#I'm too cool to fall victim to fandom shipping

[ceruleanterrapin]

Imagine getting shipped with a rabbit, couldn't be me

#I'm too cool to fall victim to fandom shipping #rip to you guys though #leo talks

[victimsofyaoipoll]

Round 2

Propaganda Under Cut

Elizabeth Midford

She started as just a cutie fiancée trying her best, turns out she's also a swordfighting genius, very under pressure to perform feminity in the Victorian Rose type of way. Fandom crucifies her bc she's Ciel's fiancée and they want him to be with his butler, Sebastian, the demon he sold his soul to for revenge

anime was a shitty canon divergent adaptation that butchered her character down to her "cutesy silly girly" persona, which obviously made the 2008 anime fans hate her with a passion (nothing wrong w being girly I'm just saying the adaptation made her super one dimensional) anyways fujoshis used to treat her as a villain because she's the fiance of Ciel,, who as u might know already was HEAVILY shipped with his butler, Sebastian back then (now it's kinda looked badly upon, nice tbh that ship sucks ass xD) She's a bit similar to Misa Amane from death note in the way she was treated. (Like an obstacle the yaoi ship must overcome rather than a person)

she's my silly little rabbit! i could gush about her character but i'll keep it short and just say that she's really well written and one of the best characters in the series. anyways she's ciel's fiance and she's like, rightfully annoying as any other 13 yr old girl would be but the fanbase fucking crucified her for even existing. she gets demonized for being 'annoying', but then ciel gets yaoishipped with an even more annoying guy. there is 100% an argument that lizzie/ciel is weird bc they're cousins (i personally don't ship it) but that falls flat when her detractors then ship the 13 yr old ciel with an eons old demon who Canonically looks like his father. the anime also never reached her main character development until years after its peak and that was only in a movie, so she really got the bad end of the stick here. not me though i had a giant crush on her when i was 12

Katara

Katara is constantly mistreated by the fans in favor of the Zukka ship (Zuko × Sokka.) They make her out to be mean, homophobic, and completely out of character just to add drama to the Zukka ship. In reality, Katara is very compassionate, and would never act that way toward anyone. 

Zutara was a popular ship but when zukka got popular over covid during the atla renaissance there were a million posts about how zutara was problematic while zukka was perfect usually for racist reasons. Meanwhile katara and sokka are siblings so it didn't even make sense. They did not have to be so illogically rude to her to ship zukka and it was weird

Katara is FANTASTIC I fucking love her to pieces she is so cool and yet the entirety of the ATLA fandom treats her like garbage because she “talks about her mom dying too much” (even though she BARELY does & also was parentified from a young age due to her mother’s death) and, of course, because she’s a more feminine women when compared to her counterparts. Even in the show itself she’s mistreated: she’s ALWAYS shown cooking for the rest of the gaang, doing their laundry, any ‘womanly’ task. She ends up with the guy who kissed her twice without her consent & who she never showed any real attraction to and apparently (despite being a badass warrior-doctor!!!) after the show ended she just… settled down in the South Pole and had a bunch of kids and never did anything else. She didn’t even get a statue :( Anyways during the ATLA renaissance, despite Zutara actually not being canon, people felt that Katara threatened the sanctity of the new almost entirely baseless yaoi ship, Zukka. Unfortunately for them, due to the fact that Katara and Sokka are siblings, the usual anti-Zutara arguments didn’t work as well. So they resorted to just… slaughtering her character. If she was lucky, they’d just make Katara a background character, wingwoman, &or throw her together with her canon love interest. If she was unlucky they’d do anything from make her homophobic (??) to killing her off! Fuck’s sake, she never even got a token spare-the-pairs wlw ship! Sorry for getting so heated, that whole debacle made me FUMING MAD.

#poll #round 2 #black butler #elizabeth midford #avatar the last airbender #atla #katara atla #katara

[kyouka-supremacy]

Ryu for the ask game?

Omg thank you all for asking this character I totally didn't specifically ask to be asked about and who I love a perfectly normal amount giggles and twirls hair

Favorite thing about them: He really strives to be good. Good at something, anything, but just good. He constantly fights against his own narrative and I find it very admirable. He was doomed from the start to fail and I feel like he knows that, and I don't know how he finds the strength to keep trying anyway but he does and it's really neat. Maybe his skull really is too thick to listen to the words of a predetermined fate. Just the whole thing about being the tragic character of all time is very compelling to me. Also, his inherently meaningless seeking a validation to live he shares with Atsushi makes me like him for reasons similar to Atsushi.

Least favorite thing about them: MMMHHHH,,,,,,,,,,,,,, Like I really like his flaws, I'm happy he has them, I wouldn't like him the same if he didn't? But at least I can safely say it's someone I wouldn't like to deal with irl lol.

Favorite line:

<3

brOTP: GIN AND RYUUNOSUKE!!!!! They make me go insane. Holding hands while working in the darkness fr. Being lonely together. Someone who's seen you at your worst FOR REAL but still hasn't abandoned you for some unfathomable reason. I don't know what goes through your mind but I see your eyes and they're the same as mine. Also mmmmhhhh sskk. Chuuaku. Kyouka and Akutagawa though I'm not sure that can count as brotp. Lucy and Akutagawa.

