Tumgik
#also im sorry for writing novel posts im extra as fuck and like making things More Immersive
togalnu · 5 months
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Do you have any specific hcs for fem togainu or just fem nitrochi as a whole? I'd love to hear them! ^^
Oops I meant to answer this earlier. Anyways yes! I will be putting this under a read more because. Lol. Enjoy!
You wanna know a secret? Earlier this year I was researching parodies and the legalities of them because I had the grand idea to make a togainu remake but yuri and with some story changes. A whole ass visual novel. I was seriously planning on making it. Suffice to say I have put in some thought in turning these yaoi boys into yuri girls.
We will be here all day if I list every little thought and headcanon I have! I'll def make more posts about my visions in the future, but for right now I need to talk about Shiki. I NEED TO TALK ABOUT SHIKI.
First and foremost, my overall thoughts about Shiki: wasted potential. His route was a huge disappointment when I finally got to it. It was fumbled so fucking badly and it pains my soul because Shiki is hot and I love the concept of his character but.. man. What a let down. I ended up thinking about him a lot because of this. What I would do if I were in charge of writing his route, parts of his characterization that I'd rid of or ameliorate, and maybe even giving him some new quirks to not make him so one-dimensional-evil-villain type. And then along with this, I started thinking about what if he was a woman. because I am attractdd to women. Typical thought process.
First, his design. I am a sucker for black haired red eyes bitches. I love black and red. I'm dying my hair black and red at the end of the year. The majority of my wardrobe is black and red. I do not play around #EMO. I love the almost leather gothic look he has but unfortunately it is not enough for me. I felt that he needed more unnecessary accessories and belts and other clothing items, as any goth should have. I've had a few ideas in mind for Shiki girl outfit and they all lean into these more, like giving her extra bracelets, belts, necklaces, crosses, whatever. I want her DECKED OUT!!! But I also struggle coming up with outfits so I can't really decide what looks good LMAO
Things I love about Shiki's outfit:
- The gloves. UGHHH gloves are so fun. The longer the gloves are the better.
- His stupid coat
- The spikes and crosses. The silver adds a lot to his appearance
- Turtleneck<3
Things I don't like about Shiki's outfit:
- those stupid ass notches on his pants. I can't tell if he has insane thigh-high boots or strange pants, and neither can a lot of artists it seems like? Though it seems pants are the consensus. SAD!
- Turtleneck should have long sleeves
- Or his coat should have long sleeves. One of those two
- What the hell is going on with his belt. It'd look fine if it didn't have those strange hanging.. circle... things
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NOW MY IDEAS
I like the idea of her having a corset and fishnets, so I've been including that in whatever iteration of her design I'm working on. I gotta keep the coat too as it's like, a Shiki classic. I've also been trying to decide how a skirt for her might look (I love the idea of it having a slit so you can see her fishnets and thigh high boots).
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But I'm torn on including the turtleneck as much as I love it.... I feel like it kinda clashes. Idk maybe i should just move her skirt up so it's not hanging off her ass but also it's fun to draw it that way.
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Although adding another belt with the skirt could work too, and have the fishnets peaking out from the skirt slit... not gonna draw that rn though im just brainstorming here
Like I said earlier I'd love to give her way more accessories than base Shiki has but I need to definitely play around with outfit ideas more bc I don't want her to look too cluttered either. Also sorry all the pics are torso only because for some reason I struggle HARD with drawing calves and feet
I don't have much to say for hair ideas.. I just like the idea of it flairing out + two long.. idk what to call them... strands of hair? Down her cheeks?? Okay well u see what I mean in the pic. Bangs pretty much stay the same
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And ohhh my god I know togainu is set in the post-apocalyptic future, but considering it came out in 2005 I feel obligated to rework some of the designs to be a little more y2k.. Akira with low waisted flared jeans... making Shiki even more gothic... it's so fucking fun HOW CAN I NOT!!
Also the other day I saw this one corset that I LOVED and wanted to see if I can Shiki-fy it but hmm... idk... I definitely need to play around with the idea more but here's a quick sketch i did just for funsies so you get the idea
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Okay moving on
Second, his characterization. I love the idea of what they were going for in terms of his relation to Nano. I wish so badly they had expanded on this past Shiki just hating line users and killing them because he's unable to kill Nano (although I do think this is a pretty good bit of characterization). I'm pretty sure the Chayamachi manga goes more into this but idc we are talking about the game so I'm gonna pretend it doesn't exist.
Shiki is smug and cocky. Incredibly so. But a big part of his character is how hateful he is, so much so that it's this hate that motivates everything he does.
I love it. I love his hatred. I wish the game went more into it sooo badly and like if he found out Akira had anti-line blood before the end of the game and there was time given to show his reaction? Would he hate Akira for it??? Would he feel any kind of resentment?? If I was Shiki I'd definitely feel complicated as fuck over it!!!
Anyways I'm still working out how fem Shiki could be improved upon in terms of this, and I LOVEEE LOVE LOVE LOVE writing personality and backstories and relationships with other characters and how they all interact with each other. I have very deep oc lore because of this but i will not get into my ocs rn because they have nothing to do with togainu.
This post is already long enough however and if I were to talk about all the ideas I had for Shiki characterization upgrade... well it'd take even longer. To say the least. One day I'll talk about it though! In a more comprehensive post including other characters and whatnot. It's something I definitely also need to work out in my head more tho
It's been a pretty fun project so far that I hope to do more with in the future. Side note that doesn't really matter but there's this song that I always imagine fem Shiki amvs too oops.. RIDE IT by LustSickPuppy... this part especially.......
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(the part is around 1:17 if you don't feel like listening to the entire thing. But u should)
Urggghhhh I love lsp ugh ughhhhhfuhrhhcuuhfhuufghh sorry for posting lyrics and a spotify link. It will happen again
OKAY. AMYWAYS
I do not give a fuck if all of this seems too self indulgent. If anything it's supposed to be!!! It's a labor of love!!!
Thank u to anyone who read this far. I appateciate it
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hyrohkaah-moved · 2 years
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prefacing this by saying i'm so fucking sorry this ask is really long and annoying and youre free to delete it if you want to. anyway re: your obi-wan post i feel like really whether or not someone thinks "obi-wan's flaw is self-doubt" or "obi-wan's flaw is complacency" really depends on how they view the jedi order and their role in the prequels. like the one thing everyone seems to agree on is that he's v much a representation of "the jedi" as they are and it varies from there. w regards to his self-doubt as a flaw there's certainly a nonzero amount of evidence behind that; there's the obi-wan age of republic comic, the rots and padawan novels, the kenobi show kind of only works if you adhere to that reading, and his voice actor for tcw has talked abt how it's a major thing informing his dynamic w anakin. However absolutely none of this actually matters if you see the jedi order and obi-wan's adherence to it as a negative thing. like you explained in your post, any doubts he has are just him coming close to realizing a truth he doesnt want to confront (and pretty much never does)
i honestly think george lucas didn't set out wanting to portray the jedi as flawed when initially writing the prequels. a bunch of interviews/commentary ive seen have him just straight up defending them and/or the code, he's stated anakin's inability to adhere to the jedi philosophy was the entire reason for his fall, the real-world allegory that order 66 very likely represents in the first place, etc. dave filoni on the other hand is most definitely not this. his portrayal of the jedi is much more along the lines of "crack-filled body whose involvement in the war played a part in the empire's rise" and he's the one who originated the "duel of the fates meant a battle for whether or not anakin would've fallen" idea. plus the way obi-wan is actually portrayed in tcw lends itself easier to his flaw being arrogance (which maul points out)
anyway im a jedi apologist because i have cringe worms in my fail brain re them as a living breathing culture that the empire wants dead. and thus my reading of obi-wan leans towards "man has unjustified fears abt himself that end up coming true". however it's very much an undercurrent to him rather than a forefront aspect (at least until the kenobi show) and i think there's def a narrative/artistic merit in the "man's adherence to a crumbling system causes him to lose everything" take. the idea of a tragedy being a result of everyone in the story is one of the better kinds—but it's not the one i see the prequels as. tldr im hitting obi-wan on the head w a baseball bat hes the dumbest fucker alive
thank you for taking the time to write all this out! it was actually really interesting to hear someone's thoughts on the matter. and i think you are absolutely correct in that how someone interprets obi-wan depends (especially how he is flawed) depends on their interpretation of the jedi order. how someone sees the jedi order and how they see obi-wan are very much informed by the other, if that makes sense.
i also should've prefaced that post with the fact that i have read Very Little of the extra material, canon or otherwise. i have not read a single novelization and i haven't read master & apprentice or padawan or any of the other canon obi-wan books. i am almost solely a movies & shows fan, and thus that's where i pull from whenever i analyze anything star wars. i also should've prefaced that i, respectfully, do not give a damn about obi-wan post-rots. he feels kind of stale and flat to me after that.
that all being said, i definitely do think that obi-wan has some modicum of self-doubt. but i guess my point was is that, in my reading of him, it's not the Major Character Flaw behind his character. it's like... a seasoning.
but (prequel era) star wars is a tragedy, so when i think about the prequel characters having flaws, what i'm thinking about is "what is the thing that keeps them from escaping the narrative? what is it about them that makes this a tragedy?"
and sure, yes, obi-wan's self doubt is part of that. i'm sure you could pick out a bunch of different scenes and events that illustrate that point. but... when i think about obi-wan, and i think about his role in the tragedy that is star wars, that isn't what comes to mind. what comes to mind is how many times obi-wan seems to be reluctantly defending the status quo, as if he's just resigned himself to How Things Are and Always Will Be™.
and yknow what, maybe obi-wan's complacency vs. self-doubt aren't even opposite interpretations. maybe the reason why obi-wan acts like he's helpless to make any changes is because he genuinely does not believe he's capable of doing so. that he can't be the one to make things better because he's just not good enough.
