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versadies · 2 years

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may these tips guide you to your writings !

VERSADIES’S WRITING TIPS FOR GENSHIN X READER WRITERS !

SPECIAL NOTE. thank you guys so much again for the 6k milestone! your love and support has always been appreciated and i decided to make this special post as a way to help those who strive to be even more amazing writers ! as always, enjoy these tips my fellow comrades <333 — sincerely, dan 🫶

SYPNOSIS. includes tips regarding the process of writing, content, genshin characters, the writers, and appearance of your blog that’s mostly for beginners !

please take note that you don’t have to follow these tips and that this isn’t the right way to help you write, but a possible way to help you write and improve (p.s. though, you should definitely get grammar, formatting, etc. right in order for your readers to have better experience in reading your fics)

1 — the process

The following tips below this point includes the process of it such as first drafts, editing, proofreading, putting tags, and more. You may proceed to the next points if these are not the tips you’re looking for!

1. OUTLINES !

A tip I always go for whenever I want to start writing fics are essentially to make outlines. If you don’t know what an outline is, it’s basically where you give a general description of what you want in your fanfic without the full details just yet. This is super helpful especially when writing a fanfic series because you know what to do and what you generally want by the time you reach to writing that part of your fic :DD

Once you’re done with your outline, you can now start writing your first draft based on it, this is where you can now write all the details (dialogues, scenes, etc.) you have in mind in your fic!

2. WRITE YOUR IDEAS

If you ever come up with new ideas, list them ASAP! Even if you don’t think you won’t write it, keep it – it can help future you if you couldn’t think of anything to write about.

3. FOCUS ON YOUR THOUGHTS

Avoid procrastinating as you let your thoughts barf out, be determined no matter what until you finally finish with letting your thoughts out.

4. SHARING IS CARING

You can also chat with other writers – you can even chat with me if you want to talk about your passionate brainrots – because writers can spark your ideas even more with ideas they have in mind if you allow them to.

5. STORYTELLING METHOD

Another tip is to recite the words you’ve written as if you’re a narrator and see if the fic sits right with you. Doing this can help some people who want to know if there’s something that’s unclear or doesn’t sound right by reciting it. Whether you’d like to read it out loud is up to you!

6. GRAMMAR

Speaking of which doesn’t sound right, grammar matters! It’s alright if you don’t have a beta reader or someone who’s willing to help you out in checking your grammar like me, I recommend using google docs and some websites that can check my grammar.

Google docs is where I write most of my fics in and I can guarantee that it helped me out with my grammar and sometimes capitalizations. Although it doesn’t exactly fix all the grammar errors you have, it’s still decent enough for it to be used. A few grammar websites I sometimes use are writer.com and quillbot.com, so you can try using them as well if you wanna try my tip out.

7. FORMAT

My next tip is regarding the format of one’s fic. When I say format, I mean by how the paragraphs are shown in one’s post, specifically paragraph breaks. Leave some space for your fics, let them breathe. Readers like me get scared when we see the whole fic being one whole paragraph. Change paragraphs when:

A new character shows up

Dialogue, specially when someone else speaks next

New topic, idea, subject, etc. is introduced

Change of settings

When you want to pull something dramatic (oh, oh.)

When the mood of the scene changes

With spaces, it’s easier for readers to understand and process what you’re trying to say in your fics.

8. PROOF-READ IT

Another tip is related to the last process of writing fanfiction: proof-reading. It won’t hurt to reread your fic (even if you feel like you want to cringe) and see if there are some errors or typos. A tip of mine is something I came across to google when I was still new around tumblr – and it is to simply list your errors that you’d commonly make and to keep an eye out for them.

The errors could be misspellings, misinterpretation on what a certain word means, even mistaking the reader’s gender, and more.

Either way, always double check on everything until you feel like you’re satisfied or sure of your fic.

9. CW / TW

I advise you to put detailed content warning / trigger warnings in your post. Readers should know what’s going to be on your fic, especially if your post is dark/angst/mature content. Don’t forget to specify whether your fic is SFW or NSFW, not everyone who uses tumblr are adults.

10. READ MORE

By the time the fic is done and is ready to post, make sure to add a read more function. It’s going to be a hassle if your fic is really long and it’ll take a long time on swiping, so it’s best if you add the function in your fic if your fic is at least more than 700.

For those who don’t know how to put a read more function in their post on mobile, just write :readmore: and enter.

11. TAG

Lastly, the next tips are about tags. I really advise you to properly tag your fic. Use tags that are relevant and related to your fics. Some people would be disappointed if you use a tag they’re looking for and isn’t something that your fic has (example: you tagged your fic as angst but the fic is fluff for the entire post), and yes, although it’s a way to get your fic to be seen by others more, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

2 – the content

The following tips below includes writing angst, vocabularies, use of italics and bold, show-not-tell tips, dialogues, and more. You may proceed to the next points if these are not the tips you’re looking for!

1. WRITING ANGST

Be in the mood, listen to sad songs, watch series and movies, or even read books that absolutely wrecked you – the same can go for writing fluff.

Ask yourself these questions as a reader when you’re writing: is this enough to make me feel sad? Is the impact of the angst strong enough? If you say no to these questions, try to add or change something that could make it even more tragic, be it dialogues or more scenes (just not too much of course)

A favorite tip of mine is to describe the overwhelming feelings the character or the reader has. Describe how painful it was for them. Describe the agony they felt than everything else they’ve felt throughout their lives. Sure, it’s fine if you say: “He was devastated when he saw them.” But you can also say, “He felt like the world was crashing down on him the moment he saw you in such a broken state – and it’s all because of him.” Describe it, but not too much.

Try not to drag it too much. When I mean by that, I mean don’t try to make it too slow (too much dialogues, unnecessarily describing too much of the scenes, etc), it will ruin the pain for the readers. This also goes for making sure not to make your paragraphs be confusing. People won’t suffer but instead be confused if you add something that can be confusing.

2. COLORS IN TEXT

Refrain yourself from using colors on the text of your fics. It's difficult for most readers to read if you often use a lot of colors in your stories. It’s completely acceptable if you’d use them on your author note, warnings, etc., as long as it’s not in the fic. Using black is definitely a no-no because it won’t be readable at all for readers who use dark mode tumblr.

3. VOCABULARY

Vocabulary is also something important to keep in mind. Readers can pick up on how there’s a repetition of a certain word or phrase easily, so it’s best if your word choices are a variety. If you’d like to improve on your vocabulary, you can just read books, listen to music and read its lyrics – anything that requires you to read. You can explore new words you haven’t heard before and can use it on your fics.

However if you just don’t have the time, google is free comrade <33 You can either go to a few thesaurus websites (thesaurus.com, collinsdictionary.com, etc.) or ask google for synonyms of certain words so you can use those instead of the one you often use. (This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t stop using the word you always use, it just means you can go for other options so you don’t have to use the same word over and over again).

4. USE OF ITALICS AND BOLD

When it comes to italics and bold, you’d often see them in novels and fanfiction. Besides using italics to let readers know if someone is thinking, you can also use italics when you want to emphasize a lot on something! Be it the feelings of the character, a word or phrase that hits the spot, and more. If italics isn’t enough to emphasize your text, use bold instead – or even both.

5. SHOW-NOT-TELL

I sort of disagree with the “always show-not-tell” since the fic would be filled with too much description – especially unnecessarily ones.

One tip that helped me alot is to show emotion and tell feelings. It’s alright if you also show feelings if you feel like it’s important to note it.

Don’t tell how “You became happy when you saw him”, show how “Your eyes sparkled at the sight of him entering the room, your mouth twitching upwards as you watch him walk towards you with the same expression on his face.”

Don’t show how “You feel like you could barely function at all and tears keep on coming out from your eyes due to the amount of times you’ve yawned, holding onto your pen with determination of finishing the report.” Tell how “You’re fighting the urge to sleep as you try to finish your report tonight.”

It’s also okay to do a mix of both (show and tell feelings/emotions) “You almost stumble on your steps, swaying back and forth as you yawn quietly. You continued walking around the kitchen to find coffee; the events that happened last night made you not be able to sleep.”

Overall, just visualize the reactions/thoughts of the characters – be it body language, facial expressions, etc. It will be able to help readers understand more and imagine about it easily. It doesn’t have to be long and can be as short as you want as long as the thought is there.

6. DIALOGUES

When it comes to dialogues, there are few things you can use that’s based on what people do in real life (Take note, you don’t always have to do this).

When someone is thinking about something, you can interrupt their line of thought with a sudden new one. Example:

Thoma thought to himself, what could be the reason why Taroumaru has been going out a lot recen – He then gasps quietly to himself, does he have a crush on someone?!

Use filler words such as “like”, “literally”, “uhm”, “uh”, “i think”, etc. It makes it more relatable especially if the reader is the one saying them! Example:

Thoma nodded eagerly. “Yes! Taroumaru was literally barking and the general was – like speaking for him as if he understood what Taroumaru was saying! Can you believe it?!”

You can also mention their hand gestures, noises they’d make to emphasize on their words, facial expressions, etc. as they talk – it will definitely help readers imagine more as well on how they say the dialogues. Example:

Thoma nodded eagerly. “Yes! Taroumaru was literally barking and the general was like, uh,” he then proceeds to silently snap his fingers a couple of times, trying to think of what Gorou said, “he was like ‘Taroumaru, you fought the traveler too?!’ It’s like the general understood what Taroumaru was saying! Can you believe it?!”

You can also have them repeat themselves when others don’t understand what they’re saying or to get their point across. Example:

Ayato tilts his head. “So… Your point, Thoma?” He asks, lowkey amused by the housekeeper’s astonished reaction from his experience.

Thoma couldn’t believe how the young master is so laid-back from what he had just said. “My lord… General Gorou can understand Taroumaru.”

“What?” Ayato asks, knowing fully well what the blonde-haired man had just said.

“General Gorou can understand Taroumaru.” Thoma repeated.

7. SAID IS NOT DEAD

Said is not dead and can in fact be used often. Don’t use it otherwise if you want to get a description of how the character is saying something, it makes it more interesting.

You can do: “Yeah, Arataki Itto is one interesting guy.” Thoma said with a smile.

You can also do: “Happy birthday to you, OWA OWA, happy birthday to you, OWA OWA–!” Itto sings dedicatedly.

8. SUMMARIES ARE IMPORTANT

Summaries are important because they’re the ones that can let the reader know what to expect. Don’t say “idk how to summarize this. i dont have a summary.” – I know it’s difficult to think of one, but you have to keep trying – instead, you can just say “basically you feel insecure and the character comforts you” or “you’re tired, he’s doing his work. so you came up to him to cuddle with him while he’s working.”

It’s an exception if you’re doing a request and the anon’s request basically has a full summary already, that is, unless it’s an event theme and doesn’t have a summary on what it’s about.

9. PUNCTUATIONS

Punctuation marks are also important to know. Commas can help you put a soft pause on your sentence, question marks (?) and exclamation points (!) are helpful in expressing dialogues, semicolons can make a gap between two sentences smaller or introduce a new completed sentence with “however”, “therefore”, etc. Use them if you feel like you have to!

10. SAVE THE BEST FOR LAST

Lastly, a quick tip I learned from this app is to put the most important information at the end of the sentence. Try “By the end of the year, they became a couple.” instead of “They became a couple by the end of the year.” It just makes it seem more dramatic, don’t you think?

3 – the characters

The following tips below includes analyzing genshin characters and what to do when writing the reader. You may proceed to the next points if these are not the tips you’re looking for!

1. OBSERVE THE CHARACTER

Google is free. Genshin wiki is free. Reading genshin lore is free. If you have no idea how characters act, analyze them based on what their lore and voiceline has given you. When you write the characters and feel like they’re ooc even if it’s unintentional, imagine them acting on what you wrote and ask yourself if this is accurate enough.

2. IT'S NO LONGER A CHARACTER X READER FIC IF READER HAS A NAME

Refrain yourself from calling the reader with someone else’s name. It’s no longer a genshin x reader fic if you decided to give the reader a name. Not everyone has the same name and your fic would be considered as a genshin x oc (yes, even if you refer to the oc as “you” instead of “I”). It won’t be enjoyable the moment the reader has a name that isn’t what they’re usually preferred to as.

3. APPEARANCE OF THE READER

If you’re going for a neutral-appearance reader, an important thing to note is to avoid describing reactions that could describe the reader’s appearance. An example of this is blushing. When you say “You smiled softly, the light pink became evident on your cheeks.”, it’s no longer appearance-neutral since blushing can’t be seen on some people’s faces. What you can do to refrain from that mistake is to describe the feelings of said reactions.

Instead of the example I’ve mentioned, try to do “You smiled softly, feeling your cheeks starting to become warm.”

Refrain from mentioning hair as well, not everyone has the same hair and not everyone has hair. Instead of “The wind was blowing your hair”, try “You relax from the cool feeling of the wind coming past you.”

Again, one of the goals of a character x reader is to make the reader feel like they’re a part of the story, and giving them a name, appearance (unless specified), etc. won’t do it.

4 – the writer

The following contains tips regarding the mindset, thoughts, interactions, and motivation of a writer. You may proceed to the next points if these are not the tips you’re looking for!

1. CONFIDENCE IS KEY

You may not know it, but your writing is always better than you think. You just think you don’t like it because you already know what’s going to happen because you wrote it.

Be more confident in yourself and your own writing! It can make you even more determined and have more passion in writing. Avoid comparing yourself to other writers – that’s an unhealthy behavior. Don’t let hate anons get to you because in the end, they’re just people who waste their life by looking down on others for no reasons at all.

It’s scary to publish your first fic, and that’s completely okay and reasonable. You can gain the confidence to publish it by just straight on or blindly pressing the post button and leave the app immediately— distract yourself from your what-ifs and buts and just hope for the best that people will like it.

2. NO PRESSURE

Always take your time and never force/pressure yourself. Writing should be something you enjoy and not something you should stress out about. Make schedules and follow them, either that or do timers where you write as many paragraphs as you can within the time limit if you’re the type to like doing challenges.

Take breaks if required. Prioritize yourself more than your blog, give yourself some self-love! If you suddenly have an emergency, feel burnt out, etc. and you won’t be able to post your fics, you can let your followers know and apologize for the inconvenience. Don’t worry about it, people will understand and will wish you well!

3. GET ATTENTION

If you want your posts to get attention, tag as many as you can (at least 20) and make sure it’s related to your fic.

You can also interact with a blog network that reblogs works for more people to see, especially those that’s only for genshinblr, so feel free to join one if you feel like it.

Interact with your followers often. If you’re a mobile-user genshin writer, please take note that the anonymous option is turned off unless you turn it on in the tumblr website/desktop version. You don’t really have to turn the anonymous option on if you feel uncomfortable, it’s super okay. Remember, prioritize your comfort over anyone else’s. Your blog is not your job, it’s your passion. It should be something that makes you comfortable and happy.

Observe your followers. Take note of when people are active the most and what time you usually get the most likes/reblogs. Use that time to be your post time (if the time is too late, you can use the queue post option whereas it’ll automatically publish your post at the time you chose.)

If you cannot reply to others in the reply/comment section due to your blog being secondary, you can just reblog your post and reply to people (with a tag that’s for you replying to comments).

Take note, don’t force yourself to reply to other people! Again, take as much time as you need.

Self-reblogging your work is a great option in increasing attention as well! Most writers, including myself, would reblog our own works in case those who have us on our feeds haven’t seen our latest posts.

4. MOTIVATION

Motivation is difficult to get sometimes. So here are a few tips that helped me and will hopefully help you!

Expose yourself to ideas, prompts, etc. One of the things that gets us motivated is the new ideas/prompts/etc. that we made up and instantly start writing for it. If you’re going through an idea that’s in the middle of the story, use that as your motivation to write the whole thing until you reach that part.

As I’ve mentioned before, outlines can really help in helping you write down what you want in your fic. Start doing that first before writing it because you won’t have to worry about getting completely stuck in your wip.

Don’t feel lazy or procrastinate. Get yourself out of your bed and go to a spot where you can focus solely on your fic. If you feel sleepy out of nowhere while writing, go splash water on your face and listen to loud music that can keep you awake.

Give yourself a deadline for your fic. It’ll make you feel determined in finishing your fic!

Read something. Whether it’d be other fics, stories, etc. – it doesn’t matter. You’ll eventually get some inspiration from reading and get motivated to write.

5 – the appearance

A big tip of mine when designing your blog is to find your colors first. If you already have your profile pic and header prepared, that’s completely okay because at least you know what colors to aim for that can match your profile and header! A huge recommendation of mine is to explore colorhunt.co for color palettes to choose – they’re such a big help to me especially since I sometimes have a hard time trying to think of a color that matches the other.

