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scaredgirlsilly · 8 months

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Show us the Homestuck! 👀

ok so i just wrote everything under the cut and its. Alot Of Words HDKAJFKSVJFKD its literally an entire story outline of the entire fan session. i would feel bad but 1. you asked for it 2. you are on anon so no ones even gonna get a notification for this and 3. its my blog and i get to be autistic about my own stories ::P

merp (and anyone else currently reading homestuck really) stop reading here until youve finished homestuck. i dont even know if it spoils anything for you merp but just in case

first things first there are some foundational beliefs and opinions that make my fan session what it is and i feel like i need to say them

the game is an analogy (or allegory or metaphor i never know what is the correct one) for real life. everyone tells you that there is a correct way to go through life but then everything goes to shit and youre off that path before you even had a chance to start. this works with homestuck insanely well and one of the main reasons i connect with it

there is no ideal sburb session. not only have we not seen one and i dont even know if there are any sburb games besides the ones we see and the dancester trolls, but if there actually is an ideal sburb session, it kinda goes in the face of it being an alagory for life and how it never goes how you expect it to go

i will add a bunch of stuff outside of what we see in homestuck and some of it may contradict what is stated in homestuck, especially when it comes to the rules of sburb. i dont think the exact rules of sburb matter as much as what sburb as a concept really is, which is a nigh-omnipotent and omnipresent force that makes kids go through trauma to give them a "character" arc. it is a story generator so that the next universe can have heroes, while weeding out those too weak to even get to the part where they make a new universe. this is fucked up and bad and kinda evil and i really wish homestuck focused more on how fucking crazy evil sburb was but it got caught up in a bunch of other shit so thats why i made this

also this is gonna be so fuckin long even if i try to summarize it as much as possible cause its pretty much the entire story of the fan session, but you are on anon so i dont care that im infodumping right now cause no ones gonna read this far

anyways. ONTO THE ACTUAL FANSESSION

it starts put in 2015, after a mysterious delay of the sburb launch back in 2009. after so long, it is finally coming out!!

we follow 6 kids, all around the age of 19 (they would have been 13 if sburb came out when it was originally supposed to back in 2009)

Anna (she/her), a no nonsense, kinda autistic tabletop wargamer. Think the vibes of kanaya but the convictions of vriska. if she believes she knows whats best, only god can stop her from doing it. very egalitarian, very "ends justify the means" but she isnt like. also kinda intense but she knows that so she knows to tone it down when the moment calls for it

Noah (he/they), an excitable and cripplingly bisexual graffiti artist, his friends mean the world to him and he would do anything for them. a bit of anarchist leanings, but he hasnt really delved into theory much cause hes got other stuff to worry about. extremely outgoing and could probably talk to anyone. Anna and Noah have been kinda flirty/close for a while now and it kinda makes the others sick

Drew (he/him), an adorable farm hand who looks up to those western lone wolf hero types in movies and tries to emulate that, but is too much of a pure soul to ever be mean, so he just kinda acts weird sometimes. Wears a lil cowboy hat and vest and talks and types in a weird southern accent. no one knows if its fake or not

Kate (she/they), a bubbly gymnist who loves talking a bit too much. shes really only doing all this cause her friends are begging her to (and something about the end of the world?? she doesnt really know milo can say some wild stuff sometimes :P )

speaking of, Milo (they/them), an audiophile who has stopped talking as much, kinda ever since the original beta got delayed. everyone else worries about them but they insist they are fine whenever pressed. has been begging everyone to get the game since it was announced, which has been the most hes talked in the group in a long while

and finally, Skye (she/her), a quiet girl who likes nature. usually lurks, but will join the group calls just to be quiet during them. also not as enthused about the game as the others but hey, its better than anything shes got goin on.

gonna try to speed up with the rest of this but you need to know about them cause its like mainly character driven

first act is them getting all the stuff ready, connecting to each other, normal act 1 highjinks. the main thing is when it gets to milo (who actually is last in the order to get revealed idk why i didnt right it like that. the order is anna, noah, kate, drew, skye, milo) where it shows milo in his house, before it fades away and reveals they are in a dream bubble wearing an heir of doom godhood. they are also 13, where everyone else is 19.

the first act culminates in a flash (no clue if i could actually do it but in my head its a dope ass flash set to Planet Telex by Radiohead) where everyone enteres the game at the same time. Milo, being in a dreambubble, asks kate to set up a second computer for them so they can actually play. She does, and milo jumps on the meteor heading for Kates house before it hits the portal, and when it ends up above kates house, they fly down, watch kate enter the game, and really quickly set up their connections, finish the loop, and enter the game just in time. the flash ends with shots of their lands which i have not figured out jdkskfhahf

act 2 is just sburb hijinks. they hang out, grow closer, talk alot cause yk its homestuck jfkshdk. the main developments are noah and anna growing even closer with a cute lil sparring match before ending by planning a date, skye and kate growing closer and skye getting a bit of a crush, and drew and milo grow closer (but not romantically cause milos 13) because milo is a fuckin ghost and has been isolating themself from the group and drew has taken note and pretty much been like "whatever your goin through, ill be there for you"

there are other scenes i just havent written them/thought them out yet

this all takes place over like a few weeks btw

then its one of the kids' birthdays!! they are all together for the first time in a little bit, and one of them (probably anna) asks what the deal with milo is. after some hesitation he tells them this

milo is from an alternate timeline where they all entered the game in 2009 and everyone died. turns out it was a doomed session. before milo dies, being the last kid alive, they go to talk to their denizen. the denizen tells them that they were not supposed to play the game. the main heroes of earth (i forgot what they were called i know they were called something like the alpha kids were the nobles but i forgot what the beta kids were called anyways its the beta kids) were supposed to be the only ones to play, and because so many people are playing the game, its messing with skaia and causing a ton of glitches to happen in the beta kids' game. but, like everyone else, milo has a choice. let this timeline fade, allowing skaia to focus solely on just the beta kids, but they will not be able to live in the dream bubbles. Or, create an offshoot timeline, leave the beta kids to die in their horribly glitched session, and have another chance as the main heroes of that timelines earth, knowing that success is still not a certainty. Milo, being a 13 y/o who misses their friends and doesnt give a fuck about a bunch of "heroes" chooses the second option. this causes the offshoot timeline where sburb is delayed, and milo has to sit in the dream bubbles until the game eventually releases. oh uh that also killed milo like to get them in a dream bubble their denizen just fuckin killed them like falling fuckin rock just instant death.

the others are horrified to hear that they all died and milo is the only one who survived (but didnt actually survive, they just can do alot more as a ghost cause they are an heir of doom) and it starts to set in the actual stakes of the game

anna pulls milo aside after the party (which has supremely fucked vibes after milos revelation) to ask them more about the game. after hearing milos story, it only invigorated her more to figure out exactly how to get them through the game. noah tags along cause hes bored and anna and noah havent left each others side in weeks.

milo is answering annas questions about the game to the best of their ability, but the topic of the alpha timeline pops up. noah asks further and milo obliges (same stuff we know, but they word it slightly wrong cause they dont know the full picture). milo days that the alpha timeline is, to their limited knowledge, the correct timeline that leads to a successful end of the game, and every other timeline is a dead timeline that skaia prunes to keep focused on the correct timeline. noah asks what they mean by "prunes" the other timelines, and milo says that everyone is killed in them. noah then asks why everyone died in milos session and if they are from one of those dead timelines, and if so, what happened to the correct timeline. milo says that the way anna explained it before she died in milos session (who was a time player in milos session but aspect is based on personality so she might not be anymore), was that some sessions dont have a correct timeline, so every timeline eventually gets pruned, and there isnt any way to fix it. noah gets frustrated, before getting up to leave, anna asking if they are ok, and noah saying hes fine he just needs some air. anna is worried, but continues to ask milo about the game

noah then sulks off and talks to himself about how fucked up that is, and kinda has a panic attack about what if they are in a doomed timeline now without even knowing. he then sets off to find out if they can escape a doomed timeline, and if not, if they can escape the game entirely.

also uhhhh i forgot to say this before but the prospit dreamers are noah, drew, and kate. and the derse dreamers are anna, milo, and skye

we then get a batch of a few standalone relationship moments, just some moments of them hanging out like before the party but this time their is a notable air of urgency to what they are doing. i havent really written them yet but noah and anna have a bit of an argument, because anna, while still agreeing that sburb is super fucked up, sees the fucked up stuff sburb does as motivation to get through the game as fast as possible, while noah sees it as reason to try and escape before they get killed for no reason with no way to stop it. this rift starts to spread to the others before it culminates in one last conversation between noah and anna

noah says that he is gonna leave. hes figured out a way that might work. turns out the universe is just a huge bubble that you can leave. anna laughs at that, asking if he really thinks that is gonna work. noah gets exasperated, saying he doesnt really know but he has to try. its better than sitting around and waiting to die. anna snaps back saying that that isnt what they are doing. they dont have any evidence to believe they are in a doomed timeline, and in fact noah leaving might be the action that dooms everyone. noah says that he has to leave, he says sorry, walks closer for one last embrace from anna, but she denies it and and says "if you are really going to do this, then im going to stop you. i hope you see the error of your ways before it comes to that" and she walks off

as this is happening, milo and drew find drews quest bed. drew says that noah has already talked to him about leaving and is telling milo. drew says he may leave, because all this pressure to do what sburb wants is kinda getting to him. milo goes quiet, before saying "i get it, but. please dont. i dont want what i did to be in vain". drew says that milo can join them!! but milo shakes his head, saying they have sacrificed too much already, before saying "well... heres your quest bed" and turning around before drew could see the tears in their eyes.

"h- how am i s'posed ro use this dang thing?" says drew

milo turns to drew with tears in his eyes, but a small playful smile creeps onto his face, before saying "you kill yourself on it. duh" and flying off

from another spot on the planet, various bugs are flying around, and in the distance a huge yellow beam erupts into the sky, showing a winged symbol in the air

The Knight of Hope has ascended

(they didnt have yellow text thats the best i got)

Noah to kate and skye, who are having a little picnic, but arent talking much as they were distracted by the beam in the sky (drew god tiering)

Noah breaks it down for them and asks them to go, and kate says that she will, but skye says she wont. she says that that is a huge decision to make without much proof, and she cant with good conscience leave anna behind. shes the space player, and she is needed to make the genesis frog. if she leaves, it really will be a dead timeline no matter what. noah says he understands, gives her a big hug, and starts to leave. Kate is crying as skye turns to her and apologizes. kate grabs her and kisses her, tears welling in both of their eyes, before saying that she wishs she could stay, and shes sorry for leaving, and if they find each other again, she will never leave her side. noah calls after kate, but she asks for just one more moment, and noah says of course before leaving to talk with drew and get his answer and milos answer

the people who are ready to leave are noah, drew, and kate

the people staying behind are anna, milo, and skye

i am not entirely happy with kate and drews motovations i feel its a little weak but also i havent even started writing it so fuck you

noah, now dead set on leaving, goes to meet with anna one final time. he tells her whos going with him, and that she can come with him too, because if she decides to leave, the others will probably join her. she says that that is exactly why she has to stay. someone has to do the work, and after half of the group leaves, shes the only one that can get any results. noah remarks on how distant shes acting, and she says that he can fix that by not leaving. he says he cant do that, and anna says "i knew you would say that" before pulling out her rapier and attacking

(sorry i forgot to do their weapons uhhhh the ones i know so far are drew who has a revolver, anna who has a rapier, and noah who has a firemans axe)

act 2 concludes with another flash, this time set to Mood Swings by Human People. They have a hard fight, mirroring their sparring match from early act 2, but this time anna isnt holding back. she slices noah up and gets him to a pretty bad spot before it cuts to drew. drew sees himself and a beat to shit noah pop out of nowhere with the tume turn tables, drew from the future gives current drew a copy of the turntables (specifically not to make a loop with them) and tells him to go save noah. drew shows up just in time to see anna about to make the killing blow on noah, and drew, tears welling in his eyes, says sorry and pulls out his revolver and shoots anna in the head. he then grabs noah, uses the turn tables to go back, and the flash fades as we see anna bleeding out on the floor, as milo and skye get to her right at the end of the flash

act 3 starts with drew taking noah to his quest bed, and lying him on there. noah then ascends

The Prince of Blood has ascended.

simultaneously, skye and milo brought anna to her quest bed, where she ascends as well.

The Thief of Mind has ascended.

Noah and drew go to meet up with kate at her quest bed, as she goes to god tier. she is the last of the people who are going to leave, and they need every advantage they can get

(something) of Breath has ascended.

(idk what class shed be hfkshdjd sorry)

They then get to the edge of the session, giving it one last look, before leaving.

ok so uhhhh the rest i have no clue jfkshdjs except for literally the last flash. like everything between now and the end (pretty much the entirety of act 3) i have no clue. but on annas side, she gets alot more controlling and aggressive, eventually stooping to using her thief of mind powers to mind control them (taking their mind) into doing what she wants. shit gets mad fucked up in there

i literally hsve no clue what noah and the gang do. there is a bit of a romance between drew and noah just cause i really want them to fuck nasty, but nothing serious comes of it and they are both chill with it. its kinda like a summer fling but they are traveling through the very edges of paradox space. probably like hiding from the horror terrors?? idk i have a theory that the horror terrors are all like players that have gonethrough the ultimate self shit, so maybe they go to talk to the horrorterrors and its like a physical manifestation of like a forum board?? idk that could be neat

noahs team and annas team still keep in contact somewhat, but not much. noah keeps trying to contact anna, but after she doesnt respond for a bit and noah keeps trying, she blocks him.

eventually noah and the gang figure out a way to be safe outside of the control of skaia and sburb, and he says that if the others want, noah and them can pretty much head back to get them. milo and skye agree because...

eventually, anna finds out that the session was doomed from the start and she is obviously devastated by the knews, cause that means that all of the bad shit she did, all of the friends shes lost, were all for nothing. act 3 ends on that and act 4 is just one last flash

the flash is set to Souk Eye by Gorillaz, and it starts with skye and milo grabbing a destraught anna who is just lying on the ground crying. they drag her to where noah said to meet up with them, and anna locks eyes with noah. at first she averts her gaze, but all she sees is the session, now in ruin as the war on skaia is raging on with the prospitans losing badly, and several of the planets overrun with various monsters. the session is in ruin. she looks back to meet noahs gaze, assuming she will see nothing but malice, but he just smiles and floats towards her.

drew flies into milo, giving them a huge bear hug and saying that he really missed them. kate tackles skye with kisses, joking about how he had to hear drew and noah fuck way more than she would have wanted for one life, and noah puts hid hand on annas cheek, before she kisses him like super hard like one of those kisses where they grab the others face and kiss them like its the last thing they will ever do, and they just sit like that. finally reunited, the session in ruins behind them, but they have each other, so its ok. anna breaks free of the kiss, and they all leave the session, and set off for a life beyond sburb.

the end.

uhhhh yeah idk if thats what you expected like a whole fuckin story HDKAKFLHA but. yeah thats what i had written for my fan session. im not gonna get into the themes and stuff cause ive already written so fucking much 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 but yeah. thats ir ^u^

#my stories #putting it in that tag so i dont lose this cause i will probably use this as my rough draft for the outline

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scarletwitching · 1 year

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If you could rewrite several things about Wanda, what would they be?

I think I have rather basic preferences in terms of which comics are Bad and Should Not Have Happened. Certain things are obviously offensive and published during times when Marvel editors were letting writers do whatever, and that sucks. John Byrne? Sucks. Do not like him. I'm not the first to point out that continuity, for all its joys, negatively impacts female and minority characters in disproportionate ways. Beyond the big, obvious answers though, I don't especially want to erase much. It's all part of the tapestry, and the pick-and-choose nature of the canon means I don't have to care about most of it anyway.

My unique-to-me answer is that Marvel has done some reprints of old Avengers comics where they recolored Wanda's hair from black to red, and that should be stricken from the record. Stop this redhead propaganda! Give her her black hair back!

I realize that's not a rewrite, strictly speaking, but...

Maybe a more satisfying way to look at your question is, if I could start over from the beginning, what would I do? Tom Brevoort said in a recent newsletter that writers frequently pitch a do-over/restart of the Ultimate Universe (see also), so if I were to pitch a fresh reboot of the Marvel Universe, what would my pitch for Wanda be?

