teeth, glancing over at his clothes. “Guess I should go.”

Your face fell as he reached for his pants. “Why?” Daryl froze and looked at you, head tilted. “You could stay. Here. With me.” You offered, your own face reddening. He stayed in the awkward position of halfway reaching toward his shirt but was obviously considering your words.

“Ya want me to stay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I really do.” You smiled sincerely. He nodded and straightened, coming back around to the other side of the bed. He sat stiffly against the headboard, chewing his lip again. You started to lean against him when there came a soft knock at the door. You both looked up and then at one another.

Busted.

You both scrambled to get dressed and it would have been comical had you not been thinking of who could be on the other side of the door. Carol. Rick. Michonne. Oh god, Carl! You looked back at him just as he pulled his shirt over his head, an apologetic expression on your face. Turning the knob and pulling the door open, you smiled innocently at—

No one.

“What the—” You leaned out and looked down each hall to find them empty. However, at your feet were two wrapped plates of food. One with a note addressed to Daryl and the other to you. In Carol’s handwriting.

You looked around for the woman once more while picking up the plates and stepped back into the room, kicking the door shut. Eyebrows raised, you crossed the space to hand Daryl his and then placed yours on the bed, removing the note and unfolding it.

“Good for you. Now tell him that you love him.”

You almost laughed but held it, simply folding your note and putting it in your bedside drawer. Daryl was looking at his own with a raised brow before he folded it and put it in his pocket.

“M’starvin’.” He announced, plopping onto your bed while unwrapping his food. He watched you smile and follow suit, gaze lingering just a moment longer than necessary.

His note?

“Don’t be stupid, Pookie. She loves you too.”

[eelhound]

"I think Homer outwits most writers who have written on the War [fantasy archetype], by not taking sides.

The Trojan war is not and you cannot make it be the War of Good vs. Evil. It’s just a war, a wasteful, useless, needless, stupid, protracted, cruel mess full of individual acts of courage, cowardice, nobility, betrayal, limb-hacking-off, and disembowelment. Homer was a Greek and might have been partial to the Greek side, but he had a sense of justice or balance that seems characteristically Greek — maybe his people learned a good deal of it from him? His impartiality is far from dispassionate; the story is a torrent of passionate actions, generous, despicable, magnificent, trivial. But it is unprejudiced. It isn’t Satan vs. Angels. It isn’t Holy Warriors vs. Infidels. It isn’t hobbits vs. orcs. It’s just people vs. people.

Of course you can take sides, and almost everybody does. I try not to, but it’s no use; I just like the Trojans better than the Greeks. But Homer truly doesn’t take sides, and so he permits the story to be tragic. By tragedy, mind and soul are grieved, enlarged, and exalted.

Whether war itself can rise to tragedy, can enlarge and exalt the soul, I leave to those who have been more immediately part of a war than I have. I think some believe that it can, and might say that the opportunity for heroism and tragedy justifies war. I don’t know; all I know is what a poem about a war can do. In any case, war is something human beings do and show no signs of stopping doing, and so it may be less important to condemn it or to justify it than to be able to perceive it as tragic.

But once you take sides, you have lost that ability.

Is it our dominant religion that makes us want war to be between the good guys and the bad guys?

In the War of Good vs. Evil there can be divine or supernal justice but not human tragedy. It is by definition, technically, comic (as in The Divine Comedy): the good guys win. It has a happy ending. If the bad guys beat the good guys, unhappy ending, that’s mere reversal, flip side of the same coin. The author is not impartial. Dystopia is not tragedy.

Milton, a Christian, had to take sides, and couldn’t avoid comedy. He could approach tragedy only by making Evil, in the person of Lucifer, grand, heroic, and even sympathetic — which is faking it. He faked it very well.

Maybe it’s not only Christian habits of thought but the difficulty we all have in growing up that makes us insist justice must favor the good.

After all, 'Let the best man win' doesn’t mean the good man will win. It means, 'This will be a fair fight, no prejudice, no interference — so the best fighter will win it.' If the treacherous bully fairly defeats the nice guy, the treacherous bully is declared champion. This is justice. But it’s the kind of justice that children can’t bear. They rage against it. It’s not fair!

But if children never learn to bear it, they can’t go on to learn that a victory or a defeat in battle, or in any competition other than a purely moral one (whatever that might be), has nothing to do with who is morally better.

Might does not make right — right?

Therefore right does not make might. Right?

But we want it to. 'My strength is as the strength of ten because my heart is pure.'

If we insist that in the real world the ultimate victor must be the good guy, we’ve sacrificed right to might. (That’s what History does after most wars, when it applauds the victors for their superior virtue as well as their superior firepower.) If we falsify the terms of the competition, handicapping it, so that the good guys may lose the battle but always win the war, we’ve left the real world, we’re in fantasy land — wishful thinking country.

Homer didn’t do wishful thinking.