I also advise you to put your masterlist link in your bio. People will be able to navigate your masterlist easier! You can go to tumblr's website/desktop version > edit appearance > scroll down and find edit theme > paste "<a href="insert link"> between the word you want to link it on </a>" > and then you're done! you can add as many links as you want :DD

If you need to find sources where you can get genshin characters’ faces for your banners, you can just go to the genshin wiki and search for their profile. They provided pictures where their wish art's (basically what they look like when you wish for them) backgrounds are transparent so if you’re the type to think removing their background is a hassle, genshin wilki’s your go-to! If not, then I suggest Picsart’s (mobile editing app) stickers, they surprisingly have a lot of stickers of genshin characters.

use readable fonts + visible color when adding texts on your banners.

As for pinned post, here are the things that you can put:

Short profile about you such as your name, your pronouns, age (if you’re comfortable with it), your nationality, and anything else you want people to know about.

Links such as masterlist/navigation, mutuals list, dni (do not interact), byf (before you follow), and etc.

Fandom/s (such as genshin impact, honkai impact, honkai star rail, etc.)

It’s up to you if you’d like to add some quotes, images, banners, stickers, etc. !

#— ( dan’s writing tips 🫦 )#feel free to ask me more <33 !!#once again ty for the milestone 😚😚#genshin x reader #genshin impact fanfiction #genshin fanfics #genshin fanfic tips

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mylordshesacactus · 2 months

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Eyes & Fear

Fun fact I forgot I reblogged an askmeme a few days ago and seeing this message in my inbox unexpectedly sure had a psychological effect of some kind.

How many planning documents do you have?

Total? No idea, genuinely no clue how many I might have between WIPs and defunct planning docs and indefinite-hiatus projects, etc.

On average though, I generally will have one bullet-point planning doc per major plot- or organization-heavy project. For a oneshot, my writing and planning document are the same--I put the bulletpoint outline at the top and work through in sections.

For Reunification, though, I do have a separate planning document. I'll stick snippets of dialogue I don't want to forget in there (like Beverly's extended "if I was the Draenei..." gag in the recent chapter) as well as keeping an overall broad-strokes outline of the plot and of elements that have to be introduced well in advance. Like, for instance, the fact that Beverly is on the Forsaken payroll as an assassin. Or Genn's paranoia, or the ongoing dragonflight crisis.

Then, when I'm actually writing that section of the fic, I'll pull those broad-strokes notes to their own separate bulletpoint list at the top and expand it dramatically, turn it into its own zoomed-in beat-by-beat roadmap.

Similar focus--X has to happen before Y, character A has to being this up before character B mentions the other thing, etc.

What is your greatest fear as a writer?

Shouting into the void.

Alternatively, gaining an enthusiastic following of people who absolutely cannot fucking read.

#askmeme

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annahxredaxted · 1 year

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Ripping the teeth outta the back of my mouths the closest you’ll get to my wisdom.

Lowkey felt NFs song lyric was appropriate for this fic no matter how long it is~ antiways

Pairings: angel/David

Genre: 100% purely comedic purposes

Tw: mentions of drugs/ anesthesia

ALSO THANKS @itsdaifuku For helping with the dialogue for some of this fic!!!

࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎

“Thanks doc, yeah I’ll tell them. Okay thank you. Bye.” David hung up the phone with the doctor and turned back to im his severely drowsy partner.

“He said you need to be on meds for about about one to two weeks.” David claimed to angel, gently stroking their cheek and sighing

“No.” They said muffled.

He knitted his eyebrows together

“Yes.” He said defensively

“Don’t wanna.” They said once again.

“Angel.”

“Davey.”

He sighed and just looked at them.

“You need to in order to get better.” He said in a caring tone.

They grumbled and muttered something under there breath.

࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎

“Angel, get- get back here, you have to eat!” David was chasing his mate who was running under a hell of a lot of anesthesia how? He’s not sure.

“No!” They said jumping on the couch and running across the entire house, while David was right behind them attempting to catch them, but failing miserably.

“How is it that when your not on meds your sitting around and lazy, but the second you get on drugs your as hyper as a damn hyena.?” David questioned out of breath.

“No!”

“Is that all you know how to say?!” He said trying not to pass out from exhaustion.

Angel suddenly stopped. Tears welled up in their eyes,

“Am- am I being bad?” They asked crying

Shit

David forgot the doctor said they’d be a lot more sensitive then usual

“Wait no, angel I’m sorry.” He said trying to be nicer

“So,” they sniffled “, I Have too eat?”

David nodded.

“Okay fine..” they grumbled and hopped down from the couch and sat down, and ate the soup.

࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎

“Water. No angel stop. Water, drink it.”

David put a bottle of water in angels face

“No.”

He sighed

“Angel.”

“No.”

“Angel, drink the water.”

They grumbled and passive aggressively took it from his hands.

“Okay chill.” He said

“I’m sorry, davey am I being mean again?”

“What? No your just being difficult.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

‘ This is like 100x then validation they usually need.’ He thought to himself.!

༛࿎࿎࿎࿎

Angel laid vertically on the couch, watching Hamilton, drowsy, fully medicated, half asleep as their husband, well at the moment they forgot he was said Husband

“Angel. How are you feeling?” He asked pulling a chair over to sit in front of them.

“Okay, but can I tell you something,”

“What is it?” He was confused

“,This might be to late, since your wearing a ring, but I love you.”

They said drowsy, and dramatic.

“Angel were married.”

“Oh.”

࿎࿎࿎࿎࿎

“Davey it’s gross.” They said closing their mouth into a tight line.

“I know baby, I’m sorry, but the doctor said you have to take it in order to heal.”

They grumbled And pouted to look away.

David was sad, he hated seeing them like this, sad, and frustrated, even more upset that he had to make them do something they hated.

“Angel, please..”

He said calmly brushing their cheek. They looked over sensitively, and sighed and opened their mouth.

David sighed in relief and gave them their medicine, they gaged and had a rancid look on their face.

“Davey can you hand me my water please..”

They asked and he obliged

“Of course angel, here.”

They took a couple sips before handing it back to him.

Even in this state of pain, and awkwardness, he still admired their beauty and grace, they were always beautiful, but something about this new vulnerability level made him feel like they trusted him even more, even if they were married, the only way you can go is up.

They made a whine, and a yawn, and stretched their arms, while struggling to keep their eyes open,

“Sleep angel, it’s okay.”

“Oki. Love you davey..”

“Love you more.”

He said tucking them in, leaving a soft and slow kiss to their cheek, smiling as he turned their movie off for complete silence.

“Sleep well angel, I love you..”

#redacted asmr #redacted david #redacted angel #HUSBAND DAVID #AGGHHH

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ickmick · 6 months

Text

Novelvember week 2

prompt: used another incorrect quote, its at the end of the fic!!

duo or ship: tango/scar (with a hint of grian as their third and various hermits in the bg) doc, cub, and impulse have dialogue!

A good old game of hide-and-seek is just what they all deserve right now. Tango had hinted at it way earlier in the season, so why not? It'll be a good time, and plenty other hermits can relax and just... enjoy some time. Sure, it's really cold around The Frozen Citadel, but you don't really notice when hiding away in an alcove with one of your partners.

Tango invites a bunch of hermits to play hide-and-seek at his base, and the results are better than expected. A bit of playful teasing occurs with Scar, and plenty of kisses are shared.

ao3 link | last weeks fic

pssst... wanna see the full drawing? check here! <3

"Tango?" The tall brunett seemed to perk up at the sight of his partner, Jellie in his lap as he drew up plans for the next ride in Scarland.

Smiling, said blaze leans over his shoulder and kisses his cheek, giving Jellie a pat on the back for good measure. "Hiya! Whatcha up to?" Hands rested on the back of Scars chair, he looks over the plans with a hum.

"Hey now-" Scar gets that usual amused tone to his voice, covering the blueprint with his roughed up hands. "No peeking! Top secret park plans are happening!" He grins, eyes glinting playfully. There was that slight blue tint to them, the vex part of him always pushing for mischief.

Laughing, he nods and puts his hands up. "Alright, alright." Tango steps back, letting his partner slowly get up from the table. Slightly miffed, Jellie sits on the table instead and starts grooming behind her ear.

"So, what can I do for you, Mister Tango?" He grabs his walking cane from beside his chair, leaning on it a bit as he grins.

"Oh," the blaze says, brows raised as his voice lilts in over dramatic surprise, "I didn't know we were on such formal terms, Mister Goodtime!" Both of them are grinning, and his partner can't help but titter, trying to suppress a full laugh.

Stepping closer, he takes Scars unoccupied hand and leans down, kissing it's back in a clumsy copy of a formal greeting. Tango looks up to meet his eyes, seeing a faint blush over his amused face. "Would you honour me with your presence at this afternoon's game of Hide-and-Seek?"

Scar lightly squeezes the hand holding his, nodding along. "Why of course! Thank you for the invite, fine sir!" The vex stares him down with a delighted look, then pulls him closer and kisses his cheek. "Where's it happening?"

"The Deepfrost Citadel," he hums in reply, scanning over the other's scarred face. "Grian will be there too, and a handful of the other hermits. Impulse, Ren, even Doc was convinced. Though, I'm pretty sure he just wants to be a seeker." Chuckling, Tango glances down as Jellie rubs between their legs.

"It'll be too cold for you Jellie! Sorry!" Scar soothes, as if she were concerned in the first place. He beams as the blue haired blaze bends down and scoops her up, petting her head. "Awww… look at you two! If Grian was here, it'd be my whole family!"

"Oh really? And here I thought the whole server was our family?" He teases, narrowing his eyes playfully.

"Well-!" Flushing slightly, he beams and looks away, waving his hand dismissively. "They are!" His voice softens from its defensive tone, and he smiles warmly, "but you three are dearest to me."

Tango is blushing as well now, leaning into the hand placed on his cheek. He stares fondly, then quietly teases, "Playing favorites, are we?"

"So what if I am?" The vex replies without hesitation. He leans in, humming, "I think I have the right."

Pretending to think it over, he shrugs. “Probably…” Tango trails off, sighing contently as they silently hold eye contact.

Jellie takes the opportunity to leap back onto the table, supposedly fed up with their nonsense as she's no longer being pet. “There she goes!” Scar snickers a bit, both of them startled out of their equally love struck trances.

Starting to make some joke or comment, Tango goes wide eyed and makes an alarmed noise. “Oh! I need to go check with a few more hermits.” He smiles, quickly kissing the vex's cheek. “I'll see you later, yeah?”

“Yep!” Scar reaches out and brushes some cat fur off of the others robes, “Wouldn't dare to miss it.” He looks down

There's a brisk wind at The Citadel, being fairly more pleasant than the usual snowstorms. It's a good day for outdoor games, all things considered. All the participating hermits were gathered by the entrance, in various mishmashes of warm clothes. Some borrowed, some old, some newly crafted.

“Alright! Everyone ready?” Tango looked to their seekers, Cub and Doc, then grinned. “No peeking you two!”

Crossing his arms, the tall scientist gives an unimpressed look. “As if I'd need to.” Doc huffs, a whisper of a smile playing at his lips. It makes the creeper far less imposing.

Next to him, the shorter vex simply rolls his eyes. He looks faintly amused as well, but makes no promises. Typical of a vex, really. But they know he won't cheat anyways. Unless it gets desperate.

“Okaaay-! Then turn around and let's get started!” The blaze beams, waving a hand at them incessantly until they did so, counting to 100. The hermits begin to scatter, laughing and lightly shoving each other a bit here and there.

Some of them trail off on their own, but a surprising handful of the group takes off in pairs or trios. Granted, there isn't actually all that many of them. Grian and Mumbo scurry off together, the shorter insisting that his friends dark clothes could hide his bright wings better against the rocks. Impulse, Gem, and Pearl all trudge towards lower slopes, giggling and wondering who would last longest. Ren ran off faster than anyone could follow, and naturally Bdubs dragged Etho by the hand towards the underside of The Citadel's bridge.

This conveniently leaves Tango with Scar, who is looking around with a look of great concentration. “Scar,” he begins, still grinning.

“Oh! Tango! We need to go, come on!” The taller hermit smiles, as if that wasn't his partner's intention to begin with. Seeing no point in arguing his case, Tango nods sagely and follows after him.

Together they venture out into the stark white expanse, the blaze occasionally directing Scar towards less open areas. He does know this land well after all, seeing as he lives on it. After a few more cuts between an outcrop or two, he's dragged down to the floor.

Now sitting side by side under a block and a half high ledge, they both shiver a bit. There's less snow down here, but it's colder when they aren't moving. Tango pulls his fur lined cloak closer, tail tucked over his feet. He looks over at the vex, seeing him slump down in his old aviator jacket. It looked fairly warm, but not entirely ideal for this kind of year round snow.

“All good?” Tango asks, blue eyes slitted in amusement.

He perks, looking over at him before pouting. Oh, the ‘woe is me’ face. Scar scoots slightly closer, their knees bumping together. “It's very cold out here!”

“Well yeah,” the blaze snorts, nodding, “this is a snow biome after all. I'm not exactly surprised.” Appraising the others' outfit, he quirks a brow. “I sent a message to everyone an hour beforehand to dress warm, Scar… is this the warmest outfit you have?”

There's no judgement in his tone, just pure curiosity. And perhaps a little concern. Who could blame him? They were dating after all, a little concern was warranted. Especially considering this is Scar. Are even winter activities not Scar Safe?

Crossing his arms- or possibly just hugging himself, as he rubs them and huffs- Scar frowns and cues the drama. “Yes! I don't exactly get much snow at either of my bases!” He holds his hands out quickly, “Just feel how cold my hands are!”

Obliging, he takes his partner's hands in his own. It's actually a bit shocking how cold they already are. Maybe it's just because Tango is a blaze, plus he's already used to the climate here.

“Here, how about I hold them? Then they won't be so cold.” He smiles, clasping them near to his chest, seeing as that's where he generated most his body heat.

Sighing happily at the lessened chill, Scar nods. “If you insist!” He hums, as if he hadn't practically shoved them into his partner's arms.

“Oh, trust me I do.” Tango rolls his eyes, but doesn't mind a bit. In fact, he'd rather hold onto his hands the whole round than let him shiver helplessly. Sure, he'd be fine either way, but it's the principle!

After a moment the vex grins, mischief in his eyes. “Hey Tango?” Faintly bluish green eyes meeting his, he leans a little closer.

“Yes?” He queries, soul flame tipped tail flicking a bit. This sounded an awful lot like a certain silver-tongued tone Scar liked to pull.

“My lips are cold too,” the taller murmurs. He's got a proud look on his face, clearly aware of how smooth that was. Or meant to be. Tango can never tell, too easily flustered over his sweet words either way.

Considering it, he glances to the side before taking a hand from Scars. Tango leans ever so closer, as if he were going in for a kiss. And then he covers his partner's lips with his newly freed hand, chuckling at his bewildered expression. His cheeks are still faintly flushed a deeper blue than usual, despite the quick halt.

It takes a moment to process for Scar. The blaze can practically see the loading wheel over his head, and tries his best not to laugh more.

Then finally his pointed ears twitch and he leans away enough so that Tango removes his hand. “Hey now! That's not what I wanted, and you know that Mister TangoTek.” He pushes his lip out in a little pout, playing it up again. But there is a small glint of worry in his eyes.

And coders, Tango isn't usually one to cave so quickly to playful schemes of this sort, but… it makes him feel guilty. The anxiety doesn't belong anywhere in his partner's expression, especially not now.

Letting go of his other hand, he instead grabs the collar of Scar's wool lined jacket and pulls him into a kiss. The vex seems startled, but then Tango feels him smile into it, and feels his lashes flutter against his skin as Scar closes his eyes. He holds him there for a moment before pulling back.

“Any less cold now?” He asks once they're both over the suddenness. Laughing at his partner's dazed nod, the blaze presses a chaste kiss to his lips before taking his hands again.

Scar blinks, then leans his head on his shoulder and hums. “Oh definitely. I think they could be warmer though!” Peeking up at Tango, he grins, “Maybe if you held me and kissed me?”

“Oh, making demands now, are we?” He teases, nudging him a little. “Didn't you know beggars can't be choosers?”

Gasping, he sits back up, nearly crashing the top of his skull against Tango's chin. “I'm no beggar! I'm simply making an educated guess!”

Snorting, he leans in closer again, “Sure, sure… and what could've tipped you off to that, then?” Tango stares with lidded eyes, smirking as the vex flusters.

He glances between the other's icy blue eyes, then swallows thickly. Offering a weak smile, he dares not move, unsure if Tango was going to initiate or not. The only sound for a brief moment was the chilly breeze and their warm breaths.

“Scaaar?” The blaze drawls, possibly a bit too smug. It was cute to see him choked up. It was a pretty even score between them as far as flustering the other goes. Grian, somehow, had them both beat out on that front. But Tango had a decent second place. Usually.

As Scar opens his mouth to reply finally, their noses mere inches apart, the distant crunching of snow makes them both freeze. Expressions dropping, they slowly turn to the opening of the stone hollow. Neither moved otherwise, waiting with bated breath to figure out who's lurking.

After a long pause, they hear a hum and some more footsteps. They grow distant, enough so that the two sigh and relax, leaning against each other.