but the complacency bit is always going to stick out more to me, because i am very much Not a jedi apologist (i'm not "anti jedi" ever or whatever. i like my jedi order nuanced and with teeth). in my interpretation of the text, obi-wan's adherence to the order as-is is something negative, not because adherence to a religious institution is inherently bad, but adhering to an institution that you know has problems and not desiring to do anything ABOUT those problems and simply defending the status quo because you've staked your identity in it and to suggest change would mean asking questions about yourself that you don't want to ask is [deep breath].. not poggers, maybe?
but, like, that is exactly what i like about obi-wan. he's a guy who has staked so much of himself into The Institution that he basically becomes THE archetypal jedi, to the point where i can't help but feel a little sorry about him because, yeah, it's kind of disturbing to realize how little there is of your life outside of this One Thing. because if being a jedi is all you are, and the jedi order is slowly crumbling under the weight of a corrupt government that it feels compelled to serve regardless of said corruption, then what does that make you? it becomes easier, then, to convince yourself (or try to convince yourself) that the system is still good (that you're still good) than to ruthlessly interrogate yourself and your choices.
anyway [gestures] as i said, i was raised on the clone wars and, like you mentioned, my not-so positive interpretation of the jedi order means that i will gravitate to a certain interpretation of obi-wan (i.e. really nice guy! shame that he's a liberal though /j) however i do understand the logic behind the interpretation of self-doubt being obi-wan's principal flaw, and i wish i hadn't been so quick to laugh at it because, y'know what, i DO kinda get it now.
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hanijunk · 3 years
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Alright boys, girls, and nonbinary folks of the world. It’s 5:36am (1/30 when I first started) as I decide to give up on my attempt to continue to focus on learning statistics, avoid studying for my two upcoming midterms, and put off my two actual essays for two different classes.
Instead we’re going into a dive about ✨ KazuFuuma ✨ . Is this me telling you you gotta ship it? No of course not, you’re entitled to your own ships! You don’t really gotta care about it as a ship. But I do want people to recognize it’s THERE canonically, and how disregarding it is extremely unfair to Kazuki as a character particularly. Also, I’m working on the assumption anyone clicking this at least knows the bare bones about what KazuFuuma (ex. You know they are a ship of Kazuki/Fuuma from Dolce, you know they are childhood friends, you know who Dolce is, you know about Honeyworks, etc.) I’ll be making references to specific things, but I won’t always go into heavy detail. Might just hope you know it or take my word for what it is, and go into analyzing it. Some I’ll put direct references to find, but some I’ll trust you can find it yourself. If you somehow read this MAMMOTH and want reference to a specific thing mentioned, hmu I can help you find it!!
Also I hate tumblr formatting sm if you legit wanna read this 7 page essay but hate tumblr format lmk I'll add it as a google doc link instead too. anYWHO
Before actually getting into the meat of things lemme preface some stuff.
Again it’s like almost 6am so this will be disorganized and very train of thought (and likely long due to the fact when I fly by the seat of my pants I’m known to get unnecessarily extensive). It’s definitely gonna be in large part why it’s important to recognize as a romantic relationship foundation and what about it shapes Kazuki’s character in particular. Maybe a bit of how it’s been built up and its general focus and implications. Dunno yet. We’ll see LMAOO
I say f*ck. Not a lot, just a handful of times. This ain’t something scholarly this is for my own enjoyment so if you don’t like that might not wanna read. And it’s not like spitefully I just curse a lot if you haven’t...read my tags before lol
Again this is through the lens of a Kazuki stan. Of COURSE I’m going to have some level of bias, but if anything that bias may help more than hurt because that means I become FIXATED and think a lot about Kazuki. Which plays into establishing just how important it is that Kazufuuma’s relationship is recognized, especially in a romantic light at this point. Lmfao. 
I’ll have a few more prefaces about the actual content below but to keep this from getting too long if you wanna read come below the cut owo
I have extremely limited knowledge of Japanese just taking a few classes in highschool (so like 3 yrs ago) and live in America. This means a lot of my knowledge is gathered through the english translations of the super duper incredible and lovely people in the Honeyworks fandom who provide translations (delaix and takanenene esp have provided so much for me being able to understand Dolce) and my own limited Japanese paired with Google Translate for things that remain untranslated.
This only will be drawing on information I have come in contact with and have access to and making assumptions based on that, most (if not all) of which is in the public domain. So things like the Dolce Manga Volumes released via Animate, exclusive 4komas, and Light Novels are out of my area for the most part (apart from again snippets of translations thanks to this fandom’s godlike and generous translators).
I will not be drawing on anything from the first Dolce album with the exception of Nade Nade. From a meta standpoint, I consider those songs as songs made as performance media as opposed to character explorations. Nade Nade is the exception because (1) it was released a whole year before the album and (2) you can tell it’s explicitly an exploration of Fuuma and Kazuki’s interpersonal relationship even if it’s in a slightly more performance based context than the songs that came out with the Dolce LNs. Easiest parallel I can make to show this is if you held Non-Fantasy, Yume Fanfare, and Samishigariya up against each other, you could tell the difference in intended audience and intended purpose the same way the Dolce 1st album, Nade Nade, and the songs of the LNs do respectively. Even if there is some basis to ground Kazufuuma, for the purposes of this essay I’ll be acting under the assumption the 1st album falls under the Non-Fantasy equivalent category.
THAT WAS A LOT OF PREFACING CONSIDERING LIKE 2 PPL WILL PROBABLY READ IT I just have a tendency to anytime I do anything analytical lay down ground acknowledgements for myself to work on just...cuz it makes me feel less guilty for any accidental misinformation even if I’m writing towards my future self to read lolll IM SORRY WITHOUT FURTHER TO DO HERE’S THE BRAIN DUMP
First let’s go ahead and establish why it needs to be recognized as an important relationship. Again, I’m a Kazuki stan. He’s my favorite character not only of Dolce but also of the entire Honeyworks series, and as much as I love him for reasons outside the ship, whether you like it or not Kazufuuma is an essential aspect of his character and narrative. Of course there’s the fact that him and Fuuma are childhood friends, so that’s going to in part define their characters and interactions with each other and those around them. They’re both going to be relevant to one another and important to one another’s stories to an even greater extent than the rest of the members of Dolce. But on Kazuki’s side at least, it’s an EXTREME amount. A running plotpoint in Dolce Diary is the sheer amount of dedication Kazuki has to Fuuma and how much his thoughts and decisions are influenced by Fuuma, whether it be how he feels happiest spending time with Fuuma, how he decided to get his piercing to represent he wanted to protect Fuuma, how he doesn’t want to dislike food so he can eat what Fuuma dislikes, etc. Not to mention running jokes about his borderline overprotectiveness and downright possessiveness of Fuuma, how proud he is when Fuuma gets praised, or that one 4koma that literally explicitly states he can read Fuuma’s mind when he thinks motherfucking ‘dirty thoughts’ about his childhood friend (Fuuma). I still don’t know what the fuck to make of that last bit. Genuinely. Or the fact it’s a fucking running joke. As in it’s not a one off. It’s been brought up multiple times. Kazuki what the fuck. 
That’s not to say that he doesn’t have character outside of Fuuma or he doesn’t interact with people other than Fuuma. He’s great friends with Sara, Girisha, and Kippei and is shown time and time again to have fun interactions with all of them, generally acting as the best support friend for every member of the group, not Fuuma alone. For instance how he helps Kippei with his self confidence issues or stays over at Sara’s to protect him from a cockroach (which he fails at lol). Nor is that to say all his interactions involving Fuuma focus solely on his devotion to Fuuma, especially in instances where the manga focuses on Dolce as a group dynamic (though even in that setting there are times where jokes about his devotion are thrown in). He’s kind, he’s stupid, he’s friendly, he’s an amazing character in his own right, and I love him for all those reasons. But that doesn’t change the fact a major part of his character and his character interactions are rooted in Fuuma, and arguably some of his most interesting, eccentric, and notable behaviors and traits revolve around Fuuma (again the mind reading for example).
Hell let’s take it one step further. If you look at the character bios of the Dolce members, you get everyone’s motives for being an idol and interests. Of them, Kazuki is the only one to have another character mentioned directly, not to mention that supporting Fuuma is explicitly stated to be his primary motive as to why he became an idol. Not even Fuuma’s sister is mentioned, though two arguments can be made for this. The first would be that Fuuma’s backstory about wanting to fulfill his dream for himself and his sister was decided later to explain Fuuma’s choice to crossdress though it can be argued it was intentionally done to leave it as a reveal at a later date, to which I would argue I don’t think this backstory was a choice in post. While Fuuma’s dedicated Dolce Diary extra exploring that backstory was released a little less than a year after Dolce was revealed, the preview to set up Fuuma’s backstory was actually the first thing released after the character bios on the Dolce Official Twitter page if you exclude a drawing of Dolce from Yamako. The second argument could be that information about his sister was intentionally withheld to set up the reveal when Fuuma’s extra released to explore it. However, going by that logic (which I do agree with), that would also mean that Fuuma’s inclusion and importance in Kazuki’s character bio also set up his dedicated extra, which I don’t think would be incorrect to assume considering what his actual extra turned out being.
Which brings me to the thing that makes it inexplicable to write off the romantic implications behind Kazufuuma: Kazuki’s dedicated Dolce Diary extra, Suki. I shipped Kazufuuma before even knowing of Suki, sure. But the fact that Suki even exists is a shock to me and drove into me the fact that Kazufuuma wasn’t just my own projection. Again, it’s not a surprise that Fuuma shapes Kazuki’s life. They’re childhood friends, of course they’re going to be important to each other. But this extra explicitly brought Kazuki’s feelings towards Fuuma under a direct spotlight. At first I was thinking oh, this extra was just to acknowledge the fact that Kazuki and Fuuma’s relationship can have romantic implications, but the end of it the conclusion that we got was that it didn’t matter what type of “like” he felt for Fuuma. Originally, I thought it wasn’t anything more than saying there are all types of like, and it doesn’t always need to be explicitly defined, but I appreciated the fact they were aware that they were writing Kazuki in a way that conveyed romantic implications. 