There is not much from the original Ultimate Universe that I consider worth keeping. This, maybe, if only for laughs. I don't love the probability powers, mostly because they don't make sense and not in a fun magic way, but I am amused that they accidentally make her a math savant. I wouldn't care about keeping that aspect one way or the other. She can be a math genius. She can not be a math genius. I do not care. There's nothing else worth even mentioning in Ults (and I'm not getting into rewrites for The Movies, even though any actual comics reboot would naturally be influenced by them, because we don't have time to get into All That), so that leaves us with the main universe to pull from.

First rewrite: The Brotherhood of Mutants are not evil. They're not villains.* They've just separated themselves from human society. I am so tired of "the villain has good ideas, but they've got to kill a puppy to prove that you shouldn't question the status quo TOO much." They can be a foil to the X-Men. They can be allies with ideological differences (maybe leading to the formation of Krakoa or some other island nation at a later date). But no more of that same fucking villain plot. It's tired. Do something different.

If you're introducing a new version of Wanda, she should start out as a teenager by default, and personality-wise, I think 70's Englehart is the way to go. Strong personality. Not a wallflower. Kind of bossy, not the biggest fan of humans. She can change over time, but that's a good starting place. Be creative with her powers, however you define them. No omnipotence shit. Let the inventiveness take the spotlight.

That's a good foundation to go off of and potentially launch into stories about the Avengers and whatnot. I'm not so worried about the precise backstory details (I wouldn't get rid of Django, but the specifics are not too much of a concern). I guess my overall rewrite is digging into the mutant separatist thing from a more modern angle, emphasizing creativity over raw power, and giving her the Englehartian personality from the start, along with the easy stuff like more respectful portrayal of her background and not doing the truly awful mental illness/trauma portrayals. There's a million other little details to get into from there, but this answer is already long.

*If I have another pointless rewrite to add to the main universe, it's that they have to stop saying she started out as a villain. No, she did not. Abused children are not supervillains. Stop saying this nonsense.

#anonymous #answered

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whetstonefires · 1 year

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oh sorry for sending you down a random and inane internet rabbit hole that's what i get for speed typing on a tiny iphone screen and just sending it without checking lol. i think i mean to write what if instead of the batman 2022 it was the owlman 2022 movie. because i think pattinson could play a very scary villain if they gave him the material.

🤣 ahahaha oh, I see!

okay, then...i think an owlman movie in the style of the batman 2022 could be great, that is fun, but crucially i would want it made in the context of battinson already existing.

mirror universe rpatz, just taking his already hingeless and vaguely stunted yet deeply sincere portrayal of the character and upping it to true detached-door levels.

since the official position is to not have owlman be mirror bruce, but his brother thomas jr, they obviously would never make this, even leaving budget considerations aside.

but there just haven't been enough owlmans for batman 2022's specific treatment of the material to work as a dialogue in the same way, so i think it could only really land if it was done as a dialogue with their own, existing film.

so then, what would an owlman launching from the world established in the battinson film want? he believes all the worst things about his father, i guess. he believes all the worst things about everything and thinks it makes him rational and clear-eyed; he's got to be the most self-congratulatory cynic ever, and also walk around in a bird hat in total seriousness.

he's out to master the Gotham underworld and also control its politics. you could do something with his owning the mayor?

or with a contrast to battinson's hatred of being in public etc where owlman is the one running for mayor?

if we pursue the themes around Riddler in that movie, battinson owlman probably encourages the bitterness and disillusionment of The Youth and their radicalization, and takes advantage of it to turn them into weapons against society. very modern and yet utterly traditional!

idk, owlman is a hard villain protagonist to work with imo, because he's such a control freak and so selfish you need a big external problem to get any story out of him. absent the 'thomas jr vs police commissioner thomas dad' drama at least, which is hacky but hey it's comics ig. otherwise he just keeps chugging along doing evil, unless you want to chase down the nietzche multiverse breakdown from the Crisis on Two Earths or something.

i'd want to pitch a version of jokester at him to get some dynamism in there, but realistically then i'm just using battinson as a set of action figures to play out my fanfic lmao.

robert patttinson could certainly do a good villain, in that he seems to revel in the camp end of melodrama without checking out on acting while doing so, and also he has the capacity to be quite threatening because he's demonstrated that he can go ham while maintaining character. which is not actually easy to do.

but i'm not sure how well drawing the audience's attention to the fundamental idiocy of owlman as a concept would work when he's not uh. very lovable. because battinson works because he attracts our derision and our affection simultaneously, you know?

and i've never seen pattinson play anything he wasn't making fun of--i've only seen snippets of him as cullen, come to think of it, and if i saw the fourth harry potter movie i formed no memories, but anyway.

mostly what i'm coming away with here is i'm now curious to see what pattinson would do with an actual serious dramatic role. which is not how i would describe owlman.

#ask #hoc est meum #Anonymous #owlman #battinson #hypothetical films #unsure to what degree contempt upon the world is pattinson's actual baseline setting #and to what degree he plays it up because it's his brand #but it's definitely not all fake so idk how much he can turn it off?#would be interesting to see #but i appreciate that for all it harnesses the energy of irony poisoning batman 2022 is a pretty sincere film #and you can't really capture that balance with a villain movie in the same way #...i'm thinking maybe owlman dies at the end #batman #i guess #it feels off to have the owlman movie be a refutation of owlman #but i can't imagine what else it would be

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saint-starflicker · 7 months

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Prompts from this post.

1. What is the most valuable piece of advice you've been given about writing?

The most valuable piece of advice was also the most detrimental. It was a list of writing tips in a high school English class that would improve our style, and it did get me thinking more keenly about the gears and axles that make up a language. Too bad it got to me at a time in my life that I didn't have much creative flow, and that I would cling to those tips and suggestions as though it would save me from real life. I still recognize when passive voice is not the best choice, and how that is a choice now that it's been (heh) pointed out to me what passive voice even is—but flow and content becoming more important than style is what got me actually writing again. Your body of work is only as good as the collection of stuff in it that actually exists. I still value the style tips more because the prerequisite about creative flow and content is a very internal issue, whereas style was one that I actually got external guidance with.

2. Is your main villain sympathetic? Why or why not?

I have read the wildest woobification essays on this site, combined with the most inexplicable vitriol aimed at the most non-entity characters...so I don't know anymore what makes a designated villain sympathetic or unsympathetic.

During the writing process, I think it depends on the stakes. The closer to high fantasy the vibe is, the less sympathetic I can make the villain because I'm drawing on the image of the Panopticon dictator who lives beside Mt. Doom (insert the "Are we the Baddies?" skit meme here). I do believe that we can meet real evil in a more domestic genre, but see paragraph above about how there's no consensus about what that "evil" even is.

If I write annoying people with ulterior motives who leverage their power over somebody else's life, then in the process I can think that's very annoying, but somebody else might either think it's funny or alternatively think it's triggering/enabling of the worst thing in the world and in their life. Meanwhile, if I write somebody so horrible that they can hardly be there except for the rumored impact of their abuse on a character that I am more considerate of, then I can still expect some readers to take the sympathetic characters' flaws and use that to frame that character as the worst person that never existed—while the other character, that I think of as so evil that I launched them into plot orbit, in whatever little discourse I'm lucky enough to get around something I wrote can still become woobified in that discourse and get all this backstory and reframing imagined for them. And that wild misinterpretation is going to be all my fault somehow. 😆 That's just the way I've noticed things usually go if a story gets noticed at all, so I can't be too cross.

3. Which of your characters do you think has the most similar traits to you? Why?

They're all going to be filtered through my tint of glasses, at the same time that none of them are going to be me. There's what I think of as an "authorial scope" of vocabulary and observations, within which I can try to keep more variety or consistency as appropriate...but there's other areas that I'm definitely going to flounder at, or that I can recognize as an interesting idea but I know that I don't have it in me to even go there.

Unless I'm writing a memoir, the fictional character that's most like me will still have as much emotional distance from me as a character in the background or in the chorus. I think the characters that I actually get overly protective about are unlike me and that's why I'm biased towards there being more of them in the world because I don't have what that character has.

#writing

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clairiere · 3 years

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SFX interview with Pedro Pascal

The latest issue (Jan. 2021) of SFX magazine carries a 2-page interview, which took place after the S2 premiere (technically right after The Passenger). It’s pretty good, and insightful given what took place.

This Charming Mando

Shortly after the launch of the second episode of season two, SFX caught up with the Mandalorian himself, Pedro Pascal, speaking from Budapest.

words: Adam Tanswell

There are tons of fun and interesting ways that The Mandalorian ties into Star Wars canon. Are you aware of all the Easter eggs when you’re working on the show?

There’s plenty that are pointed out to me and there’s plenty that are obvious, but I think it would be impossible for me to remember them all. On top of the Easter eggs, what I love the most is the reference to very speciﬁc genres of cinema.

Can you give us an example of that from the second season?

For season two, the set of the second episode [“The Passenger”] was the ﬁrst set that I walked on to. It was this shipwrecked Razor Crest on this snowy set, and I’d seen the illustrations of the spiders that were so incredible. The spiders hatching out of those eggs were right out of Alien. Working on the show ﬁres off all of these references to me. And then, of course, there are the speciﬁc references to the Star Wars past as well. It’s impossible to keep up with everything, but it’s endlessly fascinating.

What did you enjoy the most about working on the ﬁrst episode of season two, “The Marshal”?

Working with Timothy Olyphant and being on Tatooine with Jon Favreau was incredible. I don’t know if I’m allowed to say this, but you wouldn’t believe the kind of rehearsal that the three of us had early on for that episode, in order to understand and block a sequence. You know the scene where we’re in the bar and then we step out to the main square of the town to see the Krayt Dragon? We had to rehearse it virtually ﬁrst. We put on these mechanisms [VR headsets] with remote controls where we were literally able to be in a virtual world. We were actually able to rehearse it all before getting on the set. We were able to physically block the scene, which was crazy to me.

How would you describe the relationship between the Mandalorian and the Child in season two?

Through all of the action, adventure and special effects of the show, the core of it is this relationship between the Mandalorian and the Child. In spite of, and within, the largeness of it all, their story gets more intimate and deeper, which is the ultimate risk for somebody like the Mandalorian. It’s a huge risk to be vulnerable and to develop attachments, so it’s a very special relationship that we see unfold this year.

How does it feel to share the spotlight with the Child?

Honestly, it’s been an amazing experience because you get to witness a very, very unique show come to life. This isn’t my diplomatic answer; I mean this sincerely. To be part of a project like this is a unique experience for everyone, but I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to take the position as the central star because it’s not just me. There’s the Child and many, many others involved. There’s the incredible Industrial Light & Magic people, who have created this character of the Child that everyone has fallen in love with. Plus, there’s the production design team and every single department that’s involved in creating this experience, along with Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni, who are the ultimate parents of this show.

Talking of whom, what’s it like to work with Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni at the helm on a day to day basis?

The success of the show is because of their storytelling skills, as well as their fascination and their very, very, very pure love of Star Wars. It’s funny, because I have to ﬁgure out to the best of my abilities where I can contribute to achieve the success of it in every way. I saw images for the show when they were ﬁrst talking to me about the project. Back then, I saw illustrations of the Child and it was the reason why I said yes to the project.

Have there been any changes to your iconic costume in season two to make it more comfortable for you?

The costume actually got a little heavier in season two. We ended the ﬁrst season with him upgrading his armour. In order to have a more cinematic shine on the breastplate, it meant that some pieces were a little heavier than last year’s version

What are the themes and underlying messages of the second season that resonate with you the most?

These are very classic tales of good and evil, and how it all exists inside of us. It’s also about the journey towards the light, if that makes any sense. With my character speciﬁcally, I love that there’s this ruthless person whose physical identity is kept from the world around him – and possibly a psychological identity that’s kept from himself – but he starts to discover himself through this relationship with a vulnerable but very powerful creature. He follows his heart and does the right thing, no matter how it is against one’s practice or creed or what’s convenient. For me, that would be the prevailing message. It’s a much more intimate message than the broad strokes that can be painted onto the story as a whole. On a basic level, it’s about ﬁghting for good.

It’s a huge deal to be such an iconic part of the Star Wars universe. Were you ready for the fame and attention that comes along with a project like this?

To be honest, I think it would be challenging for any human being. I’ve certainly been navigating how to honour being part of something as iconic as this to the best of my ability. It’s deﬁnitely a challenging, intimidating and exciting experience. It’s all of those things.

You play an iconic hero in The Mandalorian, but who were your heroes when you were growing up?

I had so many heroes. I would have to say my parents are my obvious heroes for ushering in the introduction of so many heroes, either through cinema or literature. And I continue to add more and more people to the list. As a child, Indiana Jones was deﬁnitely my personal hero. And as I got older, I remember the writer James Baldwin really, really inﬂuenced my mind and my life. I introduced myself to his writing when I was around 19 years old and he has deﬁnitely been a hero to me.

How does it feel to be a Star Wars hero?

I think it’s a beautiful thing because I can see the effect of a show like this on the children of my friends. It isn’t anything like I’ve experienced before. I love to see the look on their face if their parents tell them, “This is the Mandalorian”. There’s usually some confusion at ﬁrst, because there isn’t a lot of association to this face as far as the role is concerned – but they seem to understand that somebody needs to be behind the mask. It’s somebody’s voice and it’s somebody’s limbs. It’s a magical feeling to see children’s eyes light up like that. If only I could carry around the Child everywhere, then I would really be winning!

Would definitely recommend buying the issue if you can, print or digital (via Zinio or any other platform), to show your support.

#pedro pascal #the mandalorian #interviews #behind the scenes

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absolutebl · 3 years

Text

This Week in BL

April 2021 Part 3

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs.

Ongoing Series - Thai

Second Chance Ep 3 - this is proper YA, they are dealing with actual high school issues, picking uni, first crushes, online dating, etc... We even got a senior prom trope which almost never happens in Thai stuff (just the freshman uni competition variant). Standard plot pacing means PaperFah’s kiss was too early, might indicate we’re moving to uni in the second half of the series? Tropes included: let me feed you, hand hold, black & white striped shirt, floppy drunk & first kiss.

Y-Destiny Ep 3 - the first MaxNat ep. Such fun to see them playing different characters. This one is enemies to lovers, tutor/student, but it’s using the “poor little rich kid loose cannon” archetype. Nat is doing his best, but it’s leaving me cold. Lots of tropes tho: boyfriend’s closet, floppy drunk, pillow clutch, the loom & water bottle.

Lovely Writer Ep 8 - solid installment, good use of many tropes. I really like the leads and I’m glad there isn’t much side dish action, SibGene gave us: punish, touch your face, boyfriend claiming, kissing, sleep cuddling, symmetry, rooftop, cheek kiss, hand hold, and pillow clutch.

Call It What You Want Ep 3-4 - couldn’t find the subs, don’t really care, will watch if it crosses my radar, otherwise I’m just not into it.

Brothers Ep 11 - the “everyone wants Chol” show continues (but WHY?), he and Tri are cute together, and now I kinda just want Prab to end up with the twins. I’m confused by the teachers, but Boston showed up (from UWMA), and my boys KhunKaow got together (YES!), so I’m ultimately delighted with the episode.

Fish Upon The Sky Ep 2 - the makeover happened, and we go from cute with glasses and braces to cute without them. (I’m reminded of those 90′s Pygmalion teen movies where the girl has glasses + ponytail and then *GASP* does not and *GASP* she’s HOT. This was the BL version.) Meanwhile, writers better be careful with Pi, he’s getting too tsundere to like. Did you see they gave AJ a 2gether music intro & pick up line? Well, it’s actually his brother JJ who plays Ohm in 2g. I cackled. GMMTV - you so cheeky.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

HIStory 4: Close To You (Taiwan) Ep 5 - half way point. My poor confused babies. It was a really sweet episode... if what happened before hadn’t happened in the way that it had. Also, these boys have a GREAT friendship but are probably the worst advice givers ever.

Most Peaceful Place (Vietnam) Ep 3 fin - so cute! Our boys confessed and got together. There was an adorable mutual kiss (I love me a mutual, like Ingredients). Afterwards, they actually seemed to communicate with each other about both sex and their relationship. OMG. How original for BL! This was the last episode, so the series is short, but I still enjoyed it very much. RECOMMENDED.

My Lascivious Boss (Vietnam) Ep 1-2 - oh boy this one is rough, we started out with homophobia child abuse and moved on to family drama + drunken dub-con one night stand. But production values and subs are better than normal for Vietnam (You Are My Boy levels) + our queer babies are out & proud + it’s higher heat + I’m weak. So I’m watching.

Word of Honor (China) Ep 25-27 - honestly not much happened, lots of back story. Things are looking dire for the ghosts unless they can turn the Scorpion (I LOVE HIM, he’s my precious deadly baby). Don’t know how they managed to make loosing a battle with an immortal sword god ex-friend cute... but they did. Did some calculations and at 36 eps, mathematically speaking, ep 30 will be the equivalent of a standard BL ep 11. Should I be scared for next week?

Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding (Korea) Ep 1-2 - it’s so effing adorbs, soft bois do old fashioned tropes like arranged marriage + evil stepsisters meets the more modern fake relationship + secret identity in a surprisingly comfortable mix. It launched with baby is a floppy drunk, forced proximity, performative I saw you feed him, and some fun gay panic. It’s a lot lighter and faster paced than I was expecting, but this is Korea so I don’t know why I’m surprised.

Stand Alones

K-pop band OnlyOneOf dropped a new MV that is basically BL bait, using many of the tropes we know and love. I promise I’m not trying to lure anyone into K-pop I just thought it was interesting how consciously they’re yaoi dipping.

Spin-off We Best Love Fighting Mr. 2nd, Shou Zhen | the Only Love Letter Once Written (SERIOUSLY WITH THE TITLES TAIWAN?) anyway there’s a something or other 25 minutes featuring Pei Shou Yi and his boy that aired Friday. It’s about 10 minutes of reboot footage with 15 min of new content, mostly set in the past. It entirely rests on Chih Tian Shih’s acting, fortunately for us he’s great. However, it doesn’t substantially change or add to these characters’ arcs from the finale of WBL season 2. I don’t know if there will be more or if this was just an extra footage fan service.

COLOR RUSH GOT ITS MOVIE!!! Okay this is almost the tipping point for me to get Viki Standard. It’s listed at 1:56 minutes long but the original series had only c.120 running time - that is a lot of new content. Although i was disappointed by To My Star’s movie I loved Wish You’s, so I am hoping Color Rush got Wish You level treatment. That said, I feel Color Rush the series is damn near perfect already, hard to improve on perfection.

Breaking News

Close Friend the series got an updated trailer featuring MaxNat (no subs) so if you like them in Y-Destiny or in Why R U get ready for them to play different characters again, this time for a sports romance segment. Like Y-Destiny, Close Friend looks to be another series of vignettes (Original trailer) coming April 22.

2gether the movie (Thai trailer) was intended release April 22 but is now postponed due to a surge in C19 cases in Thailand.

Tell the World I Love You, a Thai BL movie that was supposed to release last week, is similarly delayed.

My Ride has been postponed indefinitely with no airing date.

The Miracle of Teddy Bear got a teaser vid, no eng subs.

Gossip

Thai BL actors Nanon (Bad Buddy), Yoon (YYY), and Mark Siwat (LBC, Bite Me) have tested positive for C19. Press releases stated they’re fine, tho filming has paused fore their various projects, obvs. (No word on whether Nanon’s current project was Bad Buddy or not, although it seems likely given his recent Arm Share episode.)

Next Week Looks Like This:

Some shows may be listed later than actual air date for International accessibility reasons.

Upcoming 2021 BL master post here.

Links to watch are provided when possible, ask in a comment if I missed something.

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rosiehunterwolf · 3 years

Text

There's Sand Everywhere!

(quick shoutout to @fires-of-ninjago for the title idea and inspiration for this- you remember that ask game where people suggested titles for fics and you had to come up with a story to go along with it? Well, he sent in this title, and I came up with this, and liked it so much that I screenshotted it and- here we are!)

Prompts: Summer and Heist

Word Count: 7,922

Characters: The whole gang (including Pixal) :)

Timeline: Between seasons 12 and 13

Trigger Warnings: none (holy shit that's never happened before-)

Summary: It was just supposed to be a day off. A simple beach day. But when your family consists of six ninja and a samurai, including a nindroid convinced he’s a detective, his reluctant sidekick, an aquaphobe, a girl who can command the sea, an unassuming teen who seems to attract every animal he crosses paths with, and a bunch of argumentative idiots, nothing is ever that easy.

Read on FFN.net

Read on Ao3

Tumblr work under the cut

“We,” Kai proclaimed, surveying the room, “Need a day off.”

Lloyd shrieked at the fire ninja’s sudden outburst, falling out of his chair. Jay broke into snickers, and Lloyd shot him a glare.

“Kai,” Zane sighed, “get off the table.”

Kai stuck his tongue out at the nindroid, but hopped down, anyway. “Look at you guys!” Kai waved his hands at the group for emphasis. Papers fluttered to the ground where Lloyd had knocked them in his fall, Jay and Nya were sitting on the ground, surrounded by stacks of books tall enough to be mistaken for some kind of fort, Pixal was gathering some of the papers that had gone everywhere, while Cole and Zane had only just paused in their task of boxing up and carrying crates to the far side of the room. “Filing documents and organizing? Boooring.”

“Tasks which you’ve been a big help with, by the way,” Lloyd grumbled, as Cole offered him a hand and pulled him to his feet. He turned back to the desk, shuffling papers off of the keyboard of his laptop, the screen filled with lines of script and dozens of files that made Kai's brain hurt just to look at.

Nya pushed her reading glasses up her nose. “Jay and I technically aren’t working. We chose to do this of our own free will.”

Kai rolled his eyes at her. “What kind of psychopaths read for fun?”

Jay kicked his leg out, aiming for Kai’s ankle, but Cole quickly stepped between them, stopping the conflict before it could escalate into anything worse.

“We’re not reading them, we’re sorting them in order from most potentially useful to least so. They’re mechanics and engineering books. You never know when they might come in handy in a pinch.”

“Oh, because that’s so much more interesting. If you guys wanna spend all your free time geeking out, fine, what do I care. But what about the rest of you? C’mon, Lloydster. You don’t really wanna spend your entire day doing this,” he gestured at the laptop and paper-strewn desk- “do you?”

“It’s not about whether or not I want to. This stuff is important, Kai.”

“Lloyd’s right,” Zane agreed. “With all the crazy missions we’ve been on lately, we’ve neglected all our paperwork, and taking care of the Monastery.”

“It’s because we’ve been gone so long that we need a break!” Kai argued. “We just got done saving the entire city from an evil video game AI! If that’s not worth celebrating, I don’t know what is.”

“Technically,” Nya remarked, not even glancing up from the book she was skimming, “That was Jay who did that.”

Kai spluttered, ignoring the smug look on Jay’s face. “Okay, yeah, but we helped! And what about Aspheera? Or the Never Realm? That was all of us. And we didn’t have time to properly recuperate from that before we got launched right into Prime Empire!”

Pixal’s brow furrowed. “Y’know, he has a point…”

A frown flitted across Zane’s face. “I suppose we have been working for a long time…”

“That’s what I’ve been saying! Come on, let’s do something fun.”

“Not video games,” Cole groaned. “Jay and I spent the last three days playing a Lava Zombies tournament, and I’m all gamed-out.”

“No, let’s actually go somewhere. Like the-”

“The library!” Jay pitched.

“Or the museum!” Zane suggested.

“No!” Kai snapped. “Man, you guys are so lame. I meant somewhere fun. We should go to-”

“The beach!” Nya cried suddenly, standing up so quickly that she sent a pile of books toppling over. “Brilliant idea, Kai!”

“Wait, no,” he yelped. “That’s not what I was going to-”

But no one heard him. They were already scrambling to their feet, murmuring excitedly to one another.

“Guys, wait!” he cried. “Why would you want to go to the beach? It’s all sandy, and wet, and-”

“Don’t worry, Kai,” Nya giggled, “we won’t let the ocean hurt you.”

“That’s not-” he felt himself turning red as the others laughed. “That’s not what I meant! I just thought… wouldn’t laser tag or something be a lot more fun?”

The others glanced at each other, uncertain. Zane stepped forward. “Let’s take a vote. All in favor of laser tag, raise your hands.”

Kai lifted his hand, but no one else did. He scowled at them.

“And all in favor of the beach?”

Six hands went up.

“Seems like we have a clear winner. Let’s get going, shall we?”

---

“Do you have the towels?”

“All here!”

“What about the sunscreen?”

“Hold on- Jay, did you grab the sunscreen?”

“What?”

Lloyd cupped his hands around his mouth, yelling louder. “Did you grab the sunscreen?”

“Oh yeah, it’s here! Wait, do you have my-”

“Your what?” Lloyd called, walking over to him, passing Pixal and Zane as they came out of the kitchen. The female nindroid sighed.

“Can’t anything get done around here without everyone making such a racket?”

“Nope,” Nya elbowed her playfully. “When you’ve been with these idiots as long as I have, you get used to it.”

Pixal’s eyes widened. “I can’t imagine ever being used to all this.”

Nya smiled. “Did I mention I’m slightly deaf?”

“We finished making the picnic,” Zane told her, holding out the basket he was carrying. “Is everyone ready to go?”

Nya eyed the guys, who were running around the Monastery, barely avoiding tripping over one another. “‘Ready’ is an overstatement.”

“Hold your horses, we’re almost done,” Cole grunted, heaving the large beach bag over to them. “Have a little faith in us, Nya.”

Nya put her hand on her hip, waiting- and a second later, there was a crashing sound followed by an angry chorus of yells from Kai, Lloyd, and Jay.

Cole grimaced, rubbing the back of his head. “Okay, maybe you’re right to not have any faith in us.”

---

After an intense, fifteen-minute argument about what mode of transportation they would take, they ended up deciding on the city bus, and finally, finally got out the door. The bus ride went off without a hitch, for once, (except for a brief panic about not having the proper change for the bus fare, but luckily Zane had a few extra dollars on him), and before Nya knew it, they were staking out an area on Ninjago City beach. She was beginning to think this could actually work out.

Maybe.

“Check out my abs, dude.”

“They’re the same as last time.”

“Are not! I’m way more shredded than last time we went swimming.”

“Okay, that’s just a straight-up lie. I saw you sneak that extra piece of pie last night.”

“You better not be disrespecting my muscles, Flat Stanley.”

“Hey! I’m way more muscly than I used to be.”

“Are you kidding? We call you ‘green bean’ for a reason, and it’s not just because you’re the green ninja. You’re a twig!”

“I’m a twig? Have you seen Jay?”

“Hey, don’t rope me into this, green machine, and, for your information, I weigh a whole fifteen pounds more than you!”

“Yeah, well, you’re also two years older than me!”

“I think the lesson we need to learn here is that neither of you have abs anywhere near as pronounced as mine-”

Zane sighed, rolling his eyes. “Here, guys,” he held out a pouch to the group, “this is a waterproof pouch, you can store all your valuables in here.”

They quickly filled the pouch with phones, watches, and wallets. However, as Lloyd pulled back, he tripped over Jay’s foot, and half the guys collapsed into a pile, groaning.

“Jay! Get your foot out of my face!”

“Right after you get your elbow out of my ribs!”

Nya turned away from them, shaking her head. Glancing at Pixal, she asked, “Wanna help me get set up?”

The nindroid nodded, and they pulled the large picnic blanket out of the bag, unfolding it to lay it across the sand.

“Lloyd Montgomery Garmadon,” Kai cried, “You get back here right this instant!”

Nya looked up from the blanket to see Kai running through the sand after Lloyd, his feet sinking into the sand with each step, making it difficult for him to retain his balance. He waved a bottle of sunscreen at the green ninja. “It’s sunny out today! And you know how easily you burn!”

“No way!” Lloyd whined. “You always make me stay out of the water for at least twenty minutes to let it set, and it’s way too hot for me to wait that long! I wanna go swimming now.”

Kai lunged for him, and Lloyd yelped, barely dodging out of the way.

“Over here, Lloyd!” Jay cried, already wading into the shallows of the ocean. “He won’t follow you into the water!”

Lloyd hurried after him, splashing up water as he went, accidentally splattering Kai and causing the red ninja to flinch back with a yelp. Sure enough, he froze at the water’s edge, glaring at Jay and Lloyd, where they stood, only about ten feet away, laughing at him.

Zane rubbed a hand over his face, sighing. “They’re both going to get skin cancer, aren’t they?”

“At the very least, they’re going to be bright red tomatoes,” Cole laughed. “Oh, it’s going to be a blast when they take showers.”

Zane stared at him, horrified. “Please don’t let Jay do that again. He had the worst blisters, last time-”

Cole held up his hands. “It was a joke, Zane! A joke!”

Zane narrowed his eyes and didn’t reply.

Nya laughed, grabbing Pixal’s hand. “Come on. Wanna go bodyboarding with me?”

Pixal glanced at her. “I don’t know how.”

“That’s fine.” Nya stepped on the board, flipping it up into her hand and handing it to Pixal, before grabbing a second one for herself. “I can teach you!”

“Thanks, Nya.”

As they walked down towards the shore, they passed Kai and Cole, who had finally managed to get Jay and Lloyd out of the water. Cole had his arms locked around Jay, preventing him from running away as Kai slathered sunscreen across his face. Lloyd was sitting in the sand beside him, pouting, his face already smeared in white.

Nya grinned at him. “Can you guys handle yourselves for twenty minutes if Pix and I go out bodyboarding?”

Lloyd stuck his tongue out at her, and Kai rolled his eyes. “We’ll be fine, Nya. I think you’re forgetting we save the city on a regular basis? We’re perfectly capable.”

Nya put a hand near Pixal’s ear, whispering loudly into it. “Betcha anything the beach will be on fire by the time we get back.”

The two ran off, giggling at the sight of Kai’s smoldering glare, before he could set them on fire.

---

To Kai’s credit, he did not set the beach on fire, or anything, for that matter, but when Nya and Pixal returned, they found him and Cole shoveling sand onto Zane, who was chest-deep by this point.

“Zane!” Pixal exclaimed. “Are you alright?”

“When Kai told me he had something fun to show me, this wasn’t quite what I had imagined.”

“Aww, come on Zane!” Kai grinned. “I’m having a great time.”

Pixal shook her head, and stepped forward, grabbing Zane’s hand and pulling him up, sending sand cascading down everywhere. Cole and Kai groaned.

“Aww, come on, Pix, that took forever!” Cole muttered.

“Yeah, we were gonna shape it into a mermaid tail. Don’t you know how funny that would’ve been?”

“Humor is subjective.” Zane rubbed at his wrists. “Augh, now I’m going to have sand in my gears for weeks.” Shooting a glare at Kai, he added, “I’ll remember this the next time you ditch your swimming lessons.”

“Hey!” Kai yelped. “That’s totally different! Sand is warm, and solid, and most importantly, not dangerous!”

“You could suffocate,” Zane pointed out.

Kai scowled. “You’re a nindroid, you wouldn’t have suffocated.”

“You’re related to an elemental master of water. You won’t drown.”

“Being related to a master of water and being a master of water are two very different things! I control fire, not water, I can’t do anything to protect myself.”

Cole rolled his eyes. “You’re so lame. Remind me again why we brought our friend with aquaphobia to the beach?”

“Technically,” Zane said, raising a finger, “the word you’re looking for is thalassophobia. Kai doesn’t fear water in general, only large bodies, such as-”

“It was his idea,” Nya interrupted. “If it weren’t for him, we’d still be at the Monastery, filing papers.”

“I never suggested the beach!” Kai snapped. “That was your idea!”

“Yeah, well, your suggestions were lame. The beach was the obvious choice.”

“Hey,” Pixal interjected, suddenly realizing they were missing a couple of people. “Where are Jay and Lloyd?”

Cole sighed, pointing up towards their stuff, where Jay and Lloyd were struggling with a large, yellow duck inflatable that was very much not inflated at the moment. Jay had his lips around the mouthpiece, his face red.

“Blow harder, Jay,” Lloyd insisted, hovering by his side. “You’re hardly doing anything!”

Jay pulled his head back, breathing out heavily as the redness faded from his cheeks. “I’d like to see you do better! You’d probably pass out after a minute.”

“Would not!” Lloyd snatched the floaty away from him, blowing hard into the mouthpiece, putting even less air into the floaty than Jay had. His face reddened as he huffed desperately, although he still wasn’t making much progress. After a few moments, Jay pulled it away from him.

“Okay, that’s enough. I don’t want you to actually pass out.”

Lloyd glared at him, panting. “I wasn’t… going to… pass out.”

Jay sighed, grabbing the inflatable and staring at what looked to be the eyes and a very flat, crumpled-looking beak. “At this rate, we’re never going to get Mr. Quackington blown up.”

Lloyd’s nose wrinkled. “Mr. Quackington?”

Jay blinked at him. “Yeah, that’s his name.”

“No, it’s not! His name is Mr. Waddles!”

“Mr. Waddles? What kind of juvenile name is that?”

“Oh, like Mr. Quackington is any better!”

“It is! It’s loads better!”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Is so!”