Homer’s Achilles is a disobedient officer, a sulky, self-pitying teenager who gets his nose out of joint and won’t fight for his own side. A sign that Achilles might grow up someday, if given time, is his love for his friend Patroclus. But his big snit is over a girl he was given to rape but has to give back to his superior officer, which to me rather dims the love story. To me Achilles is not a good guy. But he is a good warrior, a great fighter — even better than the Trojan prime warrior, Hector. Hector is a good guy on any terms — kind husband, kind father, responsible on all counts — a mensch. But right does not make might. Achilles kills him.

The famous Helen plays a quite small part in The Iliad. Because I know that she’ll come through the whole war with not a hair in her blond blow-dry out of place, I see her as opportunistic, immoral, emotionally about as deep as a cookie sheet. But if I believed that the good guys win, that the reward goes to the virtuous, I’d have to see her as an innocent beauty wronged by Fate and saved by the Greeks.

And people do see her that way. Homer lets us each make our own Helen; and so she is immortal.

I don’t know if such nobility of mind (in the sense of the impartial 'noble' gases) is possible to a modern writer of fantasy. Since we have worked so hard to separate History from Fiction, our fantasies are dire warnings, or mere nightmares, or else they are wish fulfillments."

- Ursula K. Le Guin, from No Time to Spare, 2013.

[ruporas]

a conversation about scars

[ID: A Trigun comic. Vash is shirtless with his back to the viewer, showing off his many scars and metal implants. He complains, “Oh, c’mon... The shirt got stuck... Argh.” Wolfwood’s finger pokes him at the base of his neck, and Vash exclaims, “Ack! Wolfwood!?”

Wolfwood, looking down, asks, “Does it ever hurt?” Vash’s eyes go wide with surprise, and he looks down and says, “No-- Sometimes they ache, but nothing unbearable.” Wolfwood kisses the back of his neck and then leans against Vash, silent as Vash cheerfully laughs, “Got it! It’s free, finally!”

Wolfwood still looks sad, and Vash turns back and smiles nervously to ask, “What is it?” Hand over the grate over Vash’s heart, Wolfwood says, “... I was just thinking it would’ve been better had I met you sooner.” He hugs Vash from behind, and the background goes dark.

“If I were with you earlier, I’d been able to stop you from making dumb decisions. And protect you when you do.” Wolfwood’s expression is heavy as he looks down Vash’s back and says, “Then you’d at least have less of these.” He puts his face against Vash’s back, and Vash, mouth tight, thinks, “.. When he puts it like that... It’s so embarrassing somehow...”

Vash moves away and says forcefully, “But-- I don’t want you to protect me. Because then-- you’d get hurt.” Wolfwood angrily replies, “Huh? Are you forgetting-- Scars don’t last on me!” Vash angrily exclaims “Idiot!” and grabs Wolfwood’s collar.

Wolfwood, irate, goes, “Idiot!?” but Vash pulls down Wolfwood’s shirt as he leans their foreheads together. He exclaims, “I meant up here!” Vash looks upset and says, “Just because your body won’t leave anything-- doesn’t mean nothing every happened!”

Wolfwood grits his teeth as Vash continues, “So don’t say that-- I can take care of myself and I... wouldn’t want you to be burdened any-- mh?!” He breaks off with a loud sound of surprise when Wolfwood pulls him forward to kiss him.

Scowling very fiercely, Wolfwood demands, “Don’t call yourself my burden. That’s up to me!” Vash, flushed and scowling back with one hand raised to his mouth, shouts, “That’s what you’re upset about?!” For a second, they stay in the same positions, Vash braced over Wolfwood as they glare at each other, both labeled “upset.”

Then Vash turns somber and says, “These scars don’t bother me at all and I own responsibility for them... And... at least, I can count mines.” Wolfwood looks away as Vash touches his hair and says, “What about you?”

They lie down, Vash on top of Wolfwood as he says sadly, “I’m never going to know how many times you’ve been shot, how many times you had to drink that potion. (You won’t even tell me how it works...).” There’s a close up panel of Wolfwood’s eyes, tired and guilty, and Vash continues, “Don’t focus on me now... Please just protect yourself first.” Wolfwood responds, “You have to consider yourself first too.” Vash says, “This isn’t about me,” and Wolfwood argues, “Yes it is.” Vash says, “Nuh uh.”

There’s a final cartoony panel of them against white space: Vash pouting with annoyance at a ticked Wolfwood. Their next speech bubbles hover in white. Wolfwood aggravatedly shouts, “Listen to your own advice!”, and Vash exclaims, “Ack--! Don’t get mad, Wolfwood!!” “Fin” is written next to a donut and lollipop.