“That was close,” Scar murmurs, beaming. He turns and presses a quick kiss to Tango's lips. “A victory celebration is in order.”

Tango grins, but pauses to consider it. It isn't technically a win yet, seeing as there hasn't been a ping on their communicators yet. But of course his urges win out, as he pulls Scar in again and presses kiss after kiss upon his lips.

Arms around each other, they laugh between every few pecks. They slow until it's only sweet little nothings, lips meeting for increased periods but not quite moving against the other's. It's probably not the best idea, but it keeps them occupied while they wait. And with Scar all but in the blaze's lap, they're both warmer too.

“Hey now,” a voice interrupts, the small space suddenly darker. Neglecting to keep quiet or at least listen for other sounds, it seemed they'd been found.

Scrambling to part, Tango sheepishly meets Impulse's best attempt at an unimpressed look. It's clear he's amused, but they both flush in embarrassment, and Scar ducks his head. “Uhh, you wouldn't happen to be a seeker, would you?” He asks, the taller hermit too flustered to make anything but stuttered syllables.

The demon tsks, crouched in the entrance. “Unfortunately I am, my friend. We got caught first, I'm pretty sure.” He smiles warmly, winking, “But I could warn the others away from here if you don't wanna come seek. We're still looking for Ren, Grian, and Mumbo.”

This makes Scar sober, brows raised. “Grian!? Goodness, how has nobody seen him? He's bright red!” He's scooting towards Impulse, who moves out of the way so they could get out.

“Beats me. Maybe his little tactic of using Mumbo as a shield worked?” The shorter brunett laughs and shrugs, “I take it you'll help?”

All three of them now stood outside, Tango nods quickly. “Of course! We can't let him win!” The blaze grins, adjusting his ribes to sit properly before setting off in the direction that he felt was best.

Scar scrambled after him after waving to Impulse. “Hey! Wait up, Tango!”

Crossing his arms, he watched them go, thin tail swinging idly behind himself. “What a pairing,” Impulse muses, shaking his head fondly before setting off in another direction.

heres the IQ! def did a lot of rewording, but lets be real it feels more fluid (hopefully)

yall the brainrot is REAL!!! I meant to do another quick and cute thing but no. I spent so much more time on this and I have 0 regrets. they're gay and adorable.

next fic will either be all three of them or something with impulse and maybe scar (platonically), i havent fully decided. guess you just have to come back next sunday to find out mwehehe

ooh, and I do silly and cute song names/lyrics as the titles... so if you wanna see, then... ao3 link is up top XD

ALSO SHOUTOUT TO A REALLY VERY COOL PERSON (*cough* mossfeathers *cough*) WHO FOLLOWED ME AS I WAS DRAFTING THIS /silly /vpos

I really like your text posts so Im glad you liked the last fic :3c

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buginateacup · 4 months

Text

Tagged by @jurijurijurious - thank you!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?:

71 (don't ask me how that happened, I have no idea either)

(Guys there's no number 2 in this thing, where did it go??)

(seconding the no number 2)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Megamind, Reboot, The Queens Gambit, Goncharov, ATLA, Good Omens, Phantom of the Opera, Destiny 2, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Repo! the Genetic Opera, The Witcher, and Labyrinth

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Tea with Topsy (1,485)

Rings (807)

Presentation (805)

No one calls you honey when you're sitting on a throne (737)

Wait a Minute (702)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes always, I dropped out of the habbit when I first got back into fic writing but picked it up again and now I respond to every comment because if someone is going to take the time out of their day to say they appreciated my work you can bet I'm paying that kindness back!

6. What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Currently Somnia, though whenever I fall at your feet, won't you let your tears rain down on me? comes a strong second and is probably the angstier overall

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Probably Rings or Back of Beyond. Rings is the one where I really put the work into getting Megamind and Roxanne to a place where they were both happy and wanted to be together, so I can see it contnuing happily even after I finished writing.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Not really, got flamed a time or two in the ff.net days. The occasional person who doesn't really think

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Oh I absolutely do! I love writing smut. I love how much storytelling you can put into smut. You can get SO MUCH character work into smut just by how the characters are connecting.

My absolute favourite is the tension got to much and we HAD to break smut, because there is so much gooey deliciousness I absolutely do not write in the mornings after, where the sex comes easy but the feelings are locked behind a dozen doors.

All my smut tends to involve tentacles or some version of fuckery. The last time I wrote fic that just had a standard dick I think I struggled! XD

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Does roleplay in the DBCA mansion count? Not really, though Nails kind of crosses over with Round the Twist. I'd love to write a PacRim crossover someday though.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Doubt it, though I've never really looked and it wouldn't surprise me if some dickhead scraped my fic for AI.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! I've had a couple of fans translate one or two of my Megamind fics into Russian.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Not yet, though I think I'd like to. Dal and I have bounced ideas back and forth a few times and I did scoop and drop all of our Megamind accidentally swears a bluestreak in front of Roxanne but she just laughs at him idea into a google doc that i wil someday get around to opening.

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

Just one? I mean my ship is more of a theme of dramatic bastard in a big cape and the equally dramatic person constantly needling them back. Ideal OTP is Rick/Evey from The Mummy

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

I really REALLY want to write the florist/tattoo parlour Megarox fic but I have literally no idea what to do with it so it will remain a collection of unrelated scenes forever probably, alas.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue. I love writing exchanges between people, especially when they get to be snarky with each other. I feel like I'm pretty good at smut but everyone's mileage varies on that one.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Action scenes. I hate them, I'll take any opportunity to avoid writing fight scenes.

I'm also a wordy fucking bitch so I take forever to get to scenes that readers are begging for if I feel like the story isn't there yet.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I'm not bilingual so its something I would need to do with a translator and probably would't flow well.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Star Wars. I wanted to impress Grand Admiral Thrawn SO MUCH as a nine year old (still do tbh)

20. Favourite fic you’ve ever written?

Ahaha it changes depending on which one I'm working on. Topsy is up there but Ricochet, Recoil, Rebound is one I can always go back to with joy.

Tagging: @nientedal, @owlinabasket, @wendy-daahling

#thanks for the tag!#ask meme

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fireandiceland · 1 year

Text

Fic Writer Questions

Thanks for tagging me @kitaychan 🧡

1.) How many works do you have on AO3

2.) What’s your total AO3 count?

82,884

3.) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

as of now I'm only writing for hetalia, but there's a couple of short drabbles on my abandoned marvel blog and some unposted sherlock stuff 👀

4.) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. Say it. (rusame) and the nsfw drabble collection are on the same count rn

2. a visitor. (rusame)

3. How'd I ever get so lost? (pruk)

4. Let's get this over with, shall we? (prukden)

5. Unwinding Mr. Kirkland (mint chocolate - england x 2p america)

5.) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Ohh that's easy, Just once, before it's too late. I really put my everything into this. 💔

6.) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

That would be my 5 times crack fic. It's really cute and I still love the last chapter. 🥰

7.) Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you’ve written?

I'm not interested in crossovers at all so I haven't written any.

8.) Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes, that's most of what I write and it's whatever I find hot. 😅 I cannot write porn if it's not something I think would be sexy cause I know it won't come out good and I take pride and writing good smut. Other than that I don't really have a preference for which kind of gender/sex to write. If I care enough about a character there will eventually be a nsfw scenario featuring them on my mind :)

9.) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I usually do, because it makes me happy when someone takes the time to comment on my fics and I want them to know 💜

10.) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Luckily, no. ✌

11.) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Again, luckily, no. ✌

12.) Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but I'd be lying if I said I never thought about writing a fic in english and a translation in my native language just for fun.

13.) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No, but I will hopefully one day turn a rp between maryeve and me into a fic so I guess that would count?

14.) What’s your all time favorite ship?

It changes a lot but rn I love CanRus, nyo america x england, SuFin x DenNor, and FrUsUk. 💕

15.) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but you don’t think you ever will?

The unposted frying pangle smut from my google docs. I started writing it about two years ago and haven't looked at it in more than a year. By now I'd probably hate it so much I'd have to rewrite the whole thing.. 😶

16.) What are your writing strengths?

I have been told I'm good with (dramatic) character introductions and setting the mood. I always get these super detailed images in my head and then I try to convey those feelings and pictures into words and I'd say I'm doing very well with that. ✨🔥

17.) What are your writing weaknesses?

Plot, planning things ahead, and actually posting the stuff I do finish. 💀

18.) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in fic?

I like it when it's just single words that are not plot relevant (like greetings and short exclamations that can be made sense of in the context), but you will never find me writing entire paragraphs in a different language just to make you scroll to the end of a fic multiple times throughout a chapter so you can look for a translation (sorry if I sound like bitch here but I hate having my reading flow interrupted rip)

19.) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Sherlock (BBC) I think there's still one of the fics on my ancient instagram lol

20.) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

This is easier to answer than I thought when I first read through these questions, but it's definitely Unwinding Mr. Kirkland. I spent months editing it until I was happy with it and I love it I love every last sentence I wrote there. 💖

Tagging:

@breitzbachbea @mpregfrance @alifeasvivid (no pressure as always 😚)

#tag game #about me #riva.psnl

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severusish · 2 years

Note

I’m about to start working on a story and was wondering if you’d like to give some wise-ish words of encouragement 👀😌

HELLOOOO. YOU do not need MY encouragement because anything you write will be ABSOLUTE FIRE.

But in all seriousness; find a good beta reader. I nominate myself because I’m *tee hee* *tucks my hair behind my ear* *flutters eyelashes* humble af. However that is important.

And…

NEXT, I suggest you write your story on an auto-saving program such as Google Docs.

AND THEN — just write. I think the best advice is just to do whatever feels right for you. I think a lot of people try to prescribe a process but there’s not really a good one. However what has always worked for me is to visualize the scenes I know *have to be* in the story, and then write those first. It could be dialogue or something as simple as a landscape description. And then I write all of the key scenes I know I want to put in the story, and fill the gaps in between and then the story comes together like some kind of Frankensteinesque creation — and along the way I sometimes discover things about the story and the characters!

Another good place to start is with action, however small. Have something happen. Maybe the character is walking, or sleeping, or writing, but they are either doing something or something is happening to them. Maybe the story starts with the snow softly falling on the countryside or a dramatic thunderstorm. Or an absolutely calm morning, completely uneventful and peaceful. Even calm is something happening in a story.

And then I guess just…. Word barf. Onto the page. Just write and don’t think about making it too perfect, fix that shit later or have your beta do it.

Post ideas on tumblr for feedback sometimes if you have doubts and The Snapedom shall arise to give thoughts. 😌

Otherwise I’d say just write the story you’d want to read; that usually goes well.

YOU GOT THIS SEPH

Go forth and crush it 💚

— ish

#adviceish #pro snape #YOU GOT THIS #severusish says #snape community #snape defender #severus snape #snolidarity #snape #snover #snoyalty #severusish asks #snapedom

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cto10121 · 2 years

Text

west side story (2021) review, the good, the bad, and the ugly. let’s go, daddy-o. spoilers, of course

the good:

dramatically, much more satisfying than the 1961 movie. the sharks and the jets were appropriately very rough. riff especially was terrific. miss the balletic elegance of the original bernardo (george chakiris) something awful, but the acting overall was much more improved.

the song order made musical and dramatic sense!!! thank goodness, that i was the most worried about. “i feel pretty” was in its original broadway placement, but it wasn’t too bad (could have done a better lead-in, though). i would have much preferred the film placement. i liked the conceit of the gun play in “cool,” but i still love the swing and robbins dance of the original, can’t be beat.

the lovers!!! their chemistry!!! much better than the ‘61 movie (the height difference helps a lot, muah).

“i have forgotten why i called you.” “let me stay here till you’ve remembered it.” be still, my shakespearean heart. points to the screenwriter

ansel engort as tony. it’s too bad he’s cancelled, because he was much better overall than beymer. i actually found him a better actor than rachel zegler, though not a better singer. they gave him a backstory about how he almost killed a PR, landed him in jail, and that’s how he turned his back on that street life. great. it was affecting. it was “whoop, tripped on your dick”-able. actually first time i noticed engort was fuckable. he was very meh in “the fault of our stars.”

rachel zegler as maria. i should have known they would have not have fucked around with casting maria, because the role is not fuck-aroundable. they pulled through this time. she did lovely vocally, and her acting was solid. still not as beautifully as the maria from the houston grand opera production i saw (teared up her “somewhere,” it was so beautiful), but she looked the part and she was just lovely overall.

did i forget to mention riff? freakin’ RIFF. terrific. had good chemistry with tony too (though with pure shipping fodder for the tumblr crowd. i know you lot well by now, don’t lie).

they actually got a vocal coach for the puerto rican accent! kind of extra, but nice. that said, you can tell the original actors’ spanish is different from the borriqueño accent, and it was kind of put on.

at the end they bore a dead tony away in the exact same way they bore mercutio and tybalt off in french retj. no, seriously! i know i’m a dumb fangirl about retj, but it did make me wonder…

i liked rita moreno’s character background as the widow of doc. nice touch with the white/hispanic interracial romance parallel

lt. schrank and krupke were well-played. i was actually impressed by schrank in the scene when he’s interrogating maria and anita on chino and shows that he knows spanish. it was good writing.

the fighting really was visceral. i was genuinely like “holy shit” the whole time i was watching. ditto for the rape scene. when i first watched the ‘61 version, i actually didn’t caught on that it was supposed to be an attempted rape scene (i was a kid tho) so anita getting angry and lying that maria was dead made little sense. here it did, so props

the tonight quartet was done much better than in the ‘61 version. could have done without the fade out on anita, though.

the bad:

the dialogue for the meeting scene, the balcony scene (somewhat) and the “one hand, one heart” scene was…not great. actually inferior to the movie/stage dialogue. movie just didn’t romance good overall. actors had to do a lot of work pulling it off

maria laughing at tony trying to speak spanish to her (“yo quiero estar contigo para siempre”). it was fine on literally the first try, it was cute!!! i was personally beaming. his scene with valentina/rita moreno teaching him spanish was funny. it felt mean

actually the dialogue in general. some of it was strong and impactful, but that first scene before the jets song ran way too long. there was clearly some meta attempts to justify the existence of a white ethnic gang

and oh, that borrinqueño song the sharks sang when they left was just awful. scrub it off my memory, please.

the music and arrangements were not…bad, per se. it’s just…the orchestra was bigger in both the ‘61 and the leonard bernstein version with kiri te kanawa and josé carreras. i could have sworn gustavo dudamel had a bigger orchestra than this

some of the presentation of the songs was uneven. the jet song was weak, “america” started weak and ended strong. you get the idea

i feel ariana debose didn’t do as great as anita as rita moreno (don’t know about chita rivera, never saw her act it). it may be the writing, though. anita is supposed to be a character eager to be american, speaking mostly english, losing her accent, etc. bernardo and the sharks is supposed to be ones who are like fuck the whites!!! it doesn’t really come across like that, though, which leads me to:

the america lyrics. they kept the boy-girl version, great! they replaced anita’s beginning (“puerto rico / my heart’s devotion / let it sink back in the ocean” or even “puerto rico / you ugly island / island of tropic diseases”) for “puerto rico / you lovely island” which is supposed to be one of the shark girls’ intro!!! and then of course the censoring of “and the bullets flying” to “and the people trying” (and not sung by anita). it makes no sense for anita to start singing about how great puerto rico is and then how she prefers to be in america (???). made no sense whatsoever

spielberg must have been allergic to fantasy sequences, because he just…didn’t do them. even though they are written in the show. the transition from maria twirling to the dance of the gym was cut—i know it looked weird in the ‘61 movie, but it was the sixties! editing and special effects were not that great. now we do know how to edit better, why not use it? also, the maria cha-cha/meeting scene should definitely had been a fantasy sequence. the meeting behind the bleachers thing was just cringe. and again the dialogue (“you don’t like to dance?” “i don’t. i do. i like to dance now.” just say “i do now” dude. compress it!!).

also, (i will die on this hill): “gee officer krupke” should have 100% been a fantasy sequence and it is just. never been done as one. it’s perfectly fine and witty on stage, but on film you’re just seeing a bunch of street-hardened kids doing costume theater…yeah, it’s just awkward. it didn’t help matters that it was not as expressive or as fun or even as impactful as the ‘61 version. also the ‘61 version had a better lead-in

did not appreciate the loss of the robbins choreography, especially in the rumble and prologue. just because idiots call it too gay for tough gangsters doesn’t mean it wasn’t the best. goddamn. thing. in the original ‘61 version they looked like panthers on the prowl, sinuous and deadly.

did not like how the mambo dance was interrupted by plot. especially since it began so well with the blues and the tension of the promenade!!! the mambo also was not a true mambo or even fully latin—it’s a hybridized dance with latin and jazz elements. so anita calling for it was stupid and cringe (both sides originally called for a dance-off), and them not showcasing the dancing skills of the jets (really missed russ tamblyn’s tumbling!!! it was so badass).