OTP: Sskk is like, pretty cool if you ask me <3 Imagine a fully rotten individual who was never meant for anything but killing and making people suffer since they were born, loving someone. Imagine the “I will kill you” being replaced by “I will love you”. But also imagine being so deeply interlaced with another person, your existence just can't escape the other. Destined to be together and destined to fall apart at the same time. I'll never be able to move forward until I've denied your very being but if you die my existence will stop having a meaning. Don't tell me what to do. I will follow you to the end of the world. I will kill you. I will die for you. I just think them <333 Chuuaku too, have already spent countless words on them but. Finally a ship that's real and relatable. Finally something that doesn't feel ethereal and idealized and distant and untouchable, but real and stained and messy and human. What if I didn't understand you but I wanted to. What if we walked together home. They're neat <333 Other Akutagawa ships I vibe with would be Akutagawa × Beast Atsushi, Akutagawa × Tachihara, Akutagawa × Kajii, akuatsulucy...

nOTP: 🤨🤔🧐

Random headcanon: I think he's numb to pain. And I don't mean it in the “oh no he suffered so much he's used to it at this point :((( ” pitying way, I mean it in the “he's felt such very strong spikes of pain in multiple occasions, his pain detectors just gave out” way. The “he won't notice a wound because he just can't feel it” way.

Unpopular opinion: In the last period, it's been bugging me a little how Akutagawa and Dazai's relationship is portrayed in fancontent. It's just always so black and white, while actually I feel like there's so much nuisance to it that just gets lost in fandom. Yes, the way Dazai treated Akutagawa was horrible and inhuman. Yes, to an extent Dazai thought highly of Akutagawa's abilities and cared for him. Yes, Akutagawa was victim of Dazai's heavy abuse. No, Akutagawa isn't entirely subject to Dazai, he explicitly gave his consent to an hard training (which, I reiterate, doesn't justify it at all; but does give more nuisance to the whole situation) and did oppose him in multiple occasions. I just think sometimes Akutagawa is framed as this helpless damsel in distress and Dazai as this inhuman monster whereas their relationship is indeed unhealthy, but still so much more complex than that. And just, really, I feel like portraying Akutagawa so helpless in Dazai's hands makes him a disservice? Even though in canon he said to be willing to kill Dazai on multiple occasions, has punched him more than once, has told straight “no”s to his face. I just think... People tend to make Akutagawa a lot less aware than he actually is. Here, there it is, that's what really troubles me. Akutagawa does know Dazai hurt him. He does know Dazai's treatment of him was cruel, and unfair. He is aware of what Dazai did to him. That just can't stop him from seeking his approval, even against his will. But to think that Akutagawa is blind to everything Dazai did to him does him a disservice, because he really is not that stupid or with completely null self-awareness. The fact that he tends to run after Dazai despite knowing how much he's hurt him is just further proof of how complex and human-like Akutagawa's psyche is. Also, he does NOT like reading. All my homies hate booknerd Akutagawa.

Song i associate with them: Well, I associate with him songs I definitely shouldn't associate with him alcfjyalfiygaslfiya. One song I always listen to that infallibly makes me think of Akutagawa although it really DOES NOT fit Akutagawa is Patchwork Staccato by toa, with its delicious sewing symbolism and words of toxic codependent relationships and the line you, I'd really rather you just stop existing I just can't help but link to him. Or Vampire by DECO*27, which. self-explanatory. but really shouldn't be associated with Akutagawa. On the side of songs that do fit Akutagawa, Tokyo Teddy Bear (AKUTAGAWA SEWING SYMBOLISM MY ULTIMATE BELOVED) and Lost One's Weeping (“Who stained that heart black? Who was it? Who was it!?” “Can you untie the rope around his neck? Can we keep going like this? What're you gonna do? I don't care anymore!” “But why does this lump in our hearts // Say we want to disappear? Say we want to die?” “Can you remember the dreams of your childhood? Who threw those dreams in a ditch? Who was it!? You know who it was! When are you going to grow up!? What is a grown-up anyway? Who has the answers? What're you gonna do? I don't care anymore!”) and basically everything from Neru. And Rolling Girl by wowaka, obviously.

Favorite picture of them:

Favourite panel from the manga: The one above LMAO. I. Really like that scene and think it's the most beautiful climax Akutagawa's character arc could have ever had. Here's my second favourite though:

Favourite illustration: There's a lot of beautiful ones...

Favourite illustration in the anime art style:

BUT ALSO this please don't make me choose. And various anime screencaps. I feel like I'm cheating but maybe it's unethical to ask from me to pick a favourite Akutagawa picture in the first place.

Favourite Mayoi card:

Send me a character?

#Thank you both for asking him!!! <333 #For the text color I have picked from the character's icons from some old bsdanime twitter campaign #With Akutagawa it's hex. 0d0015 and I feel so silly changing it when it's near to completely indistinguishable from pure black text... #ryūnosuke akutagawa #bsd #mine #people asks me stuff #You kind of get what kind of series bsd is when every song you associate with it opens with a big banner #“WARNING! This subject has questionable content‚ such as: SUICIDE THEMES.” on the Vocaloid Wiki

[dunmer-pussy]

the crow for the character ask meme

Send me a character, I'll do the prompt.

THE CROW

Favourite Thing About Him

This one's another thing to which I'd say his design! I love the bird motif on his chest combined with the monochromatic color scheme.. And also he's cute LMAO

His character's intriguing to me and he's someone I'd love to learn more about!

Now for Uldren because I'm also going to double down and talk about him here too (even though they are technically two separate entities) I don't know enough about Uldren to really say much but I think he's pretty neat. Like Crow I wanna learn more about Uldren too, and based on what I do know Uldren was a fucking victim.

Least Favourite Thing About Him

The direction Bungie is going with him in Defiance. Just. This whole season has been somewhat of a trainwreck to the point where I don't even want to complete the story, just. Gimme my items and cosmetics, my emotes, and let me go. And Crow is especially where the writing for him is starting to fall flat.

