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ozzgin · 10 months

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Do you only write Hannibal lecter or do you also write for NBC Hannibal?

Yandere! Hannibal x Reader: The Grand Meal

Gather around for a short story in the spirit of Thanksgiving. You have been invited by Hannibal Lecter to a celebratory dinner, although unexpectedly barren of other guests. He will be entertaining you this evening, carefully describing each dish as he battles his own inner turmoil. (For extra immersion, I suggest listening to Bach's 'Sheep May Safely Graze')

Warning: Cannibalism and detailed gore. I'd advise against reading if you're squeamish.

[Horror Masterlist]

He politely aids you in removing your coat, folds it over his forearm, and steps aside, expectantly. You glance at him, somewhat confused.

"Your bag, if I may."

"Oh, I...I was planning to bring it with me. I have my phone in it and all the essentials." you stutter, unsure.

Uh huh. Your etiquette seems to be lacking in certain areas. Nothing that cannot be chiseled.

"You won't be needing it, I assure you." he extends his hand out, waiting.

You hesitantly place the dark leather Pochette into his fingers. Hannibal has always been rather particular when it comes to decorum. You wouldn't want to upset him, especially given his generous invite to his Thanksgiving celebration. He'd heard your complaint of being alone during the holidays and he encouraged you to join him instead.

As you hurry behind him down the spacious hallway, you quietly marvel at the expensive, tasteful paintings sporadically adorning the walls.

"I suspected they might be to your liking." He briefly peeks back at you with a faint smile on his lips.

The heavy wooden doors creak open and your nostrils are quickly overwhelmed by the tempting smell of intricate dishes. You narrow your eyes, taking in the flavors. Once you finally look ahead, you notice that the table, although neatly decorated, consists only of two seats that have been prepared for dining. Two opposing seats, causing the whole setup to seem of ridiculous length.

"Pardon my intrusion, but is anyone else attending?" You cannot contain your curiosity.

"Oh, no. Not really." Hannibal pulls your chair outwards before departing to his own designated place. "It's you and me. Does that bother you?"

"I suppose it's cozier this way." You brush it aside with a chuckle. Better than being alone, you tell yourself.

He nods in agreement before settling down. He takes a moment to examine the table, confirming that everything is indeed in its proper place. A final, satisfied incline of his head.

"Allow me to introduce today's dishes. I don't want to keep you waiting for too long." He says as he remembers your earlier little gesture of delight. "It's a little bit of a scattered theme, if I am to be honest with you. I've drawn my inspiration from varied cuisines."

"I can see. How exciting!" You swiftly scan over the diverse plates, enthusiastic and hungry.

"The main course is over there. Balsamic-glazed oven baked ribs. I recommend a drizzle of cranberry sauce to go with it."

As he points to the dish, he can almost hear the dry crack of the bone. Abruptly, he's been taken back to the previous night, to his humble slaughter room - the meat needs to be fresh after all. Shears cut through the ribs with little resistance. The blades go around the thoracic cavity, contouring the ribcage. Once a proper opening has been made, he firmly grasps each side of the ribcage and nonchalantly lifts the bone flap, resting it over the face.

Wait. He quickly digs through the skin and fat that had been shoved aside with the carcass, searching for the face of the victim. It's you. How delectable and surprising that you've wandered into such a recollection. Well, not quite a surprise that you've invaded his memories; from the very moment he met you he's been plagued by this indecent idea: How would you look on the dissecting table?

His musings are interrupted by the sizzle of the sparkling wine he's currently pouring in your glass. He finds himself back at the dining table, together with his favorite guest. You graciously thank him, and as he gazes over your features, he can't help but continue this game of imagination he's just spontaneously devised. Whoever had been carefully served for this occasion will be temporarily replaced during the theatrical retelling by you. And what a fine actor you'll be, even though you're not aware of it.

Alright, one must start from the beginning. He traces the edge of the autopsy table and inspects the drain just below your feet. He wouldn't want an incident. Would you be mortified if you'd learn your secretions and discharges leaked and clotted against the sieve? Don't worry, you'll be spared of such scenarios. He'd never willingly embarrass you like that. He softly presses the scalpel against your bare skin, going under each breast and stopping at the pubic bone. Now to trim the thick layers of fat sticking to the dermis. You're not making much of a mess, but then again it's a dream within his idle mind. A mischievous grin takes over his expression once he witnesses his clean work. The segments of skin detach smoothly, revealing your glistening, bloated organs.

He already went over the ribs. That part has been covered. What comes next? His eyes rest on the most obvious: your intestines. Which reminds him...

"This one is a Middle Eastern dish. Stuffed intestines. You gently cut the membrane, like this." He demonstrates on a separate plate. "Don't worry about seeing some additional blood. Naturally there are many capillaries irrigating the walls, so you might open them up in the process. It quickly seeps into the mixture and adds a bit of a stagnant flavor to it, but it's merely noticeable."

You swallow dryly.

Back to the original matters. He searches for his scissors and cuts along the attachment tissue smoothly. Once the bowels have been freed, he fondles them into his hands, cupping them into place, and hurries to the nearby counter. The entrails collapse and spread onto the marble surface, like mischievous tentacles. He languidly eyes them. Do organs resemble their owner? Absurd question, really. Do they reflect one's health - that much is indubitable. Yet he can't help feeling that if presented with an endless row of viscera, he could, without hesitation, point and state which ones are yours. It's a mysterious confidence whose source he cannot pinpoint. You've always captivated him. Just when he thinks he's had you like an open book, you slip and slither between his fingers. Fitting.

What is it about you that preoccupies his mind to such degree? He turns back to the table and scans the remaining options. Your intelligence? The tool drawer opens and his fingers linger over the saw and skull chisel. Perhaps. But there's more to it, really. His analytical, rational self craves for more than what it can grasp. And what it lacks, well...

He pinches the visceral fascia and lifts the translucent membrane, with the same delicacy of unveiling a young bride, and reveals your heart, cold and still. There it is, the answer to everything. A transect to the vena cava near the diaphragm and the organ has been separated from the rest of the body. An angel with clipped wings. Holding it like this, he can almost discern the faintest throb, the fibrous muscle pressing into his skin.

"And this?"

He purses his lips, taken aback by his own rudeness. Has he been zoning out in plain sight?

"I'm afraid I don't follow."

"The dish, I mean."

He follows the direction of your stretched out index. Ah.

"Heart stuffed with mushroom duxelle. Old English classic with a twist."

"You sound like a professional chef", you respond as you laugh. "Is there anything you can't do?"

Is there? He considers it. Right before his revelation was discontinued by your inquiry - absolutely not your fault, the ill manners were his - he was wondering if he possesses the capacity to love you. He definitely prefers you over all of the people he's encountered in his life, and your behavior and way of thinking never ceases to make him curious. Yet love is a conclusion he cannot asses with certainty.

He had hoped a vivisectionist approach would offer him concrete data, palpable reasoning, but his journey only reinforced that some concepts must be tested outside of pure introspection. Or, as one would describe it colloquially, he has to take the bull by its horns.

"By the way, what meat is this?" You have arranged yourself a platter with a little bit of everything, and just finished chewing a hearty bite. "Ox or something? It's very tender."

If Hannibal is to embark on his expedition of human feelings, he needs to reflect on his choices carefully. Or does he? Hmm. His methodical tactics are what caused this impasse in the first place.

One can afford to give in, every now and then. How will you react to his self indulgence? He rests his head on the back of his intertwined hands and stares at you with a determined look.

"Human."

#hannibal #hannibal lecter #hannibal x reader #hannibal lecter x reader #yandere hannibal lecter #yandere #yandere x reader #tw cannibalism #tw body horror #horror x reader #slasher x reader

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makethosenarratorsfight · 1 year

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UNRELIABLE NARRATORS; SEMI FINALS

*NOTE; propaganda is out of order due to the post length!

Eugenides Propaganda:

the entire plot hinges on a detail he lets the reader (and every other character) assume is true. I don't want to spoil it because it's a really fun reveal but he is lying from the first second he appears on the page and you can't trust him to tell the full truth about ANYTHING related to himself and his goals. he mostly does it to keep his advantage and not have other characters be suspicious of him but it's just so fun when you realise he's been lying the whole time

Kim Dokja Propaganda:

I haven't read orv but he's fucking gotta be from what I've osmosised

He tries to remove his emotions out of the narrative soooo much, literally the most repressed guy ever. Okay so for context orv is about how this guy, Kim Dokja, has been the only reader of an obscure post-apocalyptic webnovel for years and the novel suddenly becomes reality. And at first you'll probably get the weird impression that his behavior is pretty strange for, you know, a literal apocalypse happening in his world - like yes, he is concerned with survival but he doesn't seem all that scared and he kinda treats it like a video game where he has to grind to make himself stronger and he also treats his companions like a party in an rpg. Then there's also the way he approaches the protagonist of the webnovel, from the start he just kind of describes him as a ruthless psychopath and jerk that is unfortunately a pretty useful ally. And also there's the fact that he carefully omits any mention of his past and when somebody asks if he's worried about his family when the apocalypse starts he just kinda... brushes it off? Anyway so yeah, this bastard is definitely traumatized, although I don't know how much of spoiler territory that would be, considering the fact that literally when he first reveals his trauma he's also unreliable about it. And turns out he does indeed, care A LOT about this world and the people around him. Because well, he kinda didn't care to mention that this webnovel that has become reality was like... literally his whole world before it literally became his whole world. Like, it was the only thing keeping him going for 10+ years and the protagonist that he likes to call a stupid jerk was his comfort character who he pretended to be when he felt like he couldn't handle something in his life by being himself. The protagonist is also canonically the person he loves the most according to a prophecy and he literally can't fathom the thought of him dying, even the timeline versions of him that directly oppose him. And I haven't even mentioned the Fourth Wall yet but I feel like this propaganda is a little long already

misreading the intentions of his companion (yoo joonghyuk) so many time.

YOU DON'T UNDERSTANDDD DOKJA IS SUCH A UNRELIABLE NARRATORRRRRR GOD I COULD WRITE AN ESSAY BUT I KNOW YOU LOVE DOKJA TOO BUT OMG HE'S JUST SO AAAAAAAAAAAH

Rest of Propaganda under cut!

he is the worst like actually. he starts the story talking about how normal and average he is. he is not. he is constantly mischaracterizing his friends and he's so good at lying to the readers that you don't even realize it at first. almost every single time he cries we have to be told by other characters because he never says it himself. there is literally a scene where his narration says "i wasn't crying" and then the in-universe entity that narrates the actions of people (orv is really weird and meta) says that he was, in fact, crying. honestly genuinely anything he says about himself (or doesn't say) cannot be trusted. he is just so frustrating. he drives me mad. i love him dearly. but he drives me so mad.

Dictionary definition of unreliable narrator. Does not tell the reader anything and then things happen and he's like oh yeah btw there was also this and this earlier but i just didn't feel like mentioning it. There's even a thing called the "Fourth Wall" that is able to see through kdj's bs so occasionally you get gems like,

Kim Dokja: I didn't cry

The Fourth Wall: [Kim Dokja was crying]

Imagine being so unreliable as a narrator you need a more powerful narrator to call out the actual narrator.

^ same submission, just spacing it out

This goes into spoiler territory, but; Kim Dokja is in possession of a skill called the Fourth Wall, which on the surface seems like it appears because he read the book that reverse-isekai’d into his own. However, as the story goes on it becomes clear that it’s pretty much a souped up version of his pre-existing dissociation. You cannot trust him to be honest about his feelings, his past traumas or his feelings about his past traumas, not to mention his tendency to just outright omit information that only gets revealed later on either when it becomes relevant or when an outsider POV reveals what’s actually happening.

Exhibit A: he says (in 1st person POV) that he’s not crying. The Fourth Wall immediately contradicts this (as it is literally words of the novel) by saying (in 3rd person POV) ‘Kim Dokja was crying’.

Exhibit B: Fails to mention entire actions when it shows him emotionally honest even in the slightest; we had to read from another character entirely when Kim Dokja was being physically affectionate with his companion. It’s so bad that there’s this entire paragraph about Kim Dokja describing himself hiding his eyes in his hands in jerky, weirdly specific detail and just AVOIDING EVERY WORD THAT MIGHT SHOW HE’S CRYING. The brilliance of ORV is that when you re-read the entire thing you get hints that ‘yes, this WAS hinted at the entire time’ but you have to dig it out of Kim Dokja’s repressed, depressed self-hating internal dialogue with your own two hands.