the jets girls being non-entities for most of the movie until anita’s rape scene when they almost randomly try to help her just after racially abusing her. because we can’t let the audience think that the movie thinks rape isn’t wrong!!! what would the twitter discourse say???? ay ay ay

the ugly:

the swaths of spanish, mostly untranslated, without subtitles. -.- i’m a bilingual latina, watched it with my first generation colombian dad who saw the ‘61 version in the theaters and it threw us off. imagine how the monolinguals must feel—hell, just the people who don’t speak spanish!!! west side story is not a “puerto rican/hispanic” thing, it’s a worldwide phenomenon. it’s limiting and exclusive when it shouldn’t be. no mames

GIVING “SOMEWHERE” TO RITA MORENO

NO, SERIOUSLY, “SOMEWHERE” SUNG BY RITA FREAKIN’ MORENO. i was so pissed, and i mean glaring-at-the-screen pissed. wtf, movie???? what the fuck was wrong with the duet of the ‘61? with even the disembodied voice of the broadway musical? what did “somewhere” do that made you hate it so much????? and no, rita moreno did not do a good job singing it she was weak asf. shit, i thought it was a trailer thing. did not expect to be blindsided by this shit. crass move

also cutting the somewhere reprise at the ending scene for “one hand, one heart.” no. just no.

also rita moreno was overall weak in this. it’s true. sorry not sorry. she could have made a good cameo, but they just stuck her where she didn’t need to be, including the even lamer ending of leading chino to the police. the worst was during “something’s coming” with tony singing directly at her. cringe

“something’s coming” was overall botched. the whole tony and riff dialogue was good, if overly long, but riff didn’t even persuade tony to come to the dance!!! so tony singing about “something’s coming” came out of nowhere—what is he looking forward to tonight? and then he just appears at the dance. i’m guessing they tried to make the song about him slowly coming around to the idea??? didn’t work imo

the jets were never the heroes of west side story. they were consistently shown as the aggressors or at least the most racist most of the time in the stage and in the movie. but this movie tips them almost into villain territory while the sharks have a (totally unbelievable) scene trying persuading chino not to kill tony. the original movie struck a better balance, though mostly its point was not about which side is more racist, it was about the dangers of tribal mentality and us vs. them racism. the jets are also abused by racial slurs by lt. schrank and krupke in the original ‘61—this movie only keeps the “polack” comment by bernardo. there are no more white ethnic gangs, though, so the racism towards them wouldn’t ring true for today’s audiences. but let’s face it, west side story is a period piece, and it’s still set in the ‘50s here.

tony and maria in the subway arguing about which side is more racist (?) and trying to justify their own people. no. they are not supposed to care about all of that. especially this tony, who is protective of and grateful to valentina and stood up for her against riff. he even learns spanish for her!!! it rang untrue. also maria felt more resistant somehow to tony

the thematic shift altogether. the original musical and movie had a simplistic and cheesy “love not hate” theme, but y’know, can’t argue with that. here it honestly felt as if the movie accepted the racism (?) as de facto and tony and maria as mere casualties of a long war. also there’s valentina’s “life is more important than love” warning to tony (??) which is much more riddling. first of all, you can’t really say the lovers gave their lives for love as r&j did. tony’s death was very much feud-related, just precipitated by the thought of maria dying. maria didn’t die at all. the warning doesn’t apply here. i guess it might have just been an attempt on valentina’s part to keep tony from assisted suicide and no real thematic meta statement, but still. also, this is a movie where two gangs actively try to kill life and hold no love for each other. i think we all know what is the bigger problem here.

the close ups. few and far-between for the most part, but some felt claustrophobic, not intimate, and in some cases just lazy. spielsburg just plopped the camera down in front of maria and anita during “a boy like that” and had them sing-talk to each other. i call it the les misérables school of the most literal talk-singing ever.

tony fighting back and beating up bernardo before realizing what he is doing and riff taking over. no. for one thing, it made the point where tony finally snaps and kills bernardo far less meaningful. we know tony has a rough past and is capable of defending himself—he is just smart (and de facto traumatized) in turning away from that life. it would have been far better to have made riff snap from seeing tony being beat up and fight bernardo with a weapon.

in sum: the movie did work best as a movie, which is more than i can say for other musical movies minus chicago. spielberg was helped by the fact that wss was dramatic and heavy already thanks to its r&j roots, but some of his adaptational decisions were questionable. and while competitive with the ‘61 movie in many ways, i don’t think it was artistically better than even the bernstein operatic version. musically and vocally it was solid, but the truncated jerome robbins was keenly felt. you could feel his ghost bristling at parts—the dancers did well enough, but that obsessive, gravity-defying perfectionism and keen eye for detail…nah. done on purpose, i know, but it burns me, because if there is one thing the americans have managed to retain, it’s good dancing and choreography. they brought in gustavo dudamel but did not give him a big orchestra; the weakest arrangements were for the swing/jazz pieces. understandable, but it makes my heart burn. that’s my fannish heart talking—but honestly, yeah. in many ways this is an improvement.

#west side story #cristina reviews #that somewhere gaffe was unforgivable but it was overall good #all in all would watch again #i probably should

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introvertguide · 3 years

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American Outlaw Movie Heroes

Our current AFI movie is the tale of Bonnie and Clyde (1967), and re-watching it made me think of all the great movies with real bandits and outlaws as the main protagonists. I thought I would make some quick recommendations for some movies that the group might want to check out. A little bit of a spoiler warning since the lives of these criminals are the plots of the movies.

Dillinger (1945)

There was no such thing as a film biography at the time this movie was put out, but it was a gritty retelling of the news stories less than 10 years after the actual death of John Dillinger. It is the black-and-white, Old Hollywood version of an A&E Biography and an example of true crime re-enactment. The movie really moves covering all of the crimes from his first crime of convenience to pay for a dinner date to his last gunfight outside of a theater. A lot of blood and action is implied because of the Hays Code, but it is still a very good film.

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Trying not to spoil this one is a little difficult since the full review is in the works as mentioned above. The movie does follow the actual crimes of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker from the time they first meet to the time of their death. The movie does dramatize the strained relationship of Bonnie and the rest of the gang as well as combining two Barrow Gang members into one character in the movie, but it seems to be otherwise pretty accurate. This is another film that was made relatively soon after the actual crime spree (about 30 years from death to the start of film production) giving the film a realistic feel.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

This is a film that was already reviewed by the group, but well worth a second watch (or more for that matter). It is the highly stylized and romanticized story of Butch Cassidy, Harry Longabaugh, and Etta Place. The film has long comedic montages as well as witty dialogue that would not have occurred at the time. It even has a pleasant little music video in the middle of the film for "Rain Drops Keep Fallin On My Head." The names, dates, and locations are very accurate, but dialogue is much more for fun. Very enjoyable film.

The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976)

This one doesn't completely count because it is not really a hard and fast true story, but it is a great movie and it is based on the story of a Confederate guerilla fighter named Bill Wilson. He was a man from Missouri who was associated with the Quantrill Raiders. Bill became known as "The Great Bushwacker" because he would ambush Union soldiers and sell the horses and supplies to the Confederates. He moved around Texas and Missouri with his Native American wife after the war and the movie basically speculates on the life of a Confederate Bushwacker after the end of the Civil War. It is a fun note that, in the film, some bar patrons that are covering for Josey Wales refer to him as Mr. Wilson.

Tombstone (1993)

Not so much the stories of outlaws, but instead the story of vengeful lawmen that acted like outlaws. It is the story of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday versus Curly Bill Brocius and the Cowboys. The fighting between the two groups led to the very famous gunfight at the O.K. Corrall. It is the story of the escalating vengeance between outlaws and lawmen along the border of Mexico and the American Territories during the late 1800s. It is a great story based on written accounts from the time and a crime history during a time of lawlessness in the American West.

#Dillinger #Tombstone #Josey Wales #Butch Cassidy #Bonnie and Clyde #American criminals #true crime #introvert #introverts #American outlaw heroes #famous criminals

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botwstoriesandsuch · 3 years

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Sidequests are part of the story so it’s still my ballpark shut up it’s time for

Read Part 1 here!

Part 2 || Part 3

If you’re on mobile, and tumblr hates this post, follow along on this google doc!

Rules/overview this rewrite in the beginning of Part 1

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Side quests, side quests, side quests. What are they? And what are they doing here, on an Age of Calamity rewrite? I must admit, game design is not an inherent forte of mine, and I like to think that my only “expertise” would be on writing and storytelling. So what the fuck is a fool like me doing here

Well my dear ladies, lads, and gentlefolk, if your memory does serve, I did say that the format of Age of Calamity was one that served the major plot and story beats for it’s cutscenes, and its worldbuilding and good parts of it’s character development for its gameplay and side quests. It’s actually a concept that can be seen in shows and movies too, although obviously it’s origins are in TTRPGs and videogames. Definition wise, a side quest is any deviation from the main story and plot that serves to flesh out an optional/overseen aspect of the game. So there’s out perfect outlet for worldbuilding, characters, and even a bit of humour. Side quests, by definition, can’t simply be just XP grinders, because otherwise you could…..just make an XP grinder. It’s like saying you’re getting your kids a bike, but then you get them a stationary exercise one. Sure it’s functionally the same and gives the same benefits, but it could be so much more.

Does Age of Calamity have good side quests? I’d actually argue, yes. I mean sure, it’s not exactly gonna hold a candle to Fallout or Witcher 3, but there are great memorable side quests that do serve their purposes in this game.

A fan favourite is “The So-Called Knight,” in which Link spars Mipha, Teba, Sidon, and Revali, a conflict of the Sidon’s confidence and belief in Link, with Revali’s skepticism and grudge against him. Not only is it great fandom content, but it explores the carrying POVs of several characters in a fun way. We also have Hestu’s Dance Competition, and the Miss Vai Battle Pageant. What they lack in serious character tone, they make up for in humour and world building. Even the quests that have nothing to do with the main cast of characters, like the Questionable Escort Mission, still provide funny and interesting details about the world, like how the Yiga Clan is still ever persistent in trying to take down Link with monsters and Windcleavers alike.

It’s not like those side quests were functionally useless either, all of them still provided great amounts of exp and materials. What specifically made them great and memorable was their small little stories and character/world details. Of course, that’s not to say you can’t have the occasional plotless boss rush every now and again, those are fun in their own right and it’s good to have variety. But just thinking about it...what were everyone’s least favourite sidequests? The timed Yiga Escape? The ones where you sit around defending strongholds? The one hit death Hair-Width Trials? Ah...so all the least enjoyable side quests were the ones that were difficult, with no enjoyable character or worldbuilding to back it up….interesting interesting….interesting pattern indeed.

So, let’s improve the game a bit further. I do need to pace out my future character arcs somehow. I tried to make use of the existing quests where I could, but it’s just eaaaasier to just not think about it and do it from scratch. Just shove these in place of all those quests whose only description is “monsters have been spotted here! Take Mipha and go to work!” and stuff like that. Alrighty then! Here’s my take on cool side quests for every single character thus far, along with their paired gambit attacks. Prepare for heists! Drama! Simping! And Bananas!

Link: Mastering Stasis

Ok I have no idea when this quest unlocks so just for my purposes assume this only becomes available after Link pulls the Master Sword.

Engage the hordes of monsters that have been spotted in Hyrule Field. Now is a great time to master the use of the Stasis Rune. Impa and Zelda accompany you, but it seems stasised monsters aren’t the only thing coming to a tense standstill…

This isn’t anything that special, I just want to further highlight this tension that Zelda and Link have, as it’s something touched upon in Botw, but never really mentioned or used ever in Hwaoc. Now more than ever, Zelda has an excuse to have a rocky relationship with him because she could actively see just how far he’s coming in such a short amount of time. Classic “he probably hates me so I guess I’ll hate him” thing.

You play as Link, the game gives you your little prompts on how to use Stasis, you take out a few hordes of Bokoblins and blah blah blah. I wanted to use an earlier level to establish Zelda’s relationship sooner as obviously it’s gonna be important to the story. But of course like all side quests it won’t kill you to skip out. Text dialogue can be Zelda saying science shit like “This will be a good opportunity to test out the full limits of the Stasis rune” and then Impa’s all “Yep! We got your back, Princess! We’ll clear out these monsters in no time.”Then Link the little angsty shit that he is says nothing, and as you play you clear out more and more bokoblins Zelda just says “...” and then we can toss in a Moblin or two in there for gambit voice stuff.

Gambit dialogue with Impa would be supportive, her usual spunky dialogue. I had two ideas for Gambit attacks with Link: One where Impa does that thing where she cuts a giant laser through the air, but it’s aimed towards Link and he parries it right in a monster’s FACE because I think it’s badass and also a good way to show trust and stuff. The second thing was Impa’s giant bomb barrels, but Link is the one to somehow ignite them, because he is an arsonist after all. He can even have a chaotic Sheikah blue glint in his eyes like blue flame, I can already picture it so clearly given how anime/dramatic Impa’s movements are. Impa sets bombs, Link *teleports behind Moblin* nothin personal, kid.

Also right at the end of their gambit attacks, Impa and Link should try to fist bump or something (cause the whole “cool guys don’t look at explosions” thing that Impa usually does on her own) but are interrupted by eggbot jumping up to try and join in. And then Impa can be annoyed and try to punt it or something. That’s not just self-indulgent that’s in her character she totally would and I want to make use of the fact that eggbot travels around with Link. The success of her attempts to punt him can vary.

If Link does a gambit with Zelda, her dialogue can just be her usual monotone Princess stuff, “Thanks for lending your strength,” or “There is still much more to do!” just purely professional, we’re not at a stage yet where she’s buddy buddy with Link. Their gambit attacks can still be cool though. One idea I had was Zelda using stasis, and you know how when you use it in botw everything lights up with that sonar effect? So Link stands besides Zelda, and she activates stasis, the first “sonar” light wave reveals the stasised monster, and you see it from the view of the Sheikah Slate. Then with each additional flash of sonar you just see this silhouette of Link going absolute ham on a monster. And then when the stasis “ding ding ding ding ding” is done, everything’s just dead. Can you see my inspiration from Persona 5 yet? Second idea was Zelda using cryonis and makes an ice ramp for Link to shield surf on and ram into a monster. For entertainment purposes Zelda should also be putting frogs on said slide. (Also also the reason I’m putting Link as the main focus for those gambit attacks is because I want to juxtapose it with future gambits where Zelda may or may not be more powerful…)

Anyhow anyhow, so this side quest, you beat some bokoblins, theres a moblin or two. However as you progress Zelda’s dialogue because a bit more passive aggressive, maybe Zelda can be a bit irritated at how quickly Link is defeating everything before she can even contribute. Impa can comment on this like “She hasn’t exactly been warming up to you, has she…” and then the last point of the side quest, Zelda runs off, there’s a...let’s say a big horde of blue or black Moblins. Or a horde of Wizzrobes, I’m not too picky on it. Link can save her and do a gambit or whatever, but the point of importance is that Zelda leaves with the clear mindset off, “You don’t need to keep coddling me, I can handle my own” to Link, but is “Thank you, I’m glad you’re here,” to Impa.

Now I stole was inspired to use this based on this comic by @novellanova, and you should check it out here. But basically, at the end when all the monsters are dead and the last few text boxes are rolling, Impa says something like “Gee, at this rate I might have to protect you from the princess! Hmm…. you know, maybe if you two had the opportunity to hang out more and get to know each other, she’d warm up to you! Ha! That’s it! I’ve made up my mind. Listen up Link, from now on I’m gonna let you man the wheel when it comes to protecting Zelda. So with me out of the picture you better take the opportunity to be the nicest, most helpful, and most effective body guard there is. I know you already are, but still, if I hear that one little Chuchu so much as splat in her direction I will take you down...got it?” And, that’s that.

Side quest done. Fun Link gambits with Impa and Zelda, some little character POVs on the situation, plus an explanation as to why Impa doesn’t accompany Zelda everywhere/nods to the cutscenes of Botw as to what happened to Impa. Alright, that was probably the most boring one so let’s move on to

Daruk: A Rumbling Stomach

Alright I’ll be honest...I have no idea what to do with Daruk. Especially when Yunobo’s not here, I got zip-zero to work with considering his character is non-existent. Further down the line I’ll certainly try to give him more nuances and the like, but I’m afraid the majority of my character efforts have been towards Astor, Revali, Zelda, and [REDACTED] so this is my apology ahead of time, rock fuckers.

This is my take on how to make those timed quests more fun. So basically, the premise of this stage is that Daruk was just happily hanging around trying to enjoy his rock roast, when a monster surprised him and he dropped it, and now it’s rolling down the hill. This is based on my real Breath of the Wild experience where I had to trek up that Volcano path to bring a rock roast for that shrine quest, but at the very top I dropped it and had to chase it down before it fell into the lava below.

Daruk is eager to chow down on the finest rock roasts this year has to offer! It’s too bad things go downhill when monsters start to ambush. Defeat key enemies and rescue Daruk’s tumbling meal before this year’s wait goes to waste!

