#So much collaborative exploration of themes... So much love for the show and support for each other... Mwah

[themuse-if]

DEMO (TBA) | Cast Profiles | Cast Interviews

The Muse is a 18+ slice of life interactive fiction novel set at NYU focusing mostly on the art departments in the Steinhardt and Tisch schools. Inspired by my love for shows and movies like Felicity, Fame (the show), Skins UK, and Center Stage. This will not be an accurate depiction of school life at NYU, I'll be taking lots of creative liberties.

Content Warnings: explicit language, sexual themes, substance use, violence, mention of SA

You come from a family of artists and art lovers. Your mother is a passionate curator for a small gallery in the city and your father is a sculptor and painter with a very dedicated cult following. They met when they were just starting out and have built a lovely life for themselves and their two children, you and your older brother Cameron.

Your parents have always been super supportive of you and your brother’s dreams and ambitions. They were a great source of encouragement and guidance for your brother on his path to discovering his goal to become a game designer and you on your path to become whatever you choose.

Growing up surrounded by such creativity just so happened to inspired you to want to create something of your own.

Now that you’ve graduated high school it’s time for you to head off to university! You’ve decided to leave the mid sized city that you call your hometown, and go to the big city NYC! You’ll be attending NYU more specifically, but you won’t be making this move alone you’ll be attending with your best friend Maxine!

What will you discover in your university life?

Will you solely focus on schoolwork or wind up in the raging party scene?

Will you explore new creative endeavors or solely focus on honing your craft?

With so much going on will you even have the time to possibly find your muse, or maybe even become someone else’s?

Design your mc from clothing style to physical appearance to pronouns, gender identity, name, looks, and more.

Choose 1 of 9 majors that grant you different classes with new students and professors: (Studio Arts, Dance, Drama, Photography and Imaging, Jazz Studies, Songwriting, Recorded Music, Collaborative Arts, Dramatic Writing )

Curate your MCs personality and how they react to all the drama and excitement university life has to offer. Style your MC’s dorm room and their aesthetic style.

Navigate the cliques and scenes to figure out where your MC fits in. Maybe you're a social butterfly and you just float from one social group to another!

Engage in a romance with 1 of 10 characters. 5 female/male gender selectable and 5 gender set characters. And 2 poly routes one with The Rebel Rejects and on with The Exes.

Choose one of three part time jobs to give you a little extra spending money for things like spring break and birthday gifts for your new friends.

Follow The Muse through your MC’s freshman and sophomore years. Junior and senior year will come much later in Book Two of The Muse. The third and final book in The Muse series will cover the start of MC's new life after graduation.

Roxanne/Robbie Sawyer: (f/m) The lead singer and guitarist of The Rebel Rejects. Ro is everything you would want in a lead singer cool, charismatic, and super talented. Don’t let their dazzling aura intimidate you though because though they may have a raging wild side they can also be extremely down to earth.

Joleen/Johnny Nielsen: (f/m) The drummer of The Rebel Rejects. Jo is the oddball of the band with a sunny exterior and twisted flower child past. They may be a sweet boho bimbo with a heart of gold, but there’s a lot more that lies behind those blue green eyes.

Delphine/Desmond Hartley: (f/m) The bassist for The Rebel Rejects. De is the super glue propelling the group forward. With high expectations from her parent, and dreams that soar even higher, success is the only option.

Rina/Ren Fukushi: (f/m) R is the best ballet dancer in this incoming freshman class, and no one would ever think to say otherwise. They’re cold and closed off, if it isn’t about ballet then they don’t want to hear it.

Everly/Everett Thompson: (f/m) Eve is a triple threat. Singing, dancing, acting they can do it all. They hope to complete their EGOT before they turn 40.

Karla Reyes: (she/her) Karla is a sophomore at NYU studying Studio Arts. Their favorite medium is watercolor on canvas. They’ve dabbled with sculpting and ceramics...until they broke up with their ex, Faye, and can’t stand to be in the same studio with them.

Faye Winters: (she/they) Fae is every bit the ethereal being they seem to be, and just as flighty. She is a sophomore majoring in dance with a minor in studio arts. She has this effortless charm and beauty that extends to her art whether its her dancing or her sculptures.

Sebastien Auclair: (he/him) Sebastien is in his third year of university, he’s an exchange student from the Paris College of Art. He is studying photography and imaging. Sebastian loves Paris, but he is excited for this change of scenery.

Maxine Matthews: (she/her)Max is your best friend in the world! Your parents are friends so you were destined to best pals since birth, thank god you actually like each other or all those shared family functions would have been really awkward. Max is funny and always has great commentary for every show or movie that you watch together. Which is why you weren’t surprised when they decided to major in dramatic writing. Some people think that you’re too close. They wonder how is it possible that you could be just friends.

Silas Walker: (he/him) Silas is your RA. As your Resident Advisor he's super helpful and friendly. You have question about the best study spots, bad professors, how to use the subway, well he's got answers. He keeps all his advisees at arms length because everyone knows RAs can't canoodle with their advisees. And that just makes it all the more enticing.

#interactive fiction #dashingdon #twine if #twine interactive fiction #interactive novel #interactive if #choice of games #choice script #choose your own adventure #choose your own story #twine game #twine story #if: intro #if: themuse #interact if #interact-if #if wip

[ceph-the-ghost-writer]

What was the inspiration behind your oc? What was the first thing you decided about them?

Ollie: Like Athena, she sprung from the depths of my imagination fully formed and ready to do battle. It happened around the time I wrote about Renato showing up at Dorian's and mentioning other aquilae. I figured at least a few of Renato's comrades had to hate him, and that if one were his ex/rival it would be good for some laughs. A lot of Ollie's backstory is based on stories about cults and America's current political climate, extreme Protestant sects and transphobic panic in particular. She's a complicated character stewing with all sorts of emotions and I'm glad to have her around.

Micaela: She existed in a nebulous form when I started Phagophobia, but didn't coalesce until I decided Dorian would start out as human. She actually contained a few bare bones left over from a much older, villainous character, but by now the only resemblance is in the name. Coming from the same generation of bloodborn as Desmond and Theodore, she's part of the opposition to Mergus and his aquilae, highlighting different approaches to power, adversity, community, etc.

Elfy: Yet another character born from Phagophobia. I basically asked myself what kind of friends Isaac might have, and an extroverted, rebellious ghost hunter showed up first.

Ben: This one came out of a collaboration I started with two other writers years ago. He was a direct contrast to the Twilight vampires, starting out as somewhat crude, self-centered, and honestly kind of a jerk (though he would grow over time). Ben's softened somewhat in recent years, though he still has some rough edges and can definitely be terrifying when he wants to be. His love of baseball has remained consistent.

Tilda: Another character who started out much darker and gleeful about violence, meant to be the original-version-of-Ben's werewolf girlfriend. Eventually, though, I decided her lupine curse could be used to explore other avenues maybe, and she changed just like he did. Her full name, Clotilda (which she despises), comes from the last known slave ship to bring captive people from Africa to the U.S. It was burned and scuttled to hide the deed since Congress had banned importing slaves (though not owning human beings of course). Her family is loosely based on those who commissioned the ship. They're an example of insular Old Money and how oppression evolves in different eras, with a horrific supernatural element thrown in for good measure.

Yi: She was just a name until I started writing Phagophobia. Her tattoos, short hair, and muscles were the first details to pop up, the latter maybe inspired by Jude Perry from The Magnus Archives. Yi's also just a type of character I like: looks like a one-dimensional bruiser, but is actually steady and thoughtful. She's meant to be the most sympathetic of the enforcers and go through her own arc about her views on the Coven.

Mergus: He's got pieces of a few characters mixed in, including the name. But being a ruthless bastard with a lot of charisma is the unifying theme. Mergus is based on the type of person who's dangerous because he seems so reasonable and caring. And he is...to a point. He helped a lot of vulnerable humans during the break, including kids like Renato and Ollie. It gave him genuine pleasure to be of service. And in the back of his mind he had a sense that service would generate a lot of loyalty. That, say, a couple of trans kids with no support system would latch on to him and absorb his ideals because they trusted him. He doesn't make the rules, he just plays by them, and with skill, you understand.

#a question a day #character info #character profiles #dysthanasia

[thxnews]

Beyoncé's Reign: A Decade of Dominance

Queen Bey

Say the name "Beyoncé," and instantly, images come to mind of powerful vocals, electrifying dance moves, and a stage presence that commands attention. But who is the woman behind the crown? Let's dive deeper into the private life, career, and future of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, the multi-hyphenate artist who's redefined what it means to be a superstar.   From Girl's Dream to Destiny's Child Born in Houston, Texas, in 1981, Beyoncé's love for music blossomed early. From singing in church choirs to performing in talent shows, her talent was undeniable. By the age of nine, she formed Destiny's Child with her friends, launching a journey that would propel them to become one of the best-selling girl groups of all time. Hits like "Say My Name" and "Independent Women" cemented their place in pop music history, showcasing Beyoncé's powerful vocals and infectious energy.  

Beyoncé in concert. Photo By Peter Hutchins. Flickr. Solo Stardom and Creative Evolution But Beyoncé wasn't content to stay in the shadows. In 2003, she embarked on a solo career, releasing her debut album, "Dangerously in Love." The album was a smash hit, spawning popular tracks like "Crazy in Love" and "Baby Boy," showcasing her songwriting skills and artistic evolution. From R&B ballads to hip-hop collaborations, Beyoncé proved her versatility, solidifying her status as a force to be reckoned with.   Beyond Music and Building Her Empire Beyoncé's reach extends far beyond music. She's a successful businesswoman, launching her own clothing line, fragrance, and Production Company. Her visual albums, like "Beyoncé" and "Black Is King," push artistic boundaries and explore themes of race, feminism, and empowerment. She's also a vocal advocate for social justice issues, using her platform to fight for equality and inspire change.  

Beyoncé Estádio do Morumbi - SP. Photo By Carolina Mendonça. Flickr.

Love, Marriage, and Motherhood

In 2008, Beyoncé married rapper Jay-Z, forming a power couple that redefined the meaning of celebrity love. They've weathered storms and emerged stronger, raising three beautiful children together. Beyoncé openly celebrates motherhood, showcasing the joys and struggles of raising a family while navigating the demands of her career. This balance between personal and professional life resonates deeply with fans, making her a relatable role model.   100 Million Albums Sold Worldwide! That’s a whole lot of Beyonce! For example, if you laid 100 million tons of beans down on the ground, they’d reach a quarter of the way around the earth. Makes you feel kind of small right!? (As well as a bit hungry!) But well done anyway Beyonce!   She performed at Barack Obama’s Inauguration! An inauguration is when a president gets the official title of president, so it must have been a huge honor for Beyonce to perform there - even more so because Barack Obama was the first Black US President! Beyonce has spoken a lot about how we need to get rid of racism, so nice one! Feels good to be good right?  

Beyonce Mrs. Carter show. Photo By Koeni Ssey. Flickr. Beyoncé, the feminist! She strongly thinks that boys and girls should be given equal chances to live their lives - and that women should be able to do whatever they want with their lives, which isn’t that much to ask right? Beyonce gives lots to charities that support this work, so she's putting her money where her mouth is, good on her we say!   Pride of Place on the Hollywood Walk of Fame! There aren’t many marks of success bigger than that and in 2006 she was invited to put her name down on that famous walk! These fabulous stars are made of brass and set into the floor themselves, but which will last longer, the star of Beyonce’s fame? We think most probably Beyonce!   Beyonce created a stage name called ‘Sasha Fierce’! She says that she did this so that she could keep her stage performer different from who she is as a person at home. It also helps her get over any nerves she has before a show, but she simply goes into ‘Sasha Mode’ - pretty clever!  

Beyonce singing on stage. Photo By Raphael Ribas Lopes. Flickr.

The Ever-Evolving Queen: What's Next?

With each album and project, Beyoncé reinvents herself. Her 2022 single "Break My Soul" marked a return to her house music roots, proving her ability to stay fresh and relevant. So, what does the future hold for the Queen Bey? Whether it's a new album, a world tour, or ventures into filmmaking, one thing's for sure: Beyoncé will continue to push boundaries, entertain millions, and inspire generations to come.  