At the very bottom of the page is a cartoony sketch titled “Alt to p.4″. Vash presses their heads together and shouts, “I meant up here!” Wolfwood looks down with confusion at his bare chest. Vash looks down too, sweating. Wolfwood, squinting, says, “My ch--” but Vash cuts him off with a shrieked, “NO!!” End ID]

credits for ID text  

[neil-gaiman]

hi neil !

i have to write a short story for the final assignment worth 90% of my creative writing uni module, it has to be 4k words. i’ve been putting it off for months because 1) i’ve been depressed and can’t find the motivation to do anything, 2) im deathly scared of it being bad because 3) graduating my course counts on the grade i’ll get for it. writing and reading has been a huge motivator to not give up on a future for myself. i am basically terrified of writing and submitting it. all the ideas i have feel bad, or i can’t execute them, or it’s not what the marker would be looking for. i’ve had the deadline extended into summer but i just can’t bring myself to write anything. how do you make yourself write when it matters so much? when something big rests on its quality, and it scares you?

thank you so much :)

There was a colourist I knew who wanted more than anything to colour a comic book I was writing. I got him pages early to start colouring, talked to him about what we were trying to achieve. He was really smart and brilliant and I knew he'd do a great job. The editor was waiting for his work to come in.

He may have started. He may not. I don't know. All I know is he was so obsessed with it being perfect that he never sent the pages in. The person who wound up colouring the comic got the job because we were out of time and our first choice had never sent anything to the editor.

The moral I took from this is that any work, no matter how bad, is better than no work, no matter how brilliant.

I pass this along to you, in the hope that it helps. Divide 4000 by how many days you have to go, and then double that. That's what you have to write each day to get 4K written, with enough time to revise it thoroughly on the other side. Get anything down in the first half of the time. Make it brilliant in the second half of the time.

Good luck.

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

BUMBLE (WARRIOR CATS) (CW: Domestic Abuse)

1.) Back with another Warriors submission, I bet you’ll be getting a lot from other people too LMAO. Bumble is a kittypet (housecat) who befriends the male protagonist Gray Wing’s girlfriend, Turtle Tail, and lets her stay in her house. This gets Gray Wing all pissy because he’s controlling of Turtle Tail and shares most of the wild/clan cat’s proclivity for looking down upon kittypets. Turtle Tail gets pregnant by another kittypet, Tom, who tries to control her by hiding the fact that humans take away kittens after they’re born. Eventually Bumble comes clean about it so Turtle Tail returns to the forest. Some time later, Bumble is found in the forest seeking refuge because Tom has been physically abusing her, scratching her where the humans can’t see. So, she’s CANONICALLY ACKNOWLEDGED as a domestic abuse victim (unlike Squirrelflight who meets all the textbook signs but the narrative and authors deny it). How do you think our good guy protagonists, i.e. Gray Wing “The Wise” and Turtle Tail, respond to an abuse victim seeking refuge? They tell Bumble to go home, thinking to themselves that she’s fat and soft and therefore would be useless in their group. Bumble stands up for herself and asks to speak with the leaders of the group. One of them asks if Bumble could just get along with Tom better (bro???) and when Bumble says it’s not within her control, the leader suggests being nicer to the humans instead. Another rival leader butts in and verbally abuses Bumble again by ripping into how fat and lazy and useless she would be. Despite Turtle Tail having been friends with Bumble and Bumble had helped her through her own hard times, to Gray Wing’s approval Turtle Tail chooses not to intervene as Bumble is forcibly escorted back to her abuser. But that’s not all. Later Bumble is found in the forest maimed and dying, and it seems likely that Gray Wing’s brother Clear Sky, a male with a long history of violence, is the culprit. Rather than mourn the dying innocent cat, Gray Wing’s primary concern is how other cats might be mean to Clear Sky if they think he’s a murderer, and reassures himself that refusing to help Bumble in her time of need was still the right decision.

2.) I have no idea how she managed to be written so horrifically from an abuse victim and woman (/she-cat I guess) standpoint but here we are. Okay so my memory is a bit fuzzy but basically Bumble was a character in Dawn of the Clans and a close friend to Turtle Tail, a major character, as well as a character who lived close to Tom, an abusive dickhead of a cat. Bumble was largely depicted as just a really sweet cat. Turtle Tail was very briefly the mate of Turtle Tail, but once she got pregnant, he became super violent towards both her and our gal Bumble. Tom actively hid the fact that, once her kits were old enough, Turtle Tail’s kits would probably be taken from her, and made Bumble keep quiet about this too, but Bumble eventually told Turtle Tail the truth, Turtle Tail left and Tom became extremely violent towards Bumble because of this, and was extremely abusive towards her. Eventually, Bumble ran away from him to where Turtle Tail and co were and begged to stay, since the wilderness as a whole was genuinely more safe than being around Tom was. Naturally, this meant kitty xenophobia from cats who had only arrived in that area recently, because everybody was insistent than, since she was a kittypet/house cat, things wouldn’t work out, and even her friend Turtle Tail denied her on this, insisted she was too soft to live in the wild and only sent her towards a cat Bumble wanted to convince because she was absolutely certain she’d be denied. Also our good old protagonist Gray Wing got to spend this scene being all upset about this soft cat wanting to join them to escape an abuser and was all bitter about the fact that Turtle Tail lived with her for a short period of time, and he also got to have a sweet romantic moment with Turtle Tail after denying an abuse victim an escape from her abuser. Also as much as I like Tall Shadow usually she sucked ass in the following scene because she was essentially telling Bumble to go find a way to make peace with Tom as if she was not the one being abused (Bumble pointed out that Tom was the one who would need to make peace for it to happen, not her) and that she should just make life better by going back to being a housecat and being spoiled despite the fact that she was actively at risk with her owners because of Tom. Then she leaves after being threatened by several cats there and is called soft on the way out. The next time she appears she is literally dying, and her death is just a plot device to create a stupid little mystery which is solved in a very stupid way. Also her abuser does continue to be a shithead and for some reason is fully permitted to kidnap his own children but he also gets a heroic death and the only reason I will not rant more about him is because this is too long already. Long story short Bumble deserves the world and everybody who decided not to let her escape her abuser just because they thought she was soft sucks