^ same submission, spacing it out (i really should've done this earlier.)

i am a simple man (not a man). i see a tumblr text post with the words “unreliable narrator in it”. i read nothing else. i reblog & tag #kim dokja okay but in all seriousness i’m just going with the musty basic example: so there’s this moment where he sacrifices himself to save this guy. as he lays on the ground bleeding out, he says “hey, you don’t like me, right? you should kill me to get some money” the guy says “no kim dokja i cant do that (going through the five stages of grief except there’s only one and it’s anger)” the constellations (twitch viewers irl) are like omg he (the guy) doesn’t want to kill his companion (kim dokja) and shower him (the guy) with money kim dokja: oh, he’s not killing me for the money. smart!

as i quote a brilliant youtube video (all of omniscient reader’s viewpoint in 6 minutes) “yoo joonghyuk sees kim dokja as a c_____”

yoo joonghyuk: companion

kim dokja: cunt

^ same submission, once again. spacing it out.

Hides his true feelings, tells the readers what he thinks is convenient for the plot and that his own personal feelings don’t matter or are not so significant. Has unreliable thoughts abt his companion and is a liar. And is also an omniscient reader.

Kim Dokja always perceived his companions in this like nonchalant way like “oh yeah we get along but really we’re just fighting to survive (apocalypse setting) it doesn’t run that deep” when they all do genuinely care for him and he does in turn. He just, doesn’t think of it as an equal relationship? Dokja’ll sacrifice a lot for them but will get seriously flabbergasted if they do the same thing, so fricking problematic. Not to mention Yoo Joonghyuk, his “Life and Death Companion” (read: husband). Kim Dokja always seems to think that Joonghyuk has it out for him, which is kinda true, but he is literally blind to the fact that he’s attached to him. Like, it’s so obvious??? Also they have hella sexual tension but that’s another thing entirely

se get some many pov changes where kdj in his pov just assumed things based on what he knew the characters would do. however because of his interference the characters have changed and he wouldn’t know that if it hit him in the face

He's an unreliable narrator because he lies to himself and thus the audience. He literally rewrote his own childhood core memory. If someone says, "this guy is my friend!" He will go through so many hoola hoops in his mind just to rationalize it. Because he fundamentally believe that no one could love him and even if they did they couldn't know him and he's just gonna hurt them. He cries sometimes in canon but a lot of those times it's not even mentioned as crying he's that unreliable of a narrator. No joke, one time this guys he has a gay thing with called him his "companion" to someone who had just killed him (long story) and this bitch thought "oh wow he's doing it for the coins (another long story) he's so smart i wish I'd thought to that. He's terrible. He literally has an exchange with something called the Fourth Wall (an even longer story) where it said "you're crying" and he said "no I'm not" but he was crying. He makes me insane because the reader is supposed to project onto him. He made me see how much of an unreliable narrator I WAS. ORV is just like that tho.

#kim dokja #kdj #orv #omniscient readers viewpoint #once again #if kdj gets this poll blacklisted again im blowing him up #eugenides #the queens thief #queens thief #unreliable narrators battle #unreliable narrators #polls #semi finals

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kindlespark · 6 months

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this is gonna be SO long and rambly sorry anyway i saw a post abt how babel does queer characters and it got me thinking abt why the tropes it uses would usually turn me off other stories but didn’t here

MAJOR BABEL SPOILERS //

i feel like i’d be more mad abt how robinramy ended up in babel if it marketed itself as queer lit at all or if its fans were going “WOW AMAZING QUEER REP” abt it. but no one told me any of that, so finding out they were gay was just a fun little bonus surprise to me. i get why ppl are eh abt robinramy not getting together/technically still being subtext (which i dont think is really true btw like the book literally says “robin was falling in love” but idk i guess if you were stupid you might’ve assumed that it was falling in love with oxford given how romantic some of the other language is (WHICH IS ALSO THE POINT bc i think robin’s friendship with ramy blurring into romance is why he romanticised like all his friendships/experiences in oxford BUT IM GETTING OFF-TOPIC)). i just think robin’s repression abt being gay was intrinsically tied to his attitudes on imperialism (wrt refusing to acknowledge anything that complicated his life until it was too late) and i don’t consider it a cop out or queerbait. like i genuinely don’t think robinramy could ever have gotten together without drastic alterations being made in terms of plot and character. plus i think it’s clear that kuang didn’t want to write a story with any kind of focus on romance at all, because it’s not that kind of book. there’s no successful het romance either, so it grates a lot less. the only reason romance is included at all is to show the ways in which white entitlement manifests. so the tragic way robinramy played out just made sense to me.

and i speak as someone who accidentally spoiled myself on You Know What in the middle of reading and i was like ugghh boooo dreading it the whole time expecting to roll my eyes when it happened but then when it did i was like. wow im actually not that mad LMFAO 😭😭😭 actually thematically the book sets it up so well that i believed that this was unfortunately the only way it could’ve gone. babel is about the loss and tragedy and grief that colonised people experience. it’s about the lengths people will go to to uphold empire and the lengths ppl will go to to tear it down like idk 😭 i guess it is bury your gays but it didnt bother me this time because i thought it fit thematically ❤️ i enjoy tragedy as a genre a lot and i would’ve made it gay anyway you know. thanks rf kuang for doing it for me so i didnt have to.

WHICH IS ALL TO SAY that i guess if you’re going into babel for the queer rep without appreciating that the story is fundamentally a tragedy it would feel like it’s just reusing tired tropes….. but i think the choices kuang made were rly deliberate and not in a way that feels like trauma porn or shock value. the book is fundamentally about the struggles of poc so the layer of queerness that was introduced felt like a subtle extension of the experiences of characters of colour in the book, and i enjoyed and related to it as a queer chinese person who kind of realised they had to prioritise their fight for the liberation of poc over queerness mainly because the idea of western queer liberation cannot be dissociated from imperialism and many aspects of homophobia as we know it was an export of christian european empire into our colonised countries in the first place and FUCK THIS IS A WHOLE OTHER TANGENT ABOUT HOW I THINK RAMY AS A CHARACTER IS EMBLEMATIC OF THE TENSION AND STRUGGLE THAT QUEER POC DIASPORA HAVE BETWEEN OUR IDENTITIES GODDAMNIT OK FORGET IT POST CANCELLED i just rly think babel’s handling of queer characters is fine and makes sense and i like it personally and maybe i will make a coherent analysis about it one day but that day is not today byeeeeeee

#/#//#sam speaks #byeeee ive been trying to type this post for over an hour but i give up #slashes are there bc i dont want it to show up in the main tag it’s rly incoherent and also subjective #babel #babel spoilers

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dnp-pet-rectangle · 6 months

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WAD reflection from the perspective of a theatre director

Inspired by @/calvinahobbes who did an amazing job breaking down the show’s metaphors & using her English degree in this post, I wanted to share my perspective on it (even a month later) & get use out of my theatre degree lol. Also, warning, this will be very much a long, long essay with run-ons. I have ADHD & I love when my frequent hyperfixations intersect 🤪 There are major spoilers.

My Background:

I am a semi-professional theatre director, but more broadly, a theatremaker. I have a theatre degree from New York University’s Tisch School on the Arts (NYU Tisch), where I did a conservatory program with one of their studios which focused basically on those who wanted to do a little bit of everything and create new works & was the only studio training directors & playwrights. I originally went into the program as a performer. I did not mean to end up concentrating on being mainly a producer & a director, but that’s a whole other story. I also through that program had to take theatre/performance studies courses, which I loved for the most part & is an interesting interdisciplinary field. But I will try to define terms just in case since anybody reading this may not know any or all the specific terminology I might use. In short, I have a fancy degree that apparently should cost $300k 🤡 & I’m gonna actually use it with doing this lol

Setting the Tone:

While Dan might call this a comedy special or comedy show, and thereby comparing it to other comedians, I actually think he is doing himself and We’re All Doomed (WAD) a disservice. I saw folks compare him a lot to Bo Burnham in the chat (who was actually was accepted and almost went to NYU Tisch for a different studio that focused on solely experimental work), which makes sense considering the theatrical nature of both of them. However, Dan actually goes further into the realm of theatre because of how he utilizes his crowd work (I’ll go into that later). I recognize traditional comedy specials/standup as having jokes or stories, when doing you know like late night talk show interviews, that can be made outside of the context of the show & slip into a conversation. Or with Burnham’s Inside Out, the songs & other parts can be done or understood mainly out of context, as seen through Bo uploading them to his YouTube channel. Comedy specials have the sections of their comedy stand-up thread together, but what Dan has done is weave his sections together. The length along with the intermission/interval being a part of WAD, adds to my point that he is not treating this as different material he tested out at different comedy clubs, but as something cohesive storytelling pieces. I think in terms of testing, Phil was the main sufferer audience member of the initial materials being created.

Anyway, you cannot as easily remove it from the context at certain points, because the transitions & the order of these different sections are treated as equally important, rather than a means to move on to the next section, with some possible space for improv.

Basically, I’m bi. Sorry, my brain started thinking about BIG when I started writing “basically” at the start of that sentence. Actually, what I am trying to say is that I would classify We’re All Doomed as a one-man performance piece/show, so I will be treating it as such in my review/reflection/breakdown. The comedy of it is important and there, but I don’t think it captures what WAD entirely is.

Also, unfortunately due to where I was at mentally at the time & the location it was being performed at, I never saw this live. To be honest, how it got framed marketing-wise did not help me feel connected with the actual purpose of the show, with hope being a key element. So while this was filmed, I am as much as possible trying to remove the cinematography as an element of my analysis. However, some things might be clearer on film, as with theatrical directing, you cannot add a zoom or crop & instead are trying to ensure moments are clear to an audience by what they see and hear through drawing their attention to it. With theatre being mainly about the live output by performers and intake by the audience, at the end of the day, what my job as a director is is to direct not only how the performers share the story, but also direct the audience on what is important to catch for understanding.

Breakdown of Thoughts

Originally, I wanted to rewatch the show again, and started to, but considering I ended up writing about a whole page worth of things for each minute of the show & I was sleepy by the time I was like 5-10 minutes in, I decided to be nice to myself & stay up all night in my comfortable bed instead of staying up all night at my desk trying to take in-depth notes 🙃

I’m gonna breakdown this analysis/reflection into further sections, just to give myself some anchors & break up the blocks of text. Also as a way to just be that pretentious, maybe with an academic flair, as is fitting to be for something about Dan Howell (said affectionately 💕)

The Script/Writing

When considering the text of the show itself, two things came to mind for me:

(1) This is definitely what I would call intertext. Intertext is a piece of writing that relates to another or more other writings through allusions. WAD is an intertext which alludes mainly to other works of Dan’s on his YouTube channel. The ability to get the true impact of the show relies on you knowing Dan (as his internet persona) on some level. And as a theatre maker & longtime fan, I love that it is, it’s what the piece needed to be. As a theatre producer, the hiatus from engaging with his audience and the limited runway given to reactivate interest in him and his creative work I think made it difficult to get that audience in some venues, along with some other funkiness (mainly with promo) I am less knowledgeable on. But I think Dan has already learned/continues to learn from that, which I think may have been valuable for him. (sidenote: I need the tea on all that because I love knowing how presenting venues work with performers, as well as the lack of understanding they have of internet culture as it relates to venue leadership.)

(2) This was a work he made for himself. He mentions this both in the show & in reference to WAD multiple times. But I think what truly came to mind for me was that it is still powerful for him to write for himself. He is writing for what he needs to be hearing or wants to be processing creatively.

I think why it is powerful is that Dan has discussed before how much stress he put on himself regarding danisnotonfire, and later Daniel Howell, videos, focusing on the audience, and how he was presenting a specific style/quality of video to them. Add in the layer of being closeted & actively fighting internalized homophobia, and the anxiety he built up makes sense. And I might personally attribute that more to his need to pass as straight & catering I believe at one point to an audience of cishet men, whether actual or perceived by him. Not all videos, especially the most impactful ones in my opinion, rely on this, but it was a key piece of what he made during his rise in popularity on the platform. This catering slowly decreased with the amount of uploads he was doing, along with a more tangible understanding of his audience thanks to the tours he did with Phil. Basically I’m Gay I think was the true shift where he gave himself permission to write work that had a main audience of himself. That’s where his best work has come from, and I think since then, he’s been able to have the space to process things creatively through his writing.

The Relationship Between Performer & Audience

When I was in theatre school, my directing teacher would constantly talk about not just considering the relationship of the performers on “stage” (I did a lot of more immersive work & we only had black box theatres, which is literally a room that is floor to ceiling black) but also the relationship of the performers & the story with the audience. By Dan knowing mainly who his audience would be, the show can now play with that understanding in mind.

This leads to my point that, overall, Dan does not use the fourth wall, and I think that is what makes We’re All Doomed work. It may also be why he called it a comedy show, idk.

For those who don’t know what the fourth wall is, it is a term from theatre originally that is about the way in which a traditional theatre stage (called a proscenium) has three physical walls around it, while there is no 4th physical wall, so the audience can see the performance. If does exist physically, it is only the curtain that acts as the 4th “wall”. So, in order to keep it as a separation between the performers and the audience, the actors treat the side where the audience is as a fourth wall. When someone breaks the 4th wall, this is when they speak to audience directly, rather than to another character. Examples from English-speaking pop culture would be the asides from Hamlet or Ferris Bueller in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. But when you are the only person on stage, the only way to have a fourth wall is when you don’t reference that you know there’s an audience there. Hence, a monologue where the character is talking to themselves or an entity that is not the audience directly (or assigned to be the audience by the director), it is the closest you can have a fourth wall when alone.