Then I thought about it because, again, I love Kazuki of course I’m going to think about his character extra, and realized...that’s not how these character extras have worked. There are only three character extras out as far as I know and have read: Fuuma, Kippei, and Kazuki. If we look at Fuuma and Kippei’s, each extra had a conclusion, sure, but they didn’t have a resolution. Rather, they were simply setting up explicitly what each character’s primary character arc and conflict were. Fuuma’s extra brought attention to the fact that he’s particularly a crossdressing idol by exploring the motives behind it. His choice to be a crossdressing idol is constantly under fire both by himself and the world around him. He’s not immune to those who consider his crossdressing strange, and a part of his story is both finding people who accept his decision to crossdress and to succeed for himself as a crossdressing idol. It’s an essential part of how we understand and define him as a character and it’s a central part of how he interacts with the world around him. For Kippei, it lays the severity of his insecurity under the spotlight and his journey and motives for improving himself. Again, this isn’t something isolated and resolved in the extra; his extreme insecurity and negativity is constantly affecting how he interacts with practically everyone from his fellow Dolce members to his fans despite the fact in all honesty? He’s fucking insanely talented in his own right, his own brother mentioning how smart he is and how he has amazing reflexes. For Kippei, his negativity is an essential part of how we understand and define him and central to how he interacts with the world as much as Fuuma’s decision to crossdress is to him.
Which brings us back to Kazuki, of course. In his dedicated extra, in the chapter that’s supposed to explore and establish and bring attention to an essential part of his character, the aspect of himself under investigation is how he feels about Fuuma. It’s not just how he behaves around Fuuma, it’s explicitly an exploration of his feelings, on top of the fact it’s explicitly an exploration about whether or not he likes Fuuma r o m a n t i c a l l y. Literally the conflict is spurred on by someone outright asking “Do you like him?” and having to clarify “I mean romantically.” What they decided to focus on for Kazuki’s character and emphasize and establish is that Kazuki’s like towards Fuuma toes the line between friendship and romance. His ambiguous feelings towards Fuuma (if we leave them inconclusive as Suki did) are just like Fuuma’s crossdressing and Kippei’s insecurity in the sense the weight of whatever those feelings may be are seen in how he interacts with the world around him and influences his behaviors. It would be another story if they introduced the potential and shut it down all within the extra, because then his central conflict would to me be less directly open to romantic potential and more simply about how his arc was meant to explore the dynamic of the behavior of an extremely dedicated best friend. The fact that he may be romantically attracted to Fuuma or may be only platonically dedicated to Fuuma is instead something that looms over Kazuki in the same way Fuuma’s decision to crossdress constantly looms over him. It’s what Dolce wanted to point to and say this is Kazuki’s central character conflict and central arc: exploring what type of feelings he has towards Fuuma. 
Sure, it can be argued that there’s only three Dolce Diary character extras, there’s not enough to be sure about that being the purpose of the extras unless we get the other two’s extras. First, at this point I honestly don’t know if or when they’re going to release an extra revolving around Sara and Girisha just because not only has it been over a year and a half since the latest Dolce Diary Character Extra (Kazuki’s) was released despite the gap between the first and latest Dolce Diary Character Extra (Fuuma’s and Kazuki’s) were within a year of release but also because the Dolce 4komas and comics they’ve been posting to Twitter have decreased (last one being over half a year ago) potentially due to them deciding to focus on releasing Dolce manga content through the purchasable volumes instead. (This is not particularly related to the Kazufuuma argument, just wanted to put out there my two cents on what Sara and Girisha’s extra/focal arc would be. Based on a large part of the Dolce Diary in conjuncture with Can’t an Idol Fall in Love, I’d argue Sara’s would be his journey to regain his passion for performing, and if it’s not that I’d say it’d be coming out of his self-imposed isolation and opening up to people again. As for Girisha, I have less of a concrete idea but I’m assuming it’d be something pertaining to how people often misconceive him whether it be in tandem with his determination, his optimism and sociability, or his stupidity/ability to ignore those misconceptions and work past them. But Girisha is treated like the comedic relief 90% of the time so I’m not entirely sure, but his primary conflict is definitely rooted in misconceptions of him being his roadblock imo. #MoreGirishaContentPlz) That being said, I personally feel like the three are already enough evidence, especially considering it would be honestly even more cruel for Kazuki’s character-centric extra to be focusing on something that wasn’t essential to his character and character arc, anyway. And though it’s not explicitly stated that these chapters are extras exploring a central character, you can kind of tell based on how they are (to my knowledge) the only Dolce Diary updates with cover/title cards each which include their focal character front and center. So working off that fact, the Kazuki-centric chapter established that a pillar to his narrative was his feelings towards Fuuma and that those feelings are still open to romantic potential. 
But if you follow me, this is why up until Can’t an Idol Fall in Love With Another Idol’s release, I was terrified of them writing that off. I would have been ok if it was just an arc that was given attention then continued to actively work in the background, as all the character arcs have been over all of Dolce’s content. The fact that they might be giving Fuuma a love interest and giving Fuuma a love arc while Kazuki’s feelings were still up in the air and were still the primary highlighted narrative for him would have been fucking scuffed. To me, it would be like… why would they make him so Fuuma-centric to the point that even his dedicated chapter was not just focused on Fuuma but focused on the ambiguity and potential of him having romantic feelings for Fuuma, yet reduce him to being Fuuma's designated right-hand man. Don’t get me wrong, friendships are just as important as romantic relationships. But again, rather than conclude Kazuki’s answer in Suki to be that his feelings were of friendship, they left it open ended and allow audience members to be actively aware that Kazuki’s feelings towards Fuuma still had potential to be romantically coded. It would just be so weird to quickly close off that narrative by giving Fuuma a love interest as opposed to letting Kazuki conclude it himself. It would be fucking beyond frustrating for me, at least Eventually, I kept trying to drive my hopes that they would explore Kazuki’s narrative at all down to the ground because it was a Fuuma-centric novel; maybe if anything they’d explore those feelings in his own novel after the fact. But then they kept having little drops here and there of Kazuki being even the slightest bit relevant and I’d go back to questioning “Are??? They??? Is this on purpose??? Do they know what they’re doing or are they just doing this because Kazuki’s just so important to Fuuma as his best friend that he’s there as his right-hand I genuinely can’t tell???” And um. Welp.
Safe to say Can’t An Idol Fall in Love sold me on the fact that they know what they’re doing LOL. And to anyone who thinks that Kazuki’s feelings can still be read as ambiguous in CAIFILWAI as opposed to explicitly romantic - whether it be due to a fear they may pull the “I like him as a friend” card or due to the disbelief that they have an explicit mlm main character in the Honeyworks series - I’d like to cover any bases that may make you think this way. If you think it’s just Kazuki acting like a protective friend, why do you think he calls Yui a rival? If you’ve only seen the MV and think it’s ambiguous or can be taken as the "likfe" for friend, then does that mean you think Yui’s feelings toward Fuuma are also ambiguous or as a friend? With the way Yui responds, she is trying to rival Kazuki’s feelings towards Fuuma. She and Kazuki recognize whatever feeling it is that they hold towards Fuuma, both of their feelings are the same type. I don’t think most people would argue that Yui’s confession about Fuuma was one of pure respect and friendship. Plus, if anything I’d argue of the three characters in the MV, Fuuma is the one whose feelings are left the most ambiguous despite him being the central character. It’s heavily implied that he may be forming feelings for Yui, but nowhere is it established either in the song or in the MV, especially if you compare it to Kazuki and Yui’s declarations or if you compare it to Sara’s feelings for Uru in Can’t An Idol Fall in Love. Fuuma’s romantic narrative here is trying to figure out how he feels for Yui, while for Kazuki and Yui they’ve established a rivalry because they both have mutually established they like Fuuma romantically.