3.) Is nice to the group of starving, feral wild cats that left the mountains so their friends and family could have more food to eat and befriends one of them to the point of opening her home to her after she leaves the group because the guy she likes is too dumb to notice she likes him and keeps falling for his brother’s love interests.

Unfortunately, because Bumble is a house cat who lives in a house with people and not a Wild and Free cat, this is a grave and horrible crime (luring a wild cat into the safety and comforts of domesticity) and is villainized for the rest of the arc, including for things wildly out of her control

I.E.

Her owners taking in an aggressive male cat that bullies and abuses the two female cats already living there

When Bumble’s friend leaves and goes back to the wild cats, Bumble leaves her home (as the abuse as has gotten worse) to see if she could either get help or have her friend return so the abuse isn’t as bad again)

Bumble eventually dies in the wild because the feral cats all hate her for ‘stealing’ their friend and tricking her into becoming a kittypet for awhile and refuse to help Bumble adjust to wild life or even teaching her how to hunt.

They are littl e to no hard feelings at her death beyond ‘good riddance’ but the aggressive tomcat that chased her out of her home is later regarded with good feelings and regret at such a ‘good, heroic cat’ passing when he dies despite him literally never doing a good or kind thing in his life and actually causing trouble for the wild cats right before dying

ALEX DEWITT (DC COMICS)

1.) The term “fridging” is literally based on Alex and what happened to her. She was killed off violently by a bad guy trying to get at her boyfriend only a couple issues after she was introduced (making it obvious they only brought her in to kill her off for shock value). Her death did very little to the narrative other than hurt her boyfriend Kyle and was done in an exceedingly horrifying and violent way. (Bad guy came to the door with flowers and threatening note, broke in and attacked her, choking her to death, before [off panel] chopping her body up and sticking it in the refrigerator as a “surprise” for her boyfriend. This obviously is really fucked up and she deserves better and should win this actually (a vote for Alex is a vote for all fridging victims [in spirit])

2.) It doesn’t get much worse than being the character whose death originated the “fridging” trope. In Green Lantern Vol. 3 #54, Kyle Rayner comes home to find that Alexandra, his girlfriend, has been killed by the villain Major Force and stuffed into the refrigerator.

Alexandra DeWitt is the character whose misogynistic treatment coined the term where a character, usually female, is killed off purely to make the main character, usually male, feel bad. Even if there are other characters who have been subjected to similar levels of misogyny, Alexandra DeWitt’s treatment has been essentially immortalized.

3.) I know she’s not going to win but shout out to my home girl, literally the trope namer for women shoved in fridges. All anyone ever knows about her is that she was Kyle’s girlfriend and got murdered for his character development, even though she had plenty of potential to be her own character.

[cyborg-franky]

Could you do a HC about the ideal partner for Law, Zoro and Kid? What kind of person they would fall for and which traits it needs for a long lasting relationship ❤️

Oooh yes, I can do this!

Written for a GN reader!

Law

Law needs someone who can challenge him, and push him out of his comfort zone.

Someone who isn’t scared to argue with him when they think he is in the wrong.

Law also needs someone independent, he can’t handle high-maintenance or clingy people. He needs to know you can make your own mind up and have your own views regardless of what he thinks.

You need to be okay with his family, the heart pirates are alot to handle but he won’t compromise on this. 

Animal lover.

Someone who is okay with limited PDA and knows he has his own way of showing love and affection.

Someone with a wikied sense of humor like his.

Kind, he may not seem it but he needs someone who is soft and kind and tries to bring out his caring side more.

Smart, likes to read, someone who can match him in conversation.

Nerd. If you are also a big nerd into comics he will find common ground with you and feel he can be his true nerdy self around you.

Honest. Law doesn’t like people who lie or try and manipulate him.

If you're loyal to him he’ll be loyal to you.

Alright, so he likes people to be dependent but he also deep down likes being his partners ‘scary dog privilege’ 

Must hate bread. Or eat the bread from his meals for him.