Dan in his videos and in his previous tours with Phil never were without direct engagement of the audience (obvious with the naming of Interactive Introverts). It was never not a variation on him speaking with the audience in any type of dialogue, even if done parasocially.

Some of that is not new to theatre, but I would say is that it has become more of a trend within new theatre starting in the early 2010s to have more interactivity and a more authentic, explicit message that no performance will be the exact same. I definitely saw that in the shows I saw both Off-Broadway (which sidenote, all that means is that there’s fewer seats in that theatre, not about quality of the work or how worth it is to engage with) and larger settings like Broadway and the West End. That’s what I love about theatre, and why my own work is more about immersion and direct audience engagement.

Now Dan’s creative works have never been skit only or interested in telling a story outside of the realm of connecting with an audience as a variation of himself, so again, him not using the fourth wall overall is appropriate and fits in with what I mentioned about intertext. The piece does however start with a fourth wall for the music number, which I will walk through fully sharing why I am saying that about the song & dance opening after establishing some other concepts to help build understanding.

Design Can Work With You or Against You

I just want to say out the gate that the design was done really well, and I immediately felt a need to emphasize it after watching the first 10 minutes again.

First, let’s talk about the orange & black aesthetic of the show. Dan may have simply said that the orange just looked cool, but I think I would attribute more meaning to that color. Orange brings to my mind at first instance both a bright happiness/warmth and a sense of caution and warning, like road signs (at least those in America). The themes of the show reflect these two ideas and plays with the tension between them. I don’t know if he or the team meant to have that be a conscious choice, but there’s a joke I’ve had with other directors of when they get complimented on something unexpected, they just nod and say “yes, that was a choice”, even though it was just a random thing that happened or was something that you just thought would be cool to do. Orange runs through the show’s designs and it becomes clear that it is a tool for contrast and emphasis for the points Dan & the director want to make.

Now with the design team of costumes, lights, sound, and media, I can see a clear cohesion. Good theatrical design has the designs act as a character or highlighter in the story. Bad theatrical design can take away/distract from the core intensions of the show. It was so clear to me that the design was a character. And seeing that there were two media designers make complete sense considering the labor lift of both creating the projections displayed, but also creating/filming pieces of the media itself. The music/sound and lighting work well to articulate the manic feelings it means to instill in the audience and seeing it as a director, I assume part of the creative discussion was about parts of the media played they wanted to make sure were heard, and the lights help catch attentions in service of those pulled out moments. For costumes, I think Calvina did well in her post at articulating the elements of the costume and the progression it goes throughout the show. I’d rather not take up space to say the same thing truthfully.

With all the design elements, I think three characters could be defined (not including the audience), two as main characters, and one as a supporting character. I would name the main characters as “the Circle” (the looming set piece throughout hosting the projections used throughout) and “Dan On Stage/Dan performing” (the one in the physical space) with the “voiceover Dan/inner voice Dan” as a supporting character. The voiceover only exists in the beginning, and it is only shared with us to demonstrate the way in which the Dan On Stage singing is not really that aggressively optimistic and wholeheartedly believes the words he is singing. He is not the Dan we know from the Internet, so we can cathartically laugh at the attempt to pretend everything is fine. The voiceover only has one role, and it is to force Dan to confront this breakdown has an audience.

Staging an Opening Sequence: Our First Stage Character is the Circle

In directing classes, often what you focus on is called stage pictures, which is meant to help you consider what the actual imagery you want to ensure the audience absorbs for their understanding of the piece. The first and last stage moment of each act should tell a basic story of what happened, and therefore, are heavily emphasized as important for directors. The Circle (capitalized for reference purposes) being lit up before the show starts and then again in conjunction with the light flashes and sound establishes the importance of the Circle to the show. When the projection comes into play, showing the speech of a 15-year-old Greta Thunberg before beginning to add more, we are then introduced to the purpose of the Circle to be an output/portal for the overstimulation of messages, in this case, I would claim it being what comes from the Internet.

The music/sound and lighting work well to articulate the manic feelings it means to instill in the audience and seeing it as a director, I assume part of the creative discussion was about parts of the media played they wanted to make sure were heard, and the lights help catch attentions in service of those pulled out moments. The Circle also through some of the lighting moments, mimic that of a clock, which again adds to the doomsday, the "end is near" type energy. To have the end of the opening sequence build to an explosion which then shows solid orange at the end while Dan is in silhouette begins the introduction to the orange emphasis & proposes a sort of prophet-like version of him after the apocalyptic imagery disappears as he rises to be seen. What we have opened with is setting the tone to how we should view these two characters of the Circle & the Dan on Stage.

Song Time!

Dan is such a theatre kid & I love that for him. His dramatic side shows through the moment he used a rise to start his show at the top of the stairs, first in a place of seriousness with the sharp lighting and smoke to then bring in a very happy music number. The contrast & switching of expectations is a key of comedic works, and shows through most of the phandom who did not know WAD started with that, as it is indeed funnier if it comes as a shock. The movement & music mimic what folks attribute to as musical theatre, which is campy, happy singing. Knowing he was the one who suggested the song for TATINOF, I am loving Dan clearly wanting to have that opening number of a musical moment, even if it is dripping in irony. The Circle & the lights in this acts as a supporter to the message of it being sunshine and rainbows, with literal rainbow lights included. (Sidenote: I am 99% sure the pigeon coo is Phil, so if anything, I’m disappointed he was not credited as Pigeon sound effect AND remote crisis manager. Idk why I could tell, but both times now, it’s what I immediately thought when hearing that part)

I think of the musical number as the only place where he does have a fourth wall, because the number does not directly reference the audience at the start. It’s a one-man moment and it is about the performance not the audience engagement. It starts falling away when he starts pointing out the “and you”s, but the voiceover is the real break in our understanding of the world. It is emphasized by the color inversion of the sun & sky media of the Circle. The director is saying, this is important to how you now interpret what you’ve seen & will see, this is another shift from what was established of this world.

I should mention “world” is the terminology used to name what the environment the story is being told in with consideration, especially in theatre, of how much of a need there is for suspension of disbelief. I believe this term is also referenced a lot when discussing the fantasy and sci-fi genres, since those also requires some distancing from reality for the audience. This ties into a phrase I will probably end up using a lot of “rules of the space”. When establishing this world for the show you are presenting to an audience, there is a type of logic that must be established in order to understand what is the baseline for what the audience will be engaging with over the span of the show. But the voiceover immediately changes the rules of the space, because it messes with the Dan on stage, and messes with the messaging of the Circle. It adds a new context to the Dan On Stage, as while a fan will know that this song is not in alignment of our knowledge of Dan Howell, we get confirmation that this indeed ironic and outside of the branding that Dan has boxed himself into over his time on YouTube.

But the voiceover is also not in alignment with that “branding”. It expresses concerns related to the Dan On Stage’s mental wellbeing. There is no irony or subtext in that voice, it is the most direct in speaking to Dan On Stage, because it is being said by a variation of Dan in voiceover to himself. These could be seen as questions he knows to ask himself, but as someone who advocates for mental health & shares now about being openly gay, I interpret that he may feel he cannot express that outside of his mind for fear of undermining his advocacy points. The discussion of the “wonders” of the Internet also continue building in the tension that exists throughout WAD of how Dan feels about that space. The voiceover then proposes at first a type of equal extreme, which only sees the Doom, and as someone with clinical Depression myself, I think is only a furtherance of the breakdown, rather than the reality check it started off being. Not that what is listed is wrong by any means, but the barrage of it is meant to expand the drowning feeling, not act as call to action or consideration of the intricacies for engaging in the world. With the Circle’s sun imagery & the music having been inverted and shifted to something more sinister, Dan’s movement up the stairs fits a type of circular moment from the first entry of him, where the image of the prophetic figure is questioned on how he alone will solve the climate emergency. The slap & break of character for the Dan on Stage serves to confirm our understanding of the voiceover as the voice in Dan’s head & indeed there are not two Dans.

Also, the sparklers 🎇 showing up really make the key change for the song, but my producer brain is going, “girl, of course you lost money on this show, was that so VERY NECESSARY?” But the dramatic Gemini theatre bitch in me would 100% want this too. I just don’t have a capita£ester working to get sponsorship money in my life, so I have to be reasonable 😔 Also, the confetti with the high note is peak theatre gay so I again, love that for him. And of course, the confetti is orange.

Hints of Orange

When the song reaches its end & the Circle starts showing squares of orange, rather than a full background, this acts as a seed for the breakdown and waterfall of cubes, which Calvina speaks to the orange cube hint at the beginning in her post. The sudden cut-out with Dan simply lit replicates a moment the Circle is not present. The Internet is not present. To crawl to a microphone, the message is not “hey this guy needs two mics”, because we see one on his face, but that the wired mic (which I will now label as “The Microphone”) is a metaphor. It’s a crawl towards sharing out, not suppression. Only when the voiceover of himself points out the audience does he does a full fourth wall break. The suppression did not work, and neither he nor the audience can believe that it was the Truth.

The wire of the Microphone being orange showcases that it was meant to be seen. I don’t think it even in play in terms of the sound, like it might not even be on, considering the feedback nightmare it would likely cause. And no standard microphone used on stages has orange wires, because that would pull the audience’s eyes to it. But that’s the point here.

The rules of the space are now this: the Circle is not always active, the Microphone has significance, the Dan On Stage knows there is an audience. None of these were true before, even the Circle was on before the start. This draws the audience to know there has been a shift & to have the first words said into the Microphone be “We’re All Doomed” solidifies the song moment was a blip, that this is really where we start at. As an example, in the social media section, Dan does a deliberate wrapping of the wire on his hand at the same time the Circle scrolls to the social media icon. It is how the director & Dan are ensuring that we understand “what he is saying and what is been shown on the screen are in tandem”, so if you’re paying attention to that wire, it signals you should look up too.

Every other prop, except I believe the gavel and wig, is also orange. The bubble gun is mainly what comes to mind for me, since the cubes are not as activated as props necessarily. But if an item is to enter the stage, what I interpret it as is that it must be orange, there must be high contrast, nothing in the physical world on the stage can become blurred, only screens have that privilege(?) to have things blend together.

The Power Struggle Between Dan & the Circle

Once Dan has begun directly conversing with the audience, the rules of the space are:

(1) Dan On Stage acts, the design elements react (not including the Circle)

(2) The Circle and Dan have a symbiotic relationship, as neither have complete control over the other & react to what each other are doing

(3) The icons are our guides in understanding the sectioning done throughout the show

(4) Having “One Good Night” is the goal to reach at the end of the piece

As a person, as well as discussed throughout the show, we know that Dan has a contentious relationship with the Internet. It is what has given him his living but has also caused some of his worst moments mentally (2012? I don’t know her). It is the space in which lets him have an audience who have mainly showed him support, but also the space that has fed the cynicism that fuels his clinical depression. There lies in the way in which the Circle exists on the stage & looms over Dan in the background. It’s a necessary evil of what appears on the screen.

Why do I then say that the design elements are reacting? Well, if we remove the Circle from the equation, the lights, sounds effects, and props are all cued off of something Dan does like the clown honk. However, the Circle sometimes cues off what Dan does, but sometimes instigates what Dan speaks to. That especially is evident when video clips play that invoke what media Dan has been contending with on the Internet and the consequences of those things.

The Circle exists throughout both Act One & Act Two, but only becomes passive to the piece when Dan directly shows vulnerability & the removal of protective irony. Calvina spoke to this when discussing the costume choice of him opening the jumpsuit in Act Two to show the orange tank underneath.

Cubes as Articulators

Oh Creator did I have to dig deep into my brain for this term of articulators. So my directing instructor had some key terms that I think I don’t think are universally used, even by American theatre directors or at least in academic settings. She defined articulators to basically be elements that helped give almost like checkpoints for the progression of a throughline in a show. For WAD, that is easily those orange cubes.

When static is displayed on the Circle’s screen each time we transition to a new section, it is not the typical emulation of TV static, it is that sea of orange squares. It is an articulation of those fear, issues, concerns, all those pinpoints Dan speaks to why he says “We’re All Doomed”.

That’s why there is the culmination of the orange cubes falling on him, when he reaches the top of the stairs at the end of Act One. When he circles back to the same stage picture of him at the top, it can been considered a repetition of the prophetic imagery I pointed out from the opening sequence. What changes is that the orange squares enter the physical world, falling onto Dan. He can no longer say they live in his head. They are here and stay in the space until the end of the show. In Act One, they are the looming issues that signal the Apocalypse. In Act Two, they are the rubble that must be sorted through.