Beyonce giving. Photo by Neurofibromatosis - Just Ask Foundation. Flickr. Beyond the Glitz and Glamour: Lessons from the Queen Beyoncé's journey is more than just chart-topping hits and sold-out stadiums. It's a testament to hard work, dedication, and the unwavering belief in oneself. Here are some key takeaways from her multifaceted life. Dream big and chase your passions: Beyoncé started young, honing her talent and pursuing her dreams with unwavering conviction. Embrace your individuality: From her powerful vocals to her bold fashion choices, Beyoncé celebrates her unique identity, inspiring others to do the same. Empower yourself and others: Beyoncé uses her platform to advocate for social justice and inspire change, motivating others to find their own voices. Finding a healthy balance: Despite her demanding career, Beyoncé prioritizes her family and personal life, proving that success is multifaceted.   In Conclusion Whether you're a die-hard fan or simply admire her talent and impact, there's no denying Beyoncé's reign continues. As she evolves and pushes boundaries, one thing remains constant: Queen Bey will continue to inspire, entertain, and empower, ensuring her legacy as a cultural icon for generations to come.   Sources: THX News & Wikipedia. Read the full article

#Africanheritage #BeyoncéKnowles-Carter #Destiny'sChild #Empowermentanthems #Entrepreneurandadvocate #Musicindustryicon #Personallifespotlight #Socialjustice #Solosuperstardom #Visualmasterpieces

[blog-feesback]

The Magic of Preschool: Unveiling the Best Parts of a Child's Early Educational Journey

Introduction:

Preschool, often the first structured educational experience for young minds, is a magical place where curiosity blooms, friendships blossom, and the foundation for a lifetime of learning is laid. In this blog post, we'll explore the enchanting aspects that make a child's time in preschool truly special and valuable.

Imagination Takes Center Stage:

One of the most delightful aspects of preschool is the uninhibited exploration of imagination. Children engage in creative play, transforming ordinary objects into fantastical elements of their make-believe worlds. From playing house to imagining themselves as astronauts, preschool allows children to dream big and explore the limitless boundaries of their creativity.

Friendships Flourish:

Preschool is a social hub where children form their first real friendships. These connections are built through shared activities, collaborative play, and the simple joy of being together. Friendships formed in preschool often become the foundation for a child's social skills, teaching them the importance of cooperation, empathy, and kindness.

Play is Learning:

In preschool, play is not just a break from learning; it is the essence of learning itself. Through games, puzzles, and hands-on activities, children absorb essential skills without even realizing it. The best part is that they are having so much fun that the learning feels like a game, setting the stage for a positive attitude toward education.

Confidence Blooms:

Preschool provides a nurturing environment where children are encouraged to express themselves freely. Whether it's show-and-tell, storytelling, or participating in group activities, every child gets a chance to shine. This boosts their self-esteem and confidence, laying the groundwork for a positive self-image that will stay with them as they navigate the challenges of future education.

Every Day is a New Adventure:

Preschoolers experience the world with fresh eyes, and each day brings a new adventure. Whether it's a nature walk, a themed activity, or a surprise visitor, preschool is filled with excitement and curiosity. This not only keeps the children engaged but also instills a love for exploration and discovery that will stay with them throughout their academic journey.

Teachers as Guides and Cheerleaders:

Preschool teachers play a pivotal role in a child's development. They are not just educators; they are guides, mentors, and cheerleaders. Their nurturing approach helps children feel safe and supported, fostering an environment where curiosity is celebrated, mistakes are embraced, and every small achievement is cheered on.

Conclusion:

The best parts of a child's time in preschool are woven together by the threads of imagination, friendship, play, confidence, adventure, and the guiding hands of caring teachers. Preschool is not just a stepping stone to formal education; it's a magical chapter in a child's life where the seeds of lifelong learning, creativity, and social skills are planted and nurtured. As parents and educators, cherishing and celebrating these aspects of preschool ensures that children embark on their educational journey with a sense of wonder and joy.

[inlocusmads]

just want to pop in regarding Lin. she was the only writer who represented eastern Europe in the entire fandom. she chose to represent a nation that is currently suffering to introduce people to their culture. hell her work inspired me to educate myself on the region and the country. sure her works also included romance and smut but there was so much more because she went for relatable themes and topics. and Laura was such a great mc.

Thank you so much for bringing this to light, Anon! Seriously! Lin has inspired so many people to learn and know more about Eastern European culture. I would have never known about wonderful and interesting Ukrainian culture and tradition if it wasn't for her and she wove this so seamlessly into her fics!

I remember she had this one fic where Laura introduced Ethan to her playlist with a bunch of Ukrainian (?) Artists if I'm not wrong and I ended up listening to the song and it was wonderful! Lin was extremely thorough and through with everything, treating Laura as a person; an actual person than a character of her own. Albeit being new to the fandom, she advocated for kindness and would share so many things pertinent to what was going on in Ukraine so we can all be aware and show support.

There was this other fic or HC I remember of Lin's where Edenbrook has an exchange program. Lin ends up going back to her home country to improve patient care and tells Ethan all about it. It is such a clever, beautiful way of acknowledging different cultures, different traditions and I also remember a series of holiday fics she'd written where Ethan was kind of the audience surrogate in exploring Laura's heritage. Lin made it so wonderful for us to explore the culture as well and her storytelling was so fascinating, so intriguing. I don't know if she's the only Eastern European MC in the whole of the Choices fandom, but she certainly was the only one in OH; but it is such a shame, such a terrible thing that we'll probably not hear from Laura or Lin again.

Laura was someone you actively rooted for. She was a strong character and believed heavily in her roots. I think when she was young, Lin gave her a backstory where she fell fatally sick but made a great recovery, which gave her the motivation to work in medicine. She was such a romantic too, at heart, always wanted the best for everybody and I love the fact that she hated Ethan when they first met. Sure Lin's works have romance and smut in them, AND she does this characterisation so well, so beautifully executed that you can't help but not think Laura can't be just a character.

Lin did so much work; I remember her telling me she was collaborating with Ukrainian people online about this too and she's always had the most positive message to bring to the fandom. Ukraine lost so many lives, so many resources in this battle and it doesn't help that in news outlets, they're conglomerated under the "war torn zones" category, as far as the news go here, in my home country. Laura brought all of this information to light, even the ugly ones. She advocated for change on a global level by starting small. She didn't have to make Laura Ukrainian at all. She could've just stuck with a simple backstory and gone with it, but the sheer elaboratedness in her work is what drew me to it in the first place.

It just sucks that beautiful, powerful characters like Laura are just shunned and bullied off. And even more wonderful, talented writers like Lin are send miles and miles of hate. I just don't know what to say about this, honestly. It's tough to see someone go, but it is even tougher to learn that the fandom that for a long time, talked about supporting creators and got everyone to agree on it, played the part in their departure. I just wish Lin the best and I hope she perhaps picks up Laura again, maybe for an original project. Her works, the heart and soul of her projects, her literal blood, sweat and tears can't all be for nothing, no.

#anonymous #askboxed! #ofmischiefandmedicine

[greysstories]

Stepmania ddr a theme

#Stepmania ddr a theme install

#Stepmania ddr a theme simulator

Take a peek at some of the screenshots of UPSRT in the slideshow below. The entire effort (Lua engine, pixel art, non-pixel art, original soundtrack, mod-scripting) was completed in a little less than a month. Gameplay is a bit brief, but it’s an excellent demo of what is possible in StepMania 5 with enough dedication and reckless spending of time. Two friends and I spent the month of January putting together UPSRT, a Pokémon + dance game adventure for StepMania 5. UPSRT is a lighthearted game with a whole world to explore and even has a few community members inserted into the game as NPCs or sometimes gym leaders. StepMania 5 tournament at University Park Penn State on Sunday January 17th, 2016, where the theme was about playing step-files with cool visual effects that were only made possible with StepMania 5. UPSRT was presented as a side event after the U.P.S. Along with the collaborative efforts of Caitlin “HUGS” Schaeppi and Alan “TaroNuke” James, they were able to transform StepMania into a Pokémon themed role playing game called UPSRT. What Dan “dbk2” Guzek is about to show you is how StepMania can be used for so much more than simply hitting arrows. The showcase was so well received that it even got a standing ovation and brought back so much interest in StepMania again that it slammed ’s servers. AGDQ (Awesome Games Done Quick) was able to breathe life back into the game with the StepMania Showcase piloted by Staiain who wowed the audience with his high level play.

#Stepmania ddr a theme simulator

I am unaffiliated with all of the above projects.When you think about StepMania, you’re more likely to imagine the more traditional DDR simulator where a stream of arrows fly towards a set of targets. To get that functionality you’ll have to edit the step files yourself, sorry. But I’ll admit, it isn’t as pretty as the other two, still uses banners, and omits menu music (can add your own in two easy steps tho).Īlthough Stepmania supports unlocks, they are set in the individual song files themselves, and nobody sets that flag any more. It also has a calorie tracker at the end of session (unfortunately not between songs). And all of his themes, and even his github repositories for his themes were gone. If you’re looking to get better at the game, this is the theme I’d recommend. Remaking DDR A20+ theme for sm5 (Still in progress) I just checked my youtube recently and found a video from Curilang's channel and the title was 'This is the end.' Link here. It gives tons of extra analysis on the score screen, has the easiest to use/read menus, and just overall has the cleanest interface. Simply Love is by far the most useful theme. It’s almost perfectly 1:1 with DDR Ace, in fact it’s so close people will yell at you if you stream it, thinking you’re hacking arcade data. It’s honestly the prettiest theme I’ve ever used, even if it’s way clunkier to use than Simply Love.ĭDR A theme by Curilang. Starlight XX, a DDR fan project made to look like a “next generation DDR mix”.

#Stepmania ddr a theme install

I don’t know about Announcers because I personally do not install them. Fast, energetic music for selecting the Profiles, Modes, Results and the like -A fully functional Unlocking System (Either through Levels, Currency, or another manner) -Calories Burned counter with various Foods for Reference (think DDR A) -Announcer for the Menus only, no commentary during Gameplay (except maybe for Starting and Finishing the stage) -Song Artwork shown as Jackets (Think the modern DDR games from DDR X2 onwards)Ĭan anyone recommend me some Themes that has what I may be looking for? Also, I'd appreciate some help with getting generic FMV for when stages don't have their own exclusive FMV. Basically, I'm looking for a Theme that has at least some of the following: Now, I'd like to find another Theme that is similar to what you would find on a DDR of even a Pump It Up cabinet. DDR 2nd MIX Theme, which stayed smooth all the way through but the Weight system doesn't work perfectly, meaning I can't tell how many Calories I've burned in a day. All themes were run on the latest development version of StepMania 5 (post-beta 3), so some errors in display/operation are likely. Each link to a theme in this section goes to a page containing information and screenshots about that theme. I used to have a DDR X2 theme on there, but the song selection wheel was a little choppy whenever I try to automatically scoll through the wheel. This page contains the list of themes that I know existing in some playable form for StepMania 5. StepMania 5 tournament at University Park Penn State on Sunday January 17th, 2016, where the theme. I'm thinking about Uninstalling and re-installing Stepmania, and I had been considering, once I do, to get another Theme to make the game look newer than it once was. Along with the collaborative efforts of Caitlin HUGS Schaeppi and Alan TaroNuke James, they were able to transform StepMania into a Pokémon themed role playing game called UPSRT.

#Stepmania ddr a theme

[calamitys-child]

Wipes away single tear... Terror fans you are all so clever and sexy I love you

#Everyone has so much to say! I feel like I'm in a really cool seminar/workshop space every time any of us starts passing round meta #So much collaborative exploration of themes... So much love for the show and support for each other... Mwah #This also holds extremely true for black sails fans and the Venn diagram is rather close to circular tbf #I'm just terrorposting because God people have put some DELICIOUS tags and additions onto my terror post and I'm delighted

[borkthemork]

‘Ivy on the Run’, and What Sasha Needs

So, back when I was rewatching Season 2B, I had considered a lot of the tiny details found in prior episodes that seemed to promise massive comebacks later on.

I’m talking about the mossmen, who were alluded to way back in Wally and Anne, who were mentioned later with the mural and the sleepover episode.

We also have stuff such as the ability for Anne to bend light into imagery, which I definitely absolutely believe is one of her powers that will be delved into in Season Three.

With all these details, I decided to really put my foot into the series and see how much could potentially be planted throughout what I once considered to be episodic episodes.

And that was where I had a realization.

Ivy on the Run wasn’t just a Sprig and Ivy episode. It wasn’t just some random episode for the sake of having fun with the characters.

This episode is where the show tells the audience subtly that Ivy Sundew is going to be an important character to the plot when it comes to being Sasha Waybrights’s Sprig equivalent, and I’m going to be talking about why I believe that here.

Ivy on the Run is established with three things in mind: to tell the audience about who Ivy is as a character, how she interacts with her family, and what she yearns for overall in the story.

The first scene showcases her personality through the environment itself.

She has a map of the Amphibian continent to track Sprig’s progress, she has posters that talk about finding your own path in life, and you can see that she is a very action-oriented person with the amount of knives and axes on the throwing board.