If the MV isn’t enough for you and Suki isn’t enough for you for...some reason…??? You can check out the snippets of the light novel which the wonderful takanenene translated: one which revisits the conflict set up in Suki and one that covers the confession scene in the MV in more detail. If the fact that the conflict set up in Suki (aka the lurking feeling of not knowing if all he felt for Fuuma was only platonic or more than platonic) was specifically reestablished in the LN for anyone who didn’t keep up with Dolce Diary didn’t tip you off that it was something important, his behavior in the confession scene as depicted by the LN definitely should have. He’s possessive about his spot by Fuuma’s side. He doesn’t want that spot to be taken by anyone else. Even if he knows that they can help Fuuma, he wants it to be him. And this line: “Kazuki then trails off his words, quietly saying ‘That’s why…’ and then gave Yui a slightly painful smile, his cheeks turning red,” before he declares Yui a rival and states he likes Fuuma. If you can tell me you read that line and are still on the fence about Kazuki’s “like” towards Fuuma being romantic, please message me and I will see how I can get through to you. Like it wasn’t even just a romantically coded confession. It’s just a romantic confession. That “like” is romantic. And I’m so proud that he’s not only come to understand for himself how he feels, but that he’s confident enough to ask the person he sees as a romantic rival to speak in private and not only clarify her feelings for Fuuma but before she can even do that firmly establishes that he loves Fuuma with conviction. Kazuki my boy I’m so proud of you. *sniffs*
And that’s it for establishing Kazufuuma as at least canonically one-sidedly canon and why there’s not only no reason to deny it but also why denying it is a fucking disrespectful move towards Kazuki. He’s a character, sure, but that doesn’t change the fact you shouldn’t write off his struggle to come to be convicted enough to say it out loud. This has been something weighing on him at least a year, if not more (all I know is it started when both he and Fuuma were in some year in middle school). And as a character in a piece of media, I’ve been saying this the entire time, but brushing it off as non-romantic is literally chucking a fucking pillar of his character’s story into the gutter. And to those who may be saying Kazuki’s confession came out of nowhere and is pandering reread this entire fucking essay again I dare you to do it and tell me to my face it’s pandering. Again. Writing off the buildup as pandering is disrespectful to him, disrespectful to his character and narrative, and disrespectful to the wonderful people who have been creating Dolce so diligently and have crafted this narrative for us. Saying his “supposed feelings” and “ambiguous confession” is pandering is like saying Fuuma’s crossdressing is pandering which. If you say either of those I will find you and I will shank you in the fucking gut. Even if you’re not fully into Dolce, recognize these characters are actually very well developed and executed amazingly, as per every Honeyworks character that has come to exist. I don’t blame you if you weren’t aware of the weight of Kazufuuma, but now that you read this I hope you are. That’s mainly what I needed to get out there, but as follows will be me more exploring how Kazufuuma has been built up and generally waving my hand off at where it may be going. If you want you can dip, thanks for reading up to here because I know I repeated a lot because it’s just. So important to drill into your head and has been something I’ve been hung up about constantly. LOL
As for where exactly they’re taking it from this point on, I honestly don’t know. In all honesty, I didn’t even expect them to take it the direction they did. But honestly, I think the direction they went with it is really interesting and better than I could have imagined, in my opinion at least. Honeyworks never ceases to amaze me with their storytelling and narrative choices, and I don’t think there’s any that stand out to me as being severely questionable that they haven’t reapproached at some point down the line. And, again, I think they’re treating this with a lot of care and deserved respect. So I’m just gonna be gushing about how smart they set it up and how smart they’ve been executing it and maybe my own hopes on the direction it could go.
Whether they make Kazufuuma reciprocated I have no real clue or bearings, but to me my gut reaction is they will. Of course, I’m biased, but again if you trace things all the way back to 2018 and step through Dolce’s content and growth from there, I’d say even if they didn’t know if they could execute it like this and see it to fruition, I’d argue that Kazufuuma has been at least heavily implied since the beginning as a relationship they wanted to explore from both sides of the relationship. Obviously I brought up Kazuki’s character bio already, but if you look at the *goes to count* 5th Dolce Diary update already has a joke jabbing at the fact that Kazuki is technically Fuuma’s type (and the way Kippei and Kazuki excitedly react is so cute). The fifth update. And as stated before there are tons of Kazufuuma moments in Dolce Diary, whether it’s played for comedic effect or played straight (and this is post Suki but oh my god I’ve said it before I’ll say it again get yourself someone who looks at you the way Kazuki looks at Fuuma oh my jesus). But song-wise, I mentioned the one Dolce album song I would bring up is Nade Nade and this is where it comes! 
Not only is Nade Nade specifically focused on Kazuki and Fuuma’s relationship as opposed to the whole of Dolce despite being the first song, it included the setup/preview of the Fuuma-centric extra prior to the full release of the Fuuma-centric extra itself and was released early as fuck. Literally between the 6th and 7th update to Dolce Diary. Sure, it could be to isolate them as a duo for marketing purposes (they’re very often the two promoted idols together if the whole of the group aren’t included), but the way it’s established as a perspective song as opposed to a general idol duet is what fascinates me. Anyone who didn’t know about Dolce prior and only followed Honeyworks for music would be first introduced to these characters through this song alone, and maybe this is where my Kazufuuma bias comes from but I was one of those people LOL. I thought it was just a cute one-off relationship that they had set up for the purpose of a song and that it was an implied friends-to-lovers story that would never get a conclusion. Also I mistakenly thought Fuuma was a girl oop-. In the full context of Dolce, this song in part helped establish Fuuma and Kazuki more solidly as a unique duo out of all of Dolce, but it also specifically explored through Fuuma’s eyes just how much Fuuma recognizes and appreciates the unwavering support Kazuki gives him to follow his dreams as he wishes. For Fuuma, he loves Kazuki too, though whether it holds any romantic potential in the same way Kazuki loves him has never been explored to nearly the same extent. But Fuuma appreciates how Kazuki’s remained by his side and does everything he can to support him, so Nade Nade explores how his way of expressing his love and thankfulness to Kazuki is by never saying that he needs Kazuki by his side. He’s glad Kazuki’s always been there for him, and his reciprocation takes on the form of being ready to unwaveringly support Kazuki and not ask for more than he already has, even if it meant Kazuki would be leaving his side, despite the fact that he really does wish they could remain together forever just as Kazuki does. The one point he lets himself say something vaguely close to always wanting to stay together, he gets a surprised expression out of Kazuki and says an ambiguous “suki dayo.” Of course, this it much less romantically coded than what we get from Kazuki in Suki and CAIFILWAI, but there is an interesting emphasis put on it nonetheless. Keep in mind, this is all established through the song, which released long before not only Fuuma’s character-centric extra released but also Kazuki’s character-centric extra released, so there is at least a substantial setup for Fuuma’s feelings towards Kazuki’s being strong as well and possibly grow to be reciprocated one day.
I think for me the most fascinating part about Nade Nade is how they tied it back around to Can’t An Idol Fall In Love with Another Idol. Again, without remembering Nade Nade, I still thought CAIFILWAI was brilliantly explored and executed, even if some people would have preferred no love triangle. But honestly, revisiting Nade Nade makes me trust even more the direction they’re taking with this. Whether or not they make Kazufuuma canon mutually (which. Even if they for some inexplicable reason didn’t I’m going down with this ship.), I’m sure they’re putting a lot of thought into the story, because the last bit of Nade Nade directly parallels the misunderstanding that arose from Fuuma mishearing the Kazuki and Yui. Fuuma is resolved to support Kazuki in any area he’s given the chance, and that explicitly includes if Kazuki had some girl he liked, which is what he assumes is going on. The fact that they tied this back around in the form of a misunderstanding was really really smart and Honeyworks is always so good at parallels and references back to their older songs, but for some reason I didn’t expect this. I don’t know how to say why, but the fact that the song that started it all, kicked off both Dolce and Kazufuuma, was directly referenced both visually in the MV with a cameo at the start and narratively despite the central dynamic being predominantly explored in this story in particular was that of Fuuma and another potential love interest and involves said potential love interest for some reason makes me think that (sorry Yui) this is all planned out for Kazufuuma in the grand scheme of things. That being said, I don’t know if me thinking it was planned all along is just me with shipper goggles, but the idea it’s come full circle nearly 3 years later is not shipper goggles and a very very well done parallel in my opinion, whether this trajectory was their plan for Kazufuuma from the beginning or not. Just wanted to gush about that some more. 
There’s more I could go into especially if I went into specific details about interactions or specific implications established in Honeyworks' Dolce content about different characters that would be fascinating to explore in relation to and under the lens of Kazufuuma, but I think this is uh...plenty long enough. Plus, I doubt you'll stop seeing Kazufuuma posts from me so those ideas will probably just be miniposts or somethin.
Back to the overarching point of this segment, idk what they’ll do with this story in the end, but do I think Kazufuuma will canon? I’m used to looking at ships that aren’t explicitly apparent with a sliver of skepticism, but all things considered (as I stated before) yeah. I don’t see reason why they wouldn’t now that they’ve explicitly identified there is a romantic dimension to it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Like to me, the setup isn’t something that would be written off as unrequited? And this doesn’t have to play into why I don’t think it will canon, my personal opinion on the Fuuyui relationship (again albeit through the lens of a hard Kazufuuma shipper lmao) has it’s own merits and is really cute, I find it cute in the way I found Koyuhina cute. I personally never really shipped Koyuhina, and especially since they slipped Kotarou into Ima Suki Ni Naru I was more curious about who this kid was and how he played into things I didn’t really see Koyuhina as something that would come to fruition. Similarly, there’s more importance in the overall sense on Kazuki than there is Yui (considering he’s one of the 5 original and focal members of this generation of idols, this would be natural), as well as the fact there’s just way more foundation and exploration in Fuuma and Kazuki’s relationship than there is Fuuma and Yui. As for how much of a balance there is inside the LN itself, the fact that they seem to have spent a substantial amount relaying the foundation of Fuuma and Kazuki’s relationship and re-exploring it (at least in Kazuki’s perspective) at all on top of how much content there is covering their relationship prior to the LN ever since Dolce’s origin just feels like that relationship holds more weight. Pretty much Kazufuuma feels more established as a priority in general. The way I personally hope Fuuyui plays out is whether they wind up holding mutual feelings or not or whether Fuuma doesn’t feel that way towards Yui is they get a relationship akin to Kotarou and Arisa. Albeit, Kotarou and Arisa never viewed each other in a romantic light, but they had mutual respect and solidarity. That’s the type of friendship I hope comes out of Fuyui. And considering there hasn’t been a break-up in any Honeyworks’ canon relationships (nor do I expect there to be… they’re all perfect for each other LMAO) it would actually be interesting if Fuuyui get together but don’t endgame and Kazufuuma is established as the inseparable endgame after some realization or another, though I don’t expect them to go that route nor do I know if that’d be the best way to go about it anyway. Also final point, Honeyworks seems to have a thing for childhood friends trope anyway soooooo owo All in all, don’t know where they’re taking it, just excited to see where it goes. 