Understanding. Law has some damage and needs someone who gets that.

Zoro

Zoro doesn’t have a very big checklist of the ‘type of person’ he goes for.

Just don't be loud or bossy and he’ll vibe pretty well with you.

If you are a huge sword nerd he will be all over that and if you also like to work out he will be delighted to have a workout buddy. 

Napping is a must. Either snuggle up with him in the sun and take a nap at his side or simply just be okay with him napping as much as he does. He needs someone laid back, and can’t handle a loud or intense personality to date. 

He is happy to spend all his time with his partner he just needs someone who is also happy to enjoy a comfortable silence with him.

You don’t need to be into drinking, again, as long as you don’t tell him what he can and can’t do he’s happy. He would like to have a casual drink with you sometimes though, when he’s a little tipsy he is happy to go on long rants and talk about his thoughts and feelings.

Be his partner and his drinking buddy.

Be his emotional support compass. Be able to stir him in the right direction, and I do mean physically and not emotionally there.

Grab him his arm and just pull him.

You need to be firm with him. Loyal and honest and also have a good sense of humor. He likes to have a chuckle and he does have a silly side.

Kid

You need to keep up with this boy. He can’t handle someone who is easily upset or sensitive. He needs someone to match that same wild spark that runs through him.

Have a passion for adventure and don’t be scared to get your hands dirty.

He wants someone who doesn’t shy away from his loud and boisterous nature. Embrace him for him.

Also needs to be liked by Killer. If you don’t pass Killer’s vibe check there is a huge chance you won't pass Kid’s.

He enjoys picking fights and starting arguments, he lives for some passion and some shouting with the person he’s courting so scream, shout, and give him just as good as he does. Challenge him, don’t be scared of offending him.

Be okay with how rough he is, Kid needs someone who understands that and doesn’t try and change who he is, and doesn’t want to sand down his edges.

Be there for him regardless of his flaws and he will open up to you and you can make each other a better person with time and understanding.

Love the thrill of the fight. Nothing makes his heart sing like fighting a hard battle side by side with the person he loves.

[incorrectbatfam]

Types of obnoxious batfam stans

Written by an obnoxious batfam stan

Not really a rant but something I've noticed over the years interacting in different spaces and I've decided to make your problem now.

Please note that I'm not saying there's any "right" way to be a fan because we all suck by virtue of being comic nerds, but there are certain kinds of batfamily fans that stick out to be in particular.

Anywho, here are 12 kinds of annoying batfam stans that you've probably run into and you better get a laugh out of it *points gun to your head*.

1) The Newbies Who Never Heard of Google

There's no shame in being new to something. It's a phase that we're all guaranteed to go through, whether we're 11 or 101. However, in this day and age, so many things can be easily googled that you don't need to shout every question you have into the VVorld VVide VVoid. If you need comic recs or a reading list, google it. If you wanna know a character's origin story, google it. If you need to know the color of Batman's underpants in a particular issue in 1965... well that's probably too specific for Google but Reddit will definitely have an answer.

2) The Middle School Authors

Before the 13-year-olds get up in my notes, I'm not saying everyone that age writes like this. Middle school is a state of mind. These fanfic writers usually stand out in a few ways.

They're oftentimes first-person POV or reader-insert. Give Y/N a break, she's tired.

The grammar is stunningly atrocious. I get if you're inexperienced or if you're writing in a second language, but we are in the prime era of autocorrect. If you need help, it's right there. Also, fuck c*nsoring b*d w*rds and fuck "unalive."

The characters do things that are out-of-character because the author is projecting their own personality. Bruce Wayne is a lot of things but he does not listen to the fucking Mountain Goats.

There's a lack of experience or research when it comes to certain topics. That's not how physics works. He can't walk that injury off. And that's definitely NOT how you do the horizontal hokey pokey.

3) The Neckbeards

Unfortunately, these basement-dwelling mouth-breathers tainted the image of what a comic fan is, though that's been changing recently. Still, we've all seen them. They gatekeep via pop quizzes, 'cause obviously you're not a real fan unless you know what page 10 of Batman #138 smells like. They give unsolicited commentary on people's cosplays, nitpicking the guys and being gross toward women. And heaven forbid the comics add a little diversity.

4) The Moviegoers

Nothing inherently wrong with getting into the fandom via the movies, nor is there anything wrong with sticking to that. I just feel like we're two different species of Galapagos finches, you know?

5) The Christopher Nolans

Separate from casual fans of the Nolan movies. I'm calling them the Christopher Nolans because these people have a tendency to reach for the grimdarkest thing possible. It's like they cannot fathom Batman having any other emotions besides punching and gargoyle brooding.

6) The Canon Purists

Wanna share a fun headcanon? NO, because Stephanie Brown never used cherry lip balm in the comics so therefore that must be the absolute truth. These people are a stickler for comic accuracy to the point where it's like... why bother interacting with the fandom in the first place? The worst part is when they're adamant on following a single continuity and refuse to consider anything else. This is comics we're talking about. Everything either has been or will be canon at some point.