This entire episode is mainly about Ivy’s wanting to find adventure. She feels trapped in Wartwood because she saw nothing in her family but boring tea sessions, and continuously does actions that shows she’s antsy for her turn in the spotlight, for her turn to explore and conquer the world in her own way since she’s never been out of the Valley.

And here, the narrative makes sure to highlight the more rambunctious and feisty sides of the family too. With Ivy’s debut episode, we were never really given much information about her that wasn’t just one-dimensional tomboy attitude; there were moments where she showed genuine awkwardness over the whole courtship incident, but it wasn’t until Season Two where we were able to flesh her out more as a character overall.

She hates the rules and regulations her mother does for her, she is very much okay with going against said rules if she believes her boundaries were crossed, she can be pretty adaptable in stressful situations, and it isn’t until the end of the episode — where she sees more sides of her mother being an experienced traveler — do we get to see her become more open-minded and excited for learning about this side of her family that she’s never heard of before.

And when the two Sundews went face to face...

We get a parallel.

These episodes are similar in a lot of ways, but how they’re handled is executed differently.

They both focus on the wanting for communication and open-mindedness in a family dynamic, but what’s interesting here is that Sprig deliberately loses to let Hop Pop return to his role as the head of the house, while Felicia deliberately allows Ivy to win as a reassurance that she knows what her daughter needs.

In spite of Felicia’s strict actions, she pushes Ivy because she knows that Ivy will have to leave the Valley one day, and the ending makes a big promise that her part of the journey is almost ready.

"Ivy, you think I don't see you, but I do. You want to travel the world and I get it. But you have to be patient, because it's dangerous out there, and I just want you to be ready before we go."

Of course, the last part is all about their tea trip outside the Valley, but this perhaps could be foreshadowing to another big event in Ivy’s life that will make her leave the Valley.

Now, let’s talk about Sasha and the theme of nurture in Amphibia.

With Sasha, we have an interesting arc going on with her. She has a promised redemption arc, but the thing with her is that the Season Three opening explicitly promises that she’s going to have to compromise with Wartwood if she ever wants to fight Andrias. And we all know how the town is slow when it comes to the respect department.

This is where we start to get some potential parallels with Anne and Sasha. The thing with these two characters is that they do make genuine connections, however the theme of nurture found throughout the story itself emphasizes heavily on the environment and the support system the girls have.

For Anne, she was dropped into a place that knew boundaries and yet opened up to love instead of doubling down on punishment, and this leads to not only empathy but growth if Anne so chooses to become a good person.

For Sasha, she’s not given that place to grow. It has been confirmed in the show itself that Sasha, ever since she dropped into Amphibia, had been imprisoned in Toad Tower for one month. One month. It wasn’t a surprise that Sasha took advantage of the chaos found in Prison Break, since it was a lot better than having nothing by being stubborn. She played it smart, however, that meant Sasha’s manipulative nature and wanting for control became more noticeable and a key to her own survival. And this environment didn’t get any better in spite the fallout of Reunion.

Now take this angry and repressed teenager, who has no clue how to execute her actions in a genuine and authentic manner, and place her into Wartwood.

This is where Ivy Sundew comes in.

Ivy Sundew is not Sprig Plantar by any means; she is a fierce, no-can-do girl who loves adventure, fighting, ambushes, and won’t back down when it comes to being pushed around. Sprig is very emphatic but this makes him easy to push around if you look at him in Sasha’s eyes; we’ve seen him be desperate at times for the affection of people such as Sadie Croaker, and if Sasha ended up with him then the poor boy was gonna get chewed out eventually.

Sasha has the strength, she really has the capability to do amazing things, but the major factor that she needs right now is a careful guide in showing how she could improve as a person, and that means she needs someone who believes in her first and foremost while not taking her shit.

This is why Ivy Sundew could be absolutely crucial to Sasha’s development.

Sasha right now has learned some tips from people such as Toadie when it comes to listening to others, but she needs more than just one person to make lessons about empathy and collaboration stick.

Ivy is not going to take Sasha when she’s pushy, rude, or plain manipulative. She’ll call her out, she’ll mark the boundaries, she won’t let Sasha just foot around her just because she can — and if you think about it, the Sundews have the same attitude too, they’re all fighters who won’t allow themselves to be pushed around by some external force.

And we wouldn’t have known these specific details at all if Ivy on the Run didn’t air.

#amphibia #sasha waybright #anne boonchuy #ivy sundew #amphibia analysis #amphibia meta #bork speaks

[fluffyy-dreaming]

I can have some knights headcanons, that their gender neutral s/o is fantasy-type idol?

A/N - I hope I didn’t misunderstand this one! This is a bit ooc so feel free to request again- I apologize! Thank you for requesting once again! I appreciate your support sm !!

Tsukasa Suou

Tsukasa will do as much as he can to support you in your idol career, even using his influence in Knights as well as his family’s to bring light to your idol group

Would genuinely become a fan of your group, buying your merch and attending your live shows constantly

He'll text you about his feelings about your lives extremely quickly!

He finds your voice is greatest when used in symphonic pop style music or at the very least in instances that bring out power in your voice

Tsukasa admires you greatly, even asking you for advice on Knights’ next shows and their overall aesthetic

He may be slightly awkward when asking so, but he may want for you to collaborate with Knights

He’d eventually talk about your unit quite a lot to the other members of Knights and probably will end up gushing about and promoting you on social media

Please show him previews of your next songs or live shows he has brainrot for your idol group now

He’s going to take so much inspiration from you and wants to be as great as your group, and there's a small period of time where it is very evident

Tsukasa will work even harder to become as great as you, and he’ll always stay by your side supporting you no matter what!

Arashi Narukami

A fantasy themed idol? How adorable!

She’s so happy to be dating someone so talented!

The fact that you’re an idol gives her an excuse to bring you out to karaoke

She wouldn’t mind covering one of your songs or doing a duet together!

Would most likely promote you on social media as well, taking pictures with you or showing her collection of merch of your group, more specifically your merch

Arashi's particular favorites are, of course, sweet and cutesy songs paired with frilly or princess-esque clothes and props

She may become slightly envious of how often you wear varieties of brighter and more feminine clothes, at least compared to Knights

“<Y/N>, your recent live show costumes were so cuuute! May you be so kind to help with Knights’ next costumes?”

While she may not be particularly invested in fantasy, your unit made her significantly more invested in various fantasy tropes and tales

Arashi would love to try on some of your unit outfits or at the very leasts design similar or matching ones related to fairy tail couples

She’d love to accept any advice on maintaining hair and skin care or tips on remaining high energy on stage

Whenever she can, she loves to involve herself in your hobbies and interests, and if it involves your idol work, she’ll gladly and naturally become your biggest fan!

Leo Tsukinaga

As soon as Leo attends your live show, his eyes light up from how much inspiration he gets from your live shows

He already enjoys writing songs about you but he feels so exhilarated as he finds even more topics to explore in his songs from yours!

Both the reason listed above and simply the experience of hearing his favorite being in the world sing so passionately motivates him quite a lot

“Will you pleeease show me a preview of your next song? I can’t help but wish to listen to your angelic voice forever!!”

His favorite songs are more grand and over-the-top, the best songs from a fantasy themed unit will truly show the thrill of an adventure in such a world!

If Tsukasa talks “a bit more than usual” about your unit, Leo will most likely only talk about how lovely you are on stage for several days, most likely tiring out Izumi

He can’t help talk about you! It awes him how collected you are on stage

Leo would gladly have your group collaborate or have you help out with song writing

Leo makes a habit of supporting you through surprising you by appearing backstage to encourage you or in the audience

While he’s a songwriter, he’d try his best to come up with set designs or themes, possibly offering you props he designed

He’s so happy to have such a wonderful s/o in his life to positively affect so many aspects of his life

Don’t be scared to come to him for ideas as well!

Ritsu Sakuma

As much as Ritsu loves you, Ritsu isn’t the best at displaying his enthusiasm

He supports, you of course! But he'd often tell you how well you did or summarize his feelings into "you did great once again" as he plays with your hair or snuggles you

One thing you often pick up on and walk in on Ritsu doing is listening to your songs and rewatching your live shows, his favorites being more calm or gothic, and he enjoys seeing you in silkier, flowier, and occasionally frilly dark clothes

It make him feel at peace to listen to you when you’re gone

Ritsu enjoys sharing interests with his s/o, yet understanding the difficulties of being an idol, he‘d make sure to monitor your health and that you’re spending time off

He’d often try to help you backstage and would bring you refreshments or a towel to help you cool down afterwards

Ritsu feels inclined to help you with sewing your outfits, or even adding simple things like laces or making sure to tidy them before you're off to perform at a live show

He does find you to be quite cute in your outfits regardless of if you made them on your own or he helped (he does prefer the latter, though), and will find more opportunities to cuddle with you because of how busy you've been

”<Y/N>, you must have been working hard, haven’t you? It’s time you rest up, come here with me.”

Ritsu enjoys praising you for how hard you work and is sure to acknowledge your hard work

Sometimes he'll take pieces of your costumes and hug them while you're busy as he's extremely clingy and misses you very easily

He'll often ask for you to sing your songs to him as you cuddle and fall asleep

As much as he loves supporting you, don’t forget to make time for him, okay?

Izumi Sena

Similar to Ritsu, he wouldn’t openly admit he adores you as an idol as well

He’d attend your live shows, but be slightly defensive if you bring it up, making up poor excuses as to why he's there

Izumi would moreso show appreciation by giving criticism, though he may accidentally, as per usual, offend you

“Your dance moves are so sloppy! Surely you can do better than that, right?”

God, that outfit looks so childish.. I’ll fix it so you won’t embarrass yourself.”

Despite his busy schedule, he’ll do his best to clear it up to be able to help you with your dance routines and costumes

As much as he denies it, he loves spending anytime with you, and loves being apart of your passions and helping you succeed

He enjoys being depended on!

Even if he calls fantasy themes childish or idiotic, he‘ll still stay up quite a bit to come up with ideas for songs or design props and outfits.

It wouldn’t hurt to take some inspiration from your oh-so-kind boyfriend, right?

Don’t worry he really does want you to succeed and he does think highly of you

Which is why he’s using all of his knowledge from working in Knights to help you

After all, Knights is quite fantasy themed already!

Maybe you’d be able to collaborate sometime?

#fluffyydreamming #ensemble stars writing #enstars writing #enstars x reader #ensemble stars x reader #leo tsukinaga #arashi narukami #narukami arashi #izumi sena #sena izumi #tsukinaga leo #arashi narukami x reader #leo tsukinaga x reader #izumi sena x reader #enstars idol reader #enstars x idol reader #ensemble stars x idol reader #tsukasa suou #tsukasa #suou #suou tsukasa #tsukasa suou x reader #izumi #sena #tsukinaga #leo #arashi #narukami #fountain.of.dreamms #fountain of dreams

[thechanelmuse]

TW: rape

‘I May Destroy You,’ Michaela Coel’s gimlet-eyed exploration of trauma and its myriad ripple effects follows Arabella (Coel) — a funny, messy, sharp-as-hell London writer — after a dizzying night in which she’s drugged and raped by a stranger. At first, she dismisses the hazy memory as just an upsetting image in her head. Soon enough, though, Arabella reluctantly comes to understand it as the truth, and tries to work through that horrifying reality without coming apart. [...]

Not every part of Arabella has a direct line to Coel, but the series’ catalyzing experience, unfortunately, does. In 2016, Coel took a break from a marathon writing session for the second season of “Chewing Gum” to grab a drink with a friend, and was drugged and assaulted by a stranger. She’s been sifting through the emotional wreckage ever since to find some kind of clarity, if not peace. Now, with “I May Destroy You,” she’s doing it for all the world to see. “As a fellow android exploring what it means to be human,” says Coel’s friend Janelle Monáe, “watching Michaela be vulnerable on-screen as she walks in her truth gives me and so many the bravery to walk in ours.” [...]

Coel began writing “I May Destroy You” in February 2017, in between acting in TV projects like the “USS Callister” episode of “Black Mirror” and Netflix’s limited series “Black Earth Rising.” She took solo mountain trips and wrote draft after draft of what would eventually become “I May Destroy You,” spilling her stories and tangled guts onto the page, rearranging them into shapes she could better recognize. In August 2018, she spoke about her trauma publicly while delivering the Edinburgh International Television Festival’s James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture, a prestigious assignment the festival has otherwise bestowed on a cadre of white British television mainstays (as well as no fewer than three Murdochs). 