As for Uldren, I'm not really too sure because I don't know that much about him yet, and "He killed Cayde" seems too straightforward and reductive of me as someone who enjoys learning about the lore and the characters within said lore.

Favourite Line

I don't know it exactly, but his quote about how he could "Never replace Cayde," and how he wants to see if he can organize the Hunters a bit, etc etc is one of my favourite little morsels from him. He would be pretty cool as a Vanguard I think!

As for lines from Uldren, I haven't been exposed enough to him and his dialogue to really choose one in particular. But what I do know about him is that he was one kick-ass antagonist in his time.

BrOTP

Amanda!! Why ship them when they can be best friends instead?

OTP

I don't have one.

NoTP

Also don't really have one yet.

Random Headcanon

Crow is a regular at all the Last City's goth clubs. He's there whenever he has time, mingling with others with similar interests to his own, or just lurking in the corner. But when it comes to it, when his favourite song comes on, he can absolutely kill it. Want to learn about goth dancing? He would be glad to show you. Ask him for goth music recs he's full of 'em.

As for Uldren, again I don't really have one.

Unpopular Opinion

I think that. Crow/Uldren is unfortunately one of those characters that attracts Really Weird (See: terrible people) Fans. And when I say "weird fans" I'm not referring to the innocence that is shipping OC/Canon, making fankids, fanfic, etc etc. What I mean are people who just. I can't describe it other than they're obsessed with Crow/Uldren but in a way that distinctively feels off. The type of person that likes [x character] and also falls under the demographic of people that are Why Fandoms Suck. (Some other examples of cool characters that attract The Worst include characters like Starscream from Transformers. If you know I'm sorry and you deserve compensation. If you don't, stay ignorant for your own good.)

I know Crow/Uldren isn't the only character within Destiny that has a following of a Certain Group Of People (I.E Cayde-6) but it's still something worth pointing out, and it also Answers The Question. I don't know what's with characters like Crow/Uldren, Cayde-6 and Starscream (among countless others) that very quickly become the black sheep of their respective community because of the behavior of certain fans (either the vocal minority or the majority) but man it's. A problem. To my knowledge Crow/Uldren fans have been chill so far but I've also heard of absolute horror stories LMAO. and i say this because I've seen both "Uldren/Crow Haters DNI" and "Uldren/Crow Fans DNI" about a dozen times now.

Song I Associate W/ Him

For Crow;

another character I need to build a playlist for! This one I think is like. Ugh. I don't know, it feels like something my Titan would send to him on a bad day.

"When we grew up, our shadows grew up, too. / But they're just old ghosts that we grow attached to. / The tragic flaw is that they hide the truth, / That you're enough, you're enough, you're enough, / I promise you're enough, you're enough, you're enough. / I promise you're enough, you're enough, you're enough."

For Uldren;

It's the general vibe and atmosphere of this song that does it for me I think. Another candidate was The Mind Electric.

"All / For nothing at all. / All, for nothing at all, / With something to prove. / I was in the forest looking to see the trees, / But none were there."

An honorary mention is King Volcano by Bauhaus. Another one that's mostly vibe-based.

"King Volcano gave me numbers / King Volcano is clean. / Lonely people burn like candles, / Only we are clean."

Favourite Pictures

For Crow;

LOOK AT HIS FUCKING FACE. HE LOOKS SO FUCKING SWEET. HE CAN TRY HIS HARDEST TO LOOK SCARY LIKE ULDREN DOES (so effortlessly mind you) AND HE WOULD. JUST GKJDNSDKFNLFHND CUTE GUY ALERT!!!! and look. he's an absolute dork in this scene. crow my beloved my DARLING

For Uldren;

this image is cold as HELL. uldren looks so badass so effortlessly. holy fuck. work it girl.

and there's something abt the shot here specifically that. hoo boy scratches something in the back of my brain. i love antagonists that are so effortlessly cool as FUCK

#the crow #crow #destiny #destiny 2 #caydeposting #uldren sov

[catsconflictscopicsandchamomile]

gods sometimes I hate that I can't think about Palestine, about everything going on in the world, 24/7.

I ask myself "well why not? why not just think about that stuff and school and chores? why does fUCKING FANDOM and special interests eat your life and personality like this? don't you have any empathy?"

and I know the answer. I know its because there have been MANY times in my life where I've taken my own advice and tried to think about "the issues" 24/7. I became a total asshole. angry, stupid, often self-destructive. I didn't make any change or contribution besides starting fights with strangers online, and any effort I DID make to contribute irl just led to so many messes that the people who were actually helping then had to step aside and clean up.

the times I'm most capable of help are when I'm able to keep a balance between awareness of the problems in the world, with other stuff (both fandom and just like... homework n shit). it feels SO wrong and SO un-natural to actively prioritize fandom, but I've tried the "right" way so much and been such a dick and done a good bit of harm.

and I've tried the "wrong" way this past year and done more good/participated more than ever.

results speak for themselves.

and ik everyone does activism differently.

I'm obviously not gonna break any boycotts, holy shit no. I'm still attending protests and making posters/art for local activist movements and doing what I can when I can.

its just so tempting to put 99.99999% of myself into REALLY feeling that grief and rage and helplessness... but again. I know, yknow?