So, that’s what this is. The stage opens and Daruk says “NOOooOO! My rock roast! Damn monsters!” and you have to defeat baddies and catch up to the rock roast before the timer runs out and it falls into lava. And then when you finish and get back the rock roast that’s pretty much it….except SIKE no it’s not. Because a lot of these timed quests usually have a “surprise! There’s more!” thing at the end so I’ll do that here too. So Daruk has saved his rock roast and he’s talking about how he’s going to enjoy it in all its deliciousness, when he’s cut off by a random Goron’s scream. Turns out, Daruk’s yelling at the monsters about desperation to retrieve his lost lunch has attracted monsters to some traveling civilians, and now you gotta go beat a Talus, or a couple of Moblins, or something...Again I don’t really have level set or idea when these side quests unlock so just use your imagination. Once Daruk defeats the monster(s) the Gorons can thank him, and then one of the Goron kids can be like “Ooo! Is that a super special rock roast?!?” And Daruk is all: “Ah! Well all the best Goron heroes eat plenty of rocks! This here is the gourmet stuff. You can only get it once a—” And the kid’s like “Woah! I’ve always wanted to have one, that’s why I’ve been training hard so I can explore more of the mountain. Where’d you get it??” And Daruk can sputter a bit, before finally sighing and giving into his instincts. “Ah….well, why don’t you have it? You’re probably really hungry after running around with those monsters…”

“Woah really?? Are you sure—”

“YEAH JUST TAKE IT ALREADY GO”

“Woah, thank you!” and then the Goron kid and co run off. Cue Daruk crying to himself in the background. Daruk may have an appetite, but I like to characterize him as the Goron Hero first and foremost.

I’m sure that doesn’t stop him from mourning his rock though.

Mipha: Stronger Sentiments

Mipha and Daruk talked a whole bunch about training together so that Mipha can grow stronger, and Daruk was catching on to her crush on Link and it was a nice interaction in between them except for the fact that we never see them do the damn training so that’s what this is.

I think this is as good an opportunity as any to make this a Hair-Width quest, the ones where you can’t take one hit. The difficulty of a level is one of the most effective ways to put the players in the boots of a character to experience the same struggles they do. If the player works hard, then they automatically associate that with the character working hard. So, yeah, let’s have Mipha kicking ass and working to be strong enough to protect Link.

Mipha is determined to grow stronger. Daruk and the other Gorons are helping out with an intense training session by Gut Check Rock. Prove yourself by defeating all the enemies you encounter!

So Mipha is sparring with the Gorons, you fight through them and the captains and blah blah, the final boss is fighting Daruk without getting hit.

“I promise not to hurt you more than I’m capable of reversing.”

“Ha! Give me all you’ve got, princess!”

You fight, cue the special music or whatever. I mentioned that gambit dialogue/attacks could also work to be custom for the character that you’re fighting, so I’m thinking something like this. Daruk slams the ground and rocks and magma sprout up around him like jagged pieces of glass, but Mipha is no where to be seen. Daruk’s kinda huffing and puffing, “Where’d you go Mipha…” and then FWOOSH, giant geyser right behind him. [yes I KNOW I overuse the *teleports behind you* “nothing personal, kid” thing but I think it’s COOL and you can’t stop me] So anyhow, you know that thing in Avatar where Pakku is just riding at the top of a whirlpool and destroying everything? That’s Mipha.

Daruk turns around and scratches the back of his head. “...huh….that’s not good.” Cue Mipha swooping down to deal the defeating blow.

So Mipha wins, she can mention how wonderful it was and how much stronger she feels. And she can thank Daruk, and he’s all “No problem!” but he mutters something like “And I thought Gorons hit hard...now I know how Link feels.” End side quest….SIKE it’s another surprise boss at the end. A Goron captain suddenly reports that an Igneo Talus has appeared nearby.

Mipha goes up to fight it, but wow! Link is already there. They both fight it, but it’s clear that Link didn’t need her help that much. You can defeat the Talus with a Mipha/Link gambit. It’s similar to Link’s usual “swing sword in a giant circle and become a death windmill” but Mipha kinda enhances it with water or something and it puts out the Talus. I wanted this ending with a focus on how strong Link is just to show that while Mipha is improving, she’s still not yet where she needs to be.

Daruk: “Sorry I wasn’t much help at the end there, I was busy, uh, stretching.”

Mipha: “Oh it’s quite alright, Daruk. We were both quite tired from today’s training.”

Daruk: “Well I dunno about that...seems to me you were quite lively and active as you fought beside Link. *wink*”

Mipha: “Huh!?!? W-What is that supposed to mean??”

Cue laughter from Daruk. Mipha is flustered. And Link is just...confused, as always.

Urbosa: Mighty Thunder of the Gerudo

So in the game this is just some normal outpost capturing, stronghold defending side quest, but we’re gonna spice it up just a bit.

An important excavation site is being overrun by monsters, and Urbosa has set out to engage them. Defend and capture the outposts, in order to prevent this valuable place from falling into enemy hands…

So you fight as Urbosa, defeat some enemies and blah blah. When you first arrive there, I want one of the Gerudo Captains to be like “Lady Urbosa? Where did you come—What are you doing here? Aren’t there areas of greater importance for you to be at right now?” Urbosa says something like “Nevermind that now, let us focus on achieving victory over these rotten beasts.”

As the battle goes through, it is revealed that this excavation site is where Zelda’s mother would often work and hang out with Urbosa. Urbosa says some stuff like “Her Majesty would not be happy to see all these monsters heading here!” *decapitates Moblin* and then she can say other dramatic stuff at the end like “We have fought well...for her memory” and other classic lesbian pining. Some guard at the end can say “Perhaps you should move on and help out somewhere else, Lady Urbosa. We can handle the clean up from here.”

“Sure,” Urbosa replies, “Just another moment.” And then cue reminiscing. “She always did love these machines…”

And just other sentimental stuff like that. If you’re gonna be a coward and hold out on the Champion death angst, then you best be pumping that angst and emotion from somewhere, you know?

Also yay for worldbuilding! At least in my rewrite, the Guardian excavations and stuff were overseen by the Queen. Could be a reason Zelda hangs out with Sheikah tech so much...who knows who knows... who knows what other implications this has, it’s just a side quest after all.

Revali: Anti-Ice Training [get it??? Cause in this one, Revali’s gonna break the ice with some other characters?? I’m funny I swear]

Ok so for this one, I want to pull Revali’s character away from just “the birb that doesn’t like Link” and give him some other stuff to stand on. Obviously, there would be other side quests in a fully fleshed out game that did even more to characterize him, but for my rewrite I’m only dedicated this post and one other future post to sidequests, so I gotta really bring out what I can for the few side quest stories I have time to tell

Revali sets out alone to deal with some monsters by the Hebra trail. Although intended as an isolated moment to hone his skills, he finds himself with unexpected company. Defeat key enemies.

So you play as Revali and at first you’re alone, taking out Ice Lizalfos and the like. Revali’s text dialogue can say stuff like “Hmm...not fast enough” “My current needs to be stronger” “*mutters* Can’t compete with lightning and magma with aim like that.” Just stuff that establishes that he’s working hard to really prove himself as the best, but is still a bit insecure about his position. He thinks he’s better than Link, sure, and he certainly thinks that being a princess or a chief doesn’t automatically make you the best. However by this point, Revali has battled alongside the other Champions and seen their skill in battle, and has developed some respect for them. Afterall, Champions were chosen in some part for their skills, unlike Link or Zelda who destiny just thrust greatness upon.

So Revali has this slight insecurity that compared to lightning, and magic healing, and magma, with chiefs and princesses and titles of heroes, he and his efforts will be overshadowed and forgotten, unfairly deemed the useless one. Thus, here he is, training in solitude, not wanting anyone to see the imperfections and mistakes until he is absolutely perfect.

Except for the fact that after you beat a Wizzrobe, the other three Champions show up.

Revali: Wh—Huh?? What are you all doing here?

Urbosa: Well, we all have to travel with the princess to that Tower in a few hours, so I recommended we find you and hang out until then

Mipha: And a good thing too! Look how many monsters there are

Revali: I’m actually doing very well on my own right now. Wouldn’t want you to catch a cold or something, so why don’t you head on back and let me handle this.

Daruk: Aw, it’s not that we think you can’t do this. It’s that you’re hogging all the fun! Urbosa: And that it would be more efficient if all of us went to work

Daruk: That too

Revali: Look it’s not—you all can’t just—this is not just about—AUGH, look, I’m just trying to train myself at the moment, and I don’t need you all to mess with my drills

Urbosa: Training, hm? Well how about this...you let us continue helping you with these monsters, and after, I’ll let you in on a good Gerudo training technique

Revali: Hmph. Fine, whatever gets you out of my tail feathers faster

So Revali and the Champions clear out the monsters. Revali can have gambit attacks/dialogue with each of the other Champions. This is already incredibly long so perhaps I’ll save specifics for another time, feel free to use your imagination. Urbosa teasing Revali and they make a thunderstorm, Mipha and Revali swimming in the sky and kissing—wait that’s—

When all the monsters are cleared, which honestly isn’t tooooo many, Revali speaks again.

Revali: So what’s this oh-so-holy technique you had in mind, then?

Urbosa: Ah yes, well really it’s quite simple. It’s called…

Urbosa: One-on-one combat

Now Revali fights Urbosa. It think it’d be really fun if your allies on a stage could swap to a boss, and I wish hwaoc had a bit more freedom with the interactions as a whole, but ah well, that’s what I’m here for I guess.

So when you/Revali defeat her, it’s a good accomplishment! Not only for you the player, as Urbosa would not be the easiest to beat, but also because match-up wise, Revali prevailing over Urbosa is a big feat as their styles are quite opposite, arguably with the strength in favour for Urbosa.

Revali might at first have the mindset that Urbosa is overconfident and thinks she’s got an easy win on Revali, but that mindset is quickly proven wrong when 1) the difficulty of the gameplay itself shows how they’re both doing their best and 2) Urbosa with her Gerudo qualities is probably shouting stuff like “give it your all!” and things.

And so, as you beat her...

Revali, kinda huffing and puffing, but just a bit:: ...you….held back

Urbosa: Come now, do you really think of me as someone who’d do that? I’m almost insulted.

Revali: Hmm...perhaps not then....

Mipha: Wow! What a wonderful fight from both of you.

And then insert some other dialogue from Daruk or something that shows the Champions acknowledging the training and hard work Revali must have put in to be so skilled. Perhaps it’s not so bad, when you train with others and your skill is fully appreciated by your frie—GAH. Perish the thought, they’re all just a bunch of royal fools who can’t hold a candle to the skill of a Rito Master….probably…

Revali: Well unlike you lax fools, I tend to take my job seriously. I don’t have time to longue and banter when the princess is still expecting me in an hour or two

Urbosa: Oh alright, let’s get to it then. What’s the expression? “The early bird gets the w—”

Revali: Gross. No. Don’t finish that sentence, I beg you.

Urbosa: Oh? Well why don’t you fly off to escape my dreadful tones then?

Revali: ...Heh, don’t be absurd…

Revali: Without me, you’ll all probably get lost. So, I suppose I should stick around for that sake Great Fairies: Dress to Oppress

The Great Fairies are holding a fashion competition and rating people’s outfits. Poorly judged outfits gives them the right to compensation combat. Defeat all your less than fashionable allies.

...

...yeah.

It seemed funny in my head, alright? cOme on, just imagine…

Revali, fully expecting to win: Well?

Great Fairies: Hm...I don’t know dear, all the colors are very clustered. Perhaps if you were taller—?

Revali: bWHAKT!? *other angry bird noises*

- - -

Daruk: I brought my BEST out today! :D

Great Fairies: Is that a….chain?

Daruk: TWO chains, actually. :D

Great Fairies: Oh honey…

- - -

Great Fairies: Ooo! Our little hero is about to come out! Wonder what he chose...a knight in shining armour? A handsome desert voe? Ooo!! And those Snowquill braids always made him look so cute…

Link: *comes out in the Tingle Outfit*

Great Fairies: …

Great Fairies: …………..hm…..

At the end of the side quest, after you beat everyone, the Great Fairy wins because of course they do.

Great Fairies: Oh my! What an unexpected outcome...but it really couldn’t have gone any other way. I declare the judges the winner! I mean just look at me, I’m as dazzling as a jeweled desert flower, because I am! Ohohohoho…

This side quests unlocks the Tingle Outfit

Hestu: Forest Dance Festival

Alright this quest was already pretty perfect, BUT, I just want to use this opportunity to say that all of Hestu’s gambit attacks makes his allies and enemies do special dances. Absolutely abSURD that Hestu can only make the lesser smaller enemies dance on occasion, nonononono, my guy Hestu is making everyone dance. You can’t stop this. Nothing I say will ever top the imagination, so just take my word that this is a good thing. [Reluctant Revali doing the macarena against his will in sync with Hestu and they bash someone’s head in...ah the possibilities.]

Maz Koshia: Links to the Past

Ok so before I get into this, a few things. This quest takes place well after the tower activations in Akkala. Age of Calamity leaves a whole lot of plots holes as to why a Monk is just...here, and what the point of the shrines are, and personally my first reaction to all this was just a five minute extended “huuhhhhhh???”

So here is my headcanon, explanation, thing, canon to the world of the Kip Cut story. Ones all the Sheikah Towers were activated, that officially woke up all the Shrines, because we know that the Towers and Shrines are all connected to the same system. [See Great Plateau Tower activating all the Shrines and Towers, and Creating a Champion explanation on the system] But when all the monks were in their little altars and noticed how Link hadn’t dont a single one, they were like “what the fuck.” Monk Maz Koshia, who is kinda the head honcho of the monks and probably the only one powerful enough to go out in the world anyhow, sets out to see what the deal is, and after many a teleportation and telepathic communication, he figures out that Link is just running around with the Master Sword already. This kinda confuses him, because the whole point of the Shrines was to test Link and give him the spirit orbs so that he could grow strong enough to get the Master Sword, but he somehow already has it...so hmmmm something fishy is going on in this timeline. So Link technically hasn’t proven himself at all, Maz Koshia ambushes him, they do their little combat trial, Link passes, and Maz Koshia’s like “ok cool so you’re not useless.”

So now Monk Maz Koshia has cast aside his old monk duties of waiting around for a couple hundred years, in favour of just hanging out with Link and continuing to train him combat wise. Shrines are still explored by Zelda and co because they are important areas to establish teleportation pads, and whenever they’re there, Maz Koshia forces Link to get in a shrine to get a spirit orb, which is not only useful in general for health, but since Link already has the Master Sword, the other characters can get the spirit orb too. (So all those little heart upgrades that you see on the map, those are all just in the real Botw Shrine locations, rather than just scattered around randomly. Also I’m ignoring the stuff about talking to Hylia in order to exchange for stamina or heart containers because the game never talks about her, or stamina, and I’m not about to create an entirely new custom gameplay feature for this game, fuck you.)

I like to think that Maz Koshia is very selective about the Shrines he encourages people to try out. “Oh nonono, don’t bother with Qukah’s….lazy ass, only set up one little mountain that you have to blast through with lightning and that’s the entire puzzle! Disgraceful...Here, Kaam Ya’tak has set up a wonderful Trial of Power for you. I’m sure you’ll find the level design quite thrilling. They spent a lot of time on the critical thinking aspects so have fun!”

“I should warn you that this one was made by one of the millennials...yes, those youngins who were only initiated 1000 years of age. Honestly, they lack so much experience. Ms. Agana over here was experimenting with something called ‘motion controls?’ Pretty lazy if you ask me. Traditionally I would just stick to combat and block and switch stuff...but ah well, variety I suppose.”

Right, what was I talking about? Oh right! This is a sidequest. So Monk Maz Koshia doesn’t really have...a character??? Or a personality??? So I don’t really know what to do with him other than use him as an outlet for world building. Apologies to the Monk….fuckers? Stans? Feel free to leave me a comment about how I missed all the nuances of his character or something I’m all ears.

On an expedition to mark more Shrines and establish more teleports for the Kingdom, a large horde of monsters is spotted, seemingly with the intention to destroy these Ancient relics. Link and Maz Koshia use this opportunity to sharpen their combat skills. Protect the stronghold and defeat key enemies.

And then that quest would just kinda echo the stuff I said earlier about the world. (As Maz Koshia defends a Shrine, somewhere Qukah Nata is smugly shouting “Bet you wish ALL of them were protected with a giant mountain now, do ya?)

Also Link and Maz Koshia’s gambit attack involves the Master Cycle. I don’t have the specifics, but damn if I want some call backs to Botw while also having fun.

Impa: Steal Yourself [Yiga Clan Escape]

In an act of pure hatred and malice, the Yiga Clan has snuck into Kakariko Village in the dead of night…and stolen all the Swift Carrots! Impa sets out to get them back, as well as taking something else as a form of swift revenge...Escape before the time runs out.

Ok I can explain.