The majority of Coel’s speech, delivered to a room of the U.K.’s most powerful entertainment brokers, traced the constant racism and classism she endured on the way to that Edinburgh stage — a theme subtextually underlined by the fact that Coel was, and remains, the only Black woman to have that platform. She spoke about turning her solo play “Chewing Gum Dreams” into a “Chewing Gum” TV series (which aired 2015-17 on the U.K.’s Channel 4), a transformative time that taught her the technicalities of making television and confirmed just how disinclined certain white gatekeepers are to trust a poorer Black woman’s vision. Toward the end of the 50-minute lecture, Coel revealed her assault and elucidated the industry’s inability — or unwillingness — to handle such a human emergency when pages are due. As for her recovery, she said, “It’s been therapeutic to write about it, and actively twist a narrative of pain into something with more hope, and even humor.”

When it finally came time to translate it all to the screen, “I May Destroy You” was so close to her bruised heart that Coel took on the challenge of playing several roles throughout the series’ development: creator, writer, actor, producer, director. Netflix offered her a total fee of a cool $1 million to make and star in the show, but the proposed contract wouldn’t grant Coel even a tiny percentage of the rights. She hadn’t fully realized how much claiming legal proprietorship over her work mattered to her until the prospect of not being able to emerged, at which point it became crucial. 

Then, after some Googling, she realized that her CAA agents would also be profiting from the deal via the endangered practice of packaging. Stung and surprised, Coel walked away from both her agents and the offer. “I’m not anti-Netflix,” she’s quick to say now, “but I am pro-‘the creator, writer, director, actor should probably have a right.’” She’s hyper-aware of how much this project required of her, and how comparatively little granting her “a right” might cost a powerful network like Netflix. “That’s not quite fair, is it?” Coel muses. Creating the show, after all, took almost everything she had.

With the BBC, a million-dollar paycheck might not have been in the cards, but more important to Coel, she didn’t have to fight half as hard to claim ownership. (As a matter of industry course, it’s far more common for British studios to afford creators rights to their work than it is for American equivalents.) They struck a deal, and Coel got to work.[...]

“When you’re restricted,” she explains, “sometimes that’s where you find great things: in the lack of possibility.” She attributes this rather Zen approach to Hugo Blick, the “Black Earth Rising” showrunner who showed her the value of keeping a cool, empathetic head on set. Blick’s ability to step away from a gnarly situation for even 30 calming seconds is one that Coel has worked to hone for herself, especially while steering a series with such fraught ties to her history. No matter how sideways things might go, she never wants to forget just how much she loves the collaborative act of building a television show, wild complications and all. 

Read more

From Forbes:

I May Destroy You’s Michaela Coel Rejected Netflix’s $1 Million Offer In Favor Of The BBC Because Of Ownership

The creative, who stars as Arabella and wrote all 12 episodes, started pitching the programme in the spring of 2017 with one of her first ports of call being Netflix who picked up her prior series Chewing Gum.

Though Netflix offered a generous upfront fee of $1 million (£800,000), the sum had strings attached, including full rights ownership away from the creator, something Coel pushed back against. Coel recalls a moment during the interview where she is speaking with a Netflix development executive on the phone, asking if she could retain even a very small 0.5% of the copyright to her show.

“There was just silence on the phone. And she said, ‘It’s not how we do things here. Nobody does that, it’s not a big deal,’” Coel recollected. “I said, ‘If it’s not a big deal, then I’d really like to have 5 % of my rights,’” Coel added, stating that she even went down to 2%, and then 1% and even as a final compromise to 0.5%.

Coel remembers that the executive said she would have to run it passed her superiors, before adding, “‘Michaela? I just want you to know I’m really proud of you. You’re doing the right thing.'”

“I remember thinking, I’ve been going down rabbit holes in my head, like people thinking I’m paranoid, I’m acting sketchy, I’m killing off all my agents,” Coel says. “And then she said those words to me, and I finally realized — I’m not crazy. This is crazy.”

Coel discovered her agents, Creative Artists Agency (CAA) were set to make an undisclosed amount from the series if she took the deal with Netflix. She reveals that the agency pushed her to take the deal prior to her finding out and their subsequent dismissal as her U.S. representation.

Taking the project to British broadcaster the BBC later in 2017, Coel found the corporation to be supportive with her maintaining creative control even with the explicit depictions of sex, sexual assault and drug use. Plus, as the broadcaster had to adhere to terms of trade, Coel had no problem with retaining the rights also. The broadcaster also brought HBO to the table as another co-producer to help subsidise a portion of the budget.

Read more

This isn’t about just “knowing your worth;” it’s about knowing the business (your business) and never settling just to secure “something.” A million dollar offer, no copyright ownership and no creative control is beyond disrespectful. Learn the business in whatever field you’re in and stay acclimated with jargon and new, current and old practices. Know your shit. 

It’s like when people say “Get a lawyer” to handle negotiations and look over your paperwork. You pay a lawyer to do a job, but it does not mean you should be oblivious to aspects of law and contract jargon among other things because “that’s what they’re there to do.” You can’t say someone (sometimes lawyers included) screwed you over after you’ve signed the dotted line. They’re protecting and looking out for themselves. Commit to do the same for yourself.

#michaela coel #i may destroy you #film business #ownership #hbo #bbc #netflix #business

[lifeofkaze]

When Stars Ignite - Chapter 10

HPHM Rockstar AU

A/N:

General Warning: This whole fic has a general warning of being NSFW / 18+. We will give specific warnings for every chapter in itself, but several adult themes will be more or less present in every chapter, may it be explicitly or in mention. These include sexual topics, drug abuse, (ab)use of alcohol, smoking and a whole lot of cursing.

Specific Warning: None, wow 😂

~~~

Find the masterpost here, the previous chapter here and the next one here. The songs featured before every chapter can be found on this pretty badass playlist here.

~~~

This work is a collaboration with @the-al-chemist

Taglist: @slytherindisaster @night-rhea @carewyncromwell

I make my livin' off the evenin' news

Just give me somethin', somethin' I can use

People love it when you lose

They love dirty laundry

~ Don Henley - Dirty Laundry ~

Ethan’s plan to raise Equinox’s standing within the record company was very clear. While their nights were spent performing on stage, Ethan had made sure their days were filled with a tight schedule of PR appointments.

Where they’d had plenty of time to relax, socialise and explore on their previous tours, every day was now jam-packed with meet & greets, photoshoots and interviews. Even when they were off duty, Ethan was constantly reminding them to take pictures and film stories to publish on social media.

“People aren’t following you because they like your music,” he never got tired of saying. “They want to see who’s behind their favourite rockstars. Give them a look at your private life and you’ll be everybody’s darlings in no time once again.”

Some of them were more reluctant to put themselves out there than the others. While Lizzie and Skye didn’t mind the odd goofy backstage clip, Lizzie noticed Merula and especially Orion were increasingly drawing back into themselves.

Lizzie and Orion made a point to avoid talking about band business when they were spending their nights together; not that they were talking much at all. But the concerned crease that she could see more often than not on Orion’s forehead these days wasn’t lost on her either.

The worst part of Ethan’s strategy, however, were without a doubt the countless press appointments. All in the spirit of keeping the enemy close, Lizzie had lost track of how many interviews they had given since their U.K. tour had started. The publications they were working with ranged from reputable magazines and newspapers to the trashiest of tabloids. At least, most of the stories those were coming up with were just too hilarious to be actually believable; Lizzie shuddered to think what dirt they could uncover if they’d ever decide to dig for real.

Like on so many days before, Equinox were scheduled for another interview before one of their rare days off. It was for a feature story with a magazine well respected in the industry, all with an accompanying photo shoot and the whole conundrum. It wouldn’t have sounded so bad, had it not been for the journalist who had been chosen to conduct the interview.

Lizzie had met a number of reporters over the course of her career, but none who ground her nerves as Rita Skeeter did.

Beloved by her readers and dreaded by the subjects of her stories, Rita Skeeter was one of the most sharp-tongued critics British journalism had to offer. She had a singular gift - although some called it a curse - to wiggle even the slightest of juicy information out of her unheeding interview partner. Many a career had taken a dive after an unfortunate encounter with her.

If you wanted utmost attention, Rita Skeeter was the right woman for the job; but you had better get your guard up.

The blonde woman was currently watching Andre preparing them for the interview and the shoot afterwards; usually the magazines brought their own stylists, but Ethan liked to keep as many things under control as he could. Having Andre in charge of their looks guaranteed they would give off just the impression Ethan wanted.

Andre was in the process of applying Lizzie’s make up, the tip of his tongue showing between his teeth while he concentrated. She winced as her eyes started tearing up from the wand of the mascara.

“I don’t get why this much makeup is necessary,” she complained, drawing away from Andre to blink her tears away. “I get it with Merula, she’s singing and in focus, but I’m behind the drums, no one’s paying attention to me. Give her the spotlight and leave me in peace,” she added glumly as she saw Andre approach with a curling wand.

Andre tutted as he opened her ponytail and loosened her hair with practised hands. “Stop arguing, you know it’s useless. And besides,” he added with a wink that showed off his glittery eyeliner, “loads of people are paying attention to you; you’re just not looking.”

“I have to agree with Mr. Egwu,” Rita suddenly said. She had been leaning against one of the dressing tables on the set and watched them being dolled up. Andre usually held their wardrobe in dark colours, black and white, so Rita’s bilious green dress stood out like a flare in comparison. She pursed her bright red lips as she looked Lizzie up and down over the rim of her half-glasses.

“You’re a favourite with my readers, Miss Jameson… Lizzie, I may call you Lizzie, right?”

Without waiting for Lizzie’s answer, she continued. “You have a bright personality and some decent looks; you are the little sunshine of this group and everyone likes themselves a good ‘girl next door in the big wide world’ trope.”

She raised her hands at Lizzie’s sceptical look and laughed; it sounded incredibly put on. “I’m not a fan of putting people into drawers either, but it’s what the people want to see.” She tapped her finger against her temple. “It’s how my readers think.”

Skye snorted in the background; she was already done with her styling and sat on one of the tables, legs dangling in the air. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

Rita giggled. “Of course the rebel of the group would say that, I expected nothing else; after all, there’s true rockstar blood running through your veins, Skye Parkin.”

Not wanting to draw any unnecessary attention to herself, Skye fell silent.

When everyone was ready, they moved over to where two comfortable looking sofas and an armchair were set up for them. Lizzie sighed inwardly as she took her place between Skye and Everett. Rita Skeeter was known to make her interview questions up on the spot; Lizzie just hoped they wouldn’t be too off the rails.

Rita leaned back into her armchair facing them and placed a dictating machine onto the small wooden table next to her. It was no secret that the infamous reporter liked to keep her own notes, kept apart from the material belonging to her magazine; she usually kept the dictating device running long after the cameras had turned off.

“So,” she began speaking to an invisible audience with a sickly sweet voice, “I’m honoured to be talking to England’s hottest export when it comes to rock ‘n’ roll - and I mean that in more ways than one.”

She turned her attention towards them. “It’s so good to have you here today, how are you all?”

They all muttered some noncommittal phrases before Rita started with her first question. Like always in the beginning, it was more of a general palaver as both parties were taking the other’s measure.

If the questions weren’t directed at anyone in particular, it was usually Everett answering them. He loved the attention he got from Rita and contrary to the rest of them, he almost seemed to feel comfortable around her. The pictures Lizzie had seen of him and Rita in Skye’s tabloid came to her mind again, and she wondered if that might be the reason for Everett’s talkativeness.

As the interview continued, Rita’s questions were gradually becoming more detailed, focused on several aspects that she deemed sell-worthy. She watched every one of them closely as they answered, and they picked their words carefully.

“One thing I noticed about this last part of your tour is your very increased availability,” Rita said. “I don’t remember seeing you do so much fan service and public appearances before. What’s the reason behind this?”

It was Orion who answered her question. “The most important thing to us is to make sure our fans are having a good time. Without them, we wouldn’t be where we are now; it’s not a lot, but this is our way of thanking them.”

“Is this the reason for your upcoming special show tomorrow? Reserved for the indigent foster care children?”

Her eyes flicked between Merula and Orion. “It’s no secret you two have a history with the system. One orphaned at such a young age, the other the daughter of convicted criminals, bound to be raised in the shadows of her parents’ deeds. Two unlikely siblings, not bound by blood but by trauma - how does it feel to risk a look into your own past?”

“It’s a show like any other,” Merula replied bluntly, crossing her arms in front of her chest. She scowled at the blonde reporter. “No need to make a big deal out of this.”

Orion inclined his head in Merula’s direction. “What Merula wants to say is, we make no difference in what good cause we are supporting, as long as we can put a smile on the faces of those who need it, even if only for a little while. We do have our past in the care system, that is common knowledge, but as Merula pointed out already, this is in the past. If you want to continue on your path, it is no good walking with your gaze turned backwards. We live in the here and now, so it’s what’s in front of us that matters.”