I know how that ends. I may feel righteous and empathetic and, honestly, Cool(tm), but I'm not doing shit for anyone

if mainlining destiel into my brainstem lets me show up for protests and make art and do all of that while NOT being a total bag of dicks...

ugh. it just feels fucking weird

(& yes, I did try the "really feel it, no self-anesthetizing with fandom and no distancing myself from it on purpose" approach as recently as this fall. after physically forcing myself to not send threats to kill strangers' pets, exposing my unmasked face to cameras while chalking a govt building, being kinda socially inappropriate and considering vandalism, i realized that it does in fact still make me an asshole.)

like I feel guilty about purposefully distancing myself for these issues, but also simultaneously understand from past experience that this is the best way for me to make actual, meaningful contributions. its weird.

if i go full-in on Understanding(tm) it, I FEEL morally/spiritually superior, and sure, it MIGHT make me a better activist, but years of experience tell me that, despite how I'm perceiving myself in that moment, it wont.

if I keep distancing myself, ie LITERALLY PURPOSEFULLY seeking out fandom/yt brainrot/Shiny Happy Things to AVOID thinking about it, I do more. I'm involved more, go to more protests, meetings, talk to friends about it.

...that is the reverse of how those things should work.

I think this may be the same kind of reason I don't do existentialism or organized religion. there are some things, really deep or emotional things, that if I think abt them too hard I get stuck EXTREMELY far up my own ass in how I can "only" think of these things or else I'm "awful"

but that's it. its all just thinking. and feeling. and not acting.

...I guess I'll go back to obsessing over my little shows and ships, making actual contributions to anti-genocide, anti-colonialism, pro-palestine efforts

and wondering why the FUCK I'm like this.

...also ok tbh my desire for some kind of moral or spiritual depth/fulfillment/righteousness/forgiveness???? via immersing myself in the experience of VICTIMS OF ONGOING GENOCIDE to try to understand their experience is uhhh

creepy.

especially given that its at the direct detriment of my actual activism and to the emotional harm of peers and fellow activists.

yeah hm actually that is just kind of creepy. and not helpful.

#tw personal #personal #tw vent #vent #rant #tw rant #palestine #activism #internal struggles #i keep thinking im lying to myself just to have an excuse to not care #but looking at my activism when i engage “fully” vs when i dont #the difference is STAGGERING. “not engaging fully” seems to lead to much fuller engagement and idfk WHY #i think theres a part of me that sees stuff happening and ppl suffering and goes “I HAVE TO FIX THAT. I. ME.” #“if i cant fix that now. i can actually. it hurts too much” #and that part of me is rly self-destructive and not a team player #that part of me can stay in fandom. so the more grounded and collaborative part of me can do activism. #i am NOT. a GOOD PERSON. to LEAD THINGS #but IF i engage with these issues fully. I WILL TRY. and it will go POORLY. #Get My Head Out Of My Ass hours

[backslashdelta]

I considered talking a little more broadly about why them being fanon rather than canon appeals to me, because that is part of it too

Hi hi I am curious about this from your kurtbastian ask :)

Alright so I have tried to answer this so many times, and every time I end up not being able to put it into words the way I want to. So, I'm gonna try one more time, and I'm going to answer this ask if it kills me lmao. But I guess just know that I may not be articulating my thoughts in exactly the way I would like to, so sorry about that. I'm also going to put the main answer under a cut, because it's long and rambly and, like I said, I didn't do a great job articulating my thoughts haha.

Disclaimer: I'm going to be talking a lot in generalizations. I definitely understand that not everybody thinks this way, and even those who agree with some things may not agree with others. So, just, yeah. Not trying to paint everyone with one brush. Just presenting my own personal views and perspective and what I have seen in my fandom experience.

TL;DR: All fiction is made up, none of this is real, do what you want, and "well at least my ship was canon" is not the insult that you think it is because people who love fanon ships are very well aware that our ships were not canon (and oftentimes we aren't even wishing for them to be anyway).

When I see people bringing up the differences between canon and fanon ships, I feel like it tends to be from a perspective of how you should kind of... respect, canon ships? And I get it, I think. If something is canon, it has development you can see and work with, there are relationship flaws that maybe aren't the nicest bu they're there and they're canon, and on top of that it can just be the victim of bad writing as well unfortunately. In comparison, if a ship is completely fanon, you can just make up whatever the hell you want and make them perfect (not necessarily perfect in the "no flaws" sense, but perfect in the "right flaws" sense, if that makes sense). And that's not wrong. You can make up whatever the hell you want for a fanon ship.

With a fanon ship, you have the characters to work from, but you don't know how they would act in a relationship. You can guess, and that guess can be reasonably well informed depending on the source material and how much you know about each character individually and any relationships they've had with other characters. But you don't really know how they would behave in a relationship with each other.

In canon, you know. Because you see them. That happens on screen and you see their relationship and how they interact, for better and for worse. You can completely make things up, if you want, but in general that's not something most people would want to do, and that's understandable because usually people like the ship because of the dynamics they see in the source material.

So I think a lot of people take those differences, and they put canon ships on a higher level because you are working with the source material, which feels more "real," as opposed to fanon ships where you're just making up their entire relationship basically from nothing.

And... I kind of get it. I do. Because in fandom we build off the source material, we're writing meta and creating transformative works and that requires something to base these things on, right? But I think where it falls apart for me is that none of this is real. The writers of *insert media of your choice here* created your favourite ship from nothing! That's no more real than the many fanon ships that also (don't) exist, these are all imaginary characters and imaginary relationships. It's not less good to have more imagination or headcanons or whatever involved in making the ship you enjoy work, in my opinion. I mean, obviously don't tell people who like canon ships that their ship is worse either, because it's not, I think it's really so cool to be able to work with that established relationship and build and extrapolate from that, appreciate the good writing that we were given and figure out how they would act in new and different circumstances. But that's not more real than putting a fanon ship in different circumstances as well.