TL;DR of this *counts* 7 page essay, stan Kazufuuma. Not gonna proof this. Maybe I’ll edit and repost but yall are getting a confusing clusterfuck of ramblings over 2-3 hr periods of me writing across 3 different days at around 5am each day. Uh. If you got this far like and subscribe and-- jk plz reply to this mammoth anywhere you see fit or tell me if you have stuffs to add or counter or whatnot I like hearing people talk about Kazufuuma ;w; I am Kazuki and Kazufuuma brainrot can you tell after reading this? No? Lemme just remind you I’m K--
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fixielixie · 3 years
Note
I know lot of jc apologist come from cql but honestly I watched cql long before reading mdzs and it still didn't make me very sympathetic to him? I liked how complicated he was and his entitlement made him interesting to psychoanalyze buuuuut that's about it. Didn't he literally set a dog on wwx after capturing him? Among other things? In a way that was really fucking parallel to the one with wen chao? I know fairy is no cgi hellhound but it didn't make a difference to wwx and jc must have been at least aware? He's basically just madame yu w/ a dick and more power. Novel him even more so. I decently read a take about op being mad so many reconciliation fics have jc do all the work when wwx should actually grovel first and I had to do a tripple take. Still not convinced it wasn't actual jiang cheng writing that post
i think a lot of the sympathy comes from just how hard cql pushed wei wuxians connection to lotus pier, they made him really sentimental over it and you see him constantly being haunted by his time there and his 'lost family'. while in the novel, wwx was used to jumping around and making a space for himself anywhere. he spent about ten years in lotus pier, and at least a few of those were in a time of war. i have no doubt he was fond of him earlier years in lotus pier, mostly because he was mostly free to act as the child he was. but cql puts a high emphasis on both wwx and jcs relationship and the trio sibling dynamic in general. so i think that no only humanises jiang cheng in particular, but also makes it more likely for people to feel sorry for him, especially when it comes to wwx deflecting. in the untamed they paint it as this huge tragedy, and essentially a mistake on wwxs part, emphasised more by the fact that the timeline is more janky in cql so it kinda seems like the second wwx deflects from the jiang sect everything goes wrong for him. meanwhile in the novel wwx peacefully lives in the burial mounds for over two years after he leaves the jiang sect.
wei wuxian never really makes it out that he misses being a part of the jiang sect, im sure he thinks about how much more simple his life would have been if he could have continued to be their head disciple, but he made his choices and doesnt resent the life he chose. its why he makes no move to grovel to jiang cheng once he comes to life, he doesn't see himself as part of the jiangs anymore and hes happy with that, its not like he was ever alone. wei wuxian is like the personification of chosen family, and he actively chose not to have jiang cheng as part of that family anymore. i know a lot of people defend jiang chengs actions against wwx after he came back as him "being desperate to make sure it was wwx bc he just wanted his brother back uwu", they do the same with the fact that he kept chenqing (even tho in the extras we see that jc actually only kept the flute because he thought that out of everything wwx would go looking for the first, and then he would be able to take him down, falsely assuming that wwx would care enough about his fluet to put himself at risk but thats a different post). and i think people who watch cql do this bc idk the actor for jc looking at wwx sadly sometimes and cries more. jiang cheng sympathisers assume that jiang cheng is owed everything by everyone because he had a 'rough time' and is 'all alone' like the fact that his ending ends with him being alone isnt entirely his own doing.
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latetaektalk · 3 years
Text
tag games
tagging : @cosmoguk ​ @jtrbluv @yeojaa @opaljm @sleepyjhs @gyukult @jentwt @cafemiya​ @masterninjacow ​​ @gamerkooks ​ and everyone else that has tagged me
tag game one : fic writers ask game
tagged by : @luvdsc​ thanks cat! this is super fun ✨
Which new trope would you like to try writing?
ex-friends-to-lovers!! in general i love any ex type of tropes!! a heist! au would be fun too
Which trope do you want to write again?
exes! like, i genuinely love that trope so much and feel like theres not enough out there!
Which draft are you most excited to post?
i dont write multiple stories at the same time, so the newest chapter of love to hate you
Is there any new genre you want to explore?
hm i guess fluff? i kinda write angst by default because i think fluff is kinda... boring and not dramatic enough, so i guess i wanna try out fluff!
Do you have a favorite line in any of your drafts up to now?
“Can’t you at least pretend like you think I’m funny?”
“Yeah, that costs extra.”
“And you scolded Jisoo for exploiting me,” Jungkook bit back.
“Well, you said you’re all mine to exploit, didn’t you?” you hummed, scrunching your nose. “You are my boyfriend after all, right?”
Jungkook stared at you, blinked three times before tilted his head to the side and tongued his cheek, defeat.
“Touché.”
Have you decided on any creative goals for 2021?
not really! i just try to write, have fun and improve honestly!
Describe your journey on this blog last year in three words! And three more words for what you hope for 2021!
2020: growth, friendships, fun
2021: growth, friendships, fun (dont really wanna change anything! im having fun!)
tag game two : 10 songs, 10 people
rules : you can tell a lot about a person from the type of music they listen to. put your favorite playlist on shuffle and list the first ten songs. then tag ten people. no skipping!
playlist chosen : love to hate you
kiss me - sixpence none the richer
anything you want - jawny
can i call you tonight? - dayglow
heartbreak in a box - juice
daydreaming - marc wavy
lover boy - phum viphurit
let’s fall in love for tonight - finneas
dontmakemefallinlove - cuco
strangers in a dream - phum viphurit
afterglow - taylor swift
tag game three : interview
rules : answer questions and tag 20 blogs you are contractually obligated to know better!
tagged by : @lcksndkys thank you so much! these are a ton of fun ✨
name/nickname : linh 
pronouns : she/her
star sign :  scorpio 
height : around 170 cm or 5′7 
time currently : 10:30 pm
when is your birthday : nov 9th
favorite band/groups : exo, red velvet, bts, nct, superm, blackpink, twice
favorite solo artist : taylor swift, olivia rodrigo, harry styles, finneas
song stuck in your head : gone by rose
last movie you watched : get smart, i think
last show you binged : taskmaster
when you created your (main) blog : like april 2019 maybe?  
last thing you googled : how many seconds in a year
other blogs : this and my recs blog
why i chose my url : like late night talk, so i turned the night into taek because of taehyung, baekhyun and taeyong afdfsa
how many people are you following : 305
how many followers do you have : around 1.7k
average hours of sleep : uh not much? idk online class is kinda killing my sleep schedule
lucky number : 7
instruments : piano
dream job : dont know, but something that i enjoy and make good money at?
dream trip : vietnam, china, south korea, japan, england, france, netherlands
favorite food : potatoes, salmon, dim sum 
nationality : chinese 
favorite song : cruel summer by taylor swift,, its literally my most played song of 2020
top three fictional universes you’d like to live in : marvel, atla, we bare bears
tag game four : this or that 
indoor plants or gardens // cloud-watching or star-gazing // water or fire // paperback or hardcover // running or hiking // sleeping with socks or without socks // fruit or vegetables // hanging plants or succulents // dark wood or light wood // handwritten or typed // instagram or pinterest // braids or pigtails // dc or marvel // books or movies // oceans or meadows // forests or fields // sweet or salty // ice cream or chocolate // hoodies or sweaters // long hair or short hair // piercings or tattoos // summer or winter // boots or sneakers // cars or motorcycles // curls or straight hair // castles or cottages // sunny days or storms // reptiles or birds // disney or nickelodeon // strawberries or watermelon // essays or posters // phones or laptops // glass or stone // dark or light // photos or paintings // circuses or theatres // reading or writing // dogs or cats // poetry or novels // monsters or ghosts // thrift shops or libraries // fiction or non-fiction
tag game five : ten biases tag
rules : write down your top 10 biases and answer the following questions
seulgi
baekhyun
taehyung
joohyun
jungkook
jennie
chaeyoung
nayeon
mark
jongin
1. between 1 and 4 who would you rather kiss?
uhm cant i just kiss both? i could never choose between the two sadfsd
2. between 2 and 7 who would be your best friend?
chaeyoung because she speaks english but also because i feel like she and i would hit it off better
3. between 5 and 10 who has the better voice?
love jongin and his voice, but yeah jungkook 
4. between 1 and 8 who is the funniest?
ohh thats hard, but i think its nayeon adsfas 
5. between 6 and 9 who would you date?
jennie. if i have the chance to date kim fucking jennie, im dating kim fucking jennie. bye mark im not even sorry
6. between 9 and 10, who would you do a collaboration with?
mark! i feel like working with him would be so funny because he just talks and talks and talks asdfdas
7. between 4 and 8 who is the best dancer?
joohyun! 
8. between 3 and 5 who would you most likely marry?
uhm uhm uhm- i think im gonna go with taehyung? mainly because of yeontan asdadsf
9. between 1 and 7 who would you nurse when they are sick?
seulgi no fucking question asdfsd like sorry, bestie chaeyoung, but seulgi just owns my heart :((
10. between 2 and 3 who has the better smile?
i dont think this is fair at all?? because both have such gorgeous smiles?? im not choosing asdfs
11. between 6 and 8 who would you vacation with?
jennie! feel llike she would pay for everything and kinda spoil me,, also feel like she would want to do the craziest shit
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mikkock · 4 years
Note
Uhm??????? Unacceptable?? Please tell me more about your OCs in that last art? I demand it? I want a full report on my desk before morning? Cite your sources please?
Oh no,, you’re asking,,, about my own faves,,, sorry to everyone, but I guess im never going to shut up ever now. (i already don’t shut up ever, what have u done, im now going to speak so much that society will collapse AT LEAST)
But for real. I enjoy pretending I don’t have faves, I love all my kids the same, buT WE ALL KNO THAT’S A LIE, those two my fave bitches (they snatched that title from the last two faves, rip to them, and they also snatched, n I must really make that clear, the title of “the bitches with the most AUs from the previous previous faves. Their power.)