The slight twitch around the corners of Rita’s mouth was almost too quick to catch, but Lizzie had seen it nonetheless. Apparently, Orion had given her the exact bridge to her next question she had hoped for.

“If you want to speak about the here and now, I’ll be too happy to fulfill your wish,” she cooed. “Now that we’re speaking on a more personal level anyway, I just have to ask. You guys are living everyone’s wildest dreams, a life all of us mere mortals can only imagine.” Her eyes sparkled behind her glasses. “It’s only us here, you can trust me; what about the juicy stories? Any tales of sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll you want to share with the world?”

Lizzie subconsciously bit the inside of her cheek, hoping Rita hadn’t noticed before she got herself under control again; this woman was a bloodhound when it came to scandals. If she ever found out what was going on between Orion and her, Lizzie might just as well bury herself alive.

Luckily, Orion wasn’t fazed by her question. “The only passion we share is the love for our music,” he smiled noncommittally. “As professional musicians we try to keep our public and private lives separated.”

Rita’s eyes gleamed as she leaned forward. “You try to keep them separated?”

Before Lizzie couldn’t help it, her eyes flickered to Orion again.

“We have been friends for years, of course our lives intervene in places. The friendship between us we show to the world is genuine and not for show.”

“Friendship, huh?” Rita’s nostrils flared as her eyes swept the round. “Come on, we’re all adults here. So many gorgeous young people spending their time together all day, everyday? Don’t tell me you’re all staying up drinking apple juice and playing board games.”

Her attention shifted so suddenly that Lizzie was taken by surprise. “What about you, Lizzie? Any stories to tell?” She looked her up and down critically. “If you ask me, you and Jason would make quite the pair. The golden girl and the bad boy? People live for stories like that.”

Everett sighed wistfully. “Just call me Ev, Rita, everyone does. But yeah, that’s what I’ve been telling her for years now, but so far to no avail. Perhaps she’ll listen to you.”

Lizzie was relieved when he immediately started laughing his words off. “I’m joking of course; Orion is right. The band is our job and our management wants us to keep things professional. There’s other ways to live the rockstar lifestyle,” he finished with a wink.

Rita pursed her lips in a knowing smile. “That I believe in a heartbeat. Fill me in guys, between us, how is it with the ladies? The bad guy with an angel’s voice and the soulful songwriter and his magic hands… you must be spoiled for choice.”

Everett grinned and leaned back against the sofa. “I can’t complain, is all I’m saying.”

“How about you Orion? Dark eyes, messy hair, all those tattoos - your fans must love this,” she winked with a sly smile, “At least I know where I would try to go after a show if I was a little younger.”

Lizzie tried very much not to roll her eyes.

“Even if they do, I wouldn’t know of it,” Orion answered serenely. “While I love all our fans dearly, my relationship with them ends when our show does.”

“So no stories behind your many tattoos? No tales of long lost love?”

“I didn’t say there are no stories,” Orion replied, “only that they have nothing to do with any fans of ours.”

Trying to steer the conversation to a less dangerous topic, he started explaining the stories behind some of the less meaningful tattoos on his wrists and arms. Lizzie knew each and every one of them by heart, the pictures as familiar to her as Orion’s smile when she ran her fingers over his painted skin.

What he didn’t mention was the biggest of his tattoos and her favourite one; the giant dreamcatcher running along the whole length of his back. Thinking about the intricate lines made a little smile appear on her face.

She didn’t even notice Rita asking her way through the rest of her friends until the reporter’s attention turned to her.

“All of your friends seem to be quite the fans of body art; what about you, Lizzie? Do you have any tattoos as well?”

Lizzie flashed Rita the brilliant but noncommittal smile reserved for the people she just couldn’t stand. “I do have one, yes.”

Rita raised an eyebrow when she didn’t continue. “And where might that be?”

Lizzie chuckled in response. “That will stay my little secret.”

Her gaze was fixed on Rita, but out of the corner of her eye she could see Orion fighting hard to suppress a grin. Of course, he knew exactly where it was.

Rita blinked, clearly irritated by her answer, the same empty smile that was on Lizzie’s face never leaving her red lips.

“Very well, keep your secret - for now. I’ll find out eventually.”

Her smile broadened, a dangerous glint shining in her eyes. “All secrets have their way of ending up with me, one way or another.”

Rita stood up from her armchair to get herself something to drink. When she turned her back on them, Lizzie slowly breathed out, relieved to have the blonde’s prying eyes taken off her.

As the others got up to leave the set as well, Orion and Lizzie’s eyes met for a moment. A smile was playing around his lips as they dropped to where her tattoo was hidden from everybody else’s sight.

She felt her lips curve into a smile of her own and she crossed her arms in front of her chest, her hand resting over the small spot on her ribcage where the words that resonated with her so much were inked into her skin. Seeing what she was doing, Orion couldn’t contain his grin any longer. Judging by the twinkle in his eyes, the memory of when he had first seen them was playing just as vividly in his mind as it did in hers.

#hphm #hogwarts mystery #rockstar au #orion amari #lizzie jameson #merula snye #skye parkin #when stars ignite #wsi #besties collaborate

[polyboros]

hi i’ve got more of that bug fables roleswap au for people to peruse! this time, it’s largely focused on some side characters, some of which was a collaboration between me and my beloved friend @behold-a-bastard-in-this-house ! go check him out :-)

as always, under the cut is spoilers for the entirety of bug fables! similarly, this covers similar themes to what’s covered in bug fables, so if any of those bug you, take care of yourself!

the swaps covered here are: maki & kina swapping with zasp & mothiva, and general fuff swapping with vanessa! as with the central three protagonists,  it gets a little more funky from there, in the nature of telling a fun and fresh story AND preserving major & important parts of their original personalities and backstories!

ZASP & MOTHIVA AS MAKI & KINA

specifically here, zasp is maki; acting as elizant ii’s royal blade and going out on top secret missions for her. the layers i particularly like here are seen in canon: when asked about the wasps, zasp refers to them as “pests,” and for reasons currently unknown (but likely related to him having damaged antennae, etc.) he isn’t affected by the wasp king’s crown at all! the trust elizant ii has in him extends past the possibility of him being controlled or betraying her, which i VERY much like as a general (hand waves) background theme

the reason why i considered this swap to begin with was because mothiva and kina kinda reminded me of each other! and in a way, so did kina & zasp, but i felt this particular swap was more fun. i think mothiva keeps her idol status, here; most of the time she’s complaining about how zasp can’t accompany her as a body guard to her shows anymore, or about how he keeps leaving her behind (”a top secret mission would be GREAT for exposure!!” which is largely why she doesn’t end up going with him, lmao)

i also think that both of them are significantly further in their character development than they are in canon, though? mostly because: without zasp as her right hand and supporter all the time, mothiva has to actually deal with anyone who rejects her personally, and The Queen Herself supporting her is very good for her ego already! meanwhile zasp actually has a healthy level of seperation from mothiva and can foster that relationship without it fully starting from somewhere parasocial, lmao. i simply like this for them a lot!

MAKI & KINA AS ZASP & MOTHIVA

this one’s a little bit of a (handwaves) stretch of the canon role, so stick with me here!

i think maki & kina are more experienced explorers who have been trying at every step of the way to find the artifacts, and kina (and by extension maki) are more than a little annoyed that team snakemouth keeps getting to all of them first! i think maki largely thinks that they shouldn’t be out there to begin with - leif was BANNED from exploration for a REASON, after all, even if he IS proving efficient at artifact collection, and kina is annoyed that her and her brother aren’t getting the recognition they deserve!

this leads to the same threads you see in canon: maki & kina attempt to interfere at golden hills, stating that team snakemouth isn’t strong enough to take on whatever’s at the top of the hills, and that they’re destined to fail. this is then followed by the two interrupting in the termite kingdom - the queen is right there, after all! if they can prove that team snakemouth isn’t strong enough to defeat them, then they’ll be able to prove themselves and go after the artifacts themselves, even if this is jeopardizing bugaria.

a key difference here is that maki & kina actually regret their actions in termite kingdom! what you see there is a personal apology to the queen and an acknowledgement of what could’ve happened after they realize - no public apology to team snakemouth though, haha, outside of maki pulling them aside later.

maki saves kabbu from a near death experience :that one confetti discord emoji:

THE FUFF & VANESSA SWAP

once again a big thank you to my friend fall for being the huge brained genius behind this swap!! 

the conceit of this swap is that general fuff manages to escape the wasp king’s control from injuries sustained in a long-ago battle, while vanessa doesn’t. she starts acting as a false figurehead leader to the wasps, and has a similar battle gimmick to ultimax, in which she is always hiding behind her troops! (in canon, she even says that she’s never done combat for her kingdom - something that is still very true here!)

meanwhile, fuff is locked up - his focus is mainly on strategy, too, and while he’s brilliant at it, he has no people to lead, no army to plan around. while he could probably fight the capture, he doesn’t actually want to hurt his soldiers - we are a STRONG believer in actual good leader fuff when not mind controlled here! he manages to steal the flame brooch before he’s captured, though, hoping to use it to take down the king; although this fails, the king doesn’t realize he’s stolen it, and in her mind controlled state, neither does vanessa!

fuff, when broken out, proceeds to offer to help elizant ii plan defenses and battle against the wasps and the wasp king, and is the one to give team snakemouth the flame brooch before the giant’s lair. vanessa does get a tank. you LOVE to see a girlboss winning

that’s all for this post!! this was once again very fun to write out and explain; if you have any questions, just shoot me an ask about ‘em :-)

#kbitycus art #bug fables #bug fables roleswap #i love fuff so dearly

[tcm]

The Golden Years By Susan King

Family dynamics change dramatically and often tragically as parents and grandparents grow older. Some children continue to love their parents in their senior years and care for them when they become infirmed. But others turn their back on their loved ones and forget to “honor thy father and thy mother.”

King Lear, one of William Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies, explores this theme. The elderly King Lear decides to divide his kingdom among his three daughters. But he makes a fatal error when he tells his daughters that they must offer florid declarations of love in order to get the land.

The vile Goneril and Regan are effusive in their love and get part of the kingdom. But his beloved Cordelia, the only one who really loves Lear, refuses to be insincere and is disinherited. Lear learns quickly just how Goneril and Regan really feel about him when they go back on their promises to support him. Lear becomes mad as he wanders the land with his faithful Fool. And though he is reunited with Cordelia, it doesn’t end well.

This subject continues to be explored in literature, theater and feature films. In fact, there are three acclaimed films released this year that are all in awards consideration.

Netflix’s DICK JOHNSON IS DEAD is the unique, funny and poignant Sundance Award-winning documentary in which Kirsten Johnson attempts to cope with her sweet widowed father’s dementia by staging increasingly absurdist ways her father could die—body doubles did the stunts—and even stages a mock funeral so he can hear just how much people love him. Anthony Hopkins gives one of his most complex performances in the haunting film THE FATHER, which will be released this December, as a man descending down the rabbit hole of Alzheimer’s when his daughter (Olivia Colman) leaves him in a nursing home in London and moves to Paris to live with her new boyfriend.

And then there’s Sophia Loren’s powerful turn in Netflix’s Italian-language drama THE LIFE AHEAD. The still stunning 86-year-old actress, who won the Best Actress Oscar of 1961 for Vittorio De Sica’s harrowing TWO WOMEN, plays Madame Rosa, a former prostitute living in Naples who is haunted by memories of the Holocaust. Madame Rosa has created her own family as a foster mother to a trio of children born of prostitutes, as well as a loyal, caring group of friends. THE LIFE AHEAD was a family affair for Loren. Her youngest son, Edoardo Ponti, directed and co-wrote this adaptation of a 1975 Romain Gary novel. He said in a recent interview that when they collaborate on a project, “We want to show the world the best of Sophia.” And he did.

There’s a good chance you haven’t heard of one of the most admired films dealing with old age, Leo McCarey’s MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW (’37). McCarey is best known for his zany Marx Brothers comedy DUCK SOUP (’33); THE AWFUL TRUTH (‘37), the hilarious screwball comedy for which he won the directing Oscar; the sentimental GOING MY WAY (‘44), which swept the Oscars; and the four-hankie weepie romance AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER (‘57).

So, it’s hard to believe the same filmmaker made MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW, a drama so powerful, well-acted and sad that it will stay with you forever. In fact, it may force you to look at the way you treat your ageing parents. Filmmakers such as Orson Welles once said of MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW, “It would make a stone cry.” Jean Renoir, Ernst Lubitsch, Frank Capra, Delmer Daves and Bertrand Tavernier have championed the movie as well. And, it also inspired Yasujiro Ozu’s masterpiece TOKYO STORY (’53).