Calvina was the one who named it rubble and the cubes as representations of Dan’s problems. To have the audience actually able to take a cube home, she argued, would be symbolic of the audience helping carry that weight. While I’d love that, I mentioned in my tags on her post that I think mentally, that rubble would still be at his feet, even with taking home that visual metaphor. This is Dan we’re talking about, and with personal responsibility being a topic of the show, while it’s not his burden to bear alone, he does have to recognize it exists.

I think the repetition of the prophetic imagery comes to its climax when in the aftermath found in Act 2, voting who to fire into space can and does end up with him being sent by the audience. It represents an understanding of where he exists now from where he did at 18 in terms of social, political, and economic access and the possibilities of his influence. There is a responsibility there that ties to how he can move in the world now publicly, so why wouldn’t he have an existential crisis?

It is a Comedy Though, Right?

This is hundred percent comedy, and obvious dark humor at that. As a director, I love comedy, especially this type, because when an audience gets to laugh, the armor gets stripped away. They have no built-up resistance that let’s any uncomfortable point be heard effectively. It’s why the end’s vulnerability is effective, because we have already joked and laughed about our pains and our desire for escapism. Now we are able to move on into a place of reflection.

To underline why I say this is not stand-up comedy is that Dan has made it a stage show, just one that has comedy as a vehicle for telling this “story”. His interactions with his audience, through both quips based on audience reactions or “heckling” as well as explicitly asking for input into who to shot to space or what to add as a mad lib (generic brand for law purposes), are about being blended into the loose narrative constructed already, not actually to be reactionary like most crowd work I associate with stand-up comedy.

If anything, I could argue that it could be considered a comedy special that “Dan On Stage” is trying to make, but there is actually conflict being introduced that disrupts his set (both the comedy one and the physical one). There is clearly a showing of meta, as Dan makes sure to share thoughts on the creation of the show, the reactions from his overall show branding & imagery, the use of the lift because it was expensive to have. Dan’s comedy style can never be told without reference to behind the scenes, because if this is a creative means to process feelings, there are things about the show & its making that impact what needs to be processed too. It is also related to how his work is strengthened by acknowledging the two-way street of being in a parasocial relationship with his audience.

Can We Have One Good Night?

Another term central to what my directing teacher spoke of was the “Core”, usually a question, though not always, that motivated what was being explored over the course of a theatre piece. At the top, as Dan on Stage exaggerates that love doesn’t exist (which Dan refutes as being an actual belief of his during the afterparty) and other sardonic phrases, he also states he wants to give his audience one good night, because he recognizes the escapism his audience finds in his solo and joint content. We’re All Doomed’s Core is “can we just have one good night, even in the midst of the horrors we have outside of these theatre doors?”. But I would also say that in terms of where his writing was at the time of WAD’s inception and the naming of his mental health book as You Will Get Through This Night, it feels more like Dan himself has been grappling with a Core of “can I have one good night? Or a full 24 hours where I feel mainly happy when all I am bombarded with about the world is suffering?” I think night can be both literal, since we know he has had sleep issues, and metaphorical, as the night can represent this depressive episode he was writing himself out of.

When the mood tracker gets discussed in the last portion of WAD, to see a sea of neutral or uninterested emojis demonstrates when he took the time to do it, the answer that night was “no, not really” 😕. The main one mentioned is the ritual of “Fry Day” he has with Phil (sidenote: why are these British men not calling it “Chip Day”, since this ritual falls on a Saturday?), which is a rare smiley face. The question he likely has then is “can I ever have a good night again?”

So for him to then turn to his own videos during one of those nights, to a video where he states his famous “embrace the void and have the courage to exist,” that showcases what I mentioned of his best work being written for himself, in this case, a future version of himself.

Ending Sequence: Where Do We Land?

When the Circle does not display any media, it again shows the orange square motif, but after mentioning his own video, he turns to his audience for glimpses of what joy exists even in the face of Doom. The Circle changes into a display of different submitted clips showcasing this joy and hope that Dan was clearly looking for throughout this piece. He walks towards the top of the stairs to witness these clips. I cannot for my life at this point having now been separate from it for about a month, but I believe before the submitted media sequence, he states the famous line again of “Embrace the Void and Have the Courage to Exist”. With this last thing spoken, it gives that emphasis needed to take in the message emotionally and then witness what the Void (in this case the Circle) can offer.

A Good Director Should Go Unnoticed

When someone is not versed in theatrical directing, if the audience cannot tell what was a choice by the director or even consider the director themselves, this is weirdly a good sign. It means that it feels natural to what they are witnessing and to the messages that are meant to be communicated to the audience. As someone who also works in government, it feels very similar, as only bad work is evident to the general public. Obviously that is not true for everyone, but is an overall trait I think impacts both an understanding of public service and directing.

I am not familiar with any of the work of Ed Stambollouian, who through research, looks like he has done work with comedians like Joe Lycett (who I am also not familiar with) and directed TATINOF, but also more stripped down, exploratory theatre. Through a quick review of his portfolio, one, I am not shocked that Dan tapped him to assist with directing since there is a familiarity and two, his background tells me he knows how to direct for writer-performers, which is what comedians really are at the end of the day.

To direct for those who are doing one-person shows that they both wrote and performed, it is especially tricky to have the artist hand the reins over to the director. The director in this case acts as the artist’s eyes, because an artist cannot clone themselves. It is impossible for them to wear multiple hats at once, where they can give quality, objective feedback to themselves while also doing a full out performance. For Ed to be someone Dan has worked with before, there is already an established understanding of each other’s work styles, and a trust that otherwise would have to be built up before the work can truly begin to finalize the piece.

In short, Ed Stambollouian and the creative team on We’re All Doomed did an incredible job bringing what I understand Dan intended when he started writing this down in isolation. And @danielhowell you whole-heartedly deserve to call this your magnum opus. What can I say (sorry I can't help lovingly poking fun at you), your artistry shines throughout the show. I hope this too can be something your future self can turn back to.

🧡

(bonus) Thoughts on Orange Carpet & the Phil element

I didn’t fully rewatch the orange carpet, just to keep myself on task & not bring Phil too much into the main reflection without explicit reference in the show, but hearing Dan go “I’m alive in 3, 2…” made me laugh both times. He understands that we just want to know he has a pulse, ya know? Also them pretending it totally was live, when those fools (affectionate) cannot run a real live broadcast from their home for their lives. It just ran too smoothly, esp. in the transitions, for it to be anything but some very, very light editing on one improvised take they did. But I always support them in their acting, no matter how bad, like with DITL Australia’s opener or pretending there were not two apartments or that Google Feud being back was unplanned or Dil being pregnant with a statistically rare alien child or Phil living in a tiled, cramped bedroom or...

Also, Dan’s little laugh at the end of Phil’s sign-off is so fond it hurts. It also hurt that the VOD was hard to scrub through, so another deduction for the Kiswe platform.

Anyway, I’m glad that Dan was able to find space outside of the Dan & Phil branding of the 2010s as well as the image he was forced to manufacture for his YouTube presence, but also realize that with having a core audience that wants him to simply be happy, he can recognize that Phil is part of the things that make him happy. And can do so openly.

He is his own person, but it has been clearly emphasized now that Dan has no interest in not acknowledging that Phil always is and will be part of his present and future. He has made work like WAD & "Gay and Not Proud" to explore his way of thinking without the support of Phil present in the filmed/performed aspect. Dan acknowledges this intention, which is evident with him shooing away Phil at the beginning of “Gay and Not Proud” to process it alone.

It is also evident with the ending of “Daniel & Depression” and the WAD end credit of remote crisis manager showcasing the caretaking role Phil often plays in Dan’s life. But we know that caretaking is reciprocal, considering Phil's tactics with glue as well as his continuing health issues and anxieties. Dan has seen who he is without Phil by his side everyday in the public eye & has no interest in maintaining that Phil is absent for public projections.

I obviously do not know Dan Howell, or anything about him outside what exists on the internet. But in performance studies, there is a foundational understanding that there is no way to not be performing in some way during your day-to-day. Performing is not inherently a bad thing, as there are different roles you take on in your life, where how I engage at work is different from how I am hanging out with friends. This also has basis in gender studies, such as ideas that you can perform your gender "wrong". What has been so interesting to me in this phandom renaissance is the way Dan and Phil each perform as themselves in front of the camera now. What they share out and the layers they include--or choose to not remove--have been stated by them explicitly to be the most authentic they have ever been, without obviously removing their right to privacy. During the height of the glass closet that was their 2018 content, I remember thinking that it was going to be the most they would show us in the vain of "if you know, you know, and we know who will know". After the coming out videos of 2019, obviously that's not true, but the return of dapg has signaled a message of "we know you know, if you've been in the know" while veiled in a way that is not immediately perceivable by those who are casually engaging with their content. It is an authentic portrayal of themselves without filter, while also providing themselves space to not have to announce everything to the world. When you are in the know, it definitely targeted and causes psychic damage, but I am ready for anything and everything they throw our way.

#we’re all doomed #wad spoilers #daniel howell #danisnotonfire #dnp #dan and phil #dan howell #theatre analysis #performance studies #theatre director

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faux-ee · 4 months

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Fyodor’s Ability: Body Possession and The Possessed

Note: If you don’t want to read the looong premise just jump to the paragraph where I started with “the core idea,” I have it bolded and underlined.

Hi bsd fandom how are you…I don’t think anyone would remember me but I used to be one of the craziest fyolai enjoyers on this site. My irl life has honestly been a mess for the past years (and it still is ngl), but recently I went back to reading bsd and I’m so satisfied with Fyodor’s ability, I have to write something about it.

I’m not THAT obsessed with fyolai now; my current and perhaps forever obsession is the ship of Stavrogin x Pyotr (stavrovensky) from Dostoevsky’s novel, The Possessed (I have never been the same after this ship...I’ll elaborate on how incredible and messed up it is if anyone is curious about that), and with my tradition of studying fyolai alongside stavrovensky, even back when I was still mostly a bsd fan and understood very little about the latter, I was REALLY happy with how Fyodor’s ability has turned out, with all the implications of Possession.

Let’s first establish that Asagiri totally has knowledge of The Possessed. He not only quoted it but also kinda borrowed the whole “group of five spreading evil and destroying the world” idea from it, and perhaps even modeled some scenes after the book’s 2014 TV adaptation. Goncharov, who pours tea for Fyodor and wants to feel “all is well,” can be seen as a parody of Kirillov and his speech in The Possessed, a character that happens to be an architect (remember Goncharov’s ability?).

Kirillov is also discussed in length by Camus — having adapted the book into a play — who wrote The Stranger and created Meursault. BSD became explicitly a metafiction after Gogol’s appearance, and The Possessed is a chronicle of events provided by an unreliable narrator, who seems weirdly omniscent, and the story also quickly tumbles into turmoil after certain characters’ sudden appearance. One scholar argues that the narrator is only making up a story and trying to make what happens seem logical, while it really is not. Gogol’s pretending to be a government official/one of the police, gunning Atsushi in a tunnel, and making the Agency take his blame for terrorism also echoes strongly the events in The Possessed. I won’t spoil you further though.

The core idea of Dostoevsky’s The Possessed, or in some translations The Devils, or Demons, is that people who cannot think for themselves are often easily possessed by ideas planted into their heads — then driven to madness and self-destruction by what they think they have thought up themselves. Hell if that doesn’t sound familiar; that’s all Fyodor’s been doing to others, and it’s what he basically said in Chapter 42.

("being led by the nose" also appears in the book, it's one of it's crackiest jokes, but i'm not sure if it's just a matter of translation in bsd.)

Asagiri said he got the idea of Crime and Punishment being doubles from Ivan Karamazov, who truly is just a less stable/powerful version of Stavrogin in terms of intellect, the incarnation of the Devil — of Lucifer, in some Dostoevsky scholars’ words — the mysterious, beautiful protagonist of The Possessed shrouded by too many secrets, none of which gives a clue about his true character and purpose. (irl Dostoy said he “tore him [Stavrogin] out of my heart”; you can say he’s the author's special blorbo LOL).

His name literally means “cross (stav)” + “horn (rog)”, showing the heaven-hell conflict within his character. Stavrogin sometimes sees a demon double of himself, too; like BSD Fyodor, he made peace with it (the paragraphs describing this is cut from some versions of the book).

And like Fyodor, Stavrogin represents something “more evil than evil”: the void; but a void that could mess up people’s minds by “understanding” them, giving them answers for what they should be after, thus tricking them into abandoning their lives for this one pursuit, one impossible ideal. He used these ideas which he himself didn’t believe in to possess people, in every meaning of that word, and this possession comes with the process of enter into. People are no longer themselves, but — in many Dostoevsky scholars’ opinion — doubles of Stavrogin, shells of themselves that carry the pieces of this one nihilistic demon.

Characters affected the most by Stavrogin in The Possessed let these toxic ideas enter their heads, because they are trying to get rid of unbelief and skepticism about god — kill their inner demons/defend themselves against Satan’s call. You could say they stepped right into Stavrogin’s twisted experiment just as they were trying to kill the heaven-hell ambivalence within themselves; kill “Stavrogin”.