“It’s not!” Lloyd snapped, green energy sparking between his fingers. Jay glanced down at them thoughtfully. “Hey, what if…”

Lloyd was evidently catching on to Jay’s train of thought, his eyes lighting up. “We can use my powers to inflate Mr. Waddles!”

Jay narrowed his eyes. “Quackington.”

Lloyd bared his teeth, the small fangs glinting. “Waddles.”

Jay sighed. “Okay, whatever. We can use your powers to inflate Mr. Waddles.”

Lloyd grinned widely, whether about the promise of getting his inflated duck or having won the name debate with Jay, Pixal couldn’t tell. He held up a hand and formed a basketball-sized sphere of green energy. Jay’s eyes widened, and he held the mouthpiece up to the energy. Lloyd channeled it inside, watching with glee as the duck puffed up, the yellow plastic slowly tinging green, making the duck look like he was about to be sick.

Zane took a step forward, holding his hand out. “Lloyd, wait-”

There was a sharp snapping noise as the floaty popped, and Lloyd and Jay cried out in horror as the yellow pieces of plastic fluttered to the ground. Lloyd fell to his knees, gripping the busted plastic and wailing, and Jay landed next to him, crying, “No! Mr. Waddles, you were so young!”

“I can’t believe he’s really gone,” Lloyd sniffed. “He was my best friend in the whole world.”

Kai threw up his hands. “Great. You spend the last several years of your life looking out for him only to get replaced by his inflatable plastic duck.”

“Oookay,” Nya said, walking over to Jay and Lloyd and ushering them towards the picnic blanket. “Someone’s obviously been out in the sun too long. Go sit under the umbrella and let’s have something to eat.”

“Good idea,” Zane agreed. “I’m sure we’re all getting hungry. Jay, could you grab the picnic basket? It’s right behind you.”

The lightning ninja grabbed the basket, peering inside briefly as he carried it towards them. “I hope you brought the Pringles. I could really go for some of those right now- augh!”

Before anyone could stop him, Jay was falling to the ground, the basket flying out of his hands and landing sideways in the sand.

“Jay!” Kai cried. “Look what you’ve done to our picnic!”

“Hey! That was totally your fault! Why did you leave your shoes right in the middle of the sand, perfectly positioned for someone to trip over?”

“Why were you clumsy enough to get in the way of my shoes?”

“Guys, guys, it’s okay,” Zane assured. Walking over, he carefully lifted the basket out of the sand. “I’m sure it’s still salvageable.”

“Yeah, but now all our food is going to taste like sand,” Lloyd moaned.

“Lloyd, the food barely touched the sand,” Nya pointed out.

“Doesn’t matter. Every time you go to the beach, if the food gets even remotely close to the sand, it always gets sand in it. Every time. It’s one of the great mysteries of the universe.”

“Well, I think you’ll survive,” she said, passing Lloyd a sandwich and a bag of pretzels. Lloyd took them, but narrowed his eyes.

“Brings a whole new meaning to the word ‘sandwich.’”

“Just eat your food, mister.”

Lloyd shot her a glare, but grudgingly obliged. As Pixal bit into her own sandwich, she realized Lloyd was right, she could feel granules of sand between her teeth as she chewed.

“Hey… at least it adds a little crunch, right?” Cole grinned.

Kai grimaced. “Next time, I elect we don’t let Jay anywhere near the picnic basket.”

Jay chucked a grape at him, but Kai turned at the last second, catching it in his mouth. “Ha!” His gleeful expression faded as he caught sight of something behind Jay. “Um, Lloyd, you have someone you wanna introduce us to?”

The group turned to see a seagull had approached them, tilting its head where it stood only a couple feet away from Lloyd. The green ninja was staring at the bird with wide eyes, an awed expression on his face.

“Lloyd,” Nya sighed, “please don’t tell me you fed it.”

“He’s not an it,” Lloyd snapped. “His name is Scully.”

“Great.” Nya rubbed her hands over her face. “We’re already into name territory.”

“Scully?” Kai’s nose wrinkled. “Isn’t that the name of the seagull from The Little Mermaid?”

“No, that’s Scuttle,” Lloyd sniffed. “They’re completely different.”

“Lloyd,” Pixal scolded, reaching for Lloyd’s wrist just as he tossed another chunk of his sandwich at the seagull, “Feeding wildlife is not a good idea, it can be dangerous-”

Lloyd shrieked suddenly as the bird launched itself at Lloyd’s face. He scrambled to his feet, screaming, and Kai lunged forward, pushing the others out of the way. “Move, move!”

“Get it off me, get it off me!” Lloyd shrieked as the bird’s wings flapped in his face, sending feathers everywhere.

“Blast it with your powers!” Kai called, looking worried but keeping a respectable distance.

“I can’t! He’s on my face!”

“Well, I can’t do it, I’ll set you on fire! Nya, you do it!”

“I’m trying, I’m trying,” the water ninja spat through gritted teeth, globes of water already forming in her hands. “I just need to get a clear shot! For the love of… Lloyd, stop moving so much!”

Lloyd hardly seemed to hear her. “He’s going to claw my eyes out,” he wailed, batting weakly at the creature.

“Nya!”

Nya quickly thrust her hands forward, sending a large ball of water at Lloyd’s head, drenching him and the seagull. The bird squawked angrily, falling to the ground.

“Oh my gosh, are you okay?” Nya and Kai darted over to him, Nya taking his face in her hands as Kai peered over her shoulder. A small red scratch stretched across his left cheek, but apart from that, he appeared unharmed, just frazzled.

“Dude!” Kai cried. “You just got attacked. By a seagull!”

“It owned you!”

Lloyd shot Jay a glare. “Did not.”

“You should have seen your face!” Jay laughed. “Oh wait, you couldn’t- there was a bird in the way!”

Lloyd crossed his arms. “I’d like to remind you how you reacted that time when my uncle set that berserk chicken on us.”

“The chicken had lightning powers. Hardly comparable to a simple seafowl, bud.”

“Ugh, I hope this doesn’t get infected,” Nya muttered, running her finger along the scratch. “We should probably get you checked for rabies when we get home.”

“Nya, I’m fine,” Lloyd groaned, pushing her off. “A seagull isn’t going to give me rabies.”

Nya shrugged. “With your luck, I can never be sure.”

“This is why you don’t give food to wild animals, Lloyd, it makes them bolder-”

“Watch out, Lloyd!” Jay shrieked suddenly, and they whipped around to see the seagull had caught its second wind, squawking as it charged at Lloyd.

Lloyd shrieked, taking off down the beach with the seagull in pursuit. Nya sighed, putting a hand on her head. Kai grinned, walking over to her and putting a hand on her shoulder. “Do you think he’ll learn his lesson?”

“No,” Nya said without hesitation. “Absolutely not. That’s the sad part.”

“Hey,” Cole said, pointing a finger down the beach. “The volleyball court’s just opened up. You guys wanna play?”

“Sure. Tell Lloyd he can join us when he gets that seagull taken care of.”

Nya glanced towards the green ninja, who was currently lobbing balls of energy at the bird and missing by an embarrassingly wide berth. “Looks like it could be a while.”

---

“Great job, team!” Nya cheered, high-fiving Pixal and shooting a grin at Cole. “Although, if I’m being honest, the rest of you didn’t put up much of a competition.”

“Hey, don’t look at me!” Kai snapped. “I was carrying the team! Jay, Lloyd, were you planning on helping me anytime soon?”

“I was trying!” Jay insisted. “But you kept getting in my way!”

“Because every time I let you get the ball, you dropped it!”

“Hey! I never said I was good at volleyball, okay? Why are you attacking me, Lloyd sucked too!”

“It’s not like I ever had time to fit in volleyball practice between all my green ninja training! It wasn’t exactly a top priority!” “Are you telling me you’ve never played before?” Kai spluttered.

“I’ve played!” Lloyd insisted. “Uh… once or twice.”

Kai facepalmed. “Why did I let you come on my team?”

Lloyd grinned widely. “‘Cause you love me.”

Cole elbowed him. “It’s because he lost the coin toss and Nya got to pick first.”

“Hey!” Jay yelped. “Are you telling me you would have picked me last?”

“After I saw you play, yeah,” Cole snorted.

“I’m still not convinced on some of those calls, Zane,” Kai said, walking over to the nindriod. “I don’t think that one play near the third point was a foul.”

“Hey, the ref’s call is law,” Nya smirked. “Stop trying to cheat your way to victory, Kai.”

“I’m not cheating! Zane’s girlfriend is on your team! He’s obviously biased!”

“I’m a nindriod, Kai. I cannot be biased.”

“Stop being a sore loser, Kai.” Behind her, a wave swelled up. She raised her hand- then pointed it forward at Kai.

Her brother shrieked as the seawater drenched him.

“Nya! What’d you do that for?”

“You deserved it, with all the whining you were doing. Besides, you looked hot. I was just doing you a favor.”

“It’s alright,” Lloyd laughed. “You can share my towel, don’t worry.” As he handed Kai the towel, the fire ninja eyed it shrewdly.

“It’s got ducks on it. Of course it does.”

“Hey, you want the towel or not?”

“No, I’m taking the towel.” Kai wrapped the towel around himself, shivering, unfurling the ducks for all to see. Cole snickered, and Kai shot him a glare.

“Should we pack up, then?”

Zane nodded. “If we want to be back in time for dinner, probably.”

The team trudged back to their blanket, wet and sandy, but chatting amiably. They had nearly packed up all their things when Lloyd cried out suddenly.

“Where’s my wallet?”

Zane frowned. “Didn’t you put it in the valuables pouch?”

“I thought I did, but…” he paused. “Oh, wait. I tripped over Jay. I must’ve forgotten to put it in after that.”

“Well, then, it’s gotta be around here somewhere. What color is it, Lloyd?”

“What do you think? Green.”

They spent a good ten minutes searching through their entire bag and the surrounding sand, to no avail. It quickly became clear that if Lloyd’s wallet had ever fallen around here in the first place, it wasn’t here now.

Kai shrugged. “Oh well. It’s not that big of a deal. You don’t have any cards, and I don’t think you were carrying any of the cash. We can get you a new one.”

“No, but I had the things in there!”

Cole frowned. “The things?”

“You know.” Lloyd lowered his voice. “The things. That the mayor gave us?”

“What?!” Jay yelped. “Those were in there?” “You lost them?” Kai cried. “Lloyd, how could you?”

“It’s not like I did it on purpose!” Kai groaned, rubbing his face. “We should’ve never trusted you with them. Or at least split them up, so they weren’t all together.”

“I still do not understand.” Pixal frowned. “What are these things that are so important?”

“They’re a top-secret gift from the mayor,” Jay whispered. “We’re not supposed to tell anyone we have them. Not that telling anyone now would matter anyway, because we don’t have them anymore.”

“It’s not my fault!” Lloyd insisted. “It’s that stupid seagull’s, he’s the one who distracted me-” Lloyd paused, his eyes widening. “That’s it! The seagull must’ve swiped my wallet when it was chasing me!”

“Looks like we have a lead,” Kai growled.

“Wait a minute, does anyone else hear that mysterious music-”

“Oh no,” Pixal muttered, putting a hand on her forehead. “Zane, please don’t tell me you’re going to do this again.”

“It seemed that, after only a few weeks, it was time for me to crack yet another case.” The odd, deep voice rang out, and they turned to see Zane slipping on a fedora.

“Where did that even come from,” Pixal despaired. “I’m positive you didn’t bring that with you. Positive.”

“Again, I was to be accompanied by my trusty assistant, but this time, my highly trained ninja associates would also be coming along, all determined to reclaim what someone had stolen in the heist.”

Jay glanced between Pixal and Zane. “What is happening right now? Am I supposed to know what’s happening?”

Pixal shook her head. “It’s a long story. Just go with it.”

Zane tipped his hat down. “Already, we were off with a very promising lead. I suspected the culprit to be the feathered fiend that had been spotted lurking around at the scene of the crime only an hour prior.”

Kai snorted, placing a hand on Jay’s shoulder. “Oh, this is gold! Did you mess with his voice again, Jay?”

“No, I didn’t touch him! Pixal, you didn’t…”

She shook her head. “Believe me, I wouldn’t do this if you paid me. It was all him.”

Jay grinned. “What do we do next… detective Zane?” He and Kai simultaneously burst into laughter, leaning against each other for support.

Zane side-eyed them. “The primary suspect was as clear as a black bear in a snowstorm, yet the whereabouts of the creature were still unknown. It had vanished into thin air, without leaving so much as a trace in its stead.”

“Hey,” Lloyd said suddenly, leaning down to pick something up off of the sand, “What about this?”

“It appeared to be part of the plumage of a species of avian native to these shores. Could it belong to the specimen we were looking for?”

Kai plucked the feather from Lloyd’s fingers, examining it. “The feather was white with a dark tip, definitely having originated from a seagull- although the spiked, disturbed edges implied that this was from no ordinary gull- it was from one who had recently been in a fight.”

Jay grinned. “It seemed like we had hit the jackpot. Already, we were one step closer to tracking down this culprit.”

Pixal groaned. “Don’t you two start, too. It was bad enough with just Zane.”

Nya grimaced. “Yeah, this is already getting annoying.”

“How is a feather going to tell us where the seagull is now?” Cole asked.

“I could sense the wind was blowing in from the northwest,” Zane narrated. “If we wanted to find the culprit of the caper, we would have to walk upwind, hopefully leading us to the source of the feather.”

“Alright,” Pixal sighed, “let’s get this over with.”

“And so,” Zane grinned, “The Great Gull Caper began.”

The team trudged up the beach for about twenty minutes, to no avail. They passed many other beachgoers, pointing and staring as the ninja passed, but no seagulls were in sight.

“Are you sure about this, Zane?” Pixal asked.

“The feathered suspect had gained an hour’s head start in its escape from the scene, meaning we would have to hasten our pace if we ever hoped to catch up.”

“Oh, I am not walking an hour just to find this thing. Are we sure it’s that important?”

“Yes!” the guys yelped in unison.

“It’s a very important gift from the mayor! It would be rude to lose it,” Jay said. “We have to get it back!”

“Couldn’t you just ask for another… whatever they are?”

“No! They’re one of a kind!” “Well, can we at least hurry this up? Frankly, I’m getting quite tired of Zane’s shenanigans.”

Zane grinned at her. “Although she voiced her disapproval, my assistant knew the efficiency of my methods, as they had gotten us out of a pinch the last time things had been amok.”

“First of all, I was the one who successfully found Dyer last time. You just ended up getting caught.”

“Perhaps, but you used my techniques.”

Pixal huffed. “Second, I don’t appreciate that you keep calling me your assistant. If anything, we’re partners!”

Zane adjusted his fedora. “So it was a promotion she was after, eh? Well, if my assistant could prove her worth by properly complying with my techniques in this case, she may find herself with a loftier position in the future.”

Pixal sighed. “Whatever. Let’s just find the stupid bird, and go.”

The group trekked after Zane again, and Pixal wondered how long they would be here, when Zane suddenly stopped, causing half of the gang to crash into him.

“What?” Jay yelped. “What’s wrong? Why’d we stop?”

Zane pointed near his feet. “It seemed like the culprit had been careless enough to leave behind tracks in the sand.”

Pixal peered over his shoulder. Sure enough, the tracks of some avian species left a trail in the sand- and after consulting her database, it appeared to match the foot of a seagull.

“We’re getting closer!” Cole said. “It has to be around here somewhere.”

Nya’s eyes went wide, and she pointed towards something in the distance. “Look!”

Down the beach, a large group of seagulls was flocking around a half-eaten pretzel, flapping their wings and squawking as they tried to push past each other.

“It could be any of them,” Lloyd despaired. “How are we going to know which one was the one who stole my wallet?”

Jay smirked. “There’s only one way to find out.”

Lloyd eyed him nervously. “How?”

“One seagull, in particular, has come to associate you with food. One seagull has been known to chase you down.”

“Oh,” Lloyd paled, taking a step back and waving his hands. “Oh, no, I do not like where this is heading…”

“Come on, Lloyd, do it for the team,” Cole pleaded.

“You are the one who lost them in the first place,” Kai agreed. “It’s only fair.”

Lloyd groaned. “Why do I let you bully me into these things?”

“Go on,” Nya gave him a gentle shove. “We don’t have all day!”

Sticking his tongue out at her, Lloyd stepped forward, towards the seagulls. Several of them looked his way, a few flapping their wings anxiously and squawking in warning. Lloyd stopped, swallowing.

“Um. Hey. I don’t suppose any of you have seen a green wallet around here?”