7) The Fanon Worshippers

On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have the people who base their entire perception of the characters on something either they pulled out of their ass or that their mutual with 16 followers came up with, despite evidence directly contradicting it. I love WFA, but I feel like that's partially responsible for further perpetuating certain popular myths. Also, these fans tend to focus solely on the batfam/their ships. It's one thing to have some people in the foreground vs. background, but put some respect to Bart Allen's name you goddamn cheesecakes.

8) The Golden Age Dads

These guys aren't really obnoxious. I actually find it kind of cute how they think Jason Todd is still dead.

9) The Chronically Online

I have a rule of thumb when it comes to discourse: if it's not something I'd hear about at a bar, it's not worth my mental energy. Some people haven't gotten the memo, though.

These are either the well-intentioned but misinformed teenagers or grown-ass adults beefing with children because they don't have a life. They have takes that are oversimplified, rage-inducing, TikTok algorithm attention-grabbers that no one cares about in real life.

Don't get me wrong, we've got a bunch of issues in comics and fandom that are worth discussing. However, there comes a point where you're splitting hairs and need to go the fuck outside. I'm not gonna link the post 'cause I don't wanna call them and their 7 notes out, but the other week I saw someone saying Stephcass was a racist ship because something something colonialism parallel. You gotta be Elastigirl to have that kind of reach.

10) The Corporate Simps

I love comics. I appreciate the writers and artists. However, you will find my carcass in a ditch before you catch me licking the boots of DC/Warner Bros. Basically, these fans, fewer as they are, can't seem to fathom that their favorite franchise can (and does) put out some steaming motherfucking garbage.

11) The Hot Cosplayers

Not actually annoyed, I'm just a little jealous. Stop being hotter than me, please and thank you.

12) The One With A Punchline For Everything

Wait–

[generalsmemories]

Ginkgo leaves

✧ jing yuan x gn!reader

✧ based on the ask: Since reqs are open, you think you could write jing yuans reaction to his lover being Mara-struck? Thank you! - requested by anonymous

✧ contents: established relationship, angst, hurt/almost no comfort lmfao, implied character death, mentions of other characters, pov mostly written in jing yuan's pov, still usage of 2nd pov (referring the reader as you), mayhaps ooc because jing yuan is an emotional wreck.

✧ a/n: when i tell ya'll i legit struggled to be able to write this entire thing. there's been like 3-4 scrapped drafts because halfway through writing i would just NOT be satisfied with the result. to the anon who requested this, i'm so sorry it took this long - but i hope the upcoming trainwreck makes up for it! a trainwreck im still not actually satisfied with LMFAO. but it's better than the other 5 scrapped works. also not beta-read so fellas if u see a spelling error - no you didn't.

p.s: some mara-struck information i give here are totally fanmade for the purpose of this fic alone, as such don't take whatever i write about mara here as what actually happens canonically to characters (then again most of the playable characters have different symptoms of mara themselves).

"Benefactor, am I correct to believe you're asking me if the general has any specific interests?" Tingyun asks with a snicker, the trailblazer looking away from her prying eyes while mumbling a quiet yes.

"Some of the younger... Can I call them younger? Anyway, some of the younger Xianzhou citizens are very infatuated with the general. Seeing as I've been announced as his honory guest, they do often come and ask me various things to try and gain his favor. So yeah, anything at this point will work - so please!" the trailblazer hurriedly explained, clasping their hands together in a desperate attempt to get anything from the foxian amicassador leaning back with a quirked eyebrow.

"Ahh, love truly makes someone go blind doesn't it," she muses out loud, the trailblazers' eyebrow furrowing together in confusion over the foxian's lady choice of words, "... You're not entirerely wrong with that statement..."

"Do you want to know what his favorite flower is?" Tingyun asks, ignoring the confused question that had been uttered to her, snapping her fan open to hide the cheeky smile that spread across her lips - but anyone could still tell that her eyes were gleaming with mischief as the trailblazer nodded their head.

"He doesn't have one."

"Then why did you even-"

"But he likes ginkgo leaves."

The trailblazers' eyes widened in shock, and rightfully so because the very thing ginkgo leaves are associated with are after all...

"He had a lover once, and as far as I'm aware, his last moment with them while they still had their consciousness intact was surrounded by ginkgo leaves."

Jing Yuan whilst having forgotten almost every single moment with you, does unfortunately remember the exact details of the day that your descent into madness started. Because what he witnessed wasn't a futile struggle you had with yourself to not to destroy everything within your vicinity. Instead, he witnessed the slow process of your bright self becoming an empty shell, only capable of uttering a few words.

It's comical really, even when faced with a curse that struck everyone mad - he found out that it oddly fit your character to not go mad, but instead become the complete opposite of your gentle self. A hollow shell of the person he fell in love with all centuries ago.