I don't want to speak for everyone who prefers a fanon ship, but to give a little more insight into my feelings, I think it comes down to a couple things. One, is that the canon ship I feel the most strongly about, I also have not-insignificant issues with some aspects of it. You might say, "Well Bella, you said it's all imaginary, so can't you just pretend those issues aren't there?" and the answer would be yes, I can and I do lol, that's how I still enjoy the ship. But I don't think that would be enough on it's own. The second part is where the fanon ship comes in; is there another potential pairing who have demonstrated or have the potential to have a more interesting (to me) dynamic than my favourite canon ship? They might not have a canon relationship but if they've interacted, or if they both have enough development for you to be able to guess how they might interact, that can be intriguing and something worth exploring.

There's something really nice about having a fairly blank slate to work with, too. I think people look at that as a flaw of fanon relationships (or not so much a flaw, but more a criticism of why they're "less good"), but I just really don't agree. I like the freedom of being able to do whatever I want without having their canon relationship hanging over it. It's just such a different experience from shipping a canon ship. I love that it means I have to figure out how I think they would act and interact in certain scenarios, and I don't have a lot of canon information to go from. It's kind of a fun thinking exercise? I like writing and coming up with stories and I guess it's part of that, maybe, I feel like I have more opportunities to be creative, and this is important, in the ways that I enjoy being creative. Because there are lots of ways to be creative while enjoying canon ships, too, they're just kind of different. And that's really what it comes down to, and I'm not sure how else to say it haha.

I feel like I didn't do a great job explaining this, but I don't think I'm going to get anything better by waiting longer to answer, so I think this is just what it is. It's difficult because I really do think it's so subjective and such an individual thing. With canon ships you have more of a foundation to work from and build off, and there's something so wonderful about that. With fanon ships, you have less of that, but I think it's still wonderful to take these small bits and pieces that weren't meant to go together, and see what happens if you try to combine them. It's just so different, different in the way you need to think about it and different in the way you enjoy it, and sometimes nothing in canon feels quite right for you but a different combination of characters just speaks to you, and there's nothing wrong with enjoying that if it's what you like. Just don't shit on other people for liking something else and it's all good.

TL;DR: All fiction is made up, none of this is real, do what you want, and "well at least my ship was canon" is not the insult that you think it is because people who love fanon ships are very well aware that our ships were not canon, and oftentimes we aren't even wishing for them to be anyway.

#ask #fandom #mine #md-drawz #finally answering this thank you for your patience <3

[the-black-bulls]

For the ask meme, which of these do you find more interesting: Pairings: Zora x Nebra or Dorothy x Nozel. Characters: Dorothy or Vanessa, Nozel or Fuegoleon? I'm curious. :)

Alrighty, thanks for the ask 😁🍀 

This kinda gets long, so here’s a ‘keep reading’ line for you.

For the ships... Wow! Those are some interesting ships. I think I like them both, but I’ll go with Zora x Nebra... it'd be very cool to explore Nebra’s character this way, and the idea of Zora falling in love with a white, arrogant, rich woman is too hilarious to pass. Plus can you imagine Solid & Nozel’s reactions?—cause I can, and their horrified expressions are very clear in my mind xD

Dorothy x Nozel is a pretty great pair mind you. I like to see them as best buds and childhood friends, and the two have a wonderful dynamic. Can’t wait to see more of them together and learn about their shared history.

For the characters:

Dorothy or Vanessa... Vanessa hands down, no second thoughts here; she’s one of the best-written and well-rounded characters in the series, and I really admire her as a person—a desperate drunkard woman in her underpans who still finds time to support her found family without dragging them into her mess, damn me if this is not some good Best Aunt/Mom/Sister energy. Usually, this kind of characters is a victim of being sexually harassed (in a comedic sort of way cuz that’s Japan for you) by one or two characters close to them... but this is not the case with Vanessa and I'm super grateful for that... because, y’know, the black bulls are HER family, and family doesn’t do that to each other, it’s just normal, as it should be. This aside, I’m in love with her backstory, and unique magic, and dynamic with the black bulls. She’s pretty underrated in the fandom and imo should be more popular than... say, Mereoleona or Charlotte, but that’s just my opinion 😛 

Dorothy? I love her, of course. But Vanessa is on a whole nother level—she’s a black bull, after all. I gotta admit though, I’m not into the captains in general as much as most people around here are. I’m a super weirdo I know x)

Nozel or Fuegoleon... huh, that’s easy, I’ll always go with Best Bro Fuego. He has some of the best dynamic in the series—wholesome with Leo, relatable with Mereo, and admirable with Theresa. If I was more into the captains, I’d be one of his stans and simp for him like there’s no tomorrow xD

Nozel... well, gotta be honest, I just don’t care about him, and there’s a lot of things I dislike about his relationship with both Noelle and Solid & Nebra. I still find him funny tho, and I like his dynamic with Dorothy, but in general he’s not my type.

#Pitto Space #ask game #thanks for the ask! #I hate myself for talking too much x( #not a quote

[zuzuslastbraincell]

☕ Aang.

He's a character I don't see you talk about much, so I'm curious about you thoughts on him, his character arc, what you like or dislike about him, etc.

The short answer: Love Aang. He’s great! Feel like a lot of the dislike of his character (while fading, at least in the circles I’m in) is misplaced. People who think Aang didn’t make the right end game decisions don’t understand his character / miss the point, IMO. That said, dislike some of the character decisions especially r.e. Katara/Aang.

The longer answer: I really love Aang and I feel like the hate he receives from various parts of the fandom is very unwarranted, though I wonder if it stems from watching the show as a child his age and finding his playfulness unrelatable - like as a kid I might have found it exasperating but as an adult I find it very refreshing and it is so obvious to me that Aang is A Child, it informs how he behaves and his decisions massively, and I wonder if the dislike comes from the lack of perspective and being unable to view Aang as a kid, being kids themselves when these haters watched the show?