Jay rolled his eyes. “They can’t understand you. Get closer!”

“Okay! I’m going, jeez-” he broke off with a yelp as a seagull darted in front of him, nearly tripping him as he stepped on its tail.

The seagull shrieked, and, in a flurry of feathers, the flock broke into a frenzied panic. Lloyd’s eyes widened, and he cried out, running away and frantically ducking swooping seagulls.

He darted behind Kai as a last nervy seagull hopped after him. Kai held up a fist, which burst into flame, scaring the bird off. Kai glanced back at Lloyd, amusement sparkling in his dark eyes. “You okay, bud?”

Lloyd glared. “Don’t look at me like that. These birds are vicious!”

“Look!” Pixal pointed at a gull that had remained behind. With the others out of the way, she could see the small, green wallet between its beak.

“That’s the one!” Cole cried. “After it!”

For ninja, the group was embarrassingly unstealthy as they clamored after the bird, shooting elemental powers at it and screaming as they narrowly avoided each other’s blasts, so that by the time the seagull reached the water, the beach was a mess of crystalized sand, crevices in the ground, and various burn marks from fire, lightning, and energy.

“It’s a seagull!” Nya cried. “We’ve faced giant snakes, lords of darkness, elemental masters, Oni, more criminals and gangsters than I can count, and an evil video game AI, yet we can’t catch one measly seagull? It shouldn’t be this hard, you guys!”

“It’s getting away,” Jay cried, pointing at the bird, who had finally taken flight and was heading out over the ocean.

“No!” Lloyd moaned. “Now we’re never going to get it back!”

“Not on my watch,” Nya growled, racing past them towards the docks. “Come on!” “Oh no,” Kai groaned. “Nya Smith, whatever you are thinking, stop it right now, because I’m not doing it.” “Come on, Kai,” Lloyd insisted, grabbing his wrist and yanking him along. “We have to hurry!”

They raced after Nya, who was running down the dock towards a man who was examining the boats. Kai followed them more slowly, taking careful steps.

“Sir, we need to use a boat, right away! We’ll pay for it, we promise!”

The man shook his head. “Sorry, ma’am, but these are all private boats. The only one we have is that one,” he pointed to a small, worn-looking fishing boat, “and the motor’s broken, so it’s of no use to anyone.”

“It doesn’t matter, I can take care of that. Everyone, get in!”

“W-wait,” the man stuttered, looking flustered.

“We’ll bring it right back, I promise! Now, come on, we don’t have much time!”

“No!” Kai insisted, as everyone else piled in. “Nuh-uh. No way. Not in a million years. You are not bringing me out into the middle of the ocean in a tiny, crowded boat with a busted engine!”

“You don’t need an engine when you’ve got me!” Nya raised her hand, and the water swirled under the boat, rocking it slightly. “Now, come on, we don’t have time for this!” “Y’know what.” Kai took a couple of steps back from the boat. “I’m good. I’ll stay here. You guys have fun finding the wallet. I’ll cheer you on from the beach. The dry, dry beach.”

“Nope.” Cole reached forward, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him in. “This is your gift we’re saving, too. If you want to get part of it, you’re coming with.”

“Finally!” Nya huffed. The water rippled beneath them, and suddenly, it was propelling their boat, and they were off.

“Where’s the bird?” Nya asked. “Does anyone see it?” “Over there!” Cole pointed slightly towards their left, where the seagull was gliding away with surprising speed. Getting into the boat had slowed them down, and it had gotten a large head start.

Nya gritted her teeth. “Hold on.”

“Don’t go faster!” Kai yelped from where he huddled near the middle of the boat, protectively sandwiched between Lloyd and Cole. “If you tip this boat, I will never forgive you.”

“I know what I’m doing,” Nya growled, although the boat slowed slightly as they continued.

“Our team continued to chase the thief, determined to put an end to the Great Gull Caper and put the culprit to justice. Even when our path took us across the raging waters of the ocean, with nothing but a rusty, broken old boat, and deep, swirling waters around us, filled with the dark abyss and the creatures that lurked there…”

“You mean like sharks?” Lloyd perked, peering over the edge. “Did you see any? I wanna see one!”

“Nope,” Kai yelped, pulling himself into a ball as he sat down on the floor of the boat. “Nopety nope nope nope. I’m done. I’m outta here.”

“The prospect of sharks was a dire one, but one we were willing to take. We would get that wallet back, no matter the cost- even if it meant competition from this fierce predator of the sea.”

Kai screamed into his hands. “Just end me now!”

“What Zane means to say,” Pixal said, elbowing Zane sharply, “is that sharks are actually very off-put by the taste of human flesh, and do not go after humans on purpose.”

Kai stared at her. “Oh joy, now a shark can devour my flesh by accident, what a relief.”

“Do not worry, Kai,” she told him. “There is only one estimated death by shark per year in the greater Ninjago City area.”

“Knowing my luck,” Kai grumbled, “I’ll be that one.”

“Did anyone bring their phone with?” Lloyd asked. “I wanna get a good picture when the sharks come for Kai.”

“I call dibs on his katana,” Jay exclaimed. “Y’know, the super flashy one with the flaming dragon carved into the handle?”

Lloyd wrinkled his nose at him. “Why would you want a fire dragon on your katana? You’re the lightning ninja!”

“Hey, just because my element is lightning, doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate a super dope fire design when I see one-”

“Guys,” Cole sighed, pushing his way between the two arguing boys. “No one is getting eaten. We’re perfectly safe here, on this boat.”

“Cole’s right,” Pixal agreed. “The sharks around this area are smaller, reef dwellers, and won’t come after us. They may, however, come after our seagull friend if he gets too close to the water.”

Kai made a noise in the back of his throat, and Cole scowled at her. “Thanks for the help, Pix.”

“Nya,” Jay whined, “the seagull’s getting further away! We have to go faster!”

“Don’t!” Pixal cried. “This boat has not been manufactured to withstand a lot of weight. With seven people, especially when two of them are titanium, going too fast would be sure to capsize us.”

“I told you I should’ve stayed behind on the shore,” Kai wailed.

Lloyd leaned further over the edge, raising a hand to his forehead to keep the glare off of his face as he peered intently into the water. “Is… is that a shark?”

Kai stared at him. “Shut up. You’re just baiting.”

Lloyd shook his head, his eyes lighting up in a way that was not reassuring in the slightest. “I’m not! It’s a shark! It’s a real, live shark! I’ve never seen one this close before! Except at like, an aquarium!”

Kai closed his eyes, rocking himself gently. “You’re lying. You stupid liar, I hate you.”

Cole peered over, following Lloyd’s gaze, and promptly bit his lip. “You have got to be kidding me.”

“This is a dumb prank, you guys!” Kai was half-yelling by this point.

“Stop being so loud,” Lloyd hissed. “You’ll scare it!”

Kai blinked at him. “I’ll scare it?”

Lloyd crossed his arms. “A scared shark is an aggressive shark.”

Kai’s mouth snapped shut.

“I can’t believe this,” Cole muttered. “Did we really not bring any weapons?”

“No!” Lloyd yelped. “Cole, you wouldn’t!”

“I would if it kept us from being eaten.”

“For the last time, sharks don’t eat humans!”

Cole ignored him. “Well? Did we?”

Nya snorted. “Why would we bring weapons to the beach?”

“Hey, with how often this city gets attacked, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Nya rolled her eyes. “It was supposed to be our day off.”

“It’s fine,” Pixal reported, keeping a careful eye on the shark. “It’s swimming away now. As long as we leave it alone, we’re safe.”

Kai frowned. “Looks like the gull isn’t so convinced, though.”

Pixal glanced up. Sure enough, the seagull was eyeing the shark nervously, pumping its wings as it flew higher and higher above the surface of the water.

“Do something!” Jay shrieked. “If we don’t stop it now, it’s going to get away for good!”

“Lloyd!” Nya cried. “Is your wallet waterproof?”

“What?”

“Just answer the question!” “Yes! Yes, it is!”

Nya gritted her teeth. “Hold on, everyone!”

Suddenly, a vast wave rose out of the water, looming over the seagull.

Kai’s eyes widened. “Nya, be careful, you’ll hit us too-”

But it was already too late, the wave crashing down, downing the seagull, and soaking them in saltwater. The team cried out, and Kai screamed, throwing his arms over his head in a futile attempt to protect himself. As they all tried to lurch away from the spray, the boat rocked precariously, and, for a horrifying moment, they were suspended there, on the point between balance and capsize.

And then that moment was over, and they were all falling into the ocean.

Pixal’s world immediately dimmed as she plunged into the water, quietness enveloping her like a blanket. For a moment, she was too shocked to do anything, until a foot thrashed past her face, snapping her out of her trance as she swam towards the surface.

A couple of feet before she reached it, a metal hand snatched her wrist and pulled her the rest of the way up.

“Pixal!” Zane cried, his detective voice dropped. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine. What about everyone else? Are we all here?”

Zane nodded his head behind her, and she turned to see the others all within a couple of feet. Cole had his hands on the now upside-down boat, trying to use his strength to push it over, but it was hard for him to get a good grip and stay afloat at the same time. Just behind him, Jay was spitting out a mouthful of seawater, sending ripples across the surface of the ocean as he treaded water. Lloyd was doing the same a couple of feet away, only the green ninja was struggling a lot more because of the arms wrapped tightly around his neck.

“Don’t let me go, Lloyd!” Kai yelped, although the feat would’ve been impossible even if Lloyd had wanted to- the fire ninja was clinging to him like a barnacle. “I can’t swim!”

Lloyd sighed. “I know that, Kai. It’s the only reason I’m letting you hold on to me like this.”

“I can’t believe this happened,” Kai cried. “We’re going to die out here. This is the worst day off ever.”

“Hey!” Lloyd snapped. “It’s not my fault this happened!”

Nya shot them all a sharp glare from where she was drifting alongside the boat. She didn’t even bother to tread water like the rest of them, instead using her powers to keep herself afloat. “It was going to work until you guys made such a big fuss about getting a little wet and tipped the boat.”

Cole sighed. “We’re not going to die. As soon as I get this right side up again, we’ll climb up and get out of here. Can you give me a hand, Zane?”

As the nindriod moved to help him, Kai suddenly went rigid.

“Lloyd,” he whispered.

“What, Kai?”

“Something just bumped my foot.”

“It’s probably just seaweed, Kai,” Lloyd sighed, looking down- and promptly froze.

“No one. Move.”

Jay squeezed his eyes shut. “Oh no, oh gosh, don’t tell me that’s what I think it is, this is not happening-”

“Jay, shut up,” Nya whispered, her face pale as she watched the dark shape lurking below them in the water.

“Everyone, stay calm,” Pixal murmured. “Don’t make any sudden movements and try to look it in the eyes.”

“Please, the last thing I’m gonna do is look at it,” Kai breathed, burying his face in Lloyd’s hair.

After a moment, the shark slowly swam past, losing interest.

“It doesn’t care about us,” Zane realized. “It wants the seagull.”

Several yards away, the gull was floating on the water, still trying to shake off the moisture from Nya’s wave. Suddenly realizing the danger it was in, the bird raised its wings- and launched itself into the air, just as fierce jaws snapped against empty air where the seagull had been less than a second ago.

Kai’s fingers dug tighter into Lloyd’s shoulders, and Pixal caught Jay biting his lip as he swallowed back a scream, but, its prey lost, the shark was already swimming away.

“Gotcha,” Nya murmured, reaching a hand out and snatching up the wallet, which the seagull had dropped in all the commotion, before it could sink to the bottom of the ocean.

“Okay. That’s great. We got it. Now can we get out of here?” Kai pleaded.

After a minute, they finally got the boat flipped over, and Cole hauled himself aboard before helping to lift the others. Ten minutes later, they were all safely out of the water and on their way back to the dock, and Pixal had never felt more relieved by the fact.

“So,” Jay asked, as the boat glided through the water, leaning closer to Nya. “Did they survive all that?”

“Let’s see,” Nya murmured, opening up Lloyd’s wallet. Pixal leaned forward, anxious to see what all the fuss had been about.

“Yes!” Jay cried, pulling out seven slips of paper. “They’re all here!”

“Wait.” Pixal snatched one from his hand, quickly scanning it. “A summer pass for free all-you-can-eat ice cream from the Dairy Dragon?”

“Yup,” Jay smiled, passing them out to the others. “The mayor gave them to us as a gift after we saved the city from Prime Empire. That’s what we were going to do today, after the beach, actually.”

“You’re telling me,” Pixal deadpanned. “That we just risked our lives. For free ice cream.”

“Free ice cream is free ice cream, Pix.”

“You’ll understand once you’ve tried their butter pecan,” Nya told her. “It’s to die for.”

“Butter pecan?” Jay spluttered. “No way, the Ninjapolitan is best.”

“You heathen, chocolate fudge is obviously the best flavor-”

“What are you guys talking about, mint chocolate chip is superior!”

“You just like it because it’s green.”

“Do not!”

“Do so!” Nya sighed, putting her head in her hands. “Here we go again.”

“Calm down, all of you,” Pixal said. “You can get whatever flavor of ice cream you want. Just do me a favor and try not to end up capsizing us in the middle of the ocean this time.”

Jay hummed. “No promises.”

#ninjago #ninbingo #my fic #rosie writes #ninjago kai #ninjago pixal #ninjago nya #ninjago zane #ninjago lloyd #ninjago jay #ninjago cole #i cant believe i actually wrote something that is 100% fluff #that's never happened before #it feels... weird #but it was a lot of fun #and yes Lloyd loves sharks and I will die on that hill #thanks for reading!#reblogs and comments greatly appreciated!

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zedecksiew · 3 years

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Kriegsmesser

When I received Kriegsmesser in the mail I finally googled "kriegsmesser", and found out it meant "war knife". Which makes sense; Gregor Vuga's ZineQuest 2021 project is a tribute to "roleplaying games named after medieval weapons".

I love Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay's piss-renaissance Old World setting. I tend to pick up WFRP-a-likes sight unseen:

Warlock (quality);

Small But Vicious Dog (yesss);

Zweihander (which I have come to hate); etc.

Anyway: I backed Kriegsmesser without really knowing anything about it. So Kriegsmesser surprised me.

Kriegsmesser grew out of a Troika! cutting. Its 36 backgrounds are compatible with that system: each come with a couple of lines of description; a list of skills and possessions; an a visual cameo cropped from actual 16th-Century woodcut art.

Cohesive and competently flavourful. My favourite is the Labourer, who always starts with "an empty pine box":

"You've spent your life breaking your back, working hard for other people's profit. You have nothing to show for it but a spectre of the future."

(The obligatory ratcatcher-analogue , called the Vermin Snatcher, is here -- check that box!)

Kriegsmesser also comes with its own ruleset. Hits all the notes it needs to, with lots of orientation and advice for how to run a game -- but ultimately super-simple, mechanically:

Roll d6s equal to the value in a relevant skill, look at the highest result. 6 means you get what you want; 5 or 4 means you get what you want, at a cost.

It's not quite a dice pool, since only the highest result matters. No opposed tests.

Kriegsmesser intends to have this base mechanic handle fights, too. The combat rules - with armour, toughness and weapon values -- are nested in an optional section.

For a WFRP-a-like, this feels like a purposeful departure.

Many of WFRP's most celebrated adventures are celebrated for bits that their underlying ruleset does little to support: the investigative structure of "Shadows Over Bogenhafen"; the complicated timetable of "Rough Night At Three Feathers".

Ludwig von Wittgenstein never needed a statblock to be memorable.

Not to say that lethal, hyper-detailed fights isn't super Warhammer-y. (Kriegsmesser includes an injury table, broken down by body-part -- check that box!)

But here it feels like Gregor is saying: "I'm not Games Workshop and Roleplay isn't an ancillary of Warhammer Fantasy Battle; we can evoke grim-and-perilous-ness even if we fork away from heavy combat rules."

It has become ritual for me to read my partner Sharon to sleep.

Sometimes I read her RPG things. The other night, after I read her Kriegsmesser's introduction --

" The Empire wages an eternal war against Chaos. Its priests preach of Chaos as an intrusion, something unnatural ... These men see Chaos in anything that does not buttress their rule. They call it disorder, anarchy, corruption. They say that to rebel against their order is to rebel against god and nature. That the current arrangement is natural, rather than artificial.

" Meanwhile, the common people look to the Empire to deliver the justice that they were promised and they find none. They look to the Empire and do not see themselves reflected in it. They look around at what they were taught was right and good and see only misery.

" Their world begins to unravel. Chaos comes to reside in every heart and mind sound enough to look at the world and conclude it is broken. "

-- Sharon remarked: "Nice one."