Tl;dr When people are trying to kill Fyodor, they are possessed by him and become doubles of him, but not complete replicas; they retain their personality in some way, but only through their own fixations that get integrated into Fyodor, the demon. It’s like black is the mixture of all colors, and chaos is a cacophony of all sounds. When they die, Fyodor exits the body with a darker, heavier, emptier soul, and enters into the next victim, who tried fruitlessly to defeat him.

(In The Possessed, it is said that people who are possessed by ideas are basically consumed by them; their personal views on life are replaced by unreasonable fixations of the mind, which they devote their hearts wholly into. Nicolas Berdyaev connected this kind of fixation to the search for freedom and to attain godhood in his book Dostoevsky. This is a horrifying observation of the human psyche by irl Dostoy but it also reminds me of how Fyodor has described the singularity.)

There are other startling similarities between Fyodor and Stavrogin that I didn't mention. Please go read the book, it is in no way a daunting classic - it is supposed to be dark comedy; and if you can't stand old people drama, start from Volume 2, you might just experience the DoA arc all over...

P.P.S, It has been pointed out how fyolai interactions and their mannerisms mirror scenes and characters in The Possessed (2014). these two ships of crazy russian terrorists differ significantly while being similar on the surface (grumpy x sunshine, the religious/philosophical discussion on evil, soulmates, kill your darling etc.) but this is not the point of this post so I’ll leave it for now.

#bsd #bsd meta #bungo stray dogs #bsd fyodor dostoevsky #the possessed

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myfairstarlight · 2 months

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A Lover's Quill

AO3 Link.

Rated: M

Length: 2k

Pairing: Colin Bridgerton x Penelope Featherington

Canon Divergence

Based on my own post here, s1 AU in which a love letter is written instead of a scandalous gossip column...

This will be a multi-chaptered fic, but this first chapter can be read as a standalone. The whole story is already planned out! I'm not sure I will post every chapter on tumblr yet, but I will update on ao3 frequently as long as my life allows it.

Summary:

Dear Colin Bridgerton, As I understand it, this must be a farewell. Penelope’s fingers shake as she wraps them around her quill. Her eyes slide towards the crumpled pieces of paper scattered at the foot of her desk, wondering if such unrequited fantasy is even worth her tortured ink. Or. A s1 AU in which instead of a Whistledown column, Penelope writes a letter to Colin the night before he and Marina plan to elope.

*additional notes on ao3.

꧁༺࿅ིཽ• –– •❈• –– •࿅ིཽ༻꧂

Dear Colin Bridgerton,

As I understand it, this must be a farewell.

Penelope’s fingers shake as she wraps them around her quill. Her eyes slide towards the crumpled pieces of paper scattered at the foot of her desk, wondering if such unrequited fantasy is even worth her tortured ink.

I wish I had the courage to tell you what I am on the brink of revealing to your face, so forgive my cowardness for hiding behind a quill instead. These past few weeks have been full of agonising feelings, and ones I had to fully come to terms with before I could share them with you.

She pauses as she hears commotions outside her door. Servants are running up and down the estate in their haste to gather Marina’s belongings.

I must apologise, for my meddling regarding your and Marina’s courtship. It was not my place to dictate what either of you should do or should feel, even in my misguided belief that I was helping. I do believe that if one is lucky enough to be in love, well, one should declare it as loudly and fervently as you have done, claiming Marina’s hand in front of her many suitors.

She has shared with me your plans to elope to Gretna Green, I hope you do not fault her for divulging your secret. That way, I can wish you all the luck and happiness.

Penelope takes a deep breath. She knows the next words to be the hardest to put into paper and her fingers start to shake once more.

I must, once more, beg your forgiveness for my cowardness as I cannot bring myself to say those words in front of you. I truly do wish for your happiness, and yet I know the words would get lost between my heart and my mouth because there is another truth I could never speak into existence, for I knew it to be a meaningless affair.

I love you, Colin. I have loved you for many years before either of us even debuted in society. Perhaps from the moment we met, it is quite embarrassing really.

Nothing would ever come out of it, I was aware. But you deserve to know, and perhaps I also needed to admit it, to put it into the world, so I may now move on and seriously consider my prospects when I had been fighting them all season. I hope I can find a match that ignites the fire that bursts within your heart with Marina. I hope I will be as lucky one day.

I bid you farewell, my dearest friend.

Yours Truly,

Penelope Featherington.

To her surprise, the tears she feels building up in her eyes do not fall as she carefully folds the paper and seals the letter. When the wax solidifies, Penelope drops a kiss over the butterfly design.

She thinks of the ironic accuracy of her family’s symbol. Just like her heart, a butterfly will not live long once it takes flight, but at least it is free.

꧁༺࿅ིཽ• –– •❈• –– •࿅ིཽ༻꧂

Sneaking out to Bridgerton House is a familiar affair, Penelope is pretty sure Mrs Varley purposely looks away every time, a part of her cannot believe she truly is that invisible. The letter safely tucked in her bosom, she easily finds John, who looks at her with surprise and worry.

“Miss Featherington you should not—” he cuts himself off as Penelope thrusts the letter in his hand. “Ah. For Miss Eloise?”

“Mr Bridgerton,” Penelope corrects. “Colin, that is,” she clarifies, though John would know she barely ever speaks to Benedict outside of polite conversations and would have no reason to write to him. “Please make sure he receives it first thing in the morning. Is Eloise…?” She points towards the garden.

John nods, carefully putting the letter away. “Is everything alright, Miss?”

Penelope takes a deep breath. “You are aware of his plans, correct?”

“Indeed. I am to drive the carriage to the port.” A beat of silence. “For all that is worth, Miss, I do not think he is making a wise decision.”

She is not quite sure why, but servants have always felt comfortable gossiping in front of her, and even to her. Penelope will not complain, however.

“Well, it is not our place to say.”

“Is this letter not about that? Mr Bridgerton has always keenly listened to you.”

Penelope chuckles. “You flatter me, John. I do not think anyone has ever listened to me.”

But the Ton will gladly consume her every word, as long as it is put on paper. It would not have been worth losing Marina’s trust or breaking Colin’s heart, she thinks.

Although, a treacherous voice whispers in her mind, is it truly for the better, to keep silent? Though Colin believes himself in love, would it be enough to bear the burden of another man’s child? To feel the humiliation upon realising he was but a means to an end? And would Marina be able to live with herself? She has a good and kind heart, Penelope knows that to be true, but even the most beautiful souls can be pushed to cruel means when no other solution is within grasp.

Ultimately, Penelope thought, a couple of hours earlier when she decided against using her greatest weapon in Whistledown, this matter did not involve her. Marina is her cousin, Colin is her friend, but this issue only concerns them. Penelope has tried her best without breaking anyone’s trust, and she is at her limit. She cannot keep being the messenger.

And therefore, she has one more secret to divulge.

Curtseying in front of John — although she is aware she does not need to since he is a mere footman, she thinks it is still polite to do so — she ventures into the garden, to immediately find Eloise sitting at one of the swings. Their eyes meet, but Eloise does not move, nor does she scream at her to leave. So Penelope sits on the other swing.

“El.”

“Pen.”

The use of nicknames makes her smile.

“I’m sorry for yelling at you.”

“I’m sorry for not listening to you.”

A pause.

“However," Eloise huffs, "you were so wrong because you’re really pretty, Penelope, if only your mother did not have the most horrendous taste in gowns. Never speak of my best friend as such ever again!”

And just like that, they are friends again. Penelope could cry.

“There was another reason I did not wish to discuss Whistledown with you at the time,” she confesses. Eloise makes a questioning noise, a hand reaching for Penelope’s arm. Penelope squeezes it. “It is because I am Whistledown.”

There is a moment of silence as they stare at each other. For a moment, Penelope worries she won’t be believed. Who could imagine sharp and cunning Whistledown as the petite, two-stones-too-heavy Featherington girl? Eloise's grip has gone lax on her arm before suddenly the brunette girl brightens up.

“Of course!” she exclaims. “It makes so much sense! My best friend, the cleverest woman feared by the Ton!”

Penelope blinks, taken aback, before giggling at her friend’s pure excitement. “Eloise! You exaggerate.”

“Oh, you must tell me how you managed such a fit! And do I get the exclusive before anyone else now?”

Penelope smiles and nods enthusiastically, holding Eloise's hands preciously between hers.

If she must say goodbye to her love, at the very least she will always have Eloise and frankly, it is as good, if not better.

“But say, is it still true? Do you wish to marry even though you have such a gem within your hands?” Eloise asks, her voice gone soft. “You could be entirely independent, you do not need a man.”

Penelope lets out a forlorn sigh. “I still wish for it, although I very much doubt I ever will.”

꧁༺࿅ིཽ• –– •❈• –– •࿅ིཽ༻꧂

John has never been one to care for his employers’ affairs. When the other members of the staff start to gossip, he tends to turn his head and not listen, out of respect. This season has truly tested his limits, however, between Miss Bridgerton, now Duchess of Hastings, debuting, and Mr Bridgerton, the youngest — bar little Gregory — getting so unexpectedly engaged.

And of course, the now notorious Lady Whistledown who rose from the shadows seemingly out of nowhere, stirring up society for being such a bold and yet secretive woman. Gossip had become an inherent part of everyday life, more so than it already was. Whistledown held up a mirror in the Ton’s face to heighten the whispers, and so the Ton speaks even louder because they love to look at themselves.

All that to say, John cannot help but be curious. Miss Penelope’s letter feels heavy. Not literally, of course, but the metaphorical weight of it feels monumental. It is as if he failed to deliver it in time, the world would not be turning on its axis any longer. There was a quiet resignation on the young lady’s face, so far from the warmth she usually bears. In truth, when he heard that Miss Penelope had debuted early and that Mr Colin Bridgerton was courting someone, John, much like the rest of the staff, had assumed she was the one he was courting. There was obvious affection between them, of a sweet and innocent kind, rare in its beauty, and everyone believed they would follow the path Lady Bridgerton and her late husband followed, finding true love at a young age in each other. Alas, perhaps it was only wishful thinking.

And again, it does not concern John, he is merely the messenger — or the driver.

Even so, he decides he would rather not wait. He is aware most of the family is still awake, including the very Bridgerton he is in search of. He finds him brooding in the library, a likely place for him to be, fidgeting by the window.

“Sir,” John says, startling the young man who almost drops the book he was holding. “A missive, for you.”

“A missive?” Colin repeats, intrigued and wary.

“From Miss Penelope, sir,” John clarifies, giving him the letter. He sees the moment Colin's shoulders relax, and his eyes bear a spark of happiness at the sound of her name.

Ah. Foolish youth.

“Right. Thank you, John.”

John nods, bows, then takes his leave. It seems this social season, although coming to its end, will still be full of surprises.

And if it prevents him from waking at the breaks of dawn the next day, he will not be complaining.

(A mere hour later, he catches Colin sneaking out of the house and running across the square. John suspects a new scandal shall befall this family in the morning.)

#bridgerton #bridgerton fic #polin #colin x penelope #my fics #a lover's quill

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xnorthstar3x · 15 days

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I love reading fanfiction, I have been an avid reader of the craft since 2016 and one thing. I cannot stand is when I go to read a fic and the reader insert isn’t physically inclusive. I’m not talking about male readers, or fem readers, or trans, or nonbinary readers (I too struggle with writing gender inclusive readers as I’ve always been she/her I’m not sure how to be inclusive or deliver the story for someone who’s experience in life is completely different to mine but I’ve been working on it). I’m talking about physical descriptions of readers.

I get you have an idea in mind but stating the height weight hair length and all that of your reader insert really doesn’t work. Because now you’re catering to a specific demographic.

There are instances when this is ok though, when body type is key to the story. A lot of times people will request curvy readers because they feel that there isn’t any fic that is inclusive to that body type.

I’m honestly just trying to say I’m tired of opening up a tag, and the first post on that tag is an introduction to a series with a whole list of qualities for y/n. It’s (y/n) for a reason YOUR NAME not your name and whoever the author thinks you should look like. It’s supposed to be catered to you.

#x reader #northstarscorner #tmnt x reader #series #x yn #reader insert #rant post #personal rant #all inclusive

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fuckyeahgoodomensfanfic · 7 months

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Good Omens Fic Rec: Talk about the weather

Television meteorologist Aziraphale Fell and Youtube storm chaser A. J. Crowley have nothing in common aside from a purely professional interest in the weather and a mutually beneficial arrangement to lend a hand when needed. So what if they bicker and flirt more than your typical professional acquaintances, or if their arrangement inevitably veers into more personal territory? It's not as if they're in love or anything. Absolutely not.