So you know how the Yiga and the Sheikah have kiiiiinda been murdering each other a bunch in Botw, going as far as to kill a deserter’s wife and threatening to murder his kids, and also people on both sides were sorta massacred for no reason? And alsoooo one of those people who literally lived during that time of the massacre is just kinda floating around now? And you knooooooooww how the Yiga Clan just kinda joins Zelda’s side later on and we’re not supposed to think about the implications of that too hard because they’re the funny banana ninjas, haha? Yeah well neither Age of Calamity or I really have time to explore the moral grey areas of an alliance between two warring factions, one of which has a leader who doesn’t really seem to remember the reason why they hate Hyrule which brings into question whether the lackeys even know their clan’s history, and brings about the moral dilemma of criminalizing the ignorant, and also there’s the whole other dilemma of depicting the side that submitted to their oppression as being “in the right” and the topic of a race of people being pitted against their own by a higher power is really brushed over sO WE’RE JUST GONNA TOSS ALL THAT OUT THE WINDOW AND MAKE THEM ACT LIKE RIVALLING HIGH SCHOOLS, OKAY? OKAY! This is fine this is fine—

So I have dubbed the High School mascot of the Sheikah, the Swift Carrot. And although there does seem to be some internal debate about whether the carrot should be replaced by the Fortified Pumpkin, the hero of Hyrule Link favours carrots so that’s that. Then of course, the mascot for the Yiga Clan is the Mighty Banana. The two sides hate each other and steal their food symbols to be petty. I’ll be covering the side quests of Kohga and the other later characters in another later post, but just know that Kohga will have his banana heist sidequest too.

So anyhow, you play as Impa. Maybe she can say a piece of dialogue or two about how she has to uphold the image of her people as she has to lead them one day. And then, this side quest is just her retrieving the carrots and running off with the Yiga’s big banana supply before she’s caught. This is based on that “Escape the Yiga Clan” quest if you couldn’t tell.

Custom gambit defeat of Impa vs Kohga: On one hand I think it would be badass to see Impa’s Sheikah skills go up against the Yiga Clan tactics. Kohga summons a giant metal ball to throw, Impa teleports behind him “nothing personal, kid” nO fuck I’m doing it again away goes to swing a blade at his face. He blocks it with his little energy shield thing, but not before an entire conga line of Impa clones start slashing at him until he’s defeated by a giant explosion. So yeah, that’d be badass and cool. But on the other hand…

Kohga, stomping his feet and having a fit: I cARROT believe you would do something this terrible! Give us back those bananas right now! D: ….please? You can keep the gross orange sticks.

Sooga: He asked nicely. You wouldn’t deny the wishes of the most polite and charming Yiga Chief there is, would you?

Impa: No can do, Yiga scum! I’m afraid this cruel action wasn’t veggie nice of you so I must exact justice! Now it’s my time to split. *Impa clones gather and throw Kohga into a giant frog’s mouth. Impa runs off with a sack of fruit [fruit (derogatory) if you will] cackling into the horizon*

Zelda: The Path She Laid For You

The King has order Zelda to head to the Temple of Time, in order to see if anything there could help awaken her powers. Zelda sets off quietly, with minimal company, as not to attract too much attention lest the Town’s folk be hit with another attack. It seems, however, that these precautions won’t be enough...Defeat key enemies

So this is a pure Zelda sidequest, with no other characters except for eggbot because I said so. Starts out normal when SURPRISE! Bunch of monsters appear and Zelda has to whip out her iphone and fight them.

Also!! Good time for the Hollows to show up, and you know, tell her what a failure she is and all that. Convince her that she's useless and gonna doom everyone. All that good stuff!! It’s just nice to catch up with the villains and see how they’re doing, you know? ‘Sup Hollow Urbosa, last I saw you were barely spitting words in the Lost Woods, and now you’re giving full hard-hitting insults to Zelda’s character and ability? Good for you, Queen, good for you.

So Zelda and a handful of guards are fighting off monsters, and Zelda has to beat the Hollows too. Her gambit dialogue when she defeats Hollows can be stuff like “You’re not the real ___” or something idk, I don’t have a lot of experience with the evil clone trope, I’ve never played Ocarina of Time. But one specific I DO want to highlight is that Zelda uses the nearby Sheikah Tech to defeat the enemies. I find it a bit weird how Zelda just knows how to use those random water canons in the Faron region in later chapters, so we’re just gonna at least set up a pattern so that it makes a bit more sense later. Plus! This is in front of the Great Plateau, AKA Gate Post Town/Garrisons AKA oh lOOK it’s that area where Link and Impa and eggbot first meet in that Impa introduction scene of my rewrite so we have already established that Sheikah Technology is being stored here and ready to use! Continuity in world building! Nice.

So Zelda uses her knowledge of Sheikah Tech to defeat the Hollows, when...dun dun dun! Astor appears. But you don’t fight him...

Astor: Have you listened to one word spoken to you today? Why are you still resisting? Let me help you.

Zelda: And what exactly is your plan? You wish to kill me, then?

Astor: Not quite. I mean, if you do die, there are ways I can manage, so if some stray Yiga blade happens to strike you I’m not completely doomed.

Astor: But no, the most optimal outcome for everyone is the one where you live yet. You must see the truth as I do, and let me fix this. I can undo this terrible knot destiny has thread for you. [and insert other fate sisters and sewing metaphors here]

Zelda: But how? What’s your game here, if you’re truly claiming to be in everyone’s best interest then why all this secrecy?

Astor: Ah...ever the one to look for the facts and logic, hmm? Can’t blame you, you get it straight from your mother.

Zelda: …!

Astor: But...I’m afraid even if I did tell you now, you’re in no state to truly grasp it. No...the only way this works is for you to truly understand the position you're in, and the stakes that hang in the path before you.

Astor: And if I have to kill every King, Champion, or knight to get you to understand…

Astor: Then so be it.

[dun dun dun]

Zelda: No! I won’t let you hurt anyone, I swear it!

Eggbot [just pretend eggbot can have dialogue boxes too]: *chirps*

Astor, suddenly noticing eggbot: ...You…you’re one thing I still don’t—

Eggbot chirps again beside Zelda, both seeming to be angry at Astor’s words. Eggbot releases a glowing flash of light. Kinda like a...flash bang? [is that the right word idk]

Astor: Ah—! *and he teleports away to escape* Astor: Until next time then...Princess

And that’s pretty much the sidequest. Zelda can question what exactly eggbot did, but he’s not exactly the most verbal in responses. Finally it ends with Zelda going home, “He was still right though...I’m still sitting in failure, with not a hint of my powers awakening. All I have is some Sheikah tech, some exhausted shoulders….and well, you, I suppose, little one.”

“Come, it’d be a waste to continue forth in this condition. Let’s go back to the castle.”

Eggbot: *happy whistles and chirps*

= = = = =

Tune in next time folks, as we dive back into the main event! Needless to say, Chapter 4 is where the shit starts to go down...

#Hwaoc: The Kip Cut #hwaoc spoilers #hwaoc #hw aoc #hw age of calamity #age of calamity #hyrule warriors age of calamity

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thelittleredheadedmusician · 3 years

Text

I’ve been tagged by @klaineharmony and @wordshakerofgallifrey in one version of this and b @radioactivepigeons in another so I combined the 2 (there was one question difference lmao).

How many works do you have on Ao3?

146 (and like many who have done this before me, a couple are drabble collections and such)

What's your total Ao3 word count?

530,111 words which... wow.

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Oh dear GOD if I listed each individual comic series we’d be here all day. We’re gonna go with the five I know for sure off the top of my head w/ the 3 big subcategories for comics.

DCU

> Batman comics

> Teen Titans/Titans comics

> Young Justice cartoon

Newsies

Les Mis

Percy Jackson

Harry Potter

What are your top five fics by kudos?

All of these are older and Batfandom so I’m not even remotely surprised by this.

Family Gatherings Dick wakes up to a text from Bruce asking that the whole family meet at the Manor that night, causing him to stress out all day.

No Judgement Damian crashes at Jason's apartment and has to explain to Jason why.

Nursing a Sick Bird Tim loses contact with his family when he gets sick for a week, causing Dick to come and check in on him.

Bat Kid Jam Sessions All of Bruce's kids play an instrument which gives Dick Grayson and Jason Todd an idea.

Annual Wayne Enterprises Take Your Kid to Work Day Bruce has Tim, Damian, and Dick all coming to WE for the day and he's a bit nervous over what kind of mess they might make.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I do! Though I see now there’s a bunch sitting there that I haven’t yet. I’ll get to them when I’ve got more spoons. I love interacting with people and knowing what they like about my stories and writing. It makes me really really happy.

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

I don’t really write angst? I don’t think I write angst. I write a lot of ennui. So much ennui. And bittersweet endings. Donna Troy and the Outlaws may be the closest to an angsty ending cause they only get one resurrection out of a possible two? But again, it’s more bittersweet than anything.

Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve ever written?

DO I EVER. Yes. Yes I write crossovers. Mainly modern au newsies/les mis cause it just makes sense. The craziest one has to be from my main newsies/les mis series A crooked politician? Yeah but that ain't news no more where I dropped so many references in media, networking, and other things you don't learn in a lecture to Hairspray and Hamilton characters that I wrote the “shit show” of the four musicals being combined in a modern au that I alluded to (and I think I was encouraged if I remember correctly) and it’s called Cautionary Tale.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Not so much hate as someone doing what was essentially a “well, actually” on the politics in one of my Crooked Politician fics. The moral of the story is character views and emotions and blatant optimism do not directly reflect that of the author and I did study political science and know my stuff. OH! And then there’s my crowning glory of a DIFFERENT Crooked Politician fic being quoted out of context in a New York Times article. That isn’t really hate but it was certainly something.

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Haha. No.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but I welcome translations and podfics!

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes! @wordshakerofgallifrey and I cowrote Costs of Civil Disobedience as part of her Piano Man au and by that I mean were LITERALLY typing in the same doc at the same time. It was wild and amazing. From Across the Bar isn’t cowritten but is my companion to her fic Play Me A Memory. @radioactivepigeons were working on a leverage!newsies au but then we both got busy.

What's your all time favorite ship?

I? Don’t think I have one? Uh... Beatrice and Benedick from Much Ado About Nothing? Parker/Hardison/Eliot from Leverage are the ultimate ot3? I care very little about ships. If I like it, I like it. If it squicks me, it squicks me. If I don’t care, I don’t care. Sorry?

What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

Oh the Batfam Ghostbusters au. The concept is still solid but I just don’t have the motivation or know where I would go with what stands. If anything I’d strip it for parts and write it new.

What are your writing strengths?

I have been told my descriptions are really strong but personally I think that my character voices/dialogue is. Also my ability to write teenaged ennui. Any ennui. It’s a mood.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Grammar! I do weird shit with my sentence breaks and make run ons and just absolutely butcher punctuation. And balancing characters in ensembles. That’s hard.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I’m going to quote @radioactivepigeons here cause I agree with it wholeheartedly and she puts it better than I possibly can rn: “I think there needs to be a narrative purpose. Like, is it building dramatic irony? Is someone being purposefully excluded from the conversation? Is there a characterization where the linguistic difference matters?“ If the answer is no then just note it’s being said in the other language.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Actually physically wrote a story out? Batman. I wrote a “patrol report” as Batgirl to my friend as though she were Robin in middle school as part of a christmas present.

What's your favourite fic you've ever written?

Oh this is hard. Uh glitter and gold is like my love of DC characters made manifest and is absurdly long but like there’s certainly scenes I like more than others. Three Card Draw might be my favorite? I love the vibes and the little world I made and using it to work out my own thoughts about gods and magic as a stepping stone for my original stuff.

Since I think literally everyone I know in the newsies fandom has been tagged in this at some point I’m going to kick it towards the dc folks. Absolutely no pressure to do this. @audreycritter @oh-mother-of-darkness @sohotthateveryonedied @preciousthingsareprecious @whore4batfam

#personal #long post #own writing #my fic

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wordsoflittlewisdom · 3 years

Text

Watching bop again

I kinda forgot Cass was at the roller derby game. Love how all the characters are connected

Why does Roman’s voice...sound like that

Boss Bitch is weirdly nostalgic now

I like that the whole roller derby team is wearing like. team jackets. and harleys got her whole fringe sleeves thing going on

YES LOVE WHEN SHE THROWS THE NECKLACE AWAY

The chemical plant blowing up as fireworks was a very Harley choice

“So I’ll start where I fucking want” four minutes ago

huntress huntress huntress huntress huntress

I read somewhere that this huntress and Montoya scene was one take and they just changed the lighting to show the change

romans middle name being beauvais is probably the clearest clue they could have given that he was from a rich family

Love that Renee finds the necklace and knows Harley and the joker broke up. I like this idea that superheroes/villains are kinda like celebrities in this world

The egg sandwich scene is great what more can I say

Love that there’re cars and people just living their lives in this city

It’s a crime that we never see Harley wear this glittery fanny pack

The music is really good in this

It’s neat how the line between her narration and her dialogue is blurred, like how she’ll say the first part of something in narration and the second part in dialogue

Huntress’s little flute theme

And Montoya knows Cass; c o n n e c t i o n s

Montoya’s been going after Roman, too

And now we’re flipping back to the bertinelli massacre and diamond

Even if the whole missing diamond plot isn’t that unique, everything’s woven together so neatly

And now Dinah and Renee are on the phone about Cass and the diamond

It’s all connected

Harleys whole “I’m here to report a terrible crime”—she could have just run in there but she wanted to be Dramatic

I do wish the vocals were a little louder here maybe?

Big fan of this fight choreography

Harley pausing on a frame where she’s making a weird face before rewinding to explain about the diamond—it’s so rare to ever get to see women like. making weird faces in movies. All the women in his this are gorgeous but they don’t always have to be; they look beat up after fights and get dirty and make weird faces and it’s great

Dinah singing? Exceptional

“Loans, liquidity, laundering” ah yes the three L’s of illegal business

I unironically listen to Black Canary’s man’s world.

I like that everyone just calls Dinah “Canary”

“I’m all on my lonesome. It’s great” Harleys even an unreliable narrator when she’s just talking

I’ve really never seen a movie that feel like it’s from the female gaze visually as much as this one—all the rings and earrings, the hair, the makeup, it feels like what women might fantasize about dressing like

Dinah yelling “you motherfucker!” While beating some creeps up is quality

What time of day is it? Dinah would probably be leaving early in the morning, but I Refuse to believe that Roman would be awake particularly early any morning

She either canary is leaving her nightclub singing gig in the late morning/early afternoon or roman is still awake from the night before and is going to go to sleep soon

Cass and Dinah in the same building. (Bernie voice): I am once again talking about the connections

I’ve riffed on this before but i refuse to believe that Roman can drive

This Dinah and Renee scene establishes character, backstories, and moves the plot along all at once

Jesus some of ewan mcgregor’s acting in this is painfully bad

I love that Cass has a big bomber jacket and longer, looser shorts

Jurnee’s abs wow

The lights from behind the hands with the eyes behind Harley, who’s surrounded by people and then Roman and Victor emerge from the back, whispering to each other? Beautiful

One of the grievances roman has against Harley is “constantly interrupting him, like I’m doing right now”

Harleys “you’re really not as complicated as you think” bit is almost satirical of this cult we’ve created of “complicated” white male movie villains who have massive fan followings (cough cough joker)

Interesting that Roman holds the knife to Harleys face but hands it off to Victor to do that actual cutting

Someone handed Roman a bowl of popcorn

Harleys pocket tampon

It’s diamonds are a girls best friend yeah babey!

The male backup dancers are wearing muzzles/masks (Roman has one too for a split second) is an interesting flip on the way women are typically the ones being silenced, as well as Harleys desire to silence the men around her and be the one telling and controlling her own narrative

“Hey! you’re that singer no one listens to!” “Hey! You’re the asshole no one likes!”

Harley with her glitter gun

Harleys reaction when the sprinklers go off is perfect—Margot makes her feel like a living cartoon

This cell block fight scene is a showstopper

I like that cass doesn’t immediately want to stay with Harley. It gives her some agency in a story where she’s mostly just following the curveballs life throws her

Harleys little stare straight into the camera when cass admits to eating the diamond

Harley at the grocery store really emphasizes that she’s a total weirdo

I think I heard somewhere that the pic of child Harley with the nuns is a pic of young Margot??? Not totally sure though

Cass not knowing who the joker is goes with the whole supers are like celebrities thing—cass probably follows a whole different group of them (like how most kids follow different celebrities than their parents)

Huntress huntress huntresssss

“Give me number 32. Mild”

This kid in helenas flashback doesn’t really look like she’s grow up to look like Mary Elizabeth Winstead

This filming in this flashback has so much style

Helena practicing in the bathroom mirror with her drawing and her multiple bottles of travel mouthwash

We’re in the scene where Roman makes the girl dance on the table and oh god it’s so uncomfortable

No no no no no not this hate this

Alright that nightmare’s done

“and that’s why you should never pay federal income taxes”

Harley offering to bring cass to Roman after hearing doc say “business is business is interesting

OH ITS HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT TIME

Dinahs car is yellow because it’s...canary yellow

Roman putting on the mask is cool and all but he’s just gonna have to take it back off to get changed

This Harley vs Renee fight is fun because they keep mirroring each other—they’re fighting each other, but they’re really on the same side

The way the women all kind of circle each other at first and don’t immediately get along

Cass popping up with the gun also gives her some agency—she’s at the end of her rope with the diamond and being betrayed by Harley

“I am nOT THE CROSSBOW KILLER”

The way Huntress sounds so uncertain when she says “...and now I’m done” Mary’s acting really popped off

Roman’s a bitch but I like his outfits

Helenas little smile when Harley says “you just killed his BFF”

I love how excited Harley is when they all agree to work together

Roman’s giving his little speech in the back of a pickup truck?