SO. Get ready for a ride, table of content: them, their respective character, their story, and the pLETHORA OF ALTERNATE STORIES I GAVE THEM because i must yell about all the versions of my kids i have (non-exhaustive cause its that serious bro, but ill take extra time for the universe depicted in that art just for u bby). (tbh if clamp is allowed to sprinkle their fave gays in all their universes so am i, except they aint secondary characters there, every story is just theirs. love that concept.)(itll be so long you’re getting a whole novel even if i have to post it in two posts)
So~ Em twos. Dari n Wei-wei as I call em, or Dumbass n Egg if you wanna get friendly.
They’re my proudest instance of “oops i made a squad of characters, and two of them just accidentally were so perfectly compatible and complementary oh no I guess they’re in love now.” And then they became my favourite. Cause I guess their potential was too much (jk its bc they hot)
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cuties.
I spent ten minutes wondering which to introduce first cause dang son, I want to talk bout them both so much shefjgfdg
First, as I technically designed him first (like ten minutes before the other), my man weiwei. if u ever saw my art its impossible that you havent seen him at least once. cause i’m legit always drawing him. cause im in love bro.
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Demonstration : here are my computer scribbled weiweis of 2020 so far (with a few daris there n there they’re a package deal), that i could find, and they do not include all the paper sketches that i’m too lazy to take pics of. (i just been drawing him with so much hair these days that’s illegal, his brand is baldness)
But anyway, he’s CHEN Chia-Wei, he’s 21, he’s Taiwanese n I love him. Two very important facets of his character when you meet him: he doesn’t talk, and is absolutely, in every single dimension, built to make you fall head over heels for him.
He’s (in the “canon” storyline if i may call it that since it’s def not my most developed one but oh well) an art student, mostly paints but is also great at photography and videography (his vibe is busy hectic pieces with strong bold colours, lots of harsh edges, and very people focused).
Aside from that, he’s also super into fashion, and because he’s part of the rich boy squad (the “im broke so im giving half my characters wealth in compensation) he Can and Does exhibit some quite funky fits when he feels like it. (maybe a reason I draw him a lot, since my fave thing is pretty boys in weird ass clothes)(and then i also draw him in just casual shit cuz tittiful men in plain white tees you know. there’s just something about it.)
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Small compilation of outfits. ft me and my band handwriting roasting outfits that id also kill to own but ok u know.
He digs music. (i make playlists for my OCs and i gotta say, his is the best one, i spent so many hours researching it, “arranging” it etc n its still a work in progress but dude. she got many moods my fave part is when it suddenly turns into so many cheesy ballads also she’s enormous cause im as wordy in playlists as I am in writing.) listens to a lot, n also he can play piano n guitar. cause you know. heartthrobs got to win your heart with a song (and if he’s alone he can even mumble some songs, who knows maybe even sing em softly, definitly a sight to stumble on accidentally). Big main artists that have his vibes are Hello Nico, No Party for Cao Dong, n Circa Waves’s “what’s it like over there” album.
He does a lot of sports. He ain’t fit through magic, rip to him. He’s got a serious routine, and it’s a time he likes to use alone, cause nothing like running at the break of dawn, alone with your thoughts, which you can just easily forget through the exhaustion of a workout session afterwards.
he also eats. A lot. Food is just good, bro. (the canon story is def happening some place europe aka his biggest struggle is how expensive food is here. outrageous.)
He secretly loves super cheesy movies. the dramatic romcoms??? the cute shows that are just so cute and worriless?? anything involving soulmates??? yeh dude. he watches it, he reads it, he listens to it, and he may cry about it, but no one will know. That’s the one true guilty pleasure. (and he definitly has a collection of romance dvds, books n manhuas in his old room back at the family home. where no one can see it. perks of studying abroad. no one can see ur hoarding of material that clashes your image. “yes i watch edgy experimental things haha yes i love those smart people movies of course wow the philosophy…” and then immediatly goes to watch the trashiest predictable but oh so sweet dramas all night)
While he doesn’t speak (as in with the mouth) he can communicate in a bunch of language, due to having moved around quite a bit. On top of his native mandarin and hokkien, he’s fluent in English, so he can use those to write, and is also fluent in TSL, and pretty good in HKSL (and from that, other close-in-syntax sign languages). So he doesn’t have trouble getting around, but then he is also overall quiet in public (with close friends and over text though, that’s another story, that’s where he gets chattier, and also where you may get more of his true personality). Also, he can speak with his sister. That’s pretty cool bro.
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I was going to say he’s a very “hides his true colours under a shell” type of character but you know, for an egg character, that’s pretty ironic. We love poetic cinema.
He presents himself as a very laid back, chill detached dude, going with the flow and all that great stuff, and masterfully mixes just the right doses of mysterious, flirty and calm to just go around vibing. But ain’t that jUST THE MILLENIAL’S ILLNESS, those dANG KIDS, going around, gettin relationships but never intimacy 👏😢 (there’s more to it dont leave)
First of all, before you see the Drama, the Turmoil, the first thing you notice when you really do befriend him is that he’s c h i l d i s h, he gets sulky when things dont go following the plan, he gets whiny n jealous for not getting attention , he gets competitive over stupid challenges, and way too playful if you start teasing, and when he gets flustered too…you think you get cool stoic dude but actually you get a dude who’s reacting to things with way too much intensity, and boi i thought u were gon be mature what’s that why have you been pouting for three days over losing a bet come on- That’s mostly coming up when he interacts with his sister, but the closest you are to him to more of it you get to see.
He’s also an affectionate dude actually. Like physically. As in you’ll get spontaneous hugs. He’s come nap on your shoulder. That’s a perk of befriending him if you ask me.
Also he tries to look so cool, so tough haha. He’s actually a lil sensitiv boi. he gets fluffy, he gets flustered, he heart eyes. you turn around and he’s gazing at ya as if you were the whole universe. he gets a mini crisis for holding hands with his crush. ya know. he’s secretly a softie.
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nerd.
Then in the “what he doesn’t show” (my fave part), where you stock all the anxieties, all the trauma… Obviously there’s a lot of anxiety here (selective muteness being a symptom of it, he hides the other ones very well) mostly fear of inadequacy, of abandonement and of loneliness. mmmmmmmaybe that’s why he was v reticent to continue pursuing that one guy he was into when he realised he was just a tad too into him oh no is that some,, like?? some lovey-love?? cant have that im afraid of gettin heartbroken bro. Aint that sad for a someone who’s one true goal is just findin someone to love and to be with forever, the struggles of yearnin for a soulmate when there’s nothing you fear more than getting attached to a person and letting them see you and your flaws.., delicious.
Now tho (because its so alone speaking about a character on their own and i just wanna get to the part where i can speak bout em together and how they bring out bits of each others ya kno, the good kush….), Dari…
He’s pretty, i must say, and got the funniest hair to draw, and comes from the most opposite background to weiwei’s.
Darian Andriev PARVANOV, also 21, comes from the remote Bulgarian countryside, but i still love him (this makes it sound as if i wouldnt normally love someone from the bulgarian countryside. its not what i meant. by default ud remind me of my son so you’d start being liked if u came from the bulgarian countryside) Now for the first instance of “wow, the complementarity”. The first thing i thought making Dari was that he looked too cool, and that he obviously was a dumbass, and mostly that he was physically unable to shut up. (o fuck he’s me)
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best picture i could find of him. He’s got the dilemma of “wow he looked so pretty n cool until he opened his mouth” 
He’s ALSO an art student (cause they were initially created for the purpose of filling the gap of “i have ocs in every field except the one i sorta know that’s so stupid”), painting major (def vibes differently than weiwei though, he’s doing those soft pretty landscapes n flowers, everything real pretty and peaceful, we got some impressionism nerd in here folks). 
He was/is a real country boy, farm family, he helped tend the fields, he worked in plantations for pocket money, he knows how to take care of cattle and chicken and goats and all the cool babies you can take care of, he can tell whether the soil is good or not, he can drive a tractor, and doesnt fear dirt.
but then also he’s kind of a neat freak, he hates getting paint on himself, so the duality of man, dirt ok but paint? disgostin. his spaces are real neat and spotless, he likes cleaning (its relaxing) and does it nearly too often.
his dumbassery comes from lack of common sense and impulsiveness, aside from that he’s actually what you’d call “mad smart”, dude had em good grades, he can memorise pages upon pages of the most trivial information, he has an accumulation of knowledge beyond limits, and is good at problem solving. so he can recite all the words of the F letter of the dictionnary, but would also put a curling iron in his mouth to see if it would curl his tongue. (side note, he does have a problem with heat n fire, most his “oopsie how i wound up hurting myself on acccident” story involve burning -that stove was just too tempting…)
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while he doesnt feel very attached to his home country, he does feel strongly for his family. he’d do anything for his mum (and actually does everything to make her proud already, that’s his one main goal), and he’s ready to sacrifice a lot for her (as in, spend years working non-stop a really uncomfortable job so his mother wouldnt have to pay a cent of his expenses even though she said she could by doing some sacrifices herself,and then being ready to come back as soon as needed if anything happened, and potentially drop his career and dream n go back to the farm life to provide for mama)(also he still does hold onto some parts of his home country’s traditions, and does sometimes feel homesick but more in a ‘i left the most beautiful landscapes n the city feels cramped and claustrophobic and i dont know people and i dont feel in the right place cuz im a forreigner with a thicc accent who doesnt master the language of this place and straight up have different body language communicators due to cultural difference oh lord i wanna be home where a nod means no and a head shake is yes i keep misunderstanding everything”)
if you want background noise he’s the perfect pal to call over, he’s just so chatty, he got hours and hours of non stop speech ready for you. you can shut him up once you’re done listening with the offering of food. works everytime.
he’s definitly not shy. neither in terms of talking to people, nor when it comes to making decisions. he’s quite bold, and rarely hesitates to go towards something he wants. he’s direct in his approach to most everything.
he likes partying. mostly the socialising part, talkin to people is just fun ya feel. and being in the crowd, doing whatever, pressure free? ya can dance n enjoy yourself, and people wont notice? yeah that’s nice. but doesnt do it super often cause broke bitches aint got the party time n budget. 
he likes arm. (just an excuse for me to drop this thing here cuz i like it)
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While he’s an overall bubbly looking character, with a cheery loud personnality, he does carry some youth trauma that has him more reticent to engage in happiness, he comes from what you could call “not the wokest background” and he may have fallen victim of it : he’s kind of a flashy noticeable character, both physically and in his personnality, and doesnt exactly matches the expectations of dudes in the area he comes from (delicate, emotional and sweet guy? that doesnt exist bro). He went through it, and it has definitly had some impact on his confidence in many aspects. But he’s 100% the type of guy to put on the fake happy front because if feeling bad is sad, making the people you care about sad for you too is Unacceptable Right??? relying on friends?? what???
