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leofrith · 1 year

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A Critique of ACV: The Last Chapter (SPOILERS!)

I wanted to hold off on sharing my thoughts about the new content until I’d given The Last Chapter time to breathe, because I was honestly hoping that maybe if I gave it some time, I wouldn’t dislike it so much. But the more I think about it, the more I find things to dislike about it. Which is why what started out as a quick write-up of my thoughts immediately after playing The Last Chapter has now spiraled into this very long critique that got so long I needed to add subheadings to break it up.

Sorryyyyy.

I’m basically spoiling everything from The Last Chapter here, along with Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla and parts of its expansions. I also briefly mention a few other Assassin’s Creed games, mainly Odyssey and one of its DLCs. My point being, if you don’t want to know anything then please look away now. Or don’t. But I know I would have appreciated a warning before diving into this mess. 💀

As a disclaimer: this essay is not meant to be an attack, nor is it meant to place blame squarely at the feet of Darby Mcdevitt, or any of the other writers or developers involved with the game. There are so many moving parts in a game as expansive and with as much add-on content as Valhalla, and I can only guess what happened behind the scenes that brought us to this point. I don’t know who wrote what, who made what creative decisions, and I therefore don’t feel comfortable placing blame on anyone in particular. I have never worked for Ubisoft and I can therefore only speculate about their internal culture based on what has been leaked from the company over the years. Furthermore, this is not an invitation to personally attack anyone involved in the development of this game on Twitter or wherever else. This is purely an attempt on my part to articulate why me and so many other fans of Valhalla and of Eivor feel so profoundly emotionally betrayed by this ending, as well as outline some factors that I believe contributed to the way the game was mishandled.

So. I think I had already accepted when the trailer released back in September that something like this was going to happen. I had already done my mourning for the fact that Eivor would never get the send-off she deserved, which is why I think I’m a lot less upset than I would have been otherwise… but that doesn't make this suck any less. The Last Chapter was completely underwhelming, it was emotionally unsatisfying, it completely butchered Eivor's character, it felt incomplete, and rushed, and it felt more like a teaser for Mirage than anything close to the conclusion Eivor’s story deserved.

The (Character) Assassination of Eivor Varinsdottir

When we first meet Eivor as an adult, she is overconfident, brash, and she has just gotten in over her head and gotten both herself and her crew captured by the enemy. She is in the 17th year of a quest for revenge she has been in pursuit of since she was nine years old. She has spent more than half of her life hunting Kjotve, the man who stole her parents, her clan, and her childhood from her, and is fully prepared to die if need be to kill him. She is an orphan who was taken in by the Raven Clan after the slaughter of her own people, and she considers these people to be her new family. Her love for her family and community are central to Eivor’s character right from the beginning. While she learns and grows past some of her flaws throughout the game, her love for her community and her loyalty to them is what sticks with her.

Eivor also starts the game carrying an immense amount of shame for how her father died, laying down his axe in the hope that the rest of his clan would be spared, only for he and most of his people to be slaughtered anyway. Through her time spent acting as a leader to the Raven Clan–first as a warrior and later as their Jarlskona–Eivor finally understands by the end of the game why Varin did what he did, because she realizes that she would make the exact same choice to protect her people. Eivor, too, would choose to die in “dishonor” if it offered even the smallest chance to save her loved ones.

Eivor is the reincarnation of Odin; she carries his memories and his thoughts, unbeknownst to her. She has visions and prophetic dreams and hears his voice in her head, but spends much of the game not understanding the meaning of it all. The part of her that is Odin pushes her toward chasing personal glory, toward the pursuit of knowledge, toward selfishness. But she chooses to abandon all that in favor of the people she loves, even as Odin rages and screams insults into her ear and calls her a coward–the one thing she has always been most fearful of becoming. Odin is a representation of everything she has been told to value in life, and she is (literally) pulled in the opposite direction by Sigurd, Randvi, Hytham, Valka, Gunnar, Soma… everything else.

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Eivor never truly seems to grasp the meaning of her connection to Odin, Sigurd’s connection to Tyr, Basim’s connection to Loki, or anything about the sages or the Isu at all. Not in the base game or in any of the DLCs. She never really acknowledges it explicitly until The Last Chapter.

Put a pin in that.

Family and community are central to Eivor’s character. Loyalty is central to Eivor’s character. Honor is central to Eivor’s character. That’s why it makes absolutely no sense for Eivor to drop everything, seemingly out of nowhere, to go back to Vinland alone and live out the rest of her days learning from Odin, the part of her that she explicitly rejected at the end of the main game. And it certainly doesn’t justify Eivor deciding to leave Ravensthorpe in the middle of the night without a farewell, regardless of who she supposedly said goodbye to offscreen. It doesn’t justify her completely sudden and out of character decision to walk away from her clan, her family without a true goodbye. Eivor spends the entire base game acting as Jarl in Sigurd’s stead in everything but title, because Sigurd has all but completely abandoned the clan in order to chase his own ambitions, only for Eivor to supposedly do the very same thing? No. It’s completely incongruent with her character and actively contradicts facts that were established in the main game.