Jing Yuan knew he had to end your suffering right then and there when you first started to show signs.

But he couldn't - This wasn't something that had to be immediately dealt with, his hand wasn't forced like it was back when he had to slay his own master down before she took more lives.

No, this was a normal afternoon on what would've been another normal, mundane day in both of your lives. But everything went wrong the moment Jing Yuan heard the breaking of glass, and how there was a lone gingko leaf inside the palm of your hand - a ginkgo leaf that you were staring wide-eyed at with a trembling hand.

You were too far from the veranda to have a ginkgo leaf in your hand.

General Jing Yuan would've ended your suffering the moment you turned around to lock eyes with him, your own face twisted into one of utter fear.

General Jing Yuan would've reported you the to Ten-Lords Commissions as the law had stated. But Jing Yuan couldn't - because Jing Yuan knew that the moment he did, he would never see you again.

So he decided for once he would be selfish. Jing Yuan rarely made choices lately that was based off of his own feelings, but his time with you was cut too harshly, so once again he chooses to be selfish. Even if that meant that it would prolong your suffering just a tiny bit more. "... We can figure something out," was the only thing he could muster up the courage to say with a shaking voice. You didn't say anything, your mouth wobbling a tiny bit and your breathing getting harsher by the second.

But still you indulged him - you always did. So with an equally wobbly smile, you only nodded your head slightly, "... Sure."

That wobbly smile and expression of utter fear was the last genuine expression that truly came from yourself.

The descent to becoming fully mara-struck is usually a fast process, the curse able to completely overtake someone's mind within the same day the symptoms appears - rendering the person completely vulnerable with the only alternative to either hand themselves in to the Ten-Lords or wait for the Ten-Lords to come to them personally.

Your usual easy-going smile was gone, in its stead was eyes that kept going in and out of focus. Almost as if you were desperately trying to keep yourself grounded - a battle you both knew would end with your defeat.

Jing Yuan didn't dare to venture outside of the house. One step out and every Cloud Knight would've been on you within seconds to subdue you. He had first initially resorted to just holding you within his arms for as long as he could, to be able to remember how you felt like after your death.

But with the minimal strength you had left, you had wobbled to the garden, every step taken only making you pant heavily. But even with heavy breaths of air leaving your lips, you had refused to take Jing Yuans hand or offer to even carry you out to the garden. When you had managed to reach the ginkgo tree standing tall at the center of the garden, Jing Yuan was sure you were going to collapse in front of it, taking a quick step to catch you.

But instead you had merely reached your hands up, the falling leaves fluttering gently down onto your palms. And while you were in indescriable pain for the last couple of hours - Jing Yuan could only see a serene expression when you looked up at the ginkgo leaves that were continously falling down.

"... They're beautiful... aren't they... Jing Yuan? It's almost a pity... that these beautiful... leaves are associated with our doom," you said softly. Jing Yuan could feel his breath hitch in his throat when you uttered his name.

You're obviously struggling to convey whatever thoughts you still had to him properly, taking a moment in between words to catch your breath, eyebrows furrowed slightly as you fought against the searing pain that was spreading through every nerve in your body.

There's a sudden gust of wind which causes the pile of leaves in your hands to flutter away from your grasp. Your hand stretches out slightly, almost in an attempt to reach out for them - stumbling a bit in your step. The limp causes Jing Yuan to take a quick step forward with his arms outstretched. Perhaps seeing him in your peripheral vision causes you to stop the futile attempt to catch the escaping leaves, arms going limp against your side as you turn to face him - your once blank expression turning into a somber smile instead.

Jing Yuan thinks that it's unfair how normal you look in front of him - almost as if you haven't been becme mara-struck. Like nothing has happened to you aside from the ginkgo leaves fluttering from your lips whenever you cough. The same cough that causes the general of Luofu to flinch every time - without fail.

And perhaps you can see his inner turmoil, the way he tries to make eye contact with you, but is unable to after a few seconds. The way his hands clench too hard into fist to the point droplets of blood fall down to the grass and stains it a deep red while he bites his own lips to not say a word - lest he says something that he will regret.

And you truly wish that you could tell him everything is okay like you usually do.

But for the first time since the day he lost his friends, you can't.

"... I'm sorry," you finally say, the apology making him whip his head up to you again. Mouth opening to say something to comfort you, to tell you that it's not your fault. But the words are unable to leave his mouth when he sees your arms slightly outstretched towards him with a small smile.

And he can't hold it in anymore.

It only takes him a few wide steps to reach you from his position before he cradles you within his arms. The grip is tight, unbearably tight to the point it hurts, but you don't complain. You're limp in his hold, and if this was any day he wouldn't comment, but the fact that you're not moving a single muscle terrifies Jing Yuan to the core. "... Please," he finally manages to whisper, the rustling of ginkgo leaves around you almost drowning out his quiet plea.

"Please don't make me do this again."