That said, all kinds of people do dismiss Aang as immature and it frustrates me to no end, because being cynical =/= maturity, a willingness to make difficult decisions that betray deeply held beliefs =/= maturity, and Aang’s decision to stick to his beliefs should always be viewed in tandem with the context that he is a victim of genocide, that genocide includes the destruction of a culture’s common beliefs and practices too, and whether those beliefs live or die in the future starts and ends with him.

Additionally, I feel like Aang does possess a lot of emotional maturity for his age, even if he has bouts of being immature (like, normal, honestly). Like he processes his anger in a way that is largely healthy, actually? I think that’s a thing most people don’t understand, they don’t see that as part of Aang, when really Aang processes his emotions like someone who’s had very clear healthy models for it. He does feel anger, and grief. When Aang tells Katara in the southern raiders episode vengeance isn’t the way, that’s something that he’s fought hard internally to believe in, that’s something that he’s learned.

Tying into that, I think an overlooked aspect of Aang’s development is how in season 1 Aang spent a lot of time looking for Fire Nation citizens who were good / who could be good, because the idea that the Fire Nation is fundamentally evil contradicts his world view (”the monks taught us all life was sacred”), but I think that was probably a perspective he clung onto as well as a way of dealing with his grief. Like, I feel like Aang has fought hard to reaffirm his beliefs in a world that seems determined to “prove him wrong”, surrounded with characters who largely don’t share or understand them & see it as naivety because they lack perspective and have only known war / understand the brutality of the opponent they’re facing on a personal level. I think we don’t see a lot of this explicitly, it’s largely subtext and often an internal debate -- Aang doesn’t have many people to soundboard these kind of thoughts off, there’s no one who is an air nomad or of a similar kind of upbringing around.

Tbh I feel that Aang is best in season 1, largely because his developments in later seasons also incorporate his feelings about Katara as part of his general development, and if I’m just completely honest with you all, I mean no disrespect to Katara/Aang folks you’re cool in my books but I’m just not sold by it at all. For example, because Aang’s journey mastering the avatar state involves him reckoning with his earthly attachments and the idea of letting go, and that conflict revolves around his feelings for Katara, and because I am not particularly sold by Aang and Katara, that impacts on how I view that whole arc. I love a good friends to lovers arc where the depth of those feelings extends to both friendship and romance but I feel like the way ATLA writes romantic arcs often involves a character suddenly looking at another with heart eyes and very little actual bonding to justify that sudden change, very few *journeys* or *arcs* that culminate in feelings (unrelated, but this is my theory as to why Zuko is shipped with almost everyone, because he literally has several life-changing journeys with other characters at the tail end of S3), and it’s fairly unconvincing / pretty flat to me? Especially since we do not get anywhere near as much an insight into Katara’s feelings in that regard? I get that romance isn’t always a grand arc or whatever but given that it’s tied to a lot of Aang’s S2 development, I think it ought to have more prominence.

If I’m honest, I also feel like Aang’s development regarding Katara and the Avatar State was incomplete, and that made a lot of his S3 development frustrating because in other aspects I think he came into his own and matured - usually in subtle ways, like his attitude in the Southern Raiders, but also we see him from being understandably upset about having to hide his identity, to incorporate aspects of Fire Nation dress into his final late S3 look - but in that aspect, his arc felt incomplete to me? This might be a poor reading of it, but to expand on how I see it, in S2, Aang is incapable of letting go of Katara until literally the most critical moment, when he has to -- at which point, he is struck down by chance. In S3, the concept of entering into the Avatar State being a matter of difficulty is literally not mentioned, so we can presume he’s come to terms with letting go of Katara - which directly contradicts the pushy behaviour he shows in Ember Island Players, the way he ignores her boundaries? And then that’s literally never addressed, Aang never apologises, Katara and Aang never have an important conversation resolving the conflict there, and in the end Aang gets the girl? It’s frustrating.

Like, the way I see it, “letting go” of Katara shouldn’t mean putting no importance on her - I actually like the idea of Aang not being willing to leave his friends behind, his compassion and care is important in this aspect. Rather, if I were in the writer’s chair, I would have it that “letting go” means a willingness to face rejection. Aang lets go of a romantic prospect of Katara - and acknowledges she can and might reject him, and that’s always a possibility, but opens his heart to her anyway out of trust (and when they get together, it’s not because he’s proven himself worthy, but because Katara wants to be with him). I think that would have been such a monumentally *powerful* message, especially in a late 00s cartoon, prior to the likes of Adventure Time and Gravity Falls quite explicitly deconstructing the idea of the male protagonist always getting with their crush (I feel like a vital context new viewers miss r.e. Katara/Aang is that the male protagonist would always always get with the girl in cartoons, it always happened, to the extent that female characters existed as much as love interests as characters in their own rights). I honestly don’t think it would even require that much in terms of change! I might show that in S3 Aang still has difficulty with the Avatar state at times - he can go into it at will, but not always - and that’s because he’s in the process of letting Katara as a crush go. I’d still keep the kiss in Day of Black Sun - tbh, I have no issues there, he thought he’d never see her again quite possibly, he’s impulsive, it makes sense - but I’d maybe highlight a slight awkwardness afterwards. I might even keep the awful Ember Island Players conflict - but crucially, I think Aang would have to learn from this. I think when Aang might realise he’s still struggling with the Avatar state as late as Sozin’s Comet episode 1, panic, realise he needs to internalise that belief more, and I think he’d leave Katara a note - including an apology for his actions before, for pushing her when she wasn’t ready, but explaining also, that he needs to go on a journey by himself to figure this out. Rest of Sozin’s comet goes ahead as normal, more or less. I’d end with Katara, maybe at the tea shop afterwards, talking to Aang and asking him why he went off by himself, explaining that she & the gaang would be there for him, he didn’t have to go on a journey alone. Aang would explain that he didn’t expect they’d understand, they’re not monks, and Katara explaining that maybe they wouldn’t, but he could *try*, that’s a risk you sometimes take (but concedes they could have been more understanding). And I think over that conversation it hits Aang it’s not about being alone. Everything’s connected. It’s about not clinging on. it’s about being willing to lose. It’s about trust. I think by the end, they agree to try and communicate better, and Aang then asks Katara out - mirroring “Do you want to go penguin sledding with me?”, similar kind of activity. He almost tries to over-explain and say ‘listen it doesn’t have to go anywhere’ but Katara just smiles and says yeah. And they leave to go on their first real date.