Length: 81,582 words

AO3 Rating: Mature / Spice Level 🔥

Best for: Mostly Safe in Public, Human AU, Romance, Pick-me-up

Triggers: None

Read it here, fic by nightbloomingcereus

*Minor Spoilers* This rec has taken me an embarrassingly long time to write, considering I made a meme about this fic and then never gave it its due credit. But I got busy at the time, and when I was finally able to try to write, I was too rusty on the details. However, with a thunderstorm to read to today, I knew I had to take advantage and read this story again.

I'll allow myself one pun: this weather AU is electric. Crowley is a YouTube storm chaser, and Aziraphale a television meteorologist. The chemistry is off the charts, even for an Aziracrow fic, which is already top tier. Their first meeting, caught at the duck pond in a serendipitous rainstorm, will take your breath away. If I were Aziraphale, I think I would have discorporated on the spot. It's still one of my favorite meet-cutes in the whole fandom.

Crowley here is so full of life! I understand the tendency to make him cynical or burdened by life's traumas in fic (and I enjoy that depiction too), but it's also wonderful to have a Crowley who loves what he does and is full of passion and joy. The thrill of the chase, the release of the storm, his outlook is infectious—to Aziraphale and us, the readers. His online persona is fun and flirty, and with all the open shirts, of course Aziraphale couldn't resist.

Aziraphale's characterization is spot on as well. He's sassy and so intelligent, but of course, cannot spare any brain cells to understand his heart. I love his journey here so much, and his "oh, fuck" moment made me laugh but also made my heart swell. Also I need to steal his bedroom. It sounds amazing.

This is an excellent, engaging, and thrilling AU. I love it so much, and while I'm still sorry I didn't recommend it sooner, the rain today was literally perfect to read this one to. I highly recommend listening to rain sounds for this one if you don't have real rain. Here's a playlist of my favorites to read to! This is mostly safe in public; there are 2 intimate scenes, but they are not very explicit. However, if you're craving more, here's a wonderful PWP bonus scene for you called Cloudburst. wink wink

Read it here, fic by nightbloomingcereus

#good omens #good omens fanfiction #good omens fanfic #fanfic rec #aziracrow #good omens fic rec #aziraphale x crowley #Talk about the weather #nightbloomingcereus #human au #long #entertainer au #one flame #mostly safe in public

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thelavendernarwhal · 4 months

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I received an ask that a person wanted answered anonymously, so:

But I really, truly cannot stop thinking about this one scene in Legacy. It’s around page 351.

“You mean having Dizznee pull some money from your birth fund and then hitting up a shop for a couple of minutes?” Keefe asked. “Yeah, Dex told me all about how not exhausting that was last night, when he checked in to tell me how things went for you two in London, while someone was off doing something with Mr. Forkle…”

So what I’m hearing is sleepy Dex on call with Keefe? Dex telling Keefe that he’s tired? A cute little nightly convo?

Side note, why was Dex tired? Does his ability make him tired? I need more elaboration, Shannon.

This scene is hella interesting to me since you look at it and it immediately seems like a Sokeefe scene, but in the middle, it has this seemingly random shift into talking about a completely different character dynamic. The context this snippet falls into is Keefe trying to cheer up Sophie after she had an argument with Mr Forkle. It all makes sense within of their relationship and dynamic, but this bit of dialogue is communicating something pretty different. It’s pointing out that Keefe and Dex have a close friendship that Sophie isn’t super aware of and that Sophie doesn’t spend a lot of time with/pay attention to Dex.

Both of these things can be chalked up to the fact the story is from Sophie’s perceptive. The big plot details have to happen or be explained to her or else they won’t make it to the reader. That doesn’t leave a lot of page time for banter, especially for a character like Dex who’s narrative role can mostly be done off stage. Of course, Dex’s character can be used for a lot more than ‘cool gadget guy’ (ie class divides, matchmaking/queer allegories, parallels to many other characters, etc), but that’s a whole different can of worms. Having moments like this that show things happening outside of Sophie helps establish a larger, more lively world. It shows that Sophie isn’t the center of the universe.

But these little moments can be established with many different characters. There are so many background dynamics and friendships that can be leveraged for this purpose which makes it interesting that specifically Keefe and Dex are highlighted. In fact, these two are highlighted in this way fairly often. Back in book 3, the two of them hit it off quickly and spend more time together outside of a group setting which then translates into many Keefex moments (including getting their team/ship name). Late night calls are probably pretty common.

But what really gets me about all of this is the casualness and I think it's because few other relationships in this series have that. Even characters that are established to be best friends have a good amount of tension between them (ie Fitz and Keefe, Sophie and Dex, Stina and Marella), but Keefe and Dex don’t have that. There’s a sense of stability and trust. They hang out and talk to each other without a practical reason to do so. Dex feels okay complaining to Keefe about projects and, presumably, feelings of isolation. Especially seen in Unlocked, Keefe trusts Dex to help him and hear some of the ugly things he doesn’t want to say to Sophie. There's definitely a lot of room for cute late night conversation on call, but also for a chill relationship in a sea of high-tension dynamics.

The length of this thing kind of got away from me but that's my take :)

(Also, I'm exploring a lot more of the mechanics of technopathy in my own writing, so I think that it's possible that Dex’s experience is something very similar to Keefe’s as the Forbidden Cities has more integrated technology that seemingly ‘speaks’ to Dex. That could be very overwhelming for him, hence why he's tired.)

#kotlc #kotlc analysis #keefex #kotlc legacy #kotlc dex #dex dizznee #kotlc keefe #keefe sencen #I present to you: my takes #for more technopathy ideas plz see my fic 'Bittersweet and Strange'#plz im lonely

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icey--stars · 2 years

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Stories To Be Told: Azriel x Reader

Series Index (complete series)

A shadowsinger, a warrior, an Illyrian, that's what she was. Trained by one of the most formidable female warriors. Escaped the Illyrian camps and her clipping when she was barely sixteen and is now the holder of 6 siphons. What happens when she tries to sneak into the City of Starlight? And starts down a whole new road of chaos?

↢ 『 ☾ 』 ↣

Hi everyone- I write for ACOTAR a lot in my freetime, but I almost never share it. This particular one I'm posting is almost 30k words long so far, and isn't finished. It's a slow burn, obviously. I can't promise everything will be good, sometimes I skip around in my writing so that I'm not bored or losing motivation. So, when that comes, just do your best to imagine what happens in between, but know nothing of interest happened lol

I plan to split up the series best I can- but some chapters may be long, some short. Just depends on how I can split up my writing. Normally I don't write in chapters. I just... write. There are some POV changes, but they exist only in the beginning atm.

anyway. enjoy.

↢ 『 ☾ 』 ↣

I was carrying everything I had, on me, strapped with the bag that rested between my wings or on my person because it was a weapon. I peaked around the rock outcropping, spotting the city I was sneaking around down below. I didn’t mean any harm. I was just curious how everything was fairing, seeing as it had been about 15 years after Hybern.

I breathed just a little bit too hard, the great Illyrian wings behind me shifting around as I prepared to get a little closer to the city. If I could get in, that’d be great. Maybe I could afford to get some bread and cheese as a treat.

But then I heard the sound of a sword being drawn and I whipped around.

Two huge Illyrian warriors greeted me. One… one was covered in familiar darkness. Shadows. This… this was a shadowsinger in front of me. And there was only one shadowsinger I knew of in the vicinity. And he was right in front of me. I noticed the armor on both of the warriors next, 7 siphons a piece.

“Don’t move or we will kill you,” the warrior with longer hair growled.

I paused, hand resting at my thigh, just above a dagger sheathe, but I moved it up when I saw the shadowsinger eyeing the sheathe closely.

I knew who they were. The spymaster and general. Part of the Inner Circle of the Night Court. Under the High Lord, Rhysand, himself. Azriel, the shadowsinger and spymaster and Cassian, the general who had long hair apparently. Not that I judged him for it. I just preferred my clipper-short length, to long hair for fighting. It didn’t get in the way.

They kept their weapons pointed directly at me. I didn’t move, keeping my hands poised away from my sword sheath and out, but up and away from my weapons. This was bad. If they thought I was an enemy, I was fucked.

“What now?” I questioned, adding a bit of snarky tone in. “I’m not here to cause harm to you or the city below us.”

“As if we believe that. You’re strapped with weapons galore,” Cassian scoffed. “What even are you?”

I chuckled, lifting my chin up to reveal my six siphons that were attached to a leather collar around my neck.

“An Illyrian,” I responded. “Female, yes I know. Such a shocker.”

Cassian eyed me, but Azriel just seemed unnaturally still, as if frozen in place. But he kept his gaze solely focused on my hands and where they went.

“Why are you here?” Cassian growled, stepping closer with his sword. I backed up a bit closer to the cliff, putting distance in between us.

“I was curious what happened after Hybern, to Velaris and I came for food if I was able to walk in. Seeing as I cannot, I’ll leave you all in peace,” I responded.

“No,” Azriel spoke suddenly. First word he said the entire time. “You are heavily armed. So you will face an interrogation to ensure the safety of Velaris.”

I scoffed. “I hardly think that’s necessary.”

Cassian stepped forward again. I stepped even closer to that cliff.

“If you jump off that cliff, we will kill you,” the general reminded me. “So stop moving. If you are truly not here to harm anyone, prove it. Because currently you are carrying at least 5 daggers and a sword, and probably more if I had to guess.”

I narrowed my eyes. “I’m not going with you,” I growled, wings flaring slightly in frustration. “Sorry for coming so close. I’ll just go to Hewn City next time, gosh. Nobody is allowed a bite to eat around here.”

Azriel suddenly leaped into the air, and too fast for me to dodge, he kicked my head, knocking me unconscious.

-----

My head pounded when I woke up, groaning as I flickered my eyes open.

I assessed my situation for a moment.

I was tied to a chair, wings tied at the apex to each other and limbs each strapped to a chair leg or arm. My weapons and things were gone. My siphons remained luckily, I noticed as I flexed the power, causing the dark blue stones to glow a bit.

I looked around the room best I could. Gray stone walls. A completely empty room. A wooden door behind me. Hard to spot with my wings. Probably did that for a specific reason.

I pulled at my ropes a bit. No budge. They weren’t coming off which meant I needed a way to prove my innocence to the literal spymaster of the Night Court.

The door opened behind me and I jerked my head around to see.

“Good, she’s awake Azriel,” a new voice said behind me.

The male walked around to let me observe. Bright violet eyes, no wings and tussle black hair. He had the tan skin of an Illyrian though, which was a bit odd. More footsteps came from the other side of me. Azriel, I noticed. He had a very well sharpened dagger out in his hand.

The door slammed shut behind me. Whether it was someone or magic, I didn’t know.

I took a deep breath and faced the two males in front of me.

“What is your name?” The unnamed male asked.

I rolled my eyes. “Y/N.”

“Y/N,” he repeated. “Do you know who we are? And why you are here?”

“I don’t know you. I’m here because I was caught with weapons near Velaris and this idiot and the general are assholes,” I responded.

“Very well then. Let me introduce myself then. I am Rhysand, High Lord of the Night Court. Azriel, here, is my spymaster,” the male replied.

Shit, I thought. This was the High Lord? Oh I was going to have fun escaping this, I thought with a groan in my mind. Speaking of said mind, I felt a very sudden and violent attack on my mind’s shields. I tensed, building it up against the claws attacking. Just like Rainne, my master, taught me.

“A shield, interesting,” the High Lord mused. The attack on my mind stopped, but I was weary. “Who taught you to shield from daemati?”

“An old master,” I replied. “No one of concern.”

“No one of concern?” Azriel spoke up. “Why are they of no concern?”

I narrowed my eyes and glared at the spymaster. “Because they died,” I replied simply, turning away the best I could from the male.

“Why were you so heavily armed when sneaking around Velaris?” Rhysand suddenly asked, switching the subject which I was thankful for.

“I was curious of how the city looked since I last saw it during Amarantha’s time and I also wanted some food,” I replied simply. “My weapons are for my safety.”

“Why would you need all those weapons to prove safety? Are you trained as an assassin?” Azriel asked.

I chuckled. “Might as well be, but no. I need the weapons because Illyrian males from the camps don’t exactly like me.”

“Why is that?” Rhysand spoke.

“I escaped from a camp that’s run by an asshole who holds old grudges,” I replied simply. “You all don’t need my life story, so what do you want from me?”

“Escaped?” Azriel said, narrowing his eyes. His hand falling from where it’d been picking at his dagger’s edge. “Explain.”

I glared in his direction. “No. Fuck off,” I replied.

Azriel stepped forward then, a knife coming to rest under my chin, pulling my gaze up.

“Explain,” the male ordered again. Rhysand remained silent, watching.

“You don’t need my entire life-“ Azriel slapped my cheek hard. I snarled from the hit, reeling and struggling against my bonds.

But Azriel had frozen. He looked to Rhysand and then to me, and then he was gone, only a flowing bit of shadows remained for a moment.

Rhysand remained very still, staring at me more thoughtfully now. “Interesting,” he mused before he walked out the door.