But then what are we supposed to be doing with such charming characters huh,,, 
Make them fall in love obviously.
Their story obviously has to do with falling in love and workin a relationship cause if I dont write romance i literally die, but I make the center pivot of all of it communication, and barriers in communications. Most obvious being them coming from wildly different cultures, having different native languages, and also the ways you adapt to muteness (what i love most bout that part is even then they fucked up given the easiest quickest small body language things to communicate are head nods n then i managed to make one come from the one country that reverses those like iconic how do they even understand each other -through a lot of work and love bro) but also on more “introspective” points, how to say things that you are even afraid to think about, how to open up and share your burdens and trauma with someone, how to say words you’ve been convinced you weren’t allowed to, the inner turmoil of communication in short. And then also communication through art, and through alternative unusual ways. If i were snobbish i could call it something like “a thinkpieces on how humans overcome obstacles in communication, and adapt, all for the sake of pursuing love” but fact is its mostly boys being in love n learning how to speak, figuratively and also quite literally. And also its me having fun with making characters evolve from each other, be able to influence each other for the better, helping each other be more comfortable with themselves and express the true things of their personnality, and discover new aspects. I just wanna write intense and soulful love bro.
So in less concept and more facts, weiwei meets dari, dari being his puppy self just immediatly strikes a conversation and weiwei gets interested cause “oho nice pretty boy? very good. i want some of that”. they get closer because you cant fight off the Power of friendship (and also the power of “what your friend is bestie with my friend?? guess we hanging out”) and then friendship and interest turns into pining, held back by respective dread of what romance with the other would mean (as in “romance?? cant have that we cant feel” and “with him?? cant do that, convince yourself he’s just a friend immediatly what would the family think”) but eventually they do have to just crash into one another cause that’s just the gravitational pull bro, its physics bro. and from then on its all unlearning destructive behaviours, bettering oneself with the help of the other, and getting over trauma to finally live ur best life. and gettin fckin married bro they’re both cheeseballs theyll wanna wed
BUT MAKING EM FALL IN LOVE ONCE ISNT ENOUGH time to make 3894853 alternate universes about em.
Lets speak bout my fave of those for a hot second.
First of all, the one of the art that brought this ask, guess i could call it “Pretty Tribes” AU, bunch of tribes live and do their things, having nature and energy powers. Dari n Weiwei’s tribes are bros, the latter’s powers needing them to move around to get energy from different places, enabling them different abilities. So basically they get to hang at the other’s place while the regenerate energy from there, and in exchange they help them out with various tasks (dari’s tribe is a rly farmer oriented one, with plant magic, while weiwei’s got more poyvalent powers, and have very good healers notably, so it comes in handy). The two boys were born a few months apart in their respective tribes, so naturally, anything the two clans meet, they’re put together to play and all, and from that they became besties, and each time they meet, after the gaps of time separating the two groups, they feel more and more of a little something else~ story is themed round growing up, friendship between clans, their traditions and cultures, and pretty boys in pretty clothes in pretty landscapes interacting with nature.
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The superpower AU, i fuckin love it bro. Its an old one, made for other characters, but i just love it so much that i had to inject my faves in it. Its got a grimy ugly setting, bad government, propaganda, and fights between super-people (heavily mediatised for entertainment and reinforcing the idea that “look at these evil villains thank god us the good government protects you from them”), with a side of bad ethics in science. In all that, those two have the role of “those two young enemy warrior and villain, they were so powerful and fought so hard”, public figures, legendary and admired by both sides, everyone followed their fights, til one day they presumably died in one of their showdowns. (haha sike they actually found themselves talking for 5 seconds and realised they lived in a society, n built a plan to run away). The main characters get to find they’re alive because one of em had history with super-warrior-golden-boy and go to seek their help to overthrow the Big Bads. (stealing them from their nice gay cottage hermit life smh so rude)
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Mermaids. I like those. Sailor weiwei sees merman dari, they both save each other in different occasions, they grow fascinated with each other, they’re at sea, water romance. Amazing. AU made half cuz i just like water n fish. and shirtless sailors.
(i couldnt find art of it in five minutes so have a link to that lil animatic piece i made of it once)
Indie band AU, where i was listening to songs that vibe so well with those two in general n then my brain was like “what if they’re the ones playing”. They’re (along with the rest of the art squad) a nice little alternative rock band, doing their thing, then one of their songs blows up, and they get quite the attention, to the dismay of dari who wrote that song in a moment of “oh no im so in love with my bandmate but i cant tell him what if i ruin everything we have going on ill just have to love from afar and deal with that” and now has way too many people interested in who he wrote it about and theorising from his every move when performing it (a mix of music, secret crushes and social media) (ft a picture of neither of them but its the least ugly art i found of this AU cuz its old and instruments are the bane of my existence)(also kelana is so pretty i gotta flaunt her around)
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in kind of the same vibe, as in we’re in a music world overexposed to social media, i also integrated em to an AU i did for fun, “boyband AU” as its called aka idol based band system cuz you kno, i got a hobby, lets apply it. Band boy Dari and bodyguard Weiwei got a thing going on, but can’t really act on it in any way, because they’d just destroy the whole band if it ever came public. Featuring annoying bandmates, catchy pop songs and people making fanaccounts of that one hot Mr.Bodyguard cause dang he hot.
(all the art of this one so ugly im sorry)
SPY AU, one of my fave brand. They spies, they get assigned on the same mission, they work real nice with each other. spies hot. fights. strategy. i just like the concept. Gays taking down the worst traffics imaginable??? I love that song.(i actually have so much on this cause s p i e s are fuckin great)
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Fashion. U kNOW i have an AU for fashion. Supermodel and his private stylist, trying to maintain the line of professionalism. And failing to do so. Lets make out in unpractical designer clothes.
Have an highschool AU for a bunch of characters, injected them as “spinoff”, start chatting online being art buddies, fall in love without meeting (ft. all the iconics of internet friendship like knowing tiny details of their personnalities but not the fact that they have a sister or “waIT ur a GUY i thought u were a girl wow wild good news for my gay ass”)
n those are my faves as far as i remember, i got a fuckton of small other ones that arent fleshed out enough, or some that are more of a guilty pleasure universe, and some that are more like “projects that i can expend on as soon as i run out of daydream material” (like u kno those hospital drama shows with super innacurate medicine n shit like idk scrubs or whatever, yeh i want some of that but im keeping it for later)
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palukoo · 5 years
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OKAY so... some of y’all may remember me from my wicked days back when I was youknewmyelphie, and I still post about it some but. there’s something I talk about A LOT in the tags whenever I see it so we gonna finally make a post about it because I am Heated.
so we all know that theater n musicals n shit are stereotypically gay (at least for men but that’s a whole different conversation) so it makes sense that wicked would make like pride posts and stuff, and they do
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which is all well and good. please support us. but. but they get a disproportionate amount of praise for it, praise that they do not deserve. part of it is the whole “corporations make pride products for sales without really supporting us” thing, but to me at least, with wicked (the musical) it’s particularly egregious
(note: im not saying fuck anyone who makes wicked pride stuff or like the actors doing it, and honestly some of it is just timing and the show has already been written and they can’t super just rewrite it now [they could but i get why they aren’t] i just have problems with it)
because wicked, the musical, for as much as i talk about it being gay, is like, canonically straight pretty much. which, you know, i guess wouldn’t be that big of a deal if it wasn’t based on the books it’s based on. 
so if we’re talking about glinda and elphaba here, they are not technically canon in the books. they say i love you and kiss (elphaba kisses glinda’s face is basically what it says i think) and it is heavily implied that they were each other’s most important relationship but it’s not canon (and beleaf me the way greg did it bugs me too but anyways) even though it’s hinted at (see interview with gregory macguire below, sorry i dont have the link i screenshotted this literal years ago)
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so yeah, this isn’t like,,,, great canon wlw rep, BUT the musical (and yes, it is shorter but still) takes out A LOT of the subtext between glinda and elphaba (in part because of how it completely changes their characterizations but i digress) which... already really doesn’t sit right with me
but let’s just forget gelphie for a moment, let us instead talk about crope and tibbett. which, again, their book characterization and means of representation is.... flawed, but. okay, its been a long time since i read the books so i went to my good friend wiki which says this:
“Crope and Tibbett are two characters exclusive to the novel, Wicked: The Life and Times of The Wicked Witch of The West. Both are friends of Boq, who he meets while working a summer job at the Three Queens Library. It is implied that they are both gay and may be a couple. They are both from the Emerald City, are flamboyant, and enjoy wearing costumes.”