The RPG things I read her generally leave Sharon lukewarm. She has enjoyed a couple -- but, yeah: for many of these books, text isn't their strong point.

Kriegsmesser is the only time I can recall Sharon praising the writing of an RPG book without my prompting.

Nice one.

That introduction surprised me. It underlines Kriegsmesser's biggest departure from its WFRP-a-like pedigree: how it characterises Chaos.

Corruption, a mainstay of most grim-dark-y games, is made an optional rule, like combat. Explaining this, Gregor writes:

" Kriegsmesser partially subverts or deconstructs the traditional conceit of Warhammer where the characters are threatened by the forces of Chaos. In this game it is the player characters who are the agents of 'Chaos': they are likely to become the 'rats' under the streets, and the wild 'beast-men' in the woods bringing civilisation down. It's the Empire and its nobles and priests that are corrupt ... "

Describing the Empire, Gregor writes:

" The Empire encompasses the world yet is terrified of the without. It enforces itself with steel and fire yet considers itself benevolent. It consumes the labour of others with bottomless hunger yet calls its subalterns lazy, or wasteful, or greedy. "

Holy shit this is the first time I've seen the word "subaltern" in an RPG thing, I think?

I love this.

Rant incoming:

With every passing decade Warhammer abridges its Moorcockian roots more and more; nowadays it is "Order = Good" and "Chaos = Evulz", pretty much.

Gone are the days when chaos berserkers are implied to grant safe passage to the helpless (because Khorne is as much a god of martial honour as he is a god of bloodletting); Or that the succor of Papa Nurgle is a genuine comfort to the downtrodden; Or that Tzeentch could unironically embody the principle of hope, of change for the better.

As Chaos is distilled into unequivocal villainy, Order goons get painted as Good Guys by default --

Giving rise to Warhammer's contemporary problem, wherein fans are no longer able to recognise satire.

When I was introduced to 40K, it seemed pretty clear that the Imperium was a Brazil-esque absurdist-fascist bureaucratic state: planets are exterminatus-ed due to clerical error; the way it stamps out rebellions is the reason why rebellions begin in the first place.

Tragi-comic grimdarkness. That was the point.

Nowadays that tone has shifted -- and you're more likely than not going to encounter a 40K fan who argues that the Imperium's evils are a justified necessity, to prevent worse wrongs.

We went from:

"Space Nazis because insane dumbass fuckery, also chainswords vroom vroom rule of badass!"

To:

"Space Nazis because it makes sense actually, and also chainswords make sense because [insert convoluted rationalisation here]."

Even Fantasy Flight's Black Crusade line, which ostensibly offers a look at 40K from the perspective of Chaos, never truly commits to its conceit.

With prep you could play a heroic band of mutant freedom fighters, resisting the tyranny of the Evil Imperium --

But I don't remember Black Crusade giving that kind of campaign any actual support. Its supplements service the relatively more conventional "You can play villains!" angle; the Screaming Vortex is a squarely Daemons-vs-Daemons setting.

This tonal drift culminates, in my mind, with Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop's heroic-fantasy replacement of the old WFRP / WHFB setting.

Here's the framing narrative for AoS's recently-launched Third Edition. Let's see whether I've got things right:

A highly professionalised, technologically-superior tip-of-the-spear fighting force (the Stormcast Eternals);

Backed by an imperialist military-industrial complex (Azyrheim);

"Liberating" rich new territories (Ghur) for exploitation by a civilised settler culture (Settlers of Sig-- I mean, Free Cities);

Justified because the locals are irredeemable heathens (Chaos and Kruleboyz).

I mean, that's a sweet-ass Warhammer setting. It's contemporary, laser-guided lampoon. Except it is played totally straight.

In AoS, a literal crusade is justified as the moral good.

I think Kriegsmesser surprised me because its framing of Chaos -- as a promise, as the light of hope shining through cracks of a broken world --

It feels so fucking right.

Yes: its a subaltern deconstruction of the conventional moral universe of Warhammer -- but it is a take that is also already implied / all but supported in the various depictions of the setting: from WFRP to the modified title-crawl of Black Crusade.

I'm annoyed I didn't think of it, myself. Damn you, Gregor!

And I'm annoyed that more Warhammer fans aren't thinking it, also.

lmagine if Kriegsmesser's perspective stood on equal standing as the GW orthodoxy. Imagine if, instead of simplifying stuff into "Order = Good" and "Chaos = Evulz", GW did a Gregor Vuga.

You'd have a Rashomon-ed Warhammer, where villainy depends on perspective:

You are fearful villagers, huddled around your priest, muttering prayers against the wild braying coming from the trees beyond your gates.

You are Aqshyian tribeswomen, defying the thunder warrior towering over you, the foreigner demanding you bow to his foreign god.

You are a Tzeentchian revolutionary cell, desperately trying to disrupt a Inquisitor's transmissions so your home planet isn't destroyed by fascist orbital fire.

Get Kriegsmesser HERE.

+++

( Image sources: https://theenemywithinremixed.wordpress.com/2021/05/21/thoughts-on-the-4e-death-on-the-reik/ https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/59-brazil https://www.deviantart.com/faroldjo/art/Warhammer-40k-Black-Crusade-273596035 https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/06/09/fancy-a-new-life-bringing-order-to-the-mortal-realms-join-a-dawnbringer-crusade-today/ https://www.nme.com/blogs/the-movies-blog/team-america-15-anniversary-south-park-2558750 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Palestinian_children_and_Israeli_wall.jpg )

#reviews #kriegsmesser #gregor vuga #warhammer #writing #rants #overthinking #rpgs #wfrp

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itsclydebitches · 3 years

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Something I notice about the giant Grimm is that they never seem to do anything. The Wyvern in V3 awakens from it's mountain and just sits on Beacon, the Leviathan only wades through the ocean and destroys a bell-tower and Monstro only spews out smaller Grimm. Whatever happened to Team RWBY strategizing to take down a Nevermore? These giant Grimm are just showpieces now.

I honestly think part of the problem remains the show's unwillingness to attach lasting consequences—and responsibility—to the group's choices. Because what does a giant grimm do? Destroy things and kill people, to a (presumably) larger extent than the normal grimm would. The Wyvern I give a total pass to because 1. Beacon was already overrun and being destroyed (a giant grimm was kinda overkill at that point) and 2. Since it's not needed for additional destruction/death, it serves the separate purpose of helping to introduce Ruby's eyes. Which I like. We've got to remember that back in Volume 3, no one in the fanbase knew what silver eye powers were, so having Cinder flinch in pain isn't going to explain what that power actually does—her connection to grimm via the weird bug is both unique and forgettable. So you've gotta include an actual grimm in that scene for Ruby to freeze, introducing the primary mechanic of "Silver eyes are a grimm specific weapon." Making the grimm a giant and presumably powerful Wyvern both explains why the group couldn't team up to take it down normally—which, again, was never that grimm's purpose in the first place. Some grimm exist for cool fights, others for forwarding the plot—and, frankly, it's just more entertaining to get a giant grimm for a Volume finale. Freezing it at the top of the tower likewise explains why the school isn't immediately rebuilt. We answer the, "Why are the characters going on a dangerous quest when they could just go back to school?" question by keeping the Wyvern there. So all in all, I think it functions rather well, demonstrating some of the logic threads RWBY now lacks.

The other two though... that's when we run into problems. Because unlike the Wyvern, they're not serving those specific functions of introducing a new power/explaining why Beacon isn't rebuilt. For them, yeah, we absolutely expect the group to have a cool fight and take them out in some epic, strategic, GIF—worthy manner. This is a fighting show! Problem is, in order to have a cool fight with a giant grimm, you need to include the inevitable consequence that things will be destroyed and, likely, people will be killed. These giant grimm aren't appearing in the middle of a forest like the Nevermore did (or even like the first geist did), they're turning up in populated areas. Fighting them will lead to casualties... and the problem there is that responsibility for these situations goes back to the heroes. Their choice to fight Cordovin brought the Leviathan. Their choice to run with Penny kept everyone in Atlas trapped. So if an epic battle wages and people in Argus die, or Salem's army breaks through and everyone in Atlas—including the Mantle evacuees—are overrun... that tragedy is partially on the group. And, notably, the story doesn't want the group to sit with any major consequences of their choices. So nothing bad happens. And nothing bad happens by virtue of there barely being a fight. Ruby just freezes time and sets off her eyes so they don't have to deal with the Leviathan ever reaching shore where the people are. Ironwood's army holds the line until Oscar saves the day so they don't have to deal with the grimm overrunning half the Kingdom. RWBY introduces very high stakes—here's this mega powerful super big ultra evil monster!!—and then pulls back on the follow through because to do otherwise would introduce consequences the story just doesn't want its heroes to face. Anyone remember during the Volume 7 hiatus how we were saying that Salem should absolutely decimate the Kingdom? Yeah, look at all the ways the story bent over backwards to avoid that. Salem randomly waits around to start the fight, the grimm soup only attacks the shields, the whale only spews smaller grimm, the line is never broken, her subordinates turn on her... the plot (flimsily) goes out of its way to ensure nothing horrific happens, as logic dictates it should, because the heroes were the ones to prevent most of the people from escaping. You can't have the mass murder of a Kingdom after that! So it doesn't happen. Even though it should. And when the horrific, permanent things do occur—the destruction of the Kingdom itself—it's fine now because the heroes chose it.

I 100% believe that in a story where the heroes were allowed to own up to their mistakes and grow from them, the fights would likewise have more room to play with the action in creative ways. If you're willing to really put Argus in danger and have the group own up to the choices that led to that, you can choregraph that epic fight on shore. However, all of this isn't to say that RWBY doesn't also have a problem with abandoning the strategic teamwork we started out with. The Hound is the most recent example of this. There, the story's moral stance isn't hindering the action: the Hound attacks in an empty street and then in the mansion with only three non-combat characters nearby. They heroes also haven't done anything wrong in these situations where having a destructive fight would reflect badly on them. Free rein for action! Yet Team JYR still just stands there while Oscar is captured, or take turns launching single attacks rather than trying to defeat it together (though this gets much better during their chase scene). Weiss comes out to help Blake and Ruby, only to be sent right back inside. Ruby is knocked out and Blake can't defeat the acid grimm alone, but Ruby one-shots it from behind rather than the two of them working together. Then Ruby waltzes up and also one-shots the Hound with her eyes, Whitley and Willow's contribution feeling like it hardly matters. If a suit of armor falling on it is enough to finish the Hound off, any punch from any of the fighters would have done the same job. Ruby's eyes already did all the work. Even when the story has all the space it wants for those cool fights against giant and abnormal grimm... it's holding back.

The fights have really gone downhill in the last couple of Volumes and no, it's not because the current animators aren't as talented with choreography as Monty was. It's because the fights are bending in illogical ways to serve the story, rather than the story evolving naturally out of the fights. Why can't Blake take on this grimm? Because the story wants to emphasize how crucial Ruby is to the team's spirits. Why don't we get cool combos to take out the Hound? Because the story wants to reveal the faunus' silver eyes in a shocking manner. Why was Yang taken out from a single hit by Neo? Because the story wanted to quickly established that the main group would "die" in this finale. Why did JYR just stand there and attack in useless ways? Because the story needed Oscar to get kidnapped. Why wasn't the whale established as something to fight, either with traditional combat techniques or with something the group had to come up with? Because the story wanted to introduce the shocking surprise of Ozpin's cane. Etc. etc. All of these fights fail on one level or another because they're just trying to get the viewer to the next plot point, never-mind whether the fight itself makes sense or is entertaining to watch. It's the same logic as the Wyvern—this serves a purpose other than to be a cool fight for the series—but RWBY is no longer putting in the work to get all these pieces to fit together. The Wyvern keeps to the internal logic of RWBY's world, whereas something like Yang's knock out does not. Doing that with the mega grimm that promise incredible challenges and likely destruction just makes that failure to deliver all the more noticeable.

Since the Volume 4 days, the last fight I can remember really liking—that got me super hyped and eager to re-watch it on Youtube—was Ironwood vs. Watts. Looking back, it doesn't at all surprise me that this fight a) didn't require any teamwork, b) didn't have any grimm involved, c) was between a villain and a soon to be villain in an empty space (eliminating those ethics entirely), and d) existed almost solely to just be a Cool Fight (with the minor, plot forwarding details of capturing Watts and Ironwood losing his arm). Ironwood vs. Watts had the freedom to be one of the old school RWBY fights, unencumbered by the questions that now keep tripping the writers up like, "If Team RWBY won with teamwork, why didn't you animate them working as a team?" or "Why did Ruby use her eyes when we wanted to see action and didn't use her eyes to save her own life against Cinder?" or "Why did you introduce this giant grimm, promising an epic fight, only to give the group a mostly non-combat solution? Oh, because that kind of epic fight is going to introduce a lot of other questions you don't want to tackle... Jinn randomly letting Ruby stop time, it is."

#rwde #rwby #mymetas

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thatisaname · 4 years

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You know those annoying 'actually everything is connected' theories ? Well, I've got one about The Mechanisms' albums

(Please hear me out I swear it's good)

The Bifrost Incident ends with a world-ending catastrophe. The Gods arrive into the world, dragged in by Odin's train, and they destroy it.

What's the first sign of their arrival ? Communications breaking down.

Civilization-ending catastrophes and communications mysteriously breaking down... Doesn't that remind you of something ?

Yep, that's it: the catastrophe mentioned in Holder of the Grail.

This unknown catastrophe that cuts Fort Galfridian from the rest of the world and destroys an entire civilization could very well be the one that starts in Terminus.

Meaning that the events in High Noon over Camelot could be the direct consequences of the events of The Bifrost Incident.

But it doesn't stop there.

Arthur survives. He is, as Mordred puts it, "the once and future king". To our knowledge, he was never officially called King of Camelot but sure enough, he kind of was the King of this place. But... what about after ? If we see Arthur again in the Mechs' canon, it means there's a strong chance he will wear the title of King.

And who is the only character in the Mechs' canon who ever wore the title of King ?

Now hear me out.

After the events of Ulysses dies at dawn, all hope seems to be gone. Ulysses dies in peace, but all hopes of revolution seem to have faded away. The Olympians' grasp on the City seems impossible to challenge in the slightest. But one day, a strange ship crashes in the middle of the darkest street of the City.

Out of the wreckage climbs a man, with a half-empty pistol. He takes a look at the strange new world around him, and nods gravely. He has a destiny to fulfill.

Arthur will be King. That's the lasts thing Mordred told him, and he won't let this last thread to his past disappear. So, he gets to work. In one month, the whole city has heard of him. In one year, even the Olympians fear him.

When people ask him if he's really going to fight the Olympians, the man who calls himself Cole laughs, and answers calmly that it's not the first time he takes over a planet.

The City learns to fear his name and his gun. To many, he's just another crime boss. Some rumors start to spread, saying that he is an Olympian, just like the others. And this gives Arthur an idea.

Arthur starts to take a stance against immortality and the Acheron. He uses his men to spread anti-Acheron propaganda, calls out the Olympians' corruption and even manages to expose the Sphinx scandale using Oedipus' old research. The oppressed people of the City follow him and many of the Olympians' men turn against their old masters. A year later, he launches the first world-wide rebellion the City has ever known.

General Cole utterly beats the Olympians, and executes them all - which takes a little longer than expected, but still, finally works. He seizes all of their research and locks them away. He is elected King of the city, now renamed New Constantinople.

(PS: Hades doesn't stop the rebellion and just escapes. Mainly because they've run the Acheron for so long they got a bit bored of it. Also, because Brian seems to really like Cole for whatever reason.)

At first Arthur's reign is calm and prosperous. King Cole grows old and stays merry. But eventually people start realizing that Cole's longevity might not be natural. His subjects, especially the older warriors who fought at his side during the Revolution, start to get a bit suspicious: what if Cole had used the Olympians' technology to extend his own life ? What if he had become an Olympian in the end ?

Arthur didn't become immortal, but he did use the Olympians' research to extend his life far beyond his normal lifespan. Now that he is King, he refuses to let death get in the way of his destiny.

You know the rest: King Cole turns into a bloodthirsty monster, and finally, General White's rebellion puts an end to his reign and his life.

Now you're going to say: "But Arthur and Cole are so different. How could Arthur become Cole ?"

So first of, Arthur turned evil only after almost a millenia of technology-expanded life which definitely caused damage to his mind. As Jonny says in Once: "the technology that had extended his life throughout the millennia had warped his mind as it had withered his body".