Anyway that’s how I *would* have handled it and that is what I think could be an interesting and compelling arc that wouldn’t take much adjustment to add. Aang is afraid of losing Katara, and realising that he can and might lose her is important.

.... that’s way more than I intended to write but yeah. I feel like a lot of Aang’s development ties in with his feelings for Katara and that’s where I take issue.

#aang #soozenwrites

[fansplaining]

Hi guys! I recently marathoned Black Sails and i loved it! the only thing I'm sad about is that i didn't watch it in real time... I don't care if my ship is cannon, but I found that seeing it all at once means i know what happened to everyone, and I'm having a hard time shutting it off. I want to be into it, bc there are so many characters and ships i like in BS, but i don't know how to make the story feel open for exploration. any ideas or thoughts on how to incept myself into BS fandom?

Hello! Of course Elizabeth is answering this. This is a GREAT ASK, thank you, and not just because the entry point to this question is Black Sails ⚓⚓⚓. 

(I’ll have you know this is one of, like, three gifs of Flint smiling in the entire series. I also googled “Black Sails happy” and…no one looked happy.)

OK so it seems like there are a few things going on here. Apologies for taking what’s ostensibly about one show and turning it into something broader, but I think it gets at fundamental questions of fannish engagement, so I’M GOING IN.

1) Watching/reading a series all at once 

Flourish and I talk about this one a lot, because we (and many others) have observed that younger/newer Harry Potter fans approach characters and plot elements VERY differently than we do, and we chalk a lot of this up to reading the books as a complete text versus reading it with miserable long gaps in which to turn over every freakin detail only to have 75% of it jossed when the next book came out. In 2002 I legit read this one page of Dumbledore dialogue in GoF 100 times thinking there was a clue that was just…under…the surface.

I think that with some texts and with some fans, the serialized nature of TV and book series are the way in—we climb into those gaps and lingering there, waiting and obsessively turning things over and imagining all the branching possibilities, all the future reveals, all the resolutions, is part of the pleasure. I sure as hell wouldn’t have fallen for Sherlock if I hadn’t shown up to poke at the gaping emotional wound between s2 and s3. (Frankly if you showed me all four seasons at once I’m not sure I’d even like the show—my lingering emotional loyalty was the only thing that kept me saying anything nice about s4.) 

If I had not watched Black Sails all in one go it would have been LITERAL TORTURE FOR ME. I had to pause for a week while traveling and I started to read fic that actually spoiled parts of the fourth season WHOOPS. :-/// But I can also understand how watching it all in one go wouldn’t give you enough space. But then, we watched the same way and I am deep in it, plotting out fic and everything. So maybe… 

2) A complete text can stay with you but might not give you a way in

This happens to me with books *all the time*. I’ll read something that shakes me—I’ve often used the metaphor “knocks your world off its axis” when describing a really great book, like it can be the subtlest tilt and you’ll feel like everything’s changed. I think it’s pretty normal for texts to stay with you? If they’re good or if they touch you in some specific way? Especially if you’re fannish and really feel the media you’re consuming.

But one thing I often find about books is they’re more…complete. Even when television shows end properly, rather than being cancelled, they might stretch for longer than what was initially planned, for example, so it doesn’t feel like the arc of the plot was as carefully constructed—often it can’t be, especially with long-running American shows (and of course with classic episodic television, say, a monster-of-the-week show, it’s not even structurally designed to have the same sort of ~ABCDE structure as a novel might). 

Black Sails is not one of those shows—they knew they were bringing the story to a close, and the entire show rests on carefully-plotted narrative arcs. (Not to mention there was an actual ~canonical endpoint for all the Treasure Island characters, ie where the book begins (like, sort of). I mean, there were also canonical endpoints for Jack, Anne, Vane, Blackbeard, Hornigold, and every other historical figure, but…)

Over the years I’ve joined fandoms for WIPs as well as finished products, and often for me fandom’s been a way of trying to mend the wounds of a media property I found incomplete, either narratively (with bad writing) or literally (like, when a show ends abruptly). I think for some fans, this is a crucial piece—they say that when they find something too complete, there’s nothing to mend. 

3) Different modes of fannish engagement

So here’s another thing I’ve observed—different friends have different definitions of “fandom.” So people are like, “Oh yeah, I’m in the fandom, I love that show!” And I find out that means they enjoy the show and livetweet it and look at some gifs and that’s that. Which is totally fandom! And then there’s me, nodding nervously as I debate mentioning that, “Oh yeah, I’m in the fandom, I love that show!” for me means “THIS IS THE ONLY THING I WANT TO THINK ABOUT, HELP ME, I AM DROWNING.” It’s funny, sometimes I think about archetypal nerdboy fandom and its dick-measuring fact recitation, and then I think about all the times I tried to read the room to see if it was safe to let another person know how much I thought about something I loved, how much I felt about it. Even in totally fannish spaces, I still hesitate. :-/

There have been some things in the past few years that I’ve really enjoyed and toyed with checking out fandoms for, but what I’ve come to realize over the years is for me, it needs to be like falling in love. I think for some people, interest and obsession grows, and for others, you fall in head-first. And for others still, it depends on the thing. 