In a 2010 piece he wrote for Criterion, Tavernier recalled seeing the film for the first time. “The screening remains one of the most powerful moments of the decade for me,” he noted. “The nearly miraculous way in which McCarey manages to avoid the bathos inherent in such a subject, steering clear of sticky pity, of condescension and moralizing sermons – it all transfixed me. It was as though an arrow had struck me and stayed vibrating in my heart. I’ve experienced the same feeling every time I’ve seen the film in the 40 years since.”

Beulah Bondi and Victor Moore give the performances of their storied careers as a longtime married couple who lose their home to a bank foreclosure. Though they have five children, none of their offspring are willing to take them together. So, Bondi goes to live with her son (Thomas Mitchell) where she keeps driving her daughter-in-law (Fay Bainter) and teenage granddaughter (Barbara Read) crazy. Moore doesn’t have it any better moving in with his hard-nosed daughter and lazy son-in-law. The couple reunite for one day in New York City and those scenes are a gut-punch of emotion. And unlike most Hollywood films of the day, it doesn’t end happily for the couple.

Paramount pleaded with McCarey to change the ending to something more upbeat. He refused. Despite good reviews, the film bombed at the box office. Paramount dropped him from their roster. So, he signed with Harry Cohn at Columbia where he made THE AWFUL TRUTH, starring Cary Grant and Irene Dunne, which was nominated for six Oscars including Best Film, Best Actress and McCarey winning Best Director. But McCarey didn’t forget MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW during his Oscar acceptance speech. He opened it by saying: “Thanks, but you gave it to me for the wrong picture.”

#Make Way for Tomorrow #Leo McCarey #Oscars #academy #classic #old age #golden years #ageing #TCM #Turner Classic Movies #Susan King

[bewitching-elizabeth-olsen]

Press: How ‘WandaVision’s Elizabeth Olsen Brought Her MCU Role To The Small Screen: “It Was Like A Dream”

DEADLINE: When Elizabeth Olsen was first pitched the idea of taking her character Wanda Maximoff into the suburbs with her late android husband Vision, played by Paul Bettany, she wasn’t quite sure how to wrap her head around it, let alone understand the couple’s inexplicable reunion. The president of Marvel Studios, Kevin Feige, and creator Jac Schaeffer had told her their plans for WandaVision to kick off the MCU on the new Disney+ platform. They also explained the concept that each episode would be set against classic sitcom tropes from the ’50s to modern-day.

“I was really worried about launching a show like that,” admits Olsen. “The idea that Kevin had about trying to tell this story in a Twilight Zone-y way through sitcom is so twisted and bizarre to me that I could only be excited to see what they would come up with. Another issue was to bring these superhero characters that audiences are used to seeing on big screens onto a small television.”

“If you’re in a choir,” explains Olsen, “you’re adding a tone to the group. So, in the [Avengers] films, I always felt like I was adding a sincerity tone while everyone was being sarcastic. Wanda has a lot of heart and a lot of pain, but with this, all of that went out the window. The core of this woman is really her lack of having really understood her own grief and trauma, and she’s trying to move forward in the world. Then there’s this strong desire and need for creating a family nucleus allows for her to not be alone in the world. And then everything else, the sitcoms, even her knowledge of what’s happening is just circumstance.”

The big themes hidden within WandaVision’s deliberately forced sugary facade made it a hit among critics, too. Think pieces and fanatical breakdowns of each episode brought a level of kudos never before seen for a Marvel character. So much so, that when the Emmy nominations were announced, WandaVision scored 23 of them, including Lead Actor nods for Olsen and her onscreen partner Paul Bettany. It is the 3rd most-nominated show this year.

“Yeah, it’s odd,” muses Olsen. “After seven years of playing the same character, who would have predicted it? I got comfortable being in an ensemble, and I really liked trying to figure out what my point of view was to the story as a whole. But with this show, we just thought, ‘This is the weirdest thing we’re ever going to be able to participate in, so let’s just swing for the fences and either it will crash and burn or people will like it.’ We just had fun.”

Spearheading the fun was director Matt Shakman who brought his years of collaborating as the artistic director for the Geffen Playhouse onto the set; bringing a cohesive theater troupe feel to the cast.

“I’ve had some pretty great leaders on my films,” recalls Olsen, “but Matt is one of the greatest leaders I have ever had on a job. He had us come in for two weeks to do rehearsals and to all get the same visual vocabulary for every single episode. Everyone came out to Atlanta, even for a couple of nights, or even if they weren’t working until six months later. We literally felt like an acting troupe.”

“A lot of us, Teyonah (Parris), Katheryn (Hahn), Paul, were all trained from different acting conservatories,” says Olsen. “We are all students of acting. I mean it was so dorky, we would do vocal exercises in hair and makeup, trying to find this world together. I would look to everyone around me to figure out, ‘OK, are we really doing this cheese? Is this really what we’re doing?’ But we were all doing the same amount of cheese, and as an ensemble we were supporting and holding each other up. That’s why it felt like such a fun show to work on, because you really felt that camaraderie and necessity of all your scene partners, so it worked.”

Which made the different eras of comedy sitcoms, with its specific sets of rhythm, less of a challenge and more of a celebratory collaborative effort to work through.

“I mean it was like a dream,” smiles Olsen. “It already feels like such a gift as an actor to get to play a genre or tone or period piece or have a playful exploration of your voice. All those things are already just so much fun and then to constantly have to change and alter it, yet keep the same core of these characters. It was a joy.”

“I’m really grateful for this show,” continues Olsen, “I got to have a lot of fun showcasing in a way of being a ham. I haven’t gotten to do that in a lot of my work. You learn in life to become quiet and reserved and polite, and it’s really fun to have that opportunity to access the skills that you’ve learned throughout the years. It awoke my body up to what I love about work and I’m feeling residual effects in a positive way preparing for my next job.”

After traveling through multiple fictional settings, Olsen’s next job took her to the U.K. to continue playing the Avengers’ Scarlet Witch in the upcoming film Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Leaving behind her tight group of theater comrades and stepping back onto the big screen after two years of playing Wanda Maximoff, something felt different.

“It was great to stay in the same mindset,” says Olsen. “It was also frustrating because [WandaVision] hadn’t come out yet. I had just spent a year breaking down what family meant for Wanda. How our entire show is about family sitcoms, because it gave comfort though so many different time periods. And I knew that Dr. Strange was going to be different for this character, even though I was going into a film with a bunch of new people, to have this new huge group experience, I was completely alone again.”

Now back in the U.S., Olsen can finally give Wanda a break and take on characters outside the MCU, possibly even returning to the independent film scene where she got her break as an actress a decade ago.

“This has been a great gift from Marvel,” she says. “The longer you work for [them], the more included you are in every step of the process. And I really do appreciate that. I’m also grateful from a financial standpoint, because I’m now able to make decisions and take on opportunities not based on the potential of its commercial success.”

Now it seems that seven years later, playing Wanda has come to a perfect rewarding ending for Olsen. That is, unless the MCU needs her back for another round.

Press: How ‘WandaVision’s Elizabeth Olsen Brought Her MCU Role To The Small Screen: “It Was Like A Dream” was originally published on Elizabeth Olsen Source • Your source for everything Elizabeth Olsen

#Elizabeth Olsen #WandaVision #Avengers #Scarlet Witch #Wanda Maximoff #Sorry For Your Loss #Avengers Infinity War #Avengers Age of Ultron #Captain America Civil War #Ingrid Goes West #Godzilla #Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness #Marvel #MCU #Candy Montgomery #Love and Death #Avengers Endgame

[femmesfollesnebraska]

Artist feature: Helena Baka

Artist Helena Baka shares with LFF about her inspiration as an artist through trauma, experiences, identity, femininity and more. All images and text (c) Helena Baka, helenabaka.com.

Where are you from and how did you get into art?

I’m from Elmwood Park, Illinois, but I’m currently living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Both of my parents were born and raised in Albania and immigrated from there before I was born, a few years after the collapse of communism. I’ve loved art since I was a child – I used to draw princesses, my favorite television show characters, Sanrio characters, and self-portraits. This was probably because both of my parents were artists - my father is a painter, and my mom used to make little angel Christmas ornaments and draw mermaids for my sister and me (although she stopped doing that very early on once she became a paralegal). All my life I had been surrounded by my dad’s oil painting landscapes of Albania hanging on the walls of our home, so I think I wanted to be just as good as him.

It’s been hard to be upfront about this, but my mom committed suicide when I was only 16 years old, and that was really the beginning of my painting practice because I started to draw inspiration from my traumas, dreams and experiences after that. Now, my work is motivated by my cultural identity and the distance I’ve experienced with my Albanian culture while growing up American. Lots of my current work shines on aspects of my identity, both relating to culture and femininity. I also have been exploring the relationship between sculpture and painting in my work because I’m fascinated with how bending the rules of traditional sculpture and/or painting can possibly make either of those fall into either category.

I have a few impetuses for creating; much of it derives from the need to tell my story, to use my practice as a form of therapy, to take risks and experiment with both familiar and unfamiliar mediums, and to educate my audience on whatever topic evokes strong emotions from me.

Tell me about your most recent exhibit.

4th Midwest Open at Woman Made Gallery in Chicago is the upcoming show I’m featured in, and I’m really excited for it because it’s going to be filled with so many different types of work featuring many artists of diverse backgrounds. It’s a chance to showcase the voices of women and nonbinary people in a space that is not male-dominated, which I think is so important because spaces like these are rare to find in the art world.

I hope when people see my work, it can spark some curiosity and self-education of what and where Albania is, and that it’s not just some impoverished Eastern European country that never made it into the footnotes of western history textbooks. My work touches on themes of loss, displacement, and frustration with one’s identity, as well as learning to accept and embrace who you are; that it’s okay not to fit into the mold of who or what you’re “supposed” to be. So, I hope at the end of the day, anyone who views my work can see a little bit of themselves in it, too. Most importantly, I want to be the Albanian woman artist role model that I never got to see growing up.

Does collaboration play a role in your work?

Although I have always worked independently in the studio, I’ve found collaboration beneficial to my practice through exposure of others’ ideas and methods of production. Being in my last year of art school toward my BFA, I have grown used to surrounding myself in an environment of plenty of working artists, and that alone inspires me to create, too. I think the act of critiques and even showing in-progress work has been a collaboration between me and whoever is critiquing my work, because most of the time I’ll come out of it with fresh ideas handed to me by another person. It works the same way vice-versa.

I once had my first ceramic sculpture fall apart in the kiln, and through a collaborative effort of mending it with my friend who was very familiar with working with plaster, my sculpture was repaired and I gained new insight toward this specific material and potential future uses in my practice. My work could never have progressed the way it has without the exposure of different ideas, methods and materials that other artists use.

What do you think about making work right now with the current political climate?

The political climate we’re living in right now has brought on so much outstanding work that has been made by BIPOC creators. Through the darkness of the pandemic, a corrupt, unfitting president in office, systemic racism, police brutality, and all of the tragic deaths we’ve experienced in 2020 from these events, one of the few instances of light the world gained out of these tragedies was the art made by black folx and BIPOC. From music to writing to visual art, BIPOC’s voices have been uplifted and encouraged on every accessible platform, and I continue to see more and more spaces made exclusively for these communities in the art world. Art really makes a difference in impacting our ways of thinking and beliefs, and I believe that if we continue to make BIPOC creators and voices a priority after Black Lives Matter is no longer a trending topic, there could be huge changes in the art world that provide even bigger opportunities for BIPOC creators, such as solo/group exhibitions, publications, grants and rewards, and leadership positions, if not more.

Is feminism relevant to your work?

Absolutely! I would categorize much of my work as feminist pieces because it discuss the contrasting distance and pride not only between myself and my cultural identity, but with my female identity as well that has been challenged and taken advantage of throughout all my life by others. Sexism, misogyny perpetuated by both men and women, double standards, and body image dysphoria as a consequence of these things have all been themes I’ve had to work through in my life and practice.

I can’t speak for every womxn or nonbinary person, but most who are or have once been feminine presenting in their lives have experienced a hypersexualization of themselves and their bodies through the media, culture, and the overall tainted perspective of the patriarchy we’ve been trained to look through. Instead, my work inevitably sees through the lens of the female gaze, where there is no objectification or negativity associated with the female/feminine body or experience, and instead the viewer is presented with this sort of chaotic, distortion of the faces and bodies of my characters, who are often abstract depictions of self-portraits.

What’s the best advice you have received about being an artist?

Strive to make work better than the last and only compete with yourself. Never measure your talents and successes to someone else's.

helenabaka.com

instagram: @artbug666.