I growled, thrashing in my seat. The slap hadn’t hurt, it just triggered an ingrained instinct to snarl when someone, especially a male, hits me.

I breathed for a moment, staring at the wall blankly. Nothing to do, I thought with a groan of boredom.

-----

Azriel was losing his mind. He’d slapped the female Illyrian he was interrogating and then something had slapped him in the face in return. The feeling of a knot in his chest, and a roaring instinct to stop what he was doing and instead protect said female in front of him.

So he’d winnowed out into open sky, trying to figure out what the fuck just happened. There was a knot in his chest that was a bit uncomfortable, and it connected to a very loose string. It was beyond weird.

He saw Rhys flying out of where the interrogation occurred and coming straight for him.

“What was that?” Rhys asked as soon as he got close enough.

“Something was wrong,” Azriel replied. “Very wrong. I cannot hurt that female. When I slapped her, as if the touch caused it, a knot attached to a loose string now is attached in my chest and my instincts scream at me to protect the female.”

Rhys eyed him. Then the High Lord chuckled. “Interesting that your mate is literally the one you knocked out.”

Azriel’s gaze locked on him immediately. “What?” He demanded.

“The feeling you described to me sounds exactly like what I experienced with Feyre before she knew about the bond,” Rhys laughed. “Now this is just hilarious.”

“It is not,” He protested. Then softer, “are you completely sure?”

Rhys laughed. “You feel like you must protect her, right? If I wanted to slap her myself, would you willingly let me?”

Azriel’s instincts roared up all in unison. He shook his head to try and clear it. “Alright, fair point.”

A heartbeat moment later.

“Shit what the fuck do I do now,” Azriel breathed.

Rhys laughed, wings still beating against the air. “Well, first I say we let her out the ropes, and then we plan a formal dinner at the House of Wind and have a chat.”

“How the hell do I tell a female I literally just kicked unconscious that she’s my mate?” Azriel thought aloud.

“I mean, I did do some pretty bad things to Feyre before, so I’m sure it’s amendable,” Rhys offered. “Just take your time. Get to know her. Court her. Need I explain more?”

Azriel sighed in frustration. “What the fuck. Why now world,” he whispered to himself. Then louder so Rhys could hear. “Let’s go let her out I suppose. Make sure she’s aware she won’t be harmed first, and then invite her to dinner.”

Rhys nodded. “I’ll be your wingman, with wings,” he said cheekily.

“Idiot,” Azriel responded affectionately.

-----

About 30 minutes went by and then Rhysand and Azriel returned. I felt a sudden release of pressure as a knife was brought right up near the membrane of my wings to cut the ropes off. I barked out in sudden adrenaline.

Then Azriel cut my other restraints and I eyed him more closely.

“Be more careful with that thing,” I growled at Azriel. “My wings are right there and I don’t think you’d like a shape object that close either.”

“It was that or touch the wing. I think you prefer the former,” Azriel replied. “Plus I’m much more able with my dagger than you think.”

“Why am I being unrestrained?” I asked, standing up to even my height with theirs a bit more. I spotted wings on Rhysand and only let my gaze settle on them for a moment before I met Azriel’s gaze with fiery intensity.

Rhysand replied, “We’ve concluded you are most likely not a danger to Velaris. So, as an apology for these events, we’d like to invite you to a dinner at the House of Wind up on the mountain.”

I eyed them closely, massaging the ropes’ feeling out of my wrists and shaking it out of my wings. “Why,” I simply replied.

“We’re interested in you, that’s all. We’ve yet to meet a female Illyrian who claims to have escaped a war camp,” Azriel spoke up. “So perhaps we can talk over food in a more peaceful setting.”

I glared at them for a second. “If I get my things back, then I’ll go to your dinner.”

Rhysand snapped his fingers, and there, my weapons and bag were.

“How and when do I get to this House of Wind?” I asked, sheathing a few of my daggers. And putting my sword back at my hip. Just because they didn’t say they were going to hurt me doesn’t mean they won’t.

“It’s a short flight up this ridge. You’ll see the balcony,” Azriel replied. “Come when the sun touches the horizon.”

“And am I allowed outside in the meantime?”

“I’d avoid the city, but yes,” Rhysand answered. “We will see you later Y/N.”

Then they were gone. Winnowed away.

#azriel #azriel x reader #acotar #acotar fanfiction #series #azrielxreader #acotar fanfic #cassian #rhysand #bat boys #mywriting

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theconstantsidekick · 1 year

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no because, supernatural is absolutely a train wreck. it's a colossal accident that is happening in front of you that you can't look away from. it is homophobic and non-sensical and downright laughable at times but you know what? I love it. I absolute love it.

season 1 was absolutely beautiful. you don't understand, really, you don't. they had a piss poor budget, you can see that in every frame. but does that stop it from being fucking beautiful? no. it is stylised and ambitious and a fucking visual treat.

and this is like the first fucking episode. the shots have so much character! and that's nothing to say of the characters themselves. from the first fucking scene you can clearly distinguish sam and dean's character clear as day. their motivations, their dreams, their hopes, all of it. it's established so well. their dynamic is unmatched. does it also have a lot of garbage? yes for sure. because what in the name of hell was that episode with bugs? what glue were they sniffing when they green lit that one? no seriously... I wanna try some.

but then they recovered, cause they did faith. my god, what an episode. WHAT AN EPISODE. that motherfucking reaper haunts my every waking hour

like yeah, I love me some baby dean and baby sam going on their small scale ghost hunts while learning deep lessons about who they are as people and what they want from life.

also that 'laugh I nearly died' needle drop? where sam sees jess? god tier editing, GOD TIER.

then they came back with season 2. and here is my most controversial opinion that should not be controversial at all, season 2 is the best season of supernatural to ever supernatural.

what is and what should never be, hollywood babylon, heart, nightshifter, and the whole fucking season actually. not a single miss in my humble opinion. and that finale? THAT FINALE. beautiful, magnificent. ground breaking character writing, everything comes full circle while simultaneously opening up new plot lines to explore.

and my god, yellow eyes is an epic villain. he is a very viciously written villain like, he's... my god. it ain't a walk in the park writing villains, believe you me patient readers, villains are harder to write than the protagonists, always. well, at least the compelling ones are.

now season 3 suffered because of the writer's strike, but didn't miss much either. like yeah some of the hits don't hit as hard as the season 2, but hey, mystery spot, time is on my side, ghostfacers, bedtime stories are nothing to laugh about. those episodes are fucking solid, like most of the season. and there is so much raw emotion is sam's need to save dean, it just makes my weak winchester brothers loving heart throb a little too hard. also...

need I say more?

does the show did look little more washed out and boring? yes. but it's cool, cause we're moving on to season 4.

listen, I kinda just wanna leave all my season's critique at this. i mean, yeah this. this is it. this is the long and short of it; castiel. i don't think i need to get anymore into it

so season 5 is just—

i'm kidding. obviously i'm gonna talk about season 4, at length.

listen, being able to introduce angels this late in the game and then have them be a such perfectly hidden players is a masterstroke of genius. it just is. i am a writer guys... apart from the relentless fanfic as well lol. and when i tell you, introducing a new big player which is also (not so) secretly the next big bad and playing it off as smoothly as they did in season 4, is beyond hard. but the biggest home run these fuckers hit is castiel and the best part is they weren't aiming for a one lol. and oh oh, the way they use their very VERY limited budget to show wings with just flashing the fucking light? CINEMA! that's fucking cinema right there man. i work on film sets, i am telling you, this is the smartest filmmaking choice they make on the entire show. it adds so much visual intrigue while being so awfully easy to execute. BRILLIANt.

now i cannot talk about supernatural without talking about the deancas romance of it all, which i understand not everyone can see or wants to, which is fine. to each their own. you consume art the way you want to, i don't care much as long as you can acknowledge that castiel and dean's friendship was just some of the best written television that mankind has ever seen. is that too grand a statement? yes. does that make it any less true? no.

they even brought back the moody lighting.

and then there's the episodes this season, most of which are home runs in their own regard. just like beautiful writing, the character development for cas, for dean, for sam, even the late john winchester is wild. anna is a wonderful addition, so is uriel, and alastair? they don't make villains like him anymore, they just fucking don't. AND THAT GODDAMN PLOT TWIST AT THE END? man! the finale was just... too good. Chuck's introduction is absolutely wonderful, even if they ruin him by the end but that happens a decade later so wtv, who cares? But,,,, Jimmy. Fucking. Novak. That's all. that's the tweet. yeah. i'm gonna end the season 4 fan fair with jimmy.

moving to season 5.

subjectively speaking, this is my fucking favorite. this season is a writer's dream while also being their goddamn nightmare. so many WONDERFUL characters to play with and such a grand plot but you get to see it all on a very small, consumable scale which is just... it's too smart for me to not mention. i won't start naming the plot points and neither will i name my favourite episodes because what even is the point? all of it was fucking perfect. you don't understand how hard it is to develop characters to such an extent that they become so familiar to the audience that they know their next move before you even put it on the screen. and supernatural had that. they tied everything together with so much care and consideration, just... AAAH so good.

a special shoutout goes to endverse!cas, crowley and death this season. you all know it in your bones that those three were just the absolute scene stealers. especially death's introduction... immaculate.

they did lose a few points for not being as aesthetically pleasing as the past few seasons but hey, gabriel was enough to make a smooth recovery.

but this... this is the end of the road for me people. season 5 is where it should have ended. in no way shape or form am i saying that there aren't a few good episodes here and there after this, because there are. i think season 5 was so fucking solid, tied up so many goddamn lose ends and then just put a cute little hell shaped bow on top and i just... yeah. this was and should have been the end of the road. do not get me wrong, i love me some jack kline, charlie bradbury, kevin tran, rowena macleod and eileen lahey but were they worth the bullshit ending i had to sit through? not really.

i absolutely think if there weren't more episodes of supernatural I would never have become a destiel fan, because i started shipping them when dean made cas a mixtape in season TWELVE! but my god, the good times were so scattered amongst the horseshit that even when i found those hidden gems, they were so fucking drenched in the stink that they lost their value.

the worst of it all is that, i cannot explain to you what supernatural means to me in a million words, because it is a part of me, heart and soul. i fucking AM castiel. i am a gay little angel you hear me? i love this show. i do. i'm glad it went on for however long it did but i feel like once in a while i need to write shit like this or read shit like this to remind myself of the show that it used to be. of it's beautiful cinematography, of it's clever little storytelling techniques. of it's wonderful cast. of how epic their song choices used to be.

FUcking RENEGADE? iconic. wanted, dead or alive? cannot hear the song without hearing sam's off tune goat bleating that he called singing along.

i need to remind myself of how afraid i used to be of lucifer. of how much i cried while watching dark side of the moon; when dean and sam burst the crackers, and how i learnt the lyrics to knocking on heaven's door just because of that scene.

sometimes i just have to walk through memory lane and look back at gabriel's death, the good one, the only one. it was so fucking meaningful. i have to think of "we are making it up as we go" to be able to breathe properly because those moments were so fucking beautiful.

fuck the big ones, i even remind myself of the small ones, of dean's handwriting being in all caps, just like him. of sam's fucking huge laptop with that weird blue black sticker in the middle. of castiel's tie, that just was the right shade of blue, and hung all wrong but just naturally enough to add so much more to his character than any fucking dialogue could. every small little detail of supernatural that made it so damn supernatural. i miss it all.

idk. i'm rambling. whatever.

#superntural #dean winchester #sam winchester #castiel #deancas #destiel #spn #spn season 1 #spn season 2 #spn season 3 #spn season 4 #spn season 5 #dean #cas #sam #dean and sam #i think it'll add onto this post later #as i think of more things #because you best believe i will

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drakeanddice · 2 months

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DM Burnout is a D&D Problem

This is a trad-game problem and I’m tired of pretending that it’s not.

The implied structure of Dungeons & Dragons in which an authorial/managerial Dungeon Master provides content to a number of passive/experiential players who provide little to no input into the cycle of adventure creation, plot development, and experience tailoring is a direct cause for the phenomenon of “DM Burnout.”

I say implied up there because, like much of the game, the structure of a D&D game is mostly a matter of “you’ll know it when you see it.” Sure there's a section in the book that lays out the responsibilities, but the book's already told you to ignore it if it feels wrong a couple of times by this point. So really, structure is oral tradition and folkways, passed down by a neighbor kid or an older sibling, or the internet. But the basic fundamental principle is fairly inviolate; the players create characters, and the GM creates an adventure for them to go on. The Players play their characters, and the GM plays everything else, to include the impartial arbiter of the fiction. That’s about all we get. It’s not a balanced equation from the get go.

The installation of a single authorial voice, providing the framework for the players, their context, and their boundaries is heavy. That single brain at the table has to create content ahead of time, present it, and then ensure that the players don't stray. Or else, they have to pivot and adapt real-time, either exploiting their prep or improvising whole cloth. In combat encounters, they have to make decisions for multiple characters, enemies and allies both, and often present those choices as rational and plausible rather than optimal--because the oral tradition of the internet veers toward the death of Player Characters being a fail state. And moreover, they must contextualize and narrate the results and moves of not only their pieces on the board, but also often those of the player. Any collapse down to "17 hits, it does 9 slashing damage" is a reduction of interesting tactical combat to slog.