When all the guys turned around with masks on I got chills

“I love this chick she’s got rage issues.” “I DONT HAVE RAGE ISSUES”

Huntress stabbing the guy while going down the slide is peak cinema

This set lights up as the scene progresses and reveals more

I love love love that Helena is genuinely caring towards Cass and recognizing that children shouldn’t have to go through trauma like her

“When the fuck did she have time to do a shoe change?”

THE HAIR TIE YEAH

Forgot to mention this but it’s a stroke of genius for this place to be called the booby trap

Love me some canary cry

“Told ya she had a killer voice”

Harleys chase was a real group hurrah—the canary cry cleared the way and pushed her forward, Huntress towed her, Renee gave her the gun with one bullet

Cass and Roman are just sitting in the back seat. That must have been an awkward car ride

Cass pulling the gun away from Roman when he tries to shoot up at Harley when Harleys on top of the car is elite

Damn this is one foggy pier

When Harley starts with “your protection is based on the fact that people are scared of you” you expect her to say that it’s wrong or something but she says “I’m the one they should be scared of” this movie messed with tropes so much

That also includes the whole “one bullet” thing—Harley misses with her one bullet, and you don’t really know what’s gonna happen next

“I took your ring”

You can pinpoint exactly when Harley and Roman realize what Cass did

I’d put the entire taco scene here if I could

Renee moving the drink away from cass shows her caring side—she doesn’t want a kid to get into alcohol and make the mistakes she did

“Does she always talk like the cop in a bad eighties movie?”

Harley and Cass stealing the car is a fun way to show that she may be on the side of the good guys sometimes, but that doesn’t necessarily make her one

“Woman” by Kesha

Wow the outfits in this scene are iconic

I mean they are in the whole movie but I especially like these

Cass riding around with Harley and a hyena, wearing cute outfits and learning the ways of chaos

Harley got her sandwich!

The credit art for this movie is cool

Especially how they represent each character

In conclusion this is still my favorite movie

I know I’ve been kinda absent recently, but watching this again has really reminded me how much I love it. I got really busy but I’m going to Make An Effort to be a contributing member of the bop fandom again.

#birds of prey and the fantabulous emancipation of one harley quinn #birds of prey #harley quinn #huntress #black canary #Renee Montoya #Cassandra Cain #Roman sionis #Victor zsasz #words of little wisdom

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therealsaintscully · 3 years

Text

Here again, gone again - Mary between the tarmac and the end of TLD

tl;dr: Why are John and Sherlock seemingly ignoring Mary in the first minutes of T6T?

PS - I decided to have a copy of this post on Google Docs, which will be updated as I go along. I’ve given everyone permissions to add comments on my doc, to encourage further discussion.

One of the things that caught my attention in S4, while still a casual watcher and long before I began to read Sherlock meta, was the whole issue of Mary coming back to John and Sherlock’s life after shooting Sherlock.

I remember being outraged about it, especially regarding Mary’s prominence and strange redemption in T6T (and of course, the closing montage in TFP).

As with my earlier posts, I’ve been rewatching HLV/T6T over and over again as research for my WIP Turned, and new things have been standing out, now that I read meta. Recently, for example, I noticed Sherlock’s response to ‘John’s’ ghost!Mary in TLD. Sherlock responding to a ghost who insists throughout an entire episode she’s a figment of John’s imagination is strange, I’d say. I’ve since learned I wasn’t the only one who noticed this - I remember coming across a mention of this in meta by @loudest-subtext-in-tv as well @discordantwords, who mentioned this in response to a fic prompt I sent her (you’ll find some interesting clothes meta in there too, by @bakerbee).

And then I watched TST again and noticed something weird. Sherlock’s interactions with Mary between the tarmac suddenly seem, to me, as if they go back and forth between completely ignoring her to only barely acknowledging her presence. This could be NOTHING, or a part of the general fuckery of S4, or could fit well in with a larger theory I haven’t read up on yet. It could also be Sherlock not liking the person who shot him, and ignoring her, but my feeling is that this is something else. The question is, whether this is ghost!Mary in Sherlock’s mind, John’s mind, or something else?

Just to spice things up, I’d like to first direct your attention to something fucky that @tjlcisthenewsexy had pointed out about the penultimate scene in HLV. That part is supposed to be happening after Sherlock’s Victorian dream and his return to reality (SUPPOSEDLY). In this post, tjlcisthenewsexy claims and adds screenshots that show that after Sherlock ‘lands’ back in reality, every shot of Mary, unlike before, conceals her pregnant belly. It’s kinda creepy - go have a look. In fact, go on and read the entire post and ask yourself why is Mary pregnant on the tarmac but not in Victorian days, and where Mary is during the final scene of TAB.

The photo below was taken from @tjlcisthenewsexy‘s blog.

Another ‘feature of interest’ regarding Mary in the tarmac is her scarf - it has colourful butterflies on it, and remember that because I’ll get back to it soon.

Sidenote to my ‘water is dream’ homies: Sherlock’s pardon scene seems to attempt to reinforce we’re back in reality when Sherlock tweets ‘Back on terra firma’ (meaning dry land :ahem:, solid ground) and Lady Smallwood insists that Sherlock is now ‘home and dry’.

So, in the first ignoring-Mary scenario, Mary wears the same ‘frock’/kimono (I’m not sure what to call it) we saw her wearing at Sherlock’s parents’ house. This is the famous ‘fake blog post’ scene, or the jpg blog, where John is writing a post about his new fatherhood even though Mary is still incredibly pregnant. Sherlock mentions that if things continue the way they’re going, he’ll be needing two knives. Here’s the dialogue:

JOHN: It pays to advertise.

(Sherlock sits down in his chair, looking at his phone. Mary, standing near the window and rubbing her very pregnant tummy with one hand while pressing her lower back with the other, looks at him.)

MARY: So, what about Moriarty, then?

SHERLOCK: Ooh, I have a plan.

(Grimacing, Mary rubs her bump again.)

SHERLOCK: I’m going to monitor the underworld – every quiver of the web will tell me when the spider makes his move.

(As he was speaking, he has also tweeted “#221Bringit!”)

JOHN: Basically your ‘plan’ is just to sit there solving crimes like you always do.

SHERLOCK (smiling across to him): Awesome, isn’t it?!

(He jumps up, steps across to the mantelpiece and rips the top letter off the pile.)

Credits to Ariane DeVere for the transcription.

Watch this conversation and you’ll notice that neither of them acknowledges Mary, despite her physical presence there. There are two ways to read this conversation: in one Sherlock responds to Mary, in the other Sherlock is somewhat vaguely pointing out that he has a plan to deal with the issue of needing to with wait for Moriarty despite the deluge of cases he’s been getting.

Next up, the Dusty Death case:

A few things I noticed here: John never acknowledges Mary’s presence here (and neither does Sherlock) and Mary’s STRANGE APPEARANCE HERE: Where’s the belly? Where is the red lipstick, colourful clothes? The fact is that everyone’s appearance changed between the tarmac and now - whenever this now is; John’s hair and clothes are dramatically, Sherlock suddenly has a trump-tan and Mary’s hair is longer and more curly. But look at Mary in this photo - she’s all washed up!

The belly is back, but even though Mary calls Sherlock’s name a number of times he doesn’t acknowledge her at all. Look at John, too, who throws a glance at Mary’s general direction for a split second, but we don’t see an actual exchange of words between John and Mary. There’s something strangely reminiscent of TLD in this photo that I can’t put my finger on, maybe the lighting?

Things seem slightly different once Mary is in labour - although let’s not forget that Mary is ignored by Sherlock and John for long enough to the point they’re missing out on 59 calls. Interestingly Mary, who feels comfortable enough to (later, when John is on the bus) tell Sherlock that John is available at 5PM one day for a case (‘Mary says it’s fine’) never calls Sherlock when she’s in labour and can’t get a hold of John.

Sherlock is again immersed in his phone in the car on the way to the hospital, and only acknowledges Mary when John tells him to. The interesting thing in this scene (besides the fact that there are setlock photos of a version of this scene shot where Sherlock was the one doing the driving) is Mary’s dress. It’s a black dress with butterflies, a callback to her tarmac scarf. The Google search for butterflies and symbolism of death(?) are easy enough.

Sherlock is again immersed in his phone at Mary’s flat when John and Mary asks Molly and Mrs. Hudson to be the godmothers (you know, when the photos ‘don’t come out right’). He never fully acknowledges ONLY MARY and her words or even looks at her, and he’s surprised by the choice of name for Rosie later in church. To me, here at church as well as in the car on the way to the hospital, Sherlock looks surprised to find himself wherever he is.

And then comes the Welsborough case, during which we see for the first time in this episode, an actual conversation between Sherlock and Mary - I’m sure there’s a lot to be said about this case etc, but the one thing that stood out to me was Sherlock, in a split second of premonition, standing completely alone in the room staring at the Thatcher busts - in a way that ties in my mind to another idea I’ve been having, about Thatcher representing Mary in one way or another (but let’s save that for another time).

Now think again about ghost!Mary, John and Sherlock in the hug scene in TLD.

Whatever’s going on here, it’s strange. I wonder if what we’re seeing here are different versions of the same ‘unreliable narrator’ reality/narrative, jumping back and forth between ‘John’s alibi/blog’ and Sherlock who’s still locked in his Mind Palace (in the same fashion of TAB, where we switch between the various layers of supposed reality and Sherlock’s various layers of his mind).

Thoughts?

And while I have your attention, I’m researching another idea. If you know of any significance of the hazelnut/hazel tree/the word hazel or Luz in the BBCSH universe please let me know. Could be a photo, a wallpaper, the name of a place etc.

PS- I doubt any/many of my point here are completely new and were never pointed out before by others - if they were I apologize for not giving credits, at this point it’s very hard to know every single origin of meta ideas going around. Let me know if you deserve the credit for something.

Tags after the cut.

@tjlcisthenewsexy @sarahthecoat @the-7-percent-solution @gosherlocked @loveismyrevolution @inevitably-johnlocked @xistentialangst @devoursjohnlock @disregardedletters @helloliriels @tjlcblr @may-shepard @waitedforgarridebs @helplessly-johnlocked

Let me know if you’d like me to not tag you in the future!

#meta #tjlc #something's fucky

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anne-with-an-evangelion · 3 years

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Grace, i really enjoyed/still enjoy reading your fic feat. britney spears LOL --- this fic is a treasure...! but i'll save my rants for comment section on ao3. why i'm here: i'm about to start on your western au, but i'm not familiar with the genre so my question is, do you have any list of movies/shows that might help me visualize while reading it? also, check your kofi page >:D

Oh my goodness YOU ARE TOO KIND AHHHHH !!!!!!!!Thank you from the bottom of my heart !!! Omfg I was in shock when I saw this message I am in such gratitude and I’m kissing you as we speak 🗣

I’m so so glad you enjoyed the fic and I hope you like RNR too !!! Western films are all over the spectrum and they’re often about revenge, community, and fighting corruption (those are the best ones IMO) Classic spaghetti westerns are still considered some of the best films ever made for a reason but they can also be super long, with little dialogue, very dramatic, very gripping and violent. The land around the character is always a character itself in these stories, def one of the tenets of the western genre, BUT…… it’s a nonsensical white myth that the ‘frontier’ was untamed and uncivilized, and it really functions as revisionist history in the worst way sometimes. As usual, media affects and reflects our reality and history, but people have to create that media, and most of the people creating these, Wild West, empty frontier, battling with ‘scary tribes’ films were white men (or Italians..) who wanted and needed people to think the west was empty, uncivilized, and needed to be protected and claimed by white people.

Writing RNR has led me to learn so many new things and I think once you get interested in the time period and keep digging, you will learn so much you might have never been taught in school or seen in a movie. But I also keep in mind this time period was not that long ago and what I can research for fun is real shit that still affects people today. When you start thinking about the horrible genocide, displacement, murder, and slavery that America was founded on, the western genre starts looking pretty… out of touch, honestly. The experiences of both enslaved and free Black people, Mexican people whose land we were taking, and Chinese immigrants who basically built the railroad system that allowed more travel to the west- they’re pretty much completely ignored in this genre, and Indigenous tribes are very cruelly represented, if they are at all, despite the objectively horrible way white Americans treated (and treat) them. And forget about gay or trans people! I would love to see WAY more films/media in general that really centers the people who weren’t lone gun slinging womanizing white cis cowboys (also a myth, most cowboys were Black or Mexican, and they were frequently, secretly fond of each other) so if anyone ever has any recs….. please drop them to meeeee!!! I heard The Good The Bad and The Weird is a really good non-American western, that’s next on me list. That being said here are a bunch of movies I’ve watched that influenced me in some kinda way. They’re not all ‘great’ or historically accurate but….. neither is RNR LOL. Posse for example is pretty infamous for that but it’s totally worth a watch for its story about Black cowboys! And you’ll also notice a trend of like, the white savior and ‘noble savage’ stereotype if you start watching westerns. Hostiles is a good example of this, I think they wanted the story to be inclusive of the Cheyenne Nation POV/history but then they should have actually centered those characters instead of the white people trauma but I digress……I put an asterisk next to the ones I personally think are most accessible as far as plot/general vibes. I’m not like endorsing these all as Amazing Historical Films obviously but here they are!

(I put Seven Samurai on there as it is formative in general if you haven’t seen it yet. I think I was also watching a lot of Westworld when I first started writing RNR, and that has some beautiful settings and costumes, [I deleted a long rant about westworld here lol], and True Grit was actually the film that set off my whole RNR writing experience.)

Many western films or what we think of as the ‘wild west’ time period overlaps with the American Civil War. A lot of people point to the Ken Burns doc as the definitive place to start and I certainly watched it in school but again, it’s a very white man-centric doc and even actively sympathetic at times to the Confederacy so.. don’t bother with that. This article discussing it is worth a read.

Honestly, scrap this entire list and just watch Blazing Saddles. It will explain everything.

Some other good resources to start with

Read about BASS REEVES!! The legend - the Lone Ranger!

Western Violence, Law, and Order

What Wild West saloons were really like

How did westward expansion impact the Native Americans?

Black Cowboys: the overlooked heroes of the west

The true origin of country music

We Shall Remain

The Forgotten Trans History of the Wild West

Ok this is getting super long but I hope that is a good place to start!!! Also here is my huge 350+ song playlist I listen to when I write, has a large mix of different genres and artists. You can also check out my rnr stuff tag or just the rivers and roads tag, I’m working on consolidating them into one but that’s where I sequester the vibes as I find them. ENJOY I LOVE YALL SOOOOOO MUCH

#rivers and roads #ask tag #I hope all those links work #sorry this took a while my computer broke and doing everything on my phone takes forever🥲#*charger. computer charger not my computer thank god lol #the Wow!! cool cowboys !! to The Wild West Is a Myth Perpetuated By White Supremacy to Wow !! Cool cowboys !! pipeline

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h4knyeon · 4 years

Text

helping hand | jooheon (monsta x)

jooheon x female reader

genre: smut, slight crack, a bit of fluff

word count: 3.9k

summary: you’re giving out free handjobs and jooheon wants one.

warnings: take a shot whenever i say handjob

a/n: i guess this is kind of femme reader implied because the oc doesn’t know much about jerkin dicks so….. imma just make it female reader. also not at how this was 9 pages on google docs... i didn’t expect it to be this long i had too much fun with the dialogue. also i’m not making a part two because i wouldn’t know what to write i kept putting this off for a week cuz i was stuck yass

“how will i ever get enough practice to give a good handjob before i get to the real deal?” you wondered, deep in another one of your crazy conversations with your best friend changkyun. you were eating lunch together in the quad of the uni you both attended. you both came from your last lecture of the day, settling for some campus food.

“i’m sure a lot of people are willing to let you practice on them, who would pass up a free handjob?” changkyun said, taking another chip out of the bag on the table and throwing it into his mouth.

“you say that but you won’t let me practice on you?” you joked, smirking at the man across the round lunch table you two sat at.

“you gotta pay to see my dick babe,” he quipped, smirking right back at you. “if you wanna practice so bad then why don’t you just choose some rando around campus?”

“i can’t be going up to people asking if they want a handjob, i’m gonna get suspended and pepper sprayed and shit.”