~

Les Femmes Folles is a volunteer organization founded in 2011 with the mission to support and promote women in all forms, styles and levels of art from around the world with the online journal, print annuals, exhibitions and events; originally inspired by artist Wanda Ewing and her curated exhibit by the name Les Femmes Folles (Wild Women). LFF was created and is curated by Sally Brown Deskins.  LFF Books is a micro-feminist press that publishes 1-2 books per year by the creators of Les Femmes Folles including the award-winning Intimates & Fools (Laura Madeline Wiseman, 2014) , The Hunger of the Cheeky Sisters: Ten Tales (Laura Madeline Wiseman/Lauren Rinaldi, 2015 and Mes Predices (catalog of art/writing by Marie Peter Toltz, 2017). Other titles include Les Femmes Folles: The Women 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 available on blurb.com, including art, poetry and interview excerpts from women artists. A portion of the proceeds from LFF books and products benefit the University of Nebraska-Omaha’s Wanda Ewing Scholarship Fund.

Submissions always open! - Check out the 10th anniversary call here:

https://femmesfollesnebraska.tumblr.com/callforart-writing

#feminsitart #contemporaryart #womenartists #womanmadegallery

[spnfanficpond]

February 2020 Angel Fish Awards

Every month all of you fantastic writers work your asses off to post some truly incredible stories. Our Angel Fish Awards are the way for all of us, as a community of writers and readers, to lift each other up and give praise to those who have captured our attention and deserve a few kind words.

The monthly Angel Fish Awards are peer-nominated, meaning ANYONE IN THE POND CAN NOMINATE ANY POND MEMBER’S FIC. While the Pond was founded to support the Guppies, everyone in this community deserves to be showered with love and feedback, and we hope that by opening this up as a Pond wide system, we’ll be able to share the love as far as it can go.

NOTE: WE’VE BEEN HAVING OCCASIONAL PROBLEMS WITH ASKS GOING MISSING. Please use the Submit button when submitting your nominations and make sure you’re signed into Tumblr or your URL won’t show. (If the form asks for your name and email address, then you’re not signed in.) If you like, you can also send a message to Michelle @mrswhozeewhatsis or Mana @manawhaat to check and make sure we got your submission.

WITHOUT FURTHER ADO, HERE ARE THIS MONTH’S ANGEL FISH AWARDS!

There are NINE (9) stories this month with more than one nomination!! Be sure to check through all ninety (yeah, that’s 90!!!) nominations!!

Nominated by @flamencodiva 

Frat Boy (series) by @luci-in-trenchcoats 

This is one of my all time favorite stories by Michelle! It was one of the first ones I read when I joined Tumblr. it is a really good read and I recommend it highly! 

A River In Egypt (series) by @crashdevlin 

Holy crap this is another amazing fic by Cassie! I mean the way she writes Sam’s inner monologue is amazing! and the rest is yet to come! 

Darken (series) by @impala-dreamer 

I love Beka’s Stories! This one is my absolute favorite! and my god was it angsty as hell and I ate it all up! 

Nominated by @becs-bunker 

The Accidental Sexter (oneshot) by @scorpiongirl1 

OK, where to start with this one?! I honestly sweated my way through reading it. It was so hot and steamy and let’s be honest, even over 40, Dean can get it anytime. This just proves it!🔥🔥 Some accidents are so worth it, that one sure was!

Nominated by @erins-culinary-service 

Call of the Ocean (series) by @flamencodiva 

This is the first mermaid! Reader fic I’ve read but I’m loving it so much! It’s a collaboration fic, but the chapters go so well together you can’t even tell. It’s also a super slow burn and I know will be 100% worth the wait.

When You Fall (series) by @flamencodiva 

This is such an amazing and dark fic. READ THE WARNINGS THOUGH!! There are a lot of things that could trigger someone, but if you do read the story it will leave you wanting more are the end of every chapter.

Fighting For A Future (series) by @flamencodiva 

*Uncontrollable screaming noises* that’s the only way I can describe how much I love this and how excited I get when I see an update about this fic!

Running With Wolves (series) by @waywardrose13 

This series rips my heart out every single chapter and I always come back for more because how could I not?  It’s an angsty A/B/O fic and I can’t wait to find out how this ends since there’s still so much left in the fic to explore.

Nominated by @fictionalabyss 

Privacy (oneshot) by @evansrogerskitten 

Can I nominate this glorious piece of work for the AFA!? It gets right to the point and has you looking forwards to that climax at the end and what gets him there.

Porch Swing (oneshot) by @myinconnelly1 

omfg. The angst was almost subtle until it wasn’t.  Ripped my god damn heart out.

Unexpected (oneshot) by @tumbler-tidbits 

When I wrote Sleeping with the wrong Winchester, there was next to nothing for small dick Winchesters. You don’t know how happy I was to find this in the pond! I LOVEEEEEE small dick Winchester fics. WE NEED MORE!

Never In Fact Homeless (oneshot) by @slowdownsugar 

Perfect. It’s just perfect, that’s all that really needs to be said here. It’s short, and sweet, and utterly perfect.

You Can’t Save Them All (oneshot) by @sorenmarie87 

It’s an older fic that I had forgotten about until I stumbled on it again. Its easy to picture the scene, her playing the piano with a broken heart, and Dean just being there so she isn’t alone. still beautiful.

Meeting Mr. Smith (oneshot) by @evansrogerskitten 

Alpha!Dean Smith is just so.. *happy sigh*

Back to Him (oneshot) by @focusonspn 

That ending really made this fic for me. It’s such a Dean ending. The determination to put his pain aside and and get someone back.

One Night Lover (oneshot) by @thing-you-do-with-that-thing 

As always, I’m sucked in, and I can’t look away. By the end, I’m heartbroken and trying desperately to pick up the pieces and while begging to make it better.

Till the End of Time (oneshot) by @girl-next-door-writes 

This made me so happy you don’t even know. I loved this. I love the idea of this.  I just- I love this.

The New Sheriff (series) by @iflostreturntosteverogers

I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS TO START POSTING! Bad ass female main with a cowboy!Dean? Fuck yes! Get hyped, and get reading. *impatiently awaiting chapter 2*

Nominated by @thegirlwhorunswithwinchesters

We Know (oneshot) by @icequeen6666

Randomly came across this fic and, well, anyone who knows me won’t be surprised I couldn’t say no to a good dose of pure angst. I loved the pace in this oneshot. It was quick, but still managed to keep the suspense. And the ending broke my heart, as always.

Too Late, Now (oneshot) by @theholyfoxface

I don’t read many RPF’s but this one sucked me right in and there was nothing I could do about it. It was a beautiful combination of heartbreaking and heartwarming in a way I’m not sure how to describe properly. Yet, the author managed to do it absolutely perfectly.

You Scared Us (oneshot) by @theholyfoxface

Always love reading fics by fellow guppies and shining a well deserved spotlight on them through these nominations. This one I enjoyed very much. I loved the way Dean was portrayed as the more reasonable one while still being his stern self, trying to get things done his way.

You, Me & The Devil Makes Three (series) by @supersassyprobablysad

This series is very intriguing. I love the OC’s wit and the overall backstory of her and her siblings. Definitely going to keep an eye out for the next chapters to find out how this mystery will unravel.

Porch Swing (oneshot) by @myinconnelly1

Well, this sure broke me into a million pieces. I’m a sucker for angst and this piece of writing certainly delivered. It’s sad but it’s gorgeous and I’m in love.

A Day at the Cabin (oneshot) by @cloverhighfivewritestoo

All the fluff. This is so sweet, after reaching the end I went back and read it a second time right away. I would also like to say that Sam being the little spoon is something I can 100% get behind. Pun intended.

Let Me Go (oneshot) by @foreverwayward

Though the ‘Always keep fighting’ part definitely got me bad, I was an absolute fool thinking that would be the hardest part. This was so beautifully written, I don’t quite know what to say. I guess the heartbreak I’m feeling after reading this is all on me, since there was a fair warning given right at the top.

Notes (oneshot) by @kittenofdoomage

I stumbled across this fic and I just…… wow. Apart from the signature amazing writing from this author, which I keep getting blown away by, I just really loved the idea for the plot. The way it was set up with the secret blog and the notes while the brothers acted like they had no idea. I’ll say it again: Wow.

Nominated by @kittenofdoomage 

Control and Release (series) by @thecleverdame 

I lost five hours of my life to this beauty. It’s so perfect. I can’t even find the right words to describe how perfect this is. If you love Sam, and you’re into BDSM, or even if you just like really amazing smut, you need to read this.

The Oath (series) by @thecleverdame 

This story is dark, so heed the warnings, but it is another brilliant masterpiece. Absolutely fantastic.

Call Of The Ocean (series) by @flamencodiva and @anathewierdo 

There aren’t many mermaid AUs out there, so this is a rare gem. The story that these two are weaving is intriguing, angsty, funny, and just plain awesome. I’m really enjoying reading it and can’t wait to see what happens.

Just A Number (oneshot) by @crispychrissy 

I adored this oneshot for all the following reasons; the reader is a badass, Dean is spot-on, and the smut was h-h-hahmazing.

Bury It (series) by @crashdevlin 

Heed the warnings on this one, folks, it is not for the faint-hearted. It deals with some brutal themes, but it’s fucking awesome. I’m really enjoying seeing the journey from Dean’s perspective, despite how completely fucked up it is. lol

What Goes Bump In The Night (series) by @saxxxology 

If you haven’t heard of Saxxy, you are missing out, especially where it comes to her Sam A/B/Os. This series is no exception to her amazing level of work; it’s dark and twisty and just beautiful.

All Our Sins (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer 

It’s smutty, sinful, delicious - you just can’t go wrong.

Nominated by @impala-dreamer  

Cherry Red (oneshot) by @dontshootmespence 

I’m trying not to nominate you every month, but geezeus… HOLY HELL THIS IS MAGIC SMUT RIGHT HERE. ughhhh i’m a little … emotional about this.

Also, your writing is amazing in this. Like, it FELT like an old timey film and I dug that so much. Great, Great work.

‘He stares up with rapt attention, watching the curve of her body as she places herself over his knee; he’s pretty sure he’s died and gone to heaven, but he’s been to heaven before and it ain’t this fun.’

That line is magic. Mhm. Love it.

My Brother’s Keeper (oneshot) by @cleighwrites 

I don’t trust a lot of people to write Wincest with the respect and soul-level love that I believe it should be written with, as such, I don’t read a whole lot of it, except from certain people.

THIS IS PERFECT. It’s hurt/comfort Wincest, which is my absolute favorite, and then you somehow made Sam into the perfect needy sub, and it was so well written and respectful to the idea and the characters and just… it was really really well done. Bravo. Thank you.

Dutiful (oneshot) by @stusbunker 

Ya know that scene in Julie & Julia where Julie is trying to describe what eating an egg feels like for the first time and Amy Adams gets all like wide eyed and swoony and licking her lips and just…

Yeah, that was me reading this. God, that was good. Just… I can’t really explain it but I FELT it. Really Really good work.

Nominated by @sorenmarie87 

Roots (series) by @manawhaat 

I wish I could submit all three parts for a nomination because this mini series featuring JDM is so sweet and fluffy <3  Mana really knocked it out of the park.

More Than Anything (oneshot) by @iflostreturntosteverogers 

This fic in particular, I know that Carrie was gonna through a rough time and who doesn’t love a good comfort fic?  I know I do.  

The New Sheriff (series) by @iflostreturntosteverogers 

It’s no lie that I love AU’s and I was so excited when iflostreturntosteverogers said she was gonna write a Western AU.  The set up for the first part is perfect and Sara, the OC girl - I would do anything for.  

When You Fall (series) by @flamencodiva 

I had this particular fic on my list to read for such a long time, and I’m glad I finally read it. The plot is a little heavy but I highly recommend this one.   I can’t wait to see what she has in store for future parts.  

Nominated by @mrswhozeewhatsis 

Anything and Everything (oneshot) by @rockhoochie 

I said this in my reblog of this story, but I want to say it here, too: This is freaking BEAUTIFUL! I had to look up the song quoted, and this is just so perfect for that song, and the song is perfect for this story. *throws kudos at Sarah forever*

Nominated by @supersassyprobablysad 

Gods of Twilight (series) by @thecleverdame 

It was an excellently written and refreshing take on the ABO concept and I really enjoyed it!

Protector (oneshot) by @fictionalabyss 

It’s only 3 chapters in but I already can’t wait for the next one. I’m super excited to see where this goes and imagining Dean as a biker does all kinds of things to me lol

Lemon Drop (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer 

It’s basically PWP BUT it is amazing none the less. Who knew that a Hypno Kink could be so hot?

Nominated by @fangirlxwritesx67 

More in the Mortar Than the Pestle (oneshot) by @thoughtslikeaminefield 

This is one lush, sexy story featuring Dean and the always-gorgeous Rihanna. An absolute treat!