I feel like it’s pretty explicit that they are gay because it talks about them swooning over men and there’s other stuff but anyways. Look, Winnie, Stephen, i’m not saying you should have made them main fucking characters but in the book they are there about as much as like pfanee (sp?) and co so you coulda just had them being there, being gay, which also isn’t like great queer rep, but YOU KNOW, at least it’s fucking something
but no. you know what the wicked musical really does for the community? the representation it really gives us? fucking nothing. 
and that, on it’s own, is enough to piss me off, because this is fucking musical theater, i would argue they should ADD gays, there’s practically no risk to the show (theater’s gay history [okay with women it’s different because there are like 4 musicals that even mention wlw BUT], the general liberal-ness of theater compared to other media (in some ways, at least), the gay history of wizard of oz via judy garland, etc) AND IT WAS ALREADY THERE, WRITTEN FOR YOU
i still wouldn’t like it, but i’d get not making gelphie explicitly canon, but you really went the fucking extra mile and took away the majority of the existing subtext
so fine. that’s fine. that’s fan fucking tastic live your lives write your shows like fuck you for it but i can’t stop you
BUT THE NERVE, THE GODDAMN AUDACITY
of after screwing us as a community over so spectacularly in terms of representation and then acting like you fucking support us? acting like you’re fucking allies? acting like you’ve done a damn thing for us? i’m sorry that’s too fucking far.
i understand it, i do. you look at the fans, a lot of us are queer. you look at the fic, at least on ao3 for book and musical it’s mostly gelphie. you want to appeal to your base, so you market pride stuff and make pride posts and all that. it works. we go crazy for it.
but you don’t get that right, okay? because the way you wrote this show, it doesn’t feel like you’re fucking proud of us, okay? i don’t feel like you’re defying any fucking homophobia or hate or whatever, and i’m not even gonna start on the irony of making elphaba a racism metaphor while whitewashing fiyero. it feels like you don’t wanna deal with the consequences of actually defying anything, you want to get and know keep you’re cushy long running show status and you throw us these meaningless marketing bones that the average person won’t see and so it won’t impact their experience with the show and you act like you’re helping us when you really really aren’t, you’re not even giving us fucking scraps you’re taking them away
get off your meaningless rainbow high horse wicked and admit that you fucked up and then we can talk. you can get my fucking respect for your “ally” ship and pride posts when you’ve earned it. until then, fuck you
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punkascas · 7 years
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Fic Author Interview
tagged by: the wonderfully talented and incredibly sweet @amirosebooks  ❤
tagging: @iggyw @tenoko1 @casolantern @schmerzerling @amazinmango @serricoj @rainbofiction @coffeeandcas @topaz-eyes @angelofthemoor @culumacilinte @coplins
im going to do this from the slightly broader perspective of creative writing in general (since i write fic but i also write scripts and things for my job). also this is v long. sorry.
What inspires your work most? (The show it is based on, the actor who portrays a certain character, maybe the character itself…? It could even be an experience.) so generally my inspiration is (in order): (a) my own life experiences, (b) some kind of commentary i want to make about the source material or about fiction or fandom in general, and (c) the characters themselves and the aspects i love in them, especially trying to find ways to play with the duality of their personalities, the good aspects and the negative ones.  i’ve known for a long time that what drives me to create is that i want to make other people feel less alone. you know those times to read something or there’s a line someone says, and you’re like, yes, yes, that’s me; no one’s ever gotten that before or at least never put it so perfectly into words, whatever that experience/feeling might be. i want to give people that moment with anything i create. there’s also a lot of things that i’ve experienced in my life that come up relatively often in fiction, or at least in fic, and a lot of it usually is off-putting to me. it never resonates. it’s melodramatic or simply inaccurate, and i think is often written by someone who doesn’t have the lived experience to pull from. so i always want to add my voice to the pile and benefit from my own experiences to make those kinds of tropes and situations more realistic and relatable -- to me, but hopefully also to others.  like generally every character backstory or character arc i write in fic is something pulled from my own life. like it’s probably twisted or adapted somewhat, because i’m not into being autobiographical. but as an example, in faith healer, this bit: Memory degrades with time. Maybe as a child he knew that somehow. He knew that there would be a second, slower death across time, as she became more of idea than person, and so he clung onto specific moments as a talisman for Mom: I had a mom once; this was my mommy. He remembers her hands best. The way her skin was thin and dry, but her fingers strong, and the way they'd close around his hands. The way she would press in love and good luck and humility when he misbehaved with a squeeze to his chubby, too small hands. Second best he remembers her laugh, the way her mouth moved around a smile, the warmth in it, tinged with embarrassment whenever someone startled it out from her. The rest of the memories are vague, more like facts he can read out of a mental police blotter than lived experience. She used to wear some kind of fleece robe in the winter, thick and pilled, creating a soft cushion between her breasts for his head to rest when he sat in her lap for a story. He thinks the robe was red. She used to bake things from scratch and used to let him pretend to help. On Sundays she did laundry, down in the basement. He followed her once, asking when Dad would come back, and she paused on the landing, basket of clothes cocked on her hip, and wouldn't go any further until he went back upstairs. The basement, she said, was too dangerous for him, dark and damp. She wanted him to be safe. She always cut the crust off his sandwiches. that is my experience of my grandmother’s death. when she died i knew i would forget over time the specific details of her, so i picked a couple to remind myself of daily so i’d never forget them. and that was her hands and her laugh. and i do have that memory of her doing the laundry and standing on the landing to the basement asking her where my dad was and when he’d be back (he was on an 18 month voyage to africa - my dad is a sailor). and she did always cut the crusts off my sandwiches for me.  (and btw i can’t ever re-read that passage with crying.)
What is your favorite fandom to write for? i mean, usually whatever my main fandom is at the time? which right now is spn. i did also enjoy writing potc fic and RDJ films sherlock holmes. i like writing characters who have a very strong but also very biased or unusual perspective on the world. they make for good unreliable narrators, which is something i love doing.
Which perspective do you prefer writing in? (First-person, third-person) always, always, always third-person limited is my go-to. i only write in first-person if the original source material is written that way (like ACD Sherlock Holmes) and i want to do a pastiche of that style. 
Do you prefer writing reader fics or OCs? no. full stop. (okay, one caveat: i do like kidfic, but i am also SUPER PICKY about reading it bc im always looking for some accurate representations of parenthood and what it’s like to have a child. like kids are hard??? they’re hard and they make you worry and they drive you crazy and they have their own, weird, stubborn, fascinating views on life and the world. they’re not perfect angel children who exist only to be cute or ridiculously amazing mary sue geniuses. so yeah a well done kidfic where the kid is an OC i will read.)
Do you prefer writing longer works or one shots? given that every single WIP i have right now are fucking, horrible, lengthy novels,i want to say i prefer writing one-shots. i want TO BE ABLE to write one-shots. i used to do???? but yeah, i guess i really do enjoy plotting and world-building, which lends itself to creating monster plot bunnies instead of short stories or quick scenes. 
Do you take requests? i do! do i ever actually get around to writing those requests is another question. but absolutely. send me prompts. ask for timestamps. if it speaks to me, and especially if it’s something i think i can write in less than 1000 words, i’ll most likely give it a go. 
Do you enjoy getting random Asks? yes! always! i try to respond at least with in 72 hours. but yes please COME TALK TO ME ANYTIME.
What inspires the names for OCs (or extra character names) in your works? Do you pick them from real life or just select them at random? A mix? so with fic, i never really write OCs, or if i do, they’re p much a red shirt or like extra #243 or smth and therefore don’t have names. if a character has spoken dialogue or no on-screen dialogue but some impact on the plot, i’ll try to “cast” that part with a character from the source material. for example, in the family business (which i realise isn’t posted yet), there’s some issues with a rival gang that need resolving. i cast the head of the rival gang as a well-known character from spn that has generally served a rival or an enemy to the boys on the show. i like doing that bc i like the parallels it draws, especially when working with an AU, and the ability to explore characters and dynamics from a slightly (or not slightly at all but in fact completely divergent) angle. i follow the philosophy that part of the real cathartic nature of AUs and part of why we write them is the ability to offer commentary on the source material. that a good AU should offer commentary on the source material. they're both metatexts and paratexts simultaneously. the one caveat to this, again, is kidfic, because i like and i do write it (i’ve just never finished any of those fics enough to publish them). and then i try to name kids in the way i think their parents would name them. i try to put myself in the character’s headspace and try to figure out what name(s) would appeal to them. and if we talk about work, and the scripts i write, i mean all of that is basically OCs. so far every script i’ve written while employed by my current firm, i always stick in at least one instance of one of my dogs’ names. i also will make subtle film or tv references. like the script i just wrote, there were three characters, and the first character had already been named harold by our content lead. so i named the other two perry and harmony as a reference to kiss kiss bang bang. i’ve done all the clones from orphan black as OC names. i’ve done members of radiohead.  if one of the scripts im writing already has a theme built into it for a specific pop culture reference (like yesterday one of the scripts i wrote was using yoda speech and star wars analogies as part of its marketing and engagement strategies) so i’ll name characters in line with that pop culture motif (so the star wars themed script has luke and ben and daisy and carrie as characters). 
If your story(ies) have OCs, are their appearances based on real people or celebrities? If so, who? as mentioned above, i rarely include OCs and if i do, they’re unimportant stand-ins. so i never give much thought to how they look. offspring in kidfic i do think about how they look. if the actors who play the main characters have children, i’ll start there. like for dean and cas, i always look at jj and west and maison and try to figure out what a kid with some of those combined physical features might look like. i’ll also look at photos of the actors from when they were kids or teenagers and try to decide if these two people had a kid, what features would that kid inherit.  for work, casting people depends on client expectations and design direction and budget, so it’s a different ballgame. 
How long have you been writing fanfiction? i think the first fic i published was in 2002 or 2003. so 15 years i guess??? how has it been 15 years dude. 
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