I understand this ask might have been specifically looking for resources or suggestions and while I’d just say if you’re not feeling it in this way, that’s cool, there are lots of different ways to fan, and you can keep thinking about something even if you aren’t drawn to, say, create transformative works about it? But maybe I should say something about Black Sails in particular…

4) Black Sails-specific: unreliable narrators and transformative works

If anyone hasn’t finished Black Sails, stop reading here, I’ll keep it vague but there’s only so much I can do. This is one thing that’s especially interesting to me about this ask: while I’m going on about how final and precisely plotted it all was, it’s not…that final. Because the entire point of the show is about narrative, right? Who gets to write them, who gets to own them, how they can be manipulated, how they shape “civilization.” Characters constantly talk—and constantly show—how both Flint and Silver (and, like, most of the characters, from Max to Thomas to Vane to Woodes Rogers) are these masterful shapers of narrative. Flint is the victim of clashing narratives: what’s actually happened to him, what he tells the world he’s doing, what he’s actually doing (note that explosive scene when Miranda calls him on this, ahhh I love Miranda). But the show’s choice to shift to Silver’s narration to wrap up events is a really fascinating one: the man who works so hard to obscure his past, laying out the narratives of the future. Should we believe him? 

I recommend this interview with creators Johnathan Steinberg and Robert Levine—the Flint section at the start is really delightful if you’re into artists being super into open-interpretation of their work. “Do we have a sense of what we imagine is happening?” Steinberg says when asked if we should believe Silver’s speech to Madi. “Yes, but if I was someone else, I wouldn’t want to watch it with my interpretation coloring it.” They talk about how this is essentially a transformative work (they don’t use that term)—a certain decision “made sense as a way to both acknowledge the book and spin it.”

So this is like the literal opposite of, say, JK Rowling, who seems intent on letting us know every freakin detail of canon and post-canon and seems genuinely unhappy at the idea that people will interpret things in ways that “aren’t true.” (At least in interviews I’ve seen/read of hers in the past few years.) Steinberg and Levine seem to be the ultimate “open to interpretation” guys, which really is like this big blank slate for fandom building on and playing with this world they’ve created. That being said, if oppositional fandom is your cup of tea—if you love fic and fandom as a corrective, as a way of wrestling a creator over the text—then the, “Go for it, interpret however you want” thing is probably not super appealing. 

This is the first time in my entire fandom life, going on two decades now, that I have simultaneously been really satisfied with a show’s ending and still wanted to write and read fic. And that seems…weird to me? So I don’t think it’s that weird that it wouldn’t work for someone. TL;DR: I’d just say if it happens, it happens. But it’s OK to love something and not find a way into the fandom. But if that changes for you, I’ll be there. :-)

#asks #black sails #black sails spoilers #fandom #fanfiction

[victimsofyaoipoll]

Round 1

Propaganda under the cut

Juno

She's honestly a way deeper character than people give her credit for, her arc is that of acceptance and being true to your heart despite what society thinks of you. Oh yeah and for the record she doesn't stand in the way of Lougosi because of her crush on Legoshi because I honestly think that she was more in love with the idea of being in a same species relationship than she was with Legoshi himself. I'm talking about the part where she falls for Louis and struggles with the knowledge that if she actually pursues him she's gonna be seen as a freak and never reach the social status she strives for. There's a lot to discuss with her character arc but NOOOO let's all just laugh at how she gets no bitches because Beastars fans see Juno as a joke. (I'm not mad I'm not mad it's fine it's fine)

shes cool but she doesnt have good chemistry with her canon love interest and therefore the fandom chalks her up to having no personality whatsoever. they see her as either an obstacle or a sex object basically

Done dirty by the writers and fandom alike

Keiko O'Brien

Certain People I Could Name insist on shipping her husband with the annoying twink doctor Julian Bashir because of the friendship they develop over the series. I maintain that O'Brien would never cheat on his wife, let alone with another man, and the response is often "they're in a polycule together!!!" which is even more out of character. Everyone please show my girl Keiko some more respect 😤

Wife of chief engineer Miles O'Brien, who is shipped with the chief medical officer, Julian Bashir. Show itself veered into misogyny regarding her and her marriage, manifesting as Miles constantly complaining about her and her encouraging him to go hang out with Julian and leave her and their daughter alone. Fandom responded to this by creating the "O'Brien polycule" including Keiko, Miles, Julian, and first officer Kira Nerys (who has another strange semi-romantic subplot with both O'Briens). Really, though, it just exists to have Julian/Miles without reckoning with Miles having to cheat to get there. I, too, was guilty of this in the past. Keiko had the potential to be a very interesting character (and started to be, early in the show) but it was never realized. She deserved better :(

keiko is a lovely lady and astrobotanist who had a whole romance with and married the more main character miles obrien but now frequently people sideline her to (semi-jokingly?) ship miles with his friend julian. she’s not the best written character and she deserved so much more from the narrative, but it still feels weird that the fan joke about her is always how much she is constantly encouraging her husband to cheat on her (which to be fair does happen a few times but not That much)

#round 1 #poll #juno beastars #beastars #keiko o'brien #star trek