(Which, by the way, is also what seemed to happen to those who were "brought back" from the Acheron in Ulysses, cf Orpheus' backstory)

But Cole isn't that different from Arthur:

- Cole and Arthur both fight with a gun, and both seem very skilled at it.

- Cole is paranoid. Which would make a lot considering Arthur's backstory: just when he was about to save his world, Arthur saw his two lovers being shot in the back by his own son, who then proceeded to completely destroy the world, sparing no one but him. Nobody in the universe would be more afraid of betrayal than Arthur.

- Cole is driven by a thirst for conquest. Arthur was too: in the very beginning of HNOC, he takes over Camelot and establishes a personal rule on the city. With good intentions, sure, but still.

- They have the same outlook on fear.

Remember when Arthur said that ?

Well...

Yeah...

(Also the three little pigs could act as a sort of dark reflection of what Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot once were: three unbeatable warriors, matched by no one... except this time they're not united by love for the other two, but by fanatical devotion to a leader)

So, in this theory, the "ending" of the Mechs' universe would be pretty optimistic. No matter what insane authoritarian rulers will try to do to stay in power, justice, truth and love will win in the end - even if it requires a lot of suffering and death to get there. Or, as Arthur said:

#the mechanisms #the mechs #jonnathan sims #jonny sims #jonny d'ville #the bifrost incident #high noon over camelot #ulysses dies at dawn #once upon a time (in space)#arthur #king arthur #arthur the mechs #ashes o'reilly #brian #i'm sure it probably wasn't intended #i understand authors have themes #take it more as a headcanon

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qqueenofhades · 3 years

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Keeping my fingers crossed for that Black Widow meta

Aha, okay. As usual, I am ludicrously easy to enable, so let's take a crack at this. The ask obviously contains SPOILERS for the Black Widow film (and is also tagged "black widow spoilers" if you're planning to filter), and discussion/reference to other films/properties in the MCU, though I don't feel like any of those are still a secret.

Anyway, as I said in my earlier post, I can't believe I am actually still trying to critically analyse a Marvel production in the year of our Lord 2021, but then, I feel like we all have a complicated relationship with it. Likewise, the feeling of "oh wow NOW you're giving Natasha a solo movie after you killed her off in a cheap and fairly sexist way in Endgame?" If this film had come out ten or even five years ago, it would have been major, but holding it off until now seems to have left most of us justifiably unimpressed. Plus, as I am absolutely not the first person to point out, it renders Natasha's sacrifice in Endgame "because I don't have a family" even more narratively incoherent. I realize that this film was written after that one by totally different people, there's no point in expecting the MCU to make consistent canonical sense throughout its eighty billion different films/series, we were all stuck with a mess after the Whedonified Age of Ultron Nat, and so forth, but still. Natasha explicitly SAYS that she has two families (her wacky Russian found family of spies and the Avengers) and her decision to leap off the cliff in Endgame to save Clint and his retconned perfect white heterosexual nuclear family.... Hmmmm. To which I say to you, I do not bite my thumb at you, sir, but I do bite my thumb at Male Writers, sir.

Likewise, while I am wildly attracted to Florence Pugh as Yelena and deeply desire to be wrapped between her thighs, the movie felt more like her story than Nat's. Yelena drove most of the plot and the action, while Nat was just kind of along for the ride. As a solo piece, we really didn't learn that much about Natasha aside from the opening scene (which felt like it was straight out of The Americans and probably worked the best of the whole film for the reason) with her childhood in America. But even the infamous "what happened in Budapest" backstory with her and Clint was quickly info-dumped rather than shown, and they could have taken more narrative risks or included more flashbacks or otherwise given us more NATASHA, y'know??? Instead of cramming the film into the small space between Civil War and Infinity War and making it even weirder that Nat seemingly has no memory or reference to these events when she returns to the team at that time. Why not show her looking for Yelena or her actual defection to the Avengers or anything else we might want from a film that purportedly exists entirely to provide backstory for a now-dead character? It felt like even in the film universe, the main quest was being repeated -- she tried to kill Baddie McSoviet once before and it didn't work out, so she has to do it again, something something. Okay.

As for that, good ol' Marvel and its American Superiority TM. The only actual Eastern European actress in this film about Eastern Europeans was Antonia/Taskmaster, played by the Ukrainian Olga Kurylenko (and I was very interested in her?? If she's supposed to be a narrative foil and a ghost of Nat's past and mark of her former sins, etc., why not develop her as an actual character?) Everyone else were Brits and Americans hamming it up with even more chew-the-scenery fake Russian accents than Elizabeth Olsen's "Sokovian" accent as Scarlet Witch. If it's established that they all have perfect American accents at the start of the movie, why is Nat the only American-accented character in the modern day if she had presumably the exact same childhood as Yelena? I know it's another way to set her apart, but that and Baddie McSoviet (the Russians are finding a way to steal free will from people's brains! Zomgz!!! Is this 2021 or 1981?) were straight out of the Cold War in terms of its not-so-veiled American Supremacy Message. Likewise, making modern!Natasha a former KGB agent never really made sense, since she says in Winter Soldier that she was born in 1984, and we see her in this film as an 11-year-old in 1995. But the USSR collapsed in 1991, when she was seven, and the Red Room appears to be an entirely unrelated flying....lab....thingy run by a generic evil Russian (Ray Winstone, likewise Hamming Up Accent). So like. What is she, guys?? Make up your minds!!!

Likewise, Baddie McSoviet/Dreykov as a villain obviously plays into the hoary old Hollywood "All Bad People Are Recognizable As Being Terrible Sexists and Also Probably Russians" trope, but aside from that, he doesn't make sense. He has this entire army of basically unstoppable Widows and he has just been.... waiting around and causing random explosions? Or was just waiting for Nat and company to return so he could Put His Evil Plan Into Motion? Are we really supposed to believe that this guy has just been sitting up in his flying saucer and essentially never doing anything this whole time? He had about a million chances to launch this take-over-the-world plan long before Natasha ever got there. Plus, I.... am.... not sure what to think (aside from /deep sigh/ MARVEL) about the fact that all the Widows we see dying/getting killed on screen are women of color. (Then the Black surgeon who was about to remove Yelena's brain in the Red Room and the only other Black guy being Natasha's errand boy, which just... in context... YIKES.) I think the fact that there are random Black background Widows are supposed to mean that they're inclusive and badass or something? Scarlett Johansson also has her own issues with White Feminism and all the other things we've critiqued her for before, so after TFATWS and the Flag Smashers, Marvel clearly has found its subtly racist sweet spot. As usual?

The end of the film also just basically turns into the standard Marvel empty-spectacle/cool-looking fights/people flying through the air thing, and I wanted a lot more focus on the wacky found-family Russian-spy hijinks (I did love them, for reasons) and character dynamics, rather than all of them separately fighting baddies in different places. I did obviously have feelings about Natasha putting the parachute on Yelena to save her life. But why were we then denied Nat/Gamora parallels/relationships/any character development or interaction at all in Infinity War/Endgame? Both of them are trained assassins adopted into a non-biological family that they have a complicated relationship with, but end up forging a strong bond with their sister (Yelena/Nebula) nonetheless. Of course, that would have required Endgame to put more effort into its female characters than what it did, which was one (1) Epic CGI Charge Scene at the very end, and literally nothing else. Not that I am still salty about this or anything.

Anyway. The movie was genuinely fun in places. The wacky Russian found family of spies was definitely the best part, even if it made Endgame even more nonsensical as a result. But I wanted this movie to be a lot better than it was overall, though I probably would have liked it more if it had actually come out in a timely fashion and wasn't only released after they killed her off. It just feels like there were so many possible threads of potential that could have been done with Natasha if they were actually interested in experimenting and exploring the character and not just coming up with new baddies and ways to go boom, and it unfortunately missed the mark with that.

#anonymous #ask #black widow #black widow spoilers #mcu #long post

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phoenixtakaramono · 3 years

Note

Hi! :) I was reading your post about SQH in TUT and it got me thinking. Since this version also wrote SVSSS, when he transmigrates does he realize his "dream" was real? Also, you hinted that he recognizes SY as the same person who transmigrated into SQQ, so now I'm wondering if he tells SY that, and how SY would react to learning he's the protagonist of SVSSS in another universe. I just love thinking about how meta this could potentially get, haha.

Can't wait to find out more! Keep up the good work!

(Follow-Up Post to: Part I, Part II)

@the-legend-of-chel 👏👏👏 Luv, good to see you in my Asks! I’m glad to hear that you’re looking forward to finding out more in The Untold Tale! And thanks for your support and encouragement. 💖

(TUT ch1 - Excerpt)

You’re right. There is a lot of meta potential with older!Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky being the MXTX equivalent in this AU—or, rather, I like to imagine him growing up to be the Stephen King equivalent of modern day China with a prolific portfolio of written works (novels and short stories, and extras). In canon, he churned out a great number of words per chapter and in a speedy amount of time! Do you guys know how miraculous that is, as a writer? I envy him so much! To be able to churn out that much content in a short amount of time, and in a scheduled regimen, is amazing! That’s basically my angle having written this into the prologue of TUT. That’s partially the reason why I wrote ch1. I liked the idea of paying homage to SVSSS and saying that it’s an actual book series in TUT universe that Airplane wrote (as funny as the idea would be, I wasn’t about to let SY be the one to write it, lol, for intellectual property reasons since the PIDW characters belong to Airplane, which would necessitate SY changing names and character appearances if he published what we know as irl SVSSS, so the best I can give SY is saying he wrote his own PIDW fanfic which basically launched his novelist career because he’d realized, hey, I actually have a knack for writing and the ever so spiteful I feel like practically every writer has had this thought before: fine, if I don’t see what I want to read, then I’ll write it myself!)

(TUT ch1 - Excerpt)

We’re approaching TUT spoiler territory so skip below if you don’t wish to be spoiled.

TUT (Meta) Spoilers

I personally love meta. If I’m to be writing a lovestory to SVSSS, there will be attempts at meta thrown into TUT. And this is one of them:

Airplane did “dream” about canon SVSSS. He basically “dreamt” about his favorite black powder fan, Peerless Cucumber

changing events of Airplane’s biggest regret Proud Immortal Demon Way. (As a writer, it embarrasses me to read my old writing. So I imagine it could be the same for Airplane.) As an author, Airplane recognized what he dreamt had potential to be a commercial success as a danmei transmigration story so basically every time he woke up, he would write pieces of what he remembers in a dream journal when the memory was fresh in his brain. It also allowed Airplane the opportunity to show his readers through the perspective of SY! Shen Qingqiu what Airplane had originally wanted to write, but integrated in a way that blends seamlessly into the reading experience. He would’ve thought it was a bit weird and strange that his brain dreamt about his past critic—whom he’d considered a small celebrity in the PIDW forums back then—aka his anti-fan-turned-accomplished-novelist in the writing industry, so he felt embarrassed that his unconscious brain must have thought very highly of the man.

So Airplane omitted any mention of Peerless Cucumber from the final draft of SVSSS (if he mentioned both “Shen Yuan” and “Peerless Cucumber,” then even SY would be like, Hey, wait one moment....). This detail will be included in a later chapter, but did you know the name “Shen Yuan” has come up in other works? Let’s ignore the variations on the Chinese written characters for the name “Shen Yuan.” There was the evil older brother character Shen Yuan from The Rebirth of the Malicious Empress of Military Lineage, a side character named Shen Yuan from a C-drama (I think he was an old minister?), and there’s even an irl visual artist named Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan (Shen Garden) is also a famous romantic garden in Shaoxing, known for the love story between Lu You and Tang Wan.

(Shen Yuan Garden - Trip Advisor Review)

Basically “Shen Yuan” in itself is not a particularly uncommon name in China (imo I would not say it’s super popular either). So when SY saw his name mentioned once or twice in Airplane’s SVSSS—aka rebooted PIDW—during his read-through, he was like, Huh, what a strange coincidence. And then dismissed it as circumstantial and thought nothing of seeing his name come up in a cutsleeve novel as the new protagonist, haha. It’s like a book written by Anne Rice; one of the titles coincidentally has the same name as mine. Now, obviously the book and main character is not based or inspired by me; I just coincidentally share the same name. If I see books which have characters with my same first name, generally I like to read them and sometimes even collect them for my bookshelves. Because there’s something just so fun and interesting about seeing your own name in a fictional piece of work.

There’s also meta joke potential about Airplane dreaming of himself being transmigrated into the cannon fodder Shang Qinghua and seeing the romantic miscommunications between the younger version of himself (his self-insert essentially) and the fictional Mobei jūn character. I can certainly say seeing such dreams would make Airplane question his sexuality and awaken something dormant in him, haha. He’d realize he might not be not as straight as he thought he was, if his brain was capable of dreaming of SY!SQQ being crushed on by LBH, and SQH being crushed on by MBJ and essentially following MBJ around calling him “my king” this and “my king” that. He’ll be sweating bullets when he meets this world’s version of MBJ, because Airplane will definitely remember how the younger Self-Insert version of himself acted toward MBJ in the SVSSS world. (It’s the classic “Just because I dreamed about it happening doesn’t mean it’ll happen here, right? ...Right? Cucumber brother, you’re a fortuneteller! Please check our eight characters for me! I have to know my marriage compatibility with Mobei jūn!”)

In a later chapter, there will be the reveal where Airplane tells Shen Yuan that he “dreamt” of a universe where a younger version of Shen Yuan—having choked on mantou (馒头) (paying homage to the donghua) or just being transmigrated in general after raging at a younger ASTTS’s writing (paying homage to the books)—transmigrated into the Shen Qingqiu we know from SVSSS who married Bing mèi. Because I think it will be hilarious when TUT’s SY finds out about the true source of Airplane’s inspiration, and he’ll naturally freak out over the fact that this is the very same Bing gē from Airplane’s Bing-gē vs Bing-mèi extra and that he’s essentially somehow stumbled on the same path as the alternative younger SY!SQQ “from Airplane’s imagination.” I will leave this open to interpretation if this does show up (it’s just an idea I��m playing with) but I might hint that there might be a higher power at play which allowed Airplane a peek into another universe—which manifested as his dreams.

I very much like this dynamic (we might see this exchange, verbatim, in a future chapter in TUT):

SY/ LBH —> He gave him a disdainful gaze.

Airplane cried inwardly at the oppression and the feeling of being wronged.

Haha, none of this is really Airplane’s fault^ though. It’s a fun parallel and if I’m still motivated when we get to the wedding and consummation chapter, we might see an epilogue where SY and Bing gē from TUT meets SY!SQQ and Bing mèi maybe. Because I think it’ll be funny with the two LBHs getting into a shouting/ fighting match about who has the “superior Shen Yuan” while the two SYs just shake their heads at their silly husbands (and potentially TUT’s SY, as the older party, can impart his fortunetelling wisdom and advice to SY!SQQ).

Personally I can’t wait when we get to those chapters, because I know it’ll be entertaining to write, haha. Personally TUT is a fun project because there’s just so much meta potential that can be incorporated and I have a lot of fun imagining the scenarios.

*Note: like always, keep in mind that these are just my current thoughts. Details are subject to change; things aren’t considered official until they show up in the final draft on AO3. :)

The Novelists’ First Impressions

The first impression SY and Airplane will have of each other will be fun. Because in their perspective, written in my notes it’s essentially like:

(Airplane seeing SY):

His first reaction was shock. Shock because the mere mortal he used to be could not conceive so much charisma being emitted by this guy.

This is definitely a man who had put all of his stats into CHARISMA.

(SY seeing Airplane):

He's suspiciously good looking in ways that normal people are not.

Ah, the Cucumberplane friendship in TUT is going to be so much fun. Not only are these two older souls who transmigrated (both are mid-aged in this universe), they’re both accomplished novelists in their own right in the writing industry. Which means with these two being celestial beings, there’s so many clichés we can playfully poke fun at.

It also makes me laugh because imagine being SY, and seeing a guy (mortal!Airplane) who exudes the same energy as these two imperial princes GIFs:

#svsss #人渣反派自救系统 #shang qinghua #moshang #shen yuan #bingyuan #binggeyuan #the untold tale #phoenixtakaramono #ask #the-legend-of-chel #phoenix talks #reply #replied #answered #I’m almost done photobashing older SY #so there’s gonna be additional visual context #for how he appears in TUT (my headcanon at least)

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yunsoh · 3 years

Text

alright season 3 ep 1 thoughts!! let’s go:

- off the bat really like the tone shift in the zodiac lore that we first saw at the start of s1e1 -- from what i can tell the line delivery is the same, but the music is much more somber. just thought that was a nice touch

- oh okay this op is a bop. the visuals are a little jarring but it’s whatever lmfao

- congrats machi for making it into a furuba op i guess. kakeru baby i’m sorry they left you out of the season 2 ops when u were so important to the season. they got away with robbery.