“well maybe they might feel uncomfortable if you go up to them but what if we just offer it to the community in general?” he said, making gestures with his hands to make his words seem more meaningful.

“what the hell are you even saying?” you furrowed your brows at him as he stood up on the seat he was just sitting on, cupping his hands around his mouth and getting ready to yell.

“FREE HANDJOBS! THIS GIRL IS GIVING OUT FREE HANDJOBS!” he projected his voice all across the quad, pointing his finger at you. “IF YOU GOT A DICK AND YOU WANT A FREE HANDJOB, SHE’S GIVIN’ EM OUT!”

any other person would be screaming at their friend to stop with their face on fire, but you were sitting there casually as if he wasn’t doing anything unusual. in fact, you thought it was funny. crazier things have happened on your college campus with no phone calls or repercussions so you didn’t have to worry about anyone reporting you two. you began to just go with changkyun’s plan, smiling and waving mindlessly while looking around for anyone who seemed to be interested.

someone whose gaze you didn’t notice though was jooheon’s. jooheon was a shy boy who you were familiar with from one of your classes, but you two had never interacted before. of course, changkyun’s yelling had caught his attention, and he initially thought to ignore the announcement until he became curious as to who was ‘giving out handjobs.’ when he turned to see it was you, the cutie from his public speaking class, he felt a blush crawl onto his cheeks. he thought of taking the offer but he quickly shook the thought out of his head, thinking it was a big joke.

his friend minhyuk chuckled from across the small table they shared, typing away on his laptop. “just another day on this crazy campus,” minhyuk muttered, bringing his face closer to his screen.

“yeah,” jooheon mumbled, unable to avert his gaze from the scene that was unfolding before him.

minhyuk peered up at him from behind his laptop for just a second, immediately noticing his flushed cheeks. “why is your face so red?” minhyuk questioned, although not pausing his fingers from tapping away on his keyboard.

“i-is it?” jooheon stuttered, placing his hands over his cheeks as if to conceal them from not already being discovered.

“uh yeah. super.” minhyuk finally tore his attention from his work on his computer and fully looked at jooheon. he cocked an eyebrow at him, then turned to survey the scene jooheon had been watching so closely. “ahhhh, you want a handjob don’t you?” minhyuk snickered.

“no!” jooheon quickly denied.

“it’s nothing to be ashamed of. who doesn’t want a free handjob?” minhyuk squinted his eyes, trying to focus his vision. “and the girl giving out handjobs is pretty cute.”

“then why don’t you go get a handjob?” jooheon asked, hands still folded over his cheeks.

“i have important things to take care of. if i’m lucky then maybe her offer will still be standing later today,” minhyuk laughed, going back to whatever was on his laptop screen. “but you seem kind of tense, maybe you should go get one and ease your nerves,” minhyuk suggested.

jooheon let the thought linger in his mind for a bit. “what if i go up to them and it’s just a joke?”

“well if it’s a joke it seems to be going on forever.” minhyuk turned to watch you and changkyun again, changkyun still yelling through his hands. “they seem a little desperate for a taker.”

“i don’t know dude.” jooheon eyed you two once again.

“you just gotta be confident. go up there and be like yep, i’m here and i want a handjob.” minhyuk puffed his chest, dramatically impersonating someone with macho confidence. “and even if it is a joke then your confidence will help you play it off without you looking like a loser.”

“but, i know the girl giving out handjobs. she’s in my public speaking class.” jooheon glanced at you again, trying not to make it too obvious.

“oh is that the hottie you’re always talking about?” minhyuk looked at you again, really observing your features this time. “you have some good taste, if you don’t take the handjob from her i will.”

“woah woah woah, i had my eyes on her first.” jooheon sent minhyuk a glare.

a lightbulb flicked on in minhyuk’s head. “this is the perfect opportunity for you then!” minhyuk’s excitement was evident on his face.

“no! what if she recognizes me?” jooheon countered.

“who cares? come on!” minhyuk got up from his seat and grabbed jooheon’s arm, dragging him from his own chair.

“what’re you doing?!” jooheon’s voice was laced with panic.

“trust me,” minhyuk reassured him, pulling him toward the stars of the commotion. by the time they made it over to you two, changkyun was already giving up.

“man, why doesn’t anyone want a handjob?” you groaned. “if i were a guy-”

“excuse me,” minhyuk interrupted. your head whipped around to see whose voice it was and you were met with minhyuk’s warm expression. “i heard you were giving out some handjobs.”

“yes, i am!” you stood from your chair to speak to him more formally-- well as formal as you could get when talking about handjobs. “were you interested?”

“ah, i actually have a paper i need to finish but if you’re still giving some out later today maybe i’ll take you up on the offer,” minhyuk laughed. “i’m minhyuk by the way, my friend on the other hand is pretty stressed right now so i think a handy would do him good.” minhyuk gestured to jooheon, who he was still gripping onto tightly. you glanced over at him, noticing his red cheeks that made him look like a human stop sign. jooheon was looking around to see if anyone was watching him ask for a handjob before his eyes landed back on you.

“hey i know you, you’re in my public speaking class. j… ji… jihoon?” you said, waving your finger in the air as you tried to think of his name.

“jooheon,” he corrected, bringing a hand up to rub the back of his neck.

“ah, sorry. i’m y/n.” you shook his hand as changkyun hopped down from his seat.

“i’m changkyun!” he yelled, knocking his body into yours clumsily and replacing your hand in jooheon’s with his. “yeah so basically she’s kind of inexperienced so she needs some practice. that’s why she’s giving handjobs out,” changkyun explained, answering everyone’s unspoken questions. “if she was any good maybe you’d have to pay.”

“ugh, you don’t know if i suck completely,” you groaned, hitting him in the chest. “i just need a bit more practice.” you held your hands up in defense.

“well, i need to get back to that paper i was working on but i’ll be on the lookout for you if you still need some more practice,” minhyuk shot you a wink, turning on his heel and patting jooheon’s chest before strutting back to his table. jooheon rolled his eyes at him, his expression becoming more panicked when he saw you step closer to him in the corner of his eye.

“so, jooheon…” you started, trying to meet his eyes, but he anxiously kept his gaze locked on the ground. “you sure you want to lend me a hand? or, moreso the other way around i guess.”

“uh…” jooheon could back out now and say minhyuk was just playing a sick joke on him, but something in him gave him a kick of confidence. he finally made eye contact with you. “yeah, i could help you out.”

“ooh,” changkyun spoke from behind you. “thanks for taking one for the team bro,” he said, saluting him as if he was being sent to war.

“shut your ass up,” you exclaimed, giving changkyun a slight push. “i’ll take jooheon back to my dorm and you can go be an idiot somewhere,” you said to changkyun. you turned back to jooheon, “unless you have another place in mind. you’re the client after all.” jooheon laughed at your choice of words, feeling like he was getting a professional service.

“your dorm is fine,” he said, sending you a comforting smile. he seemed comfortable and confident on the outside, but on the inside he was screaming.

he hadn’t really had a lot of sexual encounters in his life. he was raised in a religious family, so let’s just say he wasn’t a high school party kind of guy, going around promiscuously. he had a short relationship in his first year at university, and he did try a few things, but this was the first time he ever did anything like this so spontaneously, and he was especially nervous about doing this with someone he barely knew. what if you didn’t like how his dick looked? what if you spread rumors about him? what if he came too fast? he shook these thoughts out of his head when you grazed his hand with your own.

“you coming?” you asked, already holding all of your belongings in your arms. jooheon nodded and began to follow you on the path to your dorm, bidding changkyun farewell as changkyun yelled a good luck! before departing.

you kept the conversation alive as you walked to your dorm building, asking him about his day, basic questions about him, and occasionally bringing up your public speaking class.

“by the way, you don’t have to say much if you don’t want to when we’re getting to it. i just wanted to try some things and i just need to know if you like them,” you explained to him, continuing to walk on the path to your dorm.

“cool, i wouldn’t know what to say anyway,” he admitted sheepishly.

“maybe an ‘oh that felt good,’ or ‘oh i didn’t really like that,’ every now and then,” you shrugged, listening to him laugh at your words.

finally, you were in front of your dorm room. you brought out your key and unlocked the door, pushing it open and holding it for your guest. you put your stuff away and invited jooheon to get more comfortable. he settled for the edge of your bed, twiddling his thumbs as he watched you walk around your dorm room.

“so from the information i’ve gathered, i believe i only need some type of lubrication and my hand for this to work,” you announced your steps, inviting him to correct you or make suggestions if necessary.

he let out a soft giggle at your bizarre approach. “yes, from what i know that is all you need.”

“cool. i don’t have the real deal lube but i have some lubriderm for sensitive skin so i’m sure it’s safe for your dick.” you brought out the said bottle of lotion and took a seat next to him on the bed. luckily you lived in a single dorm so you didn’t have to worry about a roommate barging in while you guys were getting down to business.

you placed the bottle of lotion on your bedside table and turned to face jooheon. “i understand if you’re nervous jooheon, i’m shitting my pants right now,” you admitted shamelessly.

“really?” he laughed. “why?”

“well first of all, you’re in my public speaking class so if this doesn’t go well we gotta deal with the elephant in the lecture hall for the rest of the semester,” you laughed, making a smile appear on jooheon’s face along with his deep set of dimples. “second of all you’re cute and it’s just making me nervous.”

he was taken aback by your words. you thought he was cute? he felt his face begin to heat up, but your words grounded him again.

“sorry i’m awkward but should we start this off by kissing or…” you trailed off, surrendering your lead to jooheon.

“oh, sure.” jooheon turned his body towards you, unsure of whether he was making the first move or if you were.

“okay, here i go.” you brought your hand up to cup his cheek before pressing your lips against his softly. you were gentle at first, slightly teasing his lips with your own. you felt jooheon lean toward you more, desperate to deepen the kiss. you stifled a giggle at his neediness, granting his wishes and slotting your mouths together.

you may have been inexperienced with your hands, but when it came it to kissing you were very much a pro. when you swiped your tongue across his bottom lip he immediately opened his mouth, allowing you to press your tongue against his. jooheon could already tell you were skillful, and you knew you had an effect on him when he let out the softest moan. his hands winded into your locks, pulling you closer and deepening the kiss further. when you pulled away slightly for some air, jooheon leaned forward, chasing after your lips. you caught your breath and looked back into jooheon’s hooded eyes.

“just let me know at any point if your uncomfortable,” you said breathlessly.

“okay,” jooheon replied quickly before slamming his lips into yours once again, craving your kiss. you automatically reciprocated, giving him what he needed.

as your mouths continued to move together, you trailed your hand down his chest and to his stomach, stopping just before the waistband of his pants. resting your hand there for a few more seconds, you were taken aback when jooheon took your hand and placed it on the bulge that was forming in his pants. you couldn’t help but smile into the kiss at his sudden boldness that seemed to melt away when you tugged on his bottom lip with your teeth. you started to move your hand on his crotch, palming him through the material of his pants. you explored his lower region with your other hand, massaging his thighs with delicate fingers, and occasionally grazing over his balls.

you hooked your finger under the waistband of his pants, tugging on them and hinting at jooheon to lift his hips. he broke the kiss as he shoved his pants down his legs along with his boxers, his semi hard cock on display for you. jooheon was becoming more eager as time went on, desperate to keep your lips attached to his. instead, you pulled your mouth from his and reattached them to his neck, giving him an entirely new sensation. you simultaneously began to lightly trail the pads of your fingers along his shaft. you felt jooheon shiver at your touch as his head turned down to watch your fingers work on his cock.

you sat up straight, removing your lips from his neck to focus your attention on his dick. you had previously done lots of research on tips for the perfect handjob, but you just needed someone to practice these techniques on.

with the tips in mind, you continued to graze his cock with your fingertips until you noticed a bead of precum form at the tip. you couldn’t help the smirk that decorated your face as you brought your finger to the head of his dick, spreading his precum all around it. his breaths were becoming more noticable and when you looked up at him he had his bottom lip tucked between his teeth. once you spread all of his precum around, you wrapped your fingers around his shaft lightly and gave him one slow stroke.

jooheon bit down harder on his lip as he tried to control his noises. you went back to playing with the head of his cock again, teasing the tip with light touches. once you felt that you got him riled up enough, you pumped some of the lotion from your bedside table into your hand and wrapped your hand around his dick again, spreading the lotion all over him. he let out shuddering breaths as you slowly stroked his cock. remembering your research, you ran your thumb over the head of his cock whenever your fist got closer to the tip. finally, jooheon choked out a clearly audible moan, unable to keep it in.

“how does that feel jooheonie?” the nickname you gave him came out almost naturally and you pressed wet kisses along his neck and behind his ear.

“i-it feels great,” jooheon said between breaths, his head falling back. you couldn’t help but smile at his compliment, butterflies fluttering in your stomach at the thought of making him feel good. you glanced down at his hands which were turning white from the deathgrip he had on your sheets. his eyes were shut and his mouth was agape as he was focusing on trying not to explode immediately under your gentle touch.

you thought about a technique you read on a sex tip blog that talked about using both hands, so you went in. you lightly rubbed the head of his dick in circles with one of your fingers as you continued jerking his shaft with your other hand. jooheon was beginning to become much more vocal. breathy moans were constantly slipping past his lips as you continued your movements on him.

you moved your hand from playing with his tip to tugging on his balls lightly as you continued your motions with your other hand. you gently squeezed them, moving them around in your hand while keeping your strokes with your other hand consistent.

“you’re doing great y/n.” jooheon sounded out of breath as he said that just before another moan was dragged out of his throat.

“thanks, i’m thinking really hard right now,” you admitted with a giggle, and he laughed breathlessly along with you.

“can… can i touch you?” jooheon asked, his eyes shooting down to your chest. you nodded, taking one of his hands that had loosened its grip on the sheets and bringing it under your shirt, placing it on your bra clad breast. jooheon’s lips quivered from the feeling of you under his hands, a feeling that he’d been craving for so long. you held onto his hand as you guided him in massaging your flesh until he began to move his hand on his own accord. you shoved the cup of your bra out of the way for him, giving him full access to your bare skin. he pinched one of your nipples between his fingertips, eliciting a light moan from your lips. he smirked as he attached his lips to the base of your neck, nipping at the skin near your collarbones. you were becoming more riled up by the second, but you focused your attention back on his sex, remembering the reason you were both there.

trying your best to focus on the tips you had spent so much time researching, another technique popped into your head. you remember the move being called the escalator because it had made you laugh. you brought both of your hands back to his member, moving one of them along his shaft from the tip of his cock to the base. once that hand reached the base, your other hand was already back at the top, ready to repeat the motion. both of your hands repeated this routine over and over on him, sending waves of pleasure through his body.

jooheon’s forehead rested against your shoulder as whimpers that sounded like your name left his mouth. he was desperately holding onto your chest, still weakly moving your breast in circles. you went back to the traditional technique, jerking him with one hand while the other went to get more lotion. you slathered his cock up with the cream in your palm, trying to keep stimulating him. you continued a quick speed on him, squeezing a bit more when you got to the area where his shaft met his head. his hips would buck into your fist every now and then, and you could feel his cock twitch as he neared his orgasm.

you brought your other hand down to play with his balls again, and all of the feelings sent him hurtling towards his high. his skin was glazed in a sheen of sweat as he weakly pressed light kisses to the skin of your neck.

“y/n, i-i’m gonna-” he stopped mid sentence as his mouth dropped open in a silent scream. his hips stuttered as he shot out hot white ropes of cum, covering your hand and shooting onto his thighs too. you ignored the fact that some of his seed was dripping onto your sheets, your mind too busied with the triumphant feeling of getting him off.

you continued your languid strokes until he whined from overstimulation. you made a show of bringing your hand to your lips and licking up the white liquid covering it, moaning at the taste. jooheon watched you through heavy lids, feeling like he could cum untouched just from the sight before him. as jooheon regained his breath, you tugged your bra back into place and got a couple of tissues from your nightstand and began to clean him up.

“thanks again, jooheon.” you sent him a warm smile as you wiped up the last of his seed before tossing the tissues into your waste bin.

“it was my pleasure, literally,” he laughed. “i feel like you lied about being an amateur and you just wanted to show off.”

“oh no, trust me i read like ten sex blogs trying to figure this shit out,” you confessed. “i was afraid you could hear the gears in my head turning.”

jooheon couldn’t help but smile, showing off his charming dimples once again. “well, i really liked what you did. it was different, but it felt super good.” jooheon couldn’t help but blush at his simple word usage but you took the compliment nonetheless, planting a kiss right on his dimple.

“i had a few more techniques i wanted to try if you’re down. otherwise i could always ask your friend minhyuk,” you said with a teasing lilt in your voice.

“n-no!” he quickly shouted. “if you ever need help practicing anything you can just call me!”

you laughed at his jittery voice and cupped his cheek in your hand, placing a sweet kiss on his lips before straddling his lap. “if you want, we could try those techniques out now.”

“absolutely,” he replied almost immediately, grabbing your face with both of his hands and dragging you down to lay on top of him.

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