Seasons (series) by @thoughtslikeaminefield 

I don’t know how I missed this series but let me tell you, no one should miss it! I read the first chapter and wanted to wait, read the rest slowly, slowly. NOPE. I dropped everything, sat right down and read it ALL. It’s a beautiful Dean Winchester x OFC, told in an amazingly creative non-linear format, with chapters that follow the seasons of the year as well as the seasons of their relationship. It’s MJ, so of course I don’t have to tell you that her Dean is spot on, every detail is perfect, and the sex is mind blowing. Just - read it. But be aware that once you start, you may not be able to stop

Try (oneshot) by @there-must-be-a-lock 

Look, honestly, Winchester baby fanfics are a dime a dozen. Which makes this one stand out all the more for how good it is. Lou describes it as “flufftastic smut” and it is, it really is. The sex is smoking hot, of course, but there’s so much meaning and emotion to it. I’m a Sam girl anyway, so the whole thing is just *swoons* *cries*

Nominated by @princessmisery666 

Magnetic (oneshot) by @crashdevlin 

Only a few words yet gave me all the feels. Exactly how I imagine Sam would be *swoon*

Just A Number (oneshot) by @crispychrissy 

I am taking part in @beccaanne814 reblog challenge and it’s all about finding new authors and sharing each others works but I think this maybe the third fic of Chrissy’s I’ve recommended because she consistently writes stories I love and this was no exception. She gives me all the feels, laughing, crying, anger, sad. Basically I’m a huge fangirl and I don’t have to right words to express how much I love her work.

Nominated by @wingedcatninja 

Good Literature (series) by @peridottea91 

I don’t normally have the patience for a series, especially one that is still being updated. Thank goodness I signed up to beta this one because I would have missed out on some truly outstanding writing. The story is compelling, the characterization is on point, and the OC adds an intriguing layer. This could easily be a story arc on the actual show, and I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys classic SPN.

Nominated by @thoughtslikeaminefield

Shackled (series) by @itmighthavebeenintentional

Valerie has long been one of my fave fic authors and one of my dearest friends. This was such an unexpected but welcome deluge of poetry and imagery. I was on the edge of my seat and breathless every time she sent me an updated Gdoc.

Please, if you read nothing else this month, READ THIS.

Nominated by @mummybear

Rules are Rules (oneshot) by @thoughtslikeaminefield

As soon as I read this fic i was hooked!! I have reread it at least four times at this point!! I freaking love it!! MJ is incredible and so is everything she writes! Since tumblr ate the stupid ask i sent her after reading, I figured I could do this at least :) Much love honey!!

Nominated by @supernatural-jackles​

The Fun Behind Conventions (oneshot) by @focusonspn​

I came across this bad boy while searching for something else and man was I excited to read this. This fic is hot as hell! Very very NSFW, but holy! There is nothing hotter than this kind of sandwich! It was so well written and the attention to detail left me… let’s just say I’ll be going back to reread this one! Amazing!!

The Accidental Sexter (oneshot) by @scorpiongirl1

This had everything I was looking for! Humor wrapped in a hot fic! Dean accidentally sending a naughty picture shouldn’t be this much of a turn on but this is - this is freakin’ awesome! Words can’t do this one justice! Please, just read this one and you’ll see exactly what I mean! Absolutely awesome story!

High School Bullshit (oneshot) by @fictionalabyss​

 I don’t know why this one struck me as much as it did. I read this one, then I lost it until I was thinking about it. I searched high and low trying to find it again so I could reread it! I really enjoyed this one because I could relate to it in some way. Never feeling like I could get the hot guy I had a crush on because of high school bullshit. I can definitely relate to this reader and it was nice to see something like this in a fic and have an outcome like it does! Awesome job!

Nominated by @thelittleredwhocould​

What Lurks Beneath the Surface (series) by @saxxxology​ 

I. Love. Soulless. Sam. So. Fucking. Much. Also there’s a line about Sam’s nose in the first chapter and I feel. Attacked. So rude.

What Goes Bump in the Night  (series) @saxxxology​ 

I love me some dark A/B /O and this series hits all the right buttons. Angst, a dark and gritty world, Alpha!Sam (*heart eyes*). It’s just ugh. So good.

About a Boy (series) by @percywinchester27​ 

I think this series is going to be in my Hall of Fame till the end of time. Ana’s plot pulled my in from the first chapter and I’m so excited to see where this series goes!

There’s Something Strange (series) by @alleiradayne​ 

I found this on AO3 by accident and immediately fell in love. The case is super interesting, the characters are well done, and over all I really enjoyed it.

Her Saviours (series) by @bamby0304​ 

Been doing a lil reread of this series and rediscovering how much I adore it.

I Know Your Wife (She Wouldn’t Mind) (series) by @teamfreewill-imagine​ 

I will forever recommend this fic to anyone who will listen. It’s the only RPF fic I’ll read and it’s just. SO GOOD.

Nominated by @myinconnelly1​

Tighter Harder Faster (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer​

Alright look this was just straight up dirty.  Ok, what else can I saw but that I needed a cold shower after this.The Girl I Knew 

The Girl I Knew (oneshot) by @emilyshurley​

Uh, what can I say here?  I have never been so honored to have fanfic written of my fanfics before, but emilyshurley has given me the highest medal, in the absolute cutest way imaginable.

Gods of Twilight (seires) by @thecleverdame​ 

This fic was binge worthy. I could put my phone down and I simply wanted to hurry onto the next chapter.  Seriously don’t read it if you need any time to adult.

The Private Invader (oneshot) by @negans-lucille-tblr​

This was some dirty below the belt cheating.  It was amazing, and I just was like *heart eyes* the entire way through. 

The Truth (series) by @negans-lucille-tblr​ 

While this type of fic is not normally my go to, it truly grips you and puts into the minds of the characters.  I was actually scared and ashamed of myself feeling like I had done something wrong, when it was the characters.

Nominated by @tumbler-tidbits

Everything (series) by @there-must-be-a-lock

Sweet Holy Effervescent Jesus this is the hottest thing I have read in a long time! Its raw and messy and desperate, and SO fucking delicious! Lou even managed to get some fluff in too! Do yourself a favor and binge this fic! (just make sure your alone and have spare panties)

Bottle Service (series) by @thoughtslikeaminefield

This is one of my longtime faves, and it never disappoints! My girl MJ captures the true intimacy between the characters and a smut  fic has never sparked such emotion in me. It’s beautiful, and passionate and there’s a sequel! It’s called Full Service and it is equally amazing!

Worthless (oneshot) by @maddiepants

This one just ugh *sobs*. Erica captures the struggle of self-harm in this fic very well. Its heartbreaking and soul shattering, but it also reminds you that you can’t trust those voices in your head, and that there is someone who cares about you. TW: thoughts of suicide and self harm.

Hard To Love (oneshot) by @maddiepants

I’m a sucker for a good song fic and Erica does this one justice! She really captures Dean’s self-hatred and really makes you want to wrap our favorite hunter in hugs. My bestie has a gift for the angst, but she gives you fluff too.

His Property (series) by @negans-lucille-tblr

This fic is glorious! There’s angst, fluff, and smut so hot you’ll be a melted puddle of arousal. Believe it or not Bee also managed to make me hate one of my favorite Supernatural characters! There is a definite twist in this one :)

Since You’ve Been Gone (series) by @negans-lucille-tblr

This series quickly captured my heart. I don’t remember what it was that captured me but the mix of fluff, angst, and smut certainly kept me around! The best part? There’s a sequel called “Now You’re Here” and in March she’s releasing Part three of the Trilogy!

Ask Me (oneshot) by @evansrogerskitten

This one is another favorite of mine by my girl Ash! This hits so many of my kinks there are not words to describe the hotness. In fact I’m pretty sure my reblog contained gifs and keyboard smashes lol. Read it! You’ll thank me!

With Wolves (series) by @bamby0304

This one is a classic favorite! This fic was my first foray into the A/B/O world AND series works. I was still somewhat new to the fandom and tumblr when I discovered it and I was immediately hooked! I love the way Amber has incorporated our favorite characters into this alternate universe while still maintaining their cannon personalities. It’s an emotional roller coaster, so buck up and enjoy the ride!

Spanner in the Works (series) by @bamby0304

This one has a special place in my heart! It makes me smile and squee and just overall make a fool of myself. It’s incomplete right now because Amb is on hiatus, but there are seventeen AMAZING chapters that you can read right now! I just love it, plain and simple.

Cupid Can Shove His Arrow Right Up His... (oneshot) by @bamby0304

Since it’s February, I thought it appropriate to share this yummy piece! Holy Fucking shit I LOVED THIS! The attitude, the sass, the fucking innuendos… THE FUCKING! Jesus Christ on a crumbled cracker, This one killed. Go beg Amber for MORE of this! And make sure you say PLEASE! We need to see ALL those scenarios played out… Read this one in privacy ladies and have a helper handy.

Wrecked (oneshot) by @thoughtslikeaminefield

JFC if this isn’t every Jensen girls fantasy! This one just ruined me! Wall sex, hand over your mouth, soft nips and kisses *shudders* give it a read!

Our Little Secret (series) by @sis-tafics

If you’ve got a kink then Jill’s got you covered 😏 This 25 chapter serious has it all! A little angst, a dash of fluff, and whole lot of smut! Each chapter explores a different kink between Dean and the Reader from the Readers point of view while Dean tries to show her how beautiful she is. I recommend you take the time and read the series in sequence, y’all will not regret it!

Midnight Blue (oneshot) by @rockhoochie

This Fic was so fucking amazing! Precise and descriptive words paint an amazingly vivid picture that fills all your senses! You can actually see, hear, smell, and feel the things going on between the reader and Sam! I could be biased since this fic hit nearly all my kinks *fans self* but indulge in this extremely passionate sensory experience for yourself and read it!!

Bruised (oneshot) by @wayward-and-worn

This is oddly sweet and fluffy with a hen pecking Dean, and absolutely fucking hilarious at the same time 😂😂 I love it!

Not Letting Go (oneshot) by @kittenofdoomage

Whoo! I love a good A/B/O fic and this one is delicious! Just enough smut to please you and leave you begging for more!

The Maddening Empty (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer

Whew. I don’t know if it’s my praise!kink or my dom!kink but this little number right here had me wishing I waited to read until after work! This ones a panty ruiner folks!

Notes (oneshot) by @kittenofdoomage

JFC this piece is a dream come true! What would you do if Sam and Dean discovered your smutty fanfiction? Well this hot little number lets you know exactly what they would do!

The Mirror (oneshot) by @wheresthekillswitch

This sweet little drabble speaks volumes for those of us who have insecurities (read: all of us!). Short, sweet, and to the point! Hold your head high.

Only One Woman I Trust (oneshot) by @georgialouisea

This is just absolutely precious! You think you know what’s going on but there’s a surprise! This one will rot your teeth ❤️

Inked Up (oneshot) by @evansrogerskitten

Ever want to know what goes on inside Dean’s head when he sees a hot girl? This fic is super hilarious and totally fluffy! I love Dean’s internal struggle to keep himself in check 😂 this one is fun!

Hunt Hard Play Harder (two parts - link is to Pt. 1) by @rockhoochie

HOLY FUCKING SHIT! This is…. this is just. WOW! Holy Hell I can barely breathe. This one gives you Dom!Dean AND Sub!Dean and both are equally sensual and erotic! There’s even a surprise ending! Which had my pulse racing… Whew 🔥 My bitches y’all will love this one!

Mr. Quackers (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer

They say that crack is whack, well in this case quack is whack 😂😂 This little drabble with have you laughing until you cry, it’s just that ducking funny! (See what I did there?)

Holding On (oneshot) by @idreamofplaid

This is so beautiful and so painful I was teary eyed! They never really show us how the boys deal with their inner demons on the show, but Robin does a phenomenal job of painting that picture!

Clear Your Mind  (oneshot) by @impala-dreamer

Oh sweet smiling sinner this was miraculous! So soft, so gentle, so loving… this was Sam making love to the reader and the way he takes care of her makes it that much more passionate! Ladies and gents THIS is how you take care of your lover! Fucking love you Beka!

Thunder Rolls (oneshot) by @amanda-teaches

This was intensely passionate! The sex is hot but the love behind it really makes it great! The authors use of super descriptive descriptions of your pleasure will have you clenching your thighs!

Thank you all for the awesome work and great feedback!

These are not actual awards! This system is set up so everyone in the pond has a chance to share the love and promote a fic/author that has grabbed your attention. The more people that participate, and the more everyone remembers to submit their own fics after posting, the better this will be :D

THANK YOU ALL AGAIN, KEEP UP THE AMAZING WORK, AND AS ALWAYS, HAPPY WRITING!

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