- i really like ren’s jpn voice....... something about it...... evil silk

- GODDD god fucking. akito ramming ren through the fucking screen doors and launching them both into the air. i really cannot. the build up in this scene was so good and then it was just immediately ruined. next!!

- actually i like how ren’s expressions were animated during “akira-san and i have a real bond” very smooth. meanwhile i think akito’s expressions are kind of overmuch.

- i still laugh at this scene where baby kureno shigure hatori + ayame just run up to ren like “baby. give baby” like she must have been like “someone get these little gremlins away from me??”

- “i can’t see arisa while there’s another girl i have to stay with” no you can’t see arisa because you’re too old for her. next.

- actually not next i’m going to gripe about kureno/uo for a second because i haven’t in a long time and i want to. this pairing sucks. its main purpose is to lead to this huge moment where tohru learns about another layer of the curse via kureno but the pairing itself is underdeveloped and creepy as hell. it sucks the life out of uo’s character which personally i just won’t forgive ever 💖

- kureno stop getting into young girls’ personal space challenge

- it’s kureno having pity sex with akito for me. akito “pity sex” sohma.

- hana deadpanning “ta-da”...... i love her. also man i just looove love hers and tohru’s relationship and it’s so nice to see these moments later on while tohru is so completely wrapped up in the sohma drama where they can just be together :’(

- YUKIIII i love u...... shimazaki i love youuuuuuu. man i also love yuki and hana’s friendship i think they’re so cute together. it’s few and far between but they always play off of each other perfectly.

- also love shigure’s casualness with hana lmfao.... “saki-chan might be pissed at me if tohru doesn’t bounce back” the way that he figures hana knows this is his fault somehow. i suppose just thru the fact that he’s her guardian but still.

- also man i missed yuki and shigure’s banter i feel like it’s been a min since we’ve seen that

- okay back to the girls. hana’s love for tohru just overflows from her and she barely has to say anything. i also love that this is a pretty rare moment where tohru is actually allowing herself to be upset and talk about what’s bothering her (sort of) -- at this point especially because the burden she’s carrying wrt the sohmas is incredibly overwhelming and there’s really no way for her to backtrack and shove it all down. we don’t really get to see tohru rely emotionally on uo and hana during the later parts of the series so it’s just really nice to see how strong their bond continues to be.

- all that said i think the fact that tohru is clearly at some sort of breaking point and then directs all of that solely into kureno and uo’s relationship is...... yeah idk i think hana and uo would both know that something else was up. tohru’s a romantic but man uo and kureno have met exactly twice. the overreaction of it all. all of this happening in hana’s gaudy as fuck room is just the cherry on top actually.

- like imagine you get your first real crush ever and it’s a little stupid because it was from a very fleeting interaction with someone and you also feel like you’re overreacting to it but then your best friend insists that you two need to be together to the point that she’s bawling her eyes out over it when it doesn’t seem like it’ll work out. literally what then.

- aside from that this is very much part of the continued dialogue of tohru’s fears of not being a useful person. she’s so afraid of being useless bc of her abandonment issues, and in response to that she insists on overdoing things. she knows that people love her but she also has an extreme lack of faith in herself that that love has longevity if she’s not constantly proving herself to be useful. which ofc leads into hana herself saying that tohru burdens herself way, way too much with other people’s emotions.

- for some reason hana going “i worry about you” makes me wanna cry ugh. they.

- “i called her :)” queen of taking the credit for things she did not do.

- i feel like this could have been a really normal and natural conclusion to whatever was going on between uo and kureno. honestly, i think it would have been fitting even -- we have this incredibly emotionally intense side of things with kureno, which is completely wrapped up into the dark world of the curse and the sohmas. and then we have this normal side of things with uo, someone who is representative of a (relatively) normal life -- she had a crush that she briefly felt too emotionally involved in, and then she let it go. as is the case with crushes. there was really no reason to extend kureno and uo’s plotline beyond this point.

- me watching the kyoru scene and just zooming into yuki smiling at them........ he 💖

- ending the ep on the original four, and tohru uo + hana, is just perfect really. idk it feels very much like reminding us of where everything started + where it’s going.

#fruits basket #WOW i had a lot more thoughts than. i expected.#i ended up pausing a lot lmfao..... huh #fruits basket spoilers

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ilikekidsshows · 3 years

Note

These cyberbullies who worship Chloe are not the first "mob of fans to be outraged by what happens in a story". Anon has seen this kind of collective outrage before--except in previous generations, it used to be in defense of the victims, rather than their tormentors. For example, when It's Your First Kiss, Charlie Brown aired in 1977, Charlie Brown got punished for losing a football game when it was Lucy's fault. Fans sent lots of angry letters to the TV stations about it in Charlie's defense.

(addendum) Besides, Chloe stans aren't abuse apologists, or even bully apologists--that would actually be an improvement. If someone has toxic principles that "some people deserve to be mistreated", at least the person HAS principles. What this anon actually thinks is happening is that they're "person I like apologists". For instance, I've seen one Chloe stan demand that Bakugo be punished, so the person does want bullying punished UNLESS they like the bully. Stans "make up morality as they go."

Writing a strongly-worded letter/email to the company actually responsible for a piece of media about your concerns with what messages said piece of media is sending people is very different from bullying and harassing a single person every single day. The person receiving that correspondence won't be receiving it as a personal attack for one thing, and writing such a thing will make sure you think about what you're saying and what you actually want before sending it instead of typing something in a couple of minutes and hitting "send". I see the "how" in your example as more respectable than the "why".

In my personal moral code bullying is never justified, because I believe that we should strive to do as little harm to others as possible and prioritize lessening the harm someone can do over punishing them for personal gratification. Bullying someone, even for "valid reasons", is not justified in my moral system. The reality is that bullying someone with a toxic belief system will not change their mind and will, in fact, only radicalize them and make them double down on those toxic beliefs. That's why the two ends of the political spectrum have been growing more and more extreme in the online space, because both sides are harassed by the other side so they double down and become more radicalized. Bullying doesn't put a stop to the harm caused by someone's toxic beliefs, there's a high chance it'll worsen it. So I can't even condone the bullying of "bad people", because it's been proven to be counterproductive to the betterment of society.

Also, since it's so hard to determine whether or not a claimed "wrong" has been committed by the target of a harassment campaign to begin with, it's best to just reject those campaigns on principle, so that there will be less later proven innocent victims. The outrage narratives are meant to make you not question and, a lot of the time, as soon as someone has questioned what was going on, it's come to light that the harassment was just bullying and the "crimes" we fabricated by a small group of people who like to launch these campaigns for the sake of clout or just for the high of "taking someone down".

So, you're right, anon, cyberbullies are not actually about protecting people or even some belief system, they just use the idea of defending something as a justification and smokescreen for their actual intentions, which are just to bully someone, and also to "recruit" people into their cause. Cyberbullying works the best when you can get an actual mob going. But, I don't think Chloé Stans are in it for the clout. I do think you're right that it's about their highly conditional moral code, and the condition is how they feel about a particular thing. This is why even people with a "valid reason to raise concerns" are suspect to me, because you can twist anything into being about the children when, in reality, it's about that person's own personal feelings about a character. And that’s in addition to the possibility of their arguments being fabricated.

People who are out to change media to suit their personal tastes think that they experience emotions differently from others, that theirs are more real and painful and important. "Chloé has to be redeemed because her being the antagonist she's always been hurts my feelings!" The implication that Thomas Astruc deserves to get harassed because he said something generalizing that hurt Chloé Stans’ feelings is all about this narrative based on hyper-individualism.

Modern western society is very individualistic. The good thing about this is that we're more likely to defend our rights. We think: "We exist, so we matter." The bad thing is that some people take that thinking to the extreme with: "I am the only person who truly exists, I am the only person who truly matters, and so everything should cater to my personal preferences or it's Objectively Bad and Morally Evil." Hyper-individualism, or toxic individualism, basically means that you experience the world around you so stuck inside your own head and your own emotions, that empathy and sympathy become impossible and you might even consider yourself above normal society. This mostly only happens online, though, where the idea of “society” and “other people” feels less real anyway, so we get entitled fans harassing content creators on twitter to make their ship canon etc.

#media and fandom response #cyberbullying #this is now an anti bullying psa blog I guess

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redsector-a · 3 years

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AO3 Ask Game

I was tagged by @themarshalstale which, thank you so much! I feel like I always get missed on these (I know why, it’s been 84 years since I published anything but still). 1. How many works do you have on ao3?

46 it seems. Which...look I’m slow man so that’s not surprising. lol Also crippling depression does not make for much production, at least for me.

2. What’s your current AO3 wordcount?

309662 according to the stats.

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

So do I could only AO3 or in like life? lol I suppose it should only be on AO3 since this is an AO3 ask game. Hrm. Basically AO3 can be summed up as: Marvel (in several iterations - all Avengers related) Torchwood Highlander But isn’t it more fun to consider my entire fandom life, which, I’m sorry, I’m old so...yeah. Not all of this is was published and beyond that a lot is not available anymore...which is likely for the best. Highlander Star Wars Babylon 5 Ronin Warriors/Samurai Troopers Marvel (again, several iterations also of note Avengers and X-Men both count) Torchwood Star Trek LOTR Stargate (SG-1, SGA) Mortal Kombat I dabbled with the idea of Potter fic but never got past the ideas stage.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1: You rearrange me till I’m sane Clint finds himself spiraling into a deep depression after the Battle of New York...until the Winter Soldier ends up saving him and inadvertently giving him a new purpose – to save the man that the Soldier had once been – Bucky Barnes. Not one to be outdone, the Soldier decides that his new mission is to ensure that Clint remains alive himself. Protecting a blonde man with a self-destructive streak is somehow very familiar to him. Through the back and forth of who is saving whom they cross the country and learn more about themselves and each other – and perhaps find a reason for living. 2: Five Dates Bucky Didn’t Realize He Was on And the One He Planned Himself To say that Bucky was surprised when Clint kissed him was an understatement. But it was nothing compared to the shock he felt when he learned they'd been dating for months without him realizing it.Clint gets whisked away for a mission before they have time to talk and Bucky is left to figure things out on his own - hindsight being 20/20 he can't help but wonder how he missed things the first go around.

3: Puck Luck Bucky Barnes is used to the ups and downs of an NHL season. He's used to the unpredictability of the game, knows that bounces don't always go your way, but that doesn't make a broken hand in the final third of the season any easier to deal with. Especially not when he ends up with an impromptu roommate/personal assistant in the form of one Clint Barton - his agent, Natalia Romanova's (rather attractive) friend he hadn't known existed before his injury.

It's just for six to eight weeks - what could possibly happen in that span of time?

4: Loose Lips Launch Ships

Based on the following prompt: “We go to school together and I think you’re cute and apparently you’re also the pizza delivery guy and my little sibling opened the door screaming hey sibling! you know that kid you’re in love with? you really weren’t kidding when you said his jawline could cut steel holy shit-” Bucky is the pizza delivery guy. Clint's younger (foster) brother has a big mouth.

5: Indelible Bucky Barnes has a pretty decent life – a good job, good friends, a cat that adores him - but something is missing. He’s always found body art to be beautiful and inspiring, and on a whim (and with the hope that maybe he can find what he’s missing) he decides to take the plunge and get a tattoo. That's how he meets Clint Barton. Clint's talented and compassionate and there is an instant spark between the two of them. It's not long before Bucky finds himself wondering and wanting more from the relationship despite the ghosts of the past that crop back up. Because Clint makes him feel normal in a way he truly hasn't for years...

(this was pre-Alpine so I was totally chuffed when canon confirmed Bucky’s status as a crazy cat lady (affectionate).

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

I really really really want to do it but I often times don’t end up doing it. There are a few reasons. First, I am akwward AF and bad at interaction adn I feel like just saying thank you would be...not enough? Second - I often times tend to like...turtle (aka retreat into myself) when life gets Too Hard/Busy which happens a lot to me (sigh) and then I miss the vague window in my mind in which it would be okay to respond and then it’s even more weird. I do love and cherish all of them. Like there was one months ago that made me go “hmm...I didn’t think I was going to do a sequel to that fic (You rearrange me till I’m sane), timestamp glimpses sure but a sequel hadn’t come to mind” but then the comment made me think! So...who knows? lol Anyway, I literally have been rereading some in an effort to try and get myself going again. Know that if you have commented, I love you.

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

At the moment? Probably: Look at you look at me Bucky's in love with Clint - problem is he's really not supposed to be. For Winterhawk Week 2019 - Forbidden Love (I really don’t want to give away the spin in the fic but...if you’re familiar with the Secret Avengers Vol 2 run circa 2013ish (aka when SHIELD initially ‘took control of the team’) that’s a bit of a hint as to the spin). Were it done, Torch Song would be up there. ;) Torch Song Clint is sent back in time, via an alien device, to 1938. While he tries to figure out how to get back home, he takes up singing and entertaining to make ends meet and does his best to not disrupt the timeline.Then he meets a 21 year old Bucky Barnes. --- A torch song is a sentimental love song, typically one in which the singer laments an unrequited or lost love, either where one party is oblivious to the existence of the other, where one party has moved on, or where a romantic affair has affected the relationship.

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

Does *wanting* to write crossovers count? lol I want, so badly, to do more crossovers and fusions (which...are kinda deeper versions of crossovers in a way). The only one I do have posted is a crossover between Highlander and Torchwood -

The Immortal Mr. Jones A series of vignettes (some long, some short) in the life of the newly immortal Ianto Jones. My most ambitions project that I have been working on since late 2011/early 2012 is a fusion of the Avengers with Stephen King’s the Stand. I will get that done at some point *shakes fist* The Stand, for those who don’t know it, is an epic 1000+ page novel about a flu epidemic (I know) that wipes out over 99% of the population and then two figures representing Good and Evil pull the survivors in two directions for a showdown. So basically it’s a non-powered modern AU set in that universe. It’s a passion and comfort project. lol

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Yes. Well, minor bitching back when I was in a prior fandom because I tagged a pairing in a fic but it was pre-slash and not labeled as pre-slash. I got hate on...I think it was Torch Song? And I’ve gotten hate on tumblr re me and my fic in general as well. Fandom! *jazz hands* Oh! And I’ve also been hit by those reviewers within Winterhawk (among general Clint pairings actually) who like rate you on either number scales or the “meh” scale. Which isn’t hate exactly but...it’s passive aggressive bullshit because I can’t believe none of them realize at this point that the authors can see their bookmarks - you know?

9. Do you write smut?

Yes. Do I write it well? I have no idea. lol

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I am aware of. Well...there was, I think, one of those reposting sites that had a few fics on it but I don’t think it was being passed off as someone else’s? I can’t quite recall. It’s why I have a note on AO3 about reposting my work anyway.

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

Not entirely, but sort of. Let me explain - I am part of a PBEM game; which for those unfamiliar since it’s a term that was most heavily in use 15-20 years ago, in which you basically do a round robin type writing thing but rather than everyone writing the same characters you write your own characters and you play off what other people have done. Another way of looking at it is it’s basically DnD without dice and written down rather than done out loud. You also don’t have to all be around at the same time. It’s a lot of fun and yes I have been in it for 20 years even though there aren’t many of us left but they are some of my dearest friends and fabulous writers. Wins all around. One of the other writers and I have actually toyed with the idea of doing a co-written fic actually, mostly because we work super well together and keep getting ideas for things but can’t really do them as rpgs since the pbem style isn’t used much anymore.

12. What’s your all time favorite ship?

Winterhawk probably. Though, let’s be real - Han & Leia are epic and amazing as are John & Delenn (from Babylon 5).

13. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Does wanting to expand The Black Stallion books as a wee child count? lol Not much of that was written save for world building ideas but there was a great oral tradition of telling stories to my friends. Otherwise...maybe a tie between Star Wars and Highlander. Star Wars was a love since I was super young but the writing bug didn’t hit me until around the same time Highlander was a thing as well.

14. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? You rearrange me till I’m sane for sure. Though Torch Song, if it were finished, would be tied I imagine (I suck at picking favorites). Honorable mention to Puck Luck and Indelible. Tagging: I have seen this like a million times (okay 5) so I feel like everyone has been tagged already that I know. But...I guess... @vexbatch @crazycatt71 @heartonfirewrites and @disruptedvice sorry if anyone has been tagged before.

#icyredfics #writing #winterhawk #long post

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