Players are, on the other hand, expected to show up and react. The content is provided, they make choices in reaction to the content, and the game proceeds. If, perhaps, they did some creative writing and crafted a backstory for their character, it is incumbent upon the DM to weave that into the overarching plot. Otherwise, it's purely an exercise in passivity.

DMs are increasingly called on to provide accessories and sensory input beyond just their narrative and roleplaying performance. Maps, minis, tokens, music, soundboards, mood lighting, handouts, item cards, "scent-scapes" apparently. More plates to spin. More steps to the dance that a DM is expected to perform every game night.

I get it. It's fun. It's a labor of love.

But it's labor.

Eventually, you get tired. One week you realize that you're swamped. One week you don't feel like getting a lukewarm reaction to your labor. One week you're not in a good headspace to graciously lose to your players again. You're burnt out, and you need some time to recapture the joy.

I've never heard a story about a D&D player burning out. I've never seen a person, with martyred pride call themselves a "forever player." Though they're quick to say that the DM is also a player.

The DM is not a player. They are providing play. They are a single point of failure, the single authorial voice who provides content and context for every part of the game.

The thing about single points of failure, they wear out faster. Distributing strain preserves a machine. Redundancy is good. D&D is not built this way. It is a simple machine, a single pulley-- a single brain-- supporting the weight of the fiction.

You cannot be surprised that you can't find a service-minded DM to run this game for you long-term. You should not be surprised when the average length of a D&D campaign is 6 sessions. You shouldn't be surprised that many DMs have an antagonistic view of players as agents of chaos. You certainly shouldn't be surprised that a service industry has sprung up around paid DMing almost exclusively around D&D and its inheritors.

Because if you can endure it longterm and not be reduced to a ragged nub by the friction of being the sole authorial voice, you have a marketable skill. Get paid.

Tldr: D&D tells the DM to prep, improv, adjudicate on the fly, and dance for the amusement of passive players and then wonders why DMs are hard to find. DMs do this dance and then wonder why they're creatively worn-down. This is not a place of honor. This is just the service industry in your free-time, and you deserve better.

#ttrpg #d&d #miscellaneous grumping #there are five brains at the table #games are supposed to be fun #what you are describing is labor and i do not dream of labor #d&d 5e #pathfinder #dnd

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pikkish · 29 days

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I'm new to the fandom, just played 2016 and Eternal in quick succession. Eternal's DLC left me really dissatisfied, but I can't really explain why or how. Based on that poll you made, it's clear you've got some Opinions on the writing, so I was hoping you would like to share them? I feel like I need someone to mull over that whole story with. You can message me privately if you wish!!

Hi there! Welcome to the Doom fandom! I hope you enjoy your stay here more than you enjoyed TAG's writing! And you're more than welcome to come yell with me about Doom and its related games any time!

You're more than correct in your assertion that I have some Opinions about modern Doom's writing, in fact, I have quite a few of them. Most of them can be summed up as "the writing is just plain bad," which is probably also the reason you're unsatisfied with it. It's inconsistent, it regularly sacrifices coherence for the sake of something that looks cool for trailer shots, it has a lot of details that very much could be interesting plots but are simply ignored after their first mention, and at least a few more things that I'm forgetting, it's been a little bit since my last playthrough of TAG and these are just the major ones off the top of my head.

Take Hayden, for example. In 2016, he's the classic egotistical, powerful CEO of a major weapons industry, who maybe didn't necessarily intend to get a ton of people killed, but now that he has, he's gonna stick to his guns and insist he's still in the right, this was an unfortunate accident, but what he's doing is necessary, for the good of humanity, can't you see? He's the good guy! He's just trying to make things better! And he's dedicated to this course well enough that he's willing to betray the man who's there to save him, and boot Doomguy back into Hell at the end of 2016.

Then you get to Eternal, and he's inexplicably changed his mind for no good reason? And it's not like he's learned his lesson and has become more humble for it; sure, he got his rear handed to him by demons, and he emphatically states that the creation of Argent Energy is an "unholy union" that "cannot continue," but at the same time, he still acts constantly like he has everything under control and heavily implies that, were he in charge, this situation wouldn't be so bad- as if he weren't in charge when it got this bad. It's like they wanted him to have the exact same attitude (and therefore, ability to deliver dramatic voicelines) as in 2016, but didn't want to commit to him being a villain, so they just went "ok! he doesn't like Argent Energy any more," and went with it, then never felt the need to explain how or why this complete shift in attitude came about. As a result, it feels like Hayden has no clear motive or goals, and falls pretty flat as a character in general.

And then, to take it into TAG, there's the Seraphim, and don't even get me started on how much I hate that that's his name, "seraphim" is the PLURAL form of "seraph," it's like how "Guy" is a real name but then if they decided to name a character "Guys" instead, and it drives me crazy-- whom they go to some lengths to confirm is, in fact, the same person as Hayden, but then, despite the fact that Samur is sick and dying from the moment you revive him, for some reason, Hayden has to turn back into Samur. I suppose there's maybe some indication that Samur and Hayden are actually different people implied by Hayden referring to the Seraphim in the third person through the beginning of the Atlantica level, but there's still never any explanation given for that, whether they are or aren't the same person, or why you need to bring Samur back in Hayden's place.

And then, you beat Samur up, and guess what? He immediately stops being relevant to the plot and is almost completely forgotten. And that's a recurring theme in modern Doom! Olivia Pierce and the Khan Maykr both share the same fate, the moment they're dead, they practically just stop existing. Sure, there's the statue of Olivia in Nekravol, and, like, a single mention of the Khan in one of TAG's codices, if I remember correctly, but personally, to me, both of those feel more like the devs giving you a wink and a nudge and saying "haha hey, remember them?" like it's more of an Easter Egg than them actually having any significance.

And then there's the whole mess that is Davoth. Admittedly, having the Divinity Machine be fueled by his power, and Doomguy being enhanced by that power is thematically appropriate, what with the whole reason Doomguy wins being that he's even angrier than Hell. I also think something like the Divinity Machine and Dooomguy becoming superhuman did have to happen eventually, because how many times can one man singlehandedly beat back the whole of Hell itself before he stops being just some guy? But I don't think it was executed very well.

For one thing, I don't think it was a good move to imply that Doomguy always was some sort of pseudo-god super entity right from the start. Sure, like I said, he did inevitably have to stop being just some guy, but him being just some guy was a good bit of the charm of classic Doom in my opinion. All we knew about him was that he loved his pet rabbit, and was more willing to punch his commanding officer in the face than follow an order to shoot civilians. And yeah, if you take that, and also assume that the story cards are Doomguy's own internal monologue or at least a representation of his attitude, then you can't really say he was ever a blank slate character, but he was still just some guy, and he was relatable for that. And going "well, actually, he was a godling from the very beginning" just doesn't feel very good in my opinion, and feels like a big retcon besides. (And we'll get to more "well, ACTUALLY" stuff in a bit, but first I wanna finish up the tangentially Davoth related stuff first.)

All that aside, if we take it at face value and say sure, Doomguy was always something a little more than human, always destined to become the ultimate warrior, rather than making himself into the Doom Slayer by surviving Hell, then there's still not really any reason for Davoth to have looked exactly like him, beyond going "you-- but EVIL!!" for the drama of it. I think there was maybe one codex entry that says Davoth's whole soul-stealing operation was for the sake of providing his own people with immortality, which is to say, he was fighting to protect his home or something to that effect, so an argument could be made that his looking like Doomguy is an attempt at exploring "this is you, gone too far, this is you if you ever let go of your morals, this is everything you risk becoming," but, again, it's mentioned like... once, in one codex, and never explored or elaborated upon further. If I remember correctly, Davoth himself never even acknowledges this, it's just the codex entry, and he just goes on about how he'll kill Doomguy and destroy everything he ever loved. If they really wanted to make him a sympathetic villain like that, then they should've actually given us the opportunity to feel that sympathy for him. Let me see the people he's trying to protect- is it an idyllic paradise, oblivious to the lengths being gone to to keep them comfortable? A broken, dying people who should have gone extinct long ago, but for this thievery of the lives of others? I know Hell is supposed to be Jekkad, corrupted, and even in theory, that's fine- you could say Davoth's become so ruthless in pursuit of this immortality for his people that he's blinded himself to how it's also destroyed that which he was attempting to save- but you can't really see that. It's still just Hell, not really any sort of remnant of something worth saving.

And speaking of that. Trying to make Davoth a sympathetic villain at all feels like a bad choice to me. Doom is about fighting demons, about carving a bloody war path through the ultimate evil of Hell itself, and about feeling viciously satisfied about doing it. Making it about a desperate man who can't accept that he failed to save what he cared about, and making about killing that man before he does any more damage in attempting to do what he's already failed to do just doesn't feel good the way the rest of Doom does. And beyond that, TAG doesn't even succeed in the emotional gut punch that would come from it, had they managed to make Davoth into an actually sympathetic villain. It's like they're trying to strike a balance between the gratuitously violent and exhiliratingly triumphant feel that Doom is known for, and an emotionally impactful story, and as a result, both end up landing somewhere between mediocre and just plain bad.

I don't have a good segue into this bit except to say it's coming back to the "well, ACTUALLY," thing I mentioned earlier, which is: there are a lot of parts that feel a lot like a six year old kid is just making up the plot on the spot, like, for example, "Doomguy LAUNCHES himself out of a CANNON and he has a MAGIC SWORD and a PET DRAGON that carries him to the MAGIC CRYSTAL in the MIDDLE of the PLANET." Granted, these ones are pretty small and relatively inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, and, yeah, okay, they do look pretty cool. But they don't really... fit? Yeah, it's not like classic Doom didn't have this too, In Doom I alone, Doomguy gets pissed about not getting a reward for beating up the barons, practically just jumps off the side of Deimos, and then finally gets to go home when a secret teleporter just opens beside him after Hell decides he's "too tough" for it. But that all fits in classic Doom, because it's not trying to be a serious, grimdark story. Classic Doom is goofy, and it knows it, and it doesn't try to be anything else. But modern Doom tries so hard to be a very serious, dramatic story and also keep the sillier bits of classic Doom, and- yeah, okay, I already made this point once, but here it is again- it ultimately kinda fails at both as a result.

But then there's the bigger of these, namely VEGA. You spend the majority of both 2016 and Eternal with him as your main companion, and, as far as I can remember, there's never really anything to indicate that he's anything other than what he's introduced as, a sentient AI, created to help manage the Mars base. And then you get to the end of Eternal, and- after basically making you sacrifice him for a second time- with next to no buildup, go, "well actually, he's the god of the bad guys." And I'd complain about that plot thread also being brought up and then dropped with no further elaboration, except they do elaborate on it, and that's basically all that TAG is about. They spend the whole of TAG 1 telling you how VEGA is the god of Literally Everything, and how he made Davoth, then didn't kill him when he started to get out of hand, and aren't you MAD at him, for making all your problems, for being too merciful with his own creation that he loved, and don't you just wanna DESTROY the thing that would give him power again?

And then you get to TAG 2 and they spend the whole time going "WELL ACTUALLY it's DAVOTH who's god and VEGA STILL couldn't kill him and he's been LYING to you this ENTIRE TIME." It almost feels to me like a bad fandom interpretation to justify not liking a character, except worse because they're actually the ones who made the character and wrote the story, and I'm not entirely sure why they intentionally tried to make VEGA a helpful, likeable character, gave him a backstory that arguably makes him more sympathetic than Davoth, and then went "actually we hate him now and are gonna do everything we can to try to make you hate him too."

There are definitely more things I could bring up, like whatever the whole deal with the wraiths and the World Spear is, and probably a handful of other things I'm forgetting, too, but it's getting late and I gotta get up to go to work tomorrow. At any rate, thanks for stopping by and giving me an excuse to finally yell about these things! Feel free to stop by and chat with me about video games whenever you want, I love getting to hear other people's thoughts on these things just as much as I love getting to give my own.

#doom #pikspeak #bideogaem rambling :)#id say i wonder why i still love these games but i do in fact know the answer to that #and its because they still have excellent gameplay #and because i am hopelessly attracted to characters that are exceptionally powerful and violently angry but still #put everything they are and everything theyre capable of to doing good and protecting people #and- provided they dont make some HORRENDOUSLY bad decision when the dark ages comes out- doom is still the epitome of that character type #though tbh i dont think im too incredibly worried about them screwing up THAT badly #this is still id software after all; one of their biggest three franchises is the series all about beating up fascists #anyway quick reminder that it is ok to criticize things you like and that you can still like a thing while picking out its flaws #ok thats all i think. im going to bed. goodnight!

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