He doesn't ask if the tensing of your body is caused by the pain that's rapidly increasing or if it's caused by his silent confession. He can however feel the gentle hand that rests against the lower part of his back and your head resting against the side of his own. The reassurance you try to give him does nothing to help because he's aware that it probably brought you unmeasurable pain to try to move those limbs - instead the general buries his face closer to your neck and squeezes you tighter.

"... You won't." you whisper quietly.

It takes a moment for Jing Yuan to process the meaning behind those two words.

But it's a moment too late, because before he can get his phone out to usher a command, a few resounding knocks can be heard throughout the quiet mansion.

"General Jing Yuan. This is Xueyi of the Ten-Lords commission. I've gotten information that there's currently a mara-struck within these premises."

Jing Yuan feels his blood run cold, he pulls himself away from you to stare at you properly in disbelief.

You're still staring at him with the same somber expression, however he can tell there's a small pitiful smile grazing your lips, "I'm sorry," you whisper once again.

"I asked her... personally," you start, finally letting yourself rest now that the end is near, slumping down onto Jing Yuan's chest, your ear settling itself against his heart to hear his rapid heartbeats.

Jing Yuan loathes the fact that it's at this moment, with the Ten-Lords commission outside of your door and with him completely broken do you actually look at peace - like your battle against time has finally come to its conclusion.

And naturally, the one who lost is you.

"Half a day... with you. Then she would come and bring me there. You won't have to... do this again."

You're not able to see Jing Yuan's face - and Jing Yuan wouldn't want you to see how he looked like right now. The arms around you is trembling, his mind is racing - trying to come up with anything to give him a bit more time with you.

But for once, the general that had a plan for every situation had nothing in mind.

He's lost. And the prize of the loss this time is losing you forever.

"General, I apologize for the rudeness of what I'm about to do, but this is for both of your safety," Jing Yuan hear Xueyi mutter from outside of the door, before he hears the rattling of the door frame start to slide open.

"Wait- no," it's a quiet request that gets ignored as Xueyi strides in alone, the lack of company making Jing Yuan's eyebrows furrow in confusion.

"... Their last request along with the request for my late arrival here was for the Cloud Knights to not see you like this. Naturally I won't tell anyone of what I've seen today."

Jing Yuan doesn't care about that, he could care less about his image right now, pulling you closer to him while his eyes are downcast - he makes no move to hand you over to the judge.

The puppet judge before him does not say anything - nor does she make a move. What she does however is wait, wait for the general before her that has been utterly crushed and broken by the person in his arms start to accept the harsh truth once again.

If he doesn't handle the mara-struck himself, someone else would - but the end result only serves to punish him in the end, the one left behind.

Xueyi hears a silent breath be let out by the general, her once closed eyes opening up to see the general pull slightly away from you, one hand reaching up to cradle your cheek. Your eyes have long since closed, and you're most likely not even conscious to hear what he's about to say.

"My dear... I'm sorry I couldn't do more for you. But I'm afraid you'll have to wait a bit longer before we can meet again," he whispers, bumping his forehead against your own gently, "I hope you won't fault me for that."

A long ginkgo leaf flutters right between the two of you, eventually settling down on your chest.

Jing Yuan sucks in one last deep breath, "I'm sorry I kept you here for so long - I'm sorry you had to be in pain for so long because of me," he leans in to slot his lips one last time over your own, whispering something that Xueyi can't hear before he rises up, your body limp in his arms.

"Thank you for your service Miss Xueyi, please see them off appropiately." Jing Yuan says, voice sounding eerily calm - almost like his usual self.

When he turns around to finally face her, the puppet's lifeless eyes seem to grow a bit in surprise. Before her is the general of Luofu, his usual easy-going smile present on his lips.

Like he wasn't carrying his mara-struck lover in his arms.

"As much as I would want to accompany you to see them off, I'm afraid I have some urgent matters to attend to," he informs, handing your body over to Xueyi - she doesn't comment on how his hands are still slightly trembling or how he immediately turned a bit to the side to ignore staring at her head-on.

Even though Xueyi doesn't want to ask, she still asks either way, "What are your plans from here on, general?"

Jing Yuan only gives her a close eyed smile, turning his gaze towards the large ginkgo tree with his hands behind his back. He gnaws a tiny bit at his lips, finally breathing out.

A couple of seconds passes by before he opens his mouth.

"I think I'll meditate a bit under this tree before heading back to the Seat. I can't leave Luofu without me for too long after all."

5 SCRAPPED WORKS AND I'M STILL NOT ACTUALLY THAT SATISFIED BUT IF I KEEP THIS PIECE LONGER IN THE WORKS THE MORE I'LL BUTCHER IT SO HAHA - THIS IS THE BEST WE CAN DO AFTER 3 MONTHS OF CONSTANT BACK AND FORTH FELLAS. I HOPE IT SQUEEZED YOUR HEART A TINY BIT NONETHELESS.