There are so many other inconsistencies, including the fact that I highly doubt Valka–the same Valka who we saw warn Eivor against digging too deeply in her visions in the intro to The Forgotten Saga–would simply accept Eivor departing for another continent to delve deeper into her visions. But the way they miswrote Eivor’s character was particularly glaring. There could have been a version of the last chapter in which Eivor's motivations actually made sense, but that version needed so much more evidence for it to be believable. Reading between the lines is one thing, but expecting players to accept the conclusions you’re feeding them without planting any seeds beforehand is just lazy writing. [insert “HE WOULDN’T FUCKING SAY THAT” meme]

The RPG structure is the root of all evil (I know just… hear me out on this)

I think applying an RPG structure to Assassin’s Creed was a mistake, and have thought so for a while, but not really for the reason you’re probably thinking of. The “but we’re reliving another person’s memories in the animus, so how can it possibly make sense to allow us to make choices that affect the narrative?” reason. My criticism of the addition of choices is mainly this: I think that by trying to “expand” the story by adding RPG elements and dialogue options, they instead ended up severely limiting themselves. Because the problem with adding dialogue options to Assassin’s Creed is they can never take those choices to their conclusion. They can never truly have consequences.

Trying to tell a linear story with a non-linear structure like this doesn’t work, or at the very least, it hasn’t worked in Assassin’s Creed thus far. Odyssey came closer, I think, because it had multiple distinct outcomes and player choices actually had an affect on the trajectory of the plot (Mostly. Hi, Legacy of the First Blade. I’m coming for you in a minute.). Odyssey's multiple endings present a different problem entirely in the context of Assassin’s Creed because despite the input of choice, there is still a canon version of the story and a canon ending. It leaves those players that arrived at a different outcome feeling alienated, and like their choices were incorrect or simply didn't matter.

But in Valhalla, all roads lead to more or less the same destination and most decisions have no impact on the trajectory of the story. The problem that arises from this is that players will make their choices and expect some sort of payoff, as they should. But they won’t really get it. As per Darby McDevitt, for example, Sigurd always goes back to Norway at some point, regardless of whether a player ends up with the “good” or the “bad” ending. Sigurd returning to Norway is a fixed point and the timeline will always course correct, so to speak, to reach that end.

(Thank you @/vikingnerd793 for the screenshot!)

Everyone gets more or less the same version of The Last Chapter, with the siblings’ interactions only varying slightly after the “bad” ending to reflect the fact that Eivor and Sigurd haven’t seen each other in a while. But even with the tiny variations in dialogue that exist, a few changed lines in a scene that doesn't last any longer than two minutes still fail to make Eivor and Sigurd's supposed off-screen reconciliation feel even remotely earned. Ubisoft wanted to offer “choice” while not following through with emotional payoff for those choices because they only wanted a single ending. Even if a player ends the main game with Sigurd deciding to stay in Norway as a result of Eivor’s “betrayal,” the consequences of that to their relationship are never truly explored.

Having only one ending with no variations in an RPG means that they couldn’t address any of the plot points that could have been affected by player choices. Interpersonal conflicts are watered down or only vaguely referenced. They couldn’t truly address the state of Eivor and Sigurd’s relationship because that would depend on what endgame the player reached. They couldn’t give Randvi an actual goodbye because some people didn’t romance her and therefore it might feel “forced” to those people, despite her being a major character. Vili–despite apparently being Eivor’s best friend–can’t appear because for some people, he’s busy being the Jarl of Snotinghamscire. There is no true emotional follow through for any of the choices made throughout the game. The end result is a goodbye tour consisting of Aelfred, Guthrum, and Harald, three people who Eivor has little to no emotional attachment to, but whose roles in the game are fixed no matter what choices the player makes, which means they’re safe to use. To be clear, Hytham’s role in the narrative is also fixed, but the reason I separate him from the other three is because he is actually emotionally significant to Eivor. His goodbye, unlike the other three, feels earned.

To be clear, I don’t place the blame entirely on the writers for this because, as I’ve said, they were given a franchise that revolves around linear stories, told to put dialogue options into it, and make sure all those choices still lead to the same conclusion. As an extension of that, they brought back people who worked on the base game two years after its release to tie up loose ends that should have been dealt with years ago. I wouldn't be surprised if those same creators have all since moved on from this story and its characters, both creatively and emotionally. It's been two years. Even longer than that since they actually worked on the game. I wouldn't fault them for not having the same enthusiasm they once did. But the end result is a last chapter that feels almost completely devoid of emotion, and ties up absolutely none of the loose ends that most people would expect from a permanent “goodbye.” It fails to reach the emotional highs and lows that a conclusion with two years of build up should have.

Which now brings me to Randvi.

Oh, Randvi, now and forever shackled to her map table.

I know this will be a hard pill to swallow for a lot of people, but I always suspected that they would never actually follow through on making Randvi and Eivor's relationship canon despite the fact that it is indisputably the most fleshed out romance in the game. They are hinted at right from the beginning, in the form of Randvi’s clear dissatisfaction with her marriage to Sigurd and in Eivor’s lingering gazes. It is the only romance option in the game that has any effect on one of Eivor’s core internal conflicts: remaining loyal to her brother. “The wind calls [her] back to Randvi” after almost every single regional arc, whether players choose to pursue a romance or not.

But Darby McDevitt Official Headcanon or no, I never thought Ubisoft would "force" another romance after the backlash from Odyssey's Legacy of the First Blade (I told you I’d come back to it). I truly believe the company will and has happily suffered criticism from the Queer community for forcing a relationship on gamers who played Kassandra as a lesbian. Kassandra who, prior to the DLC, also never shows any interest in starting a family, or becoming a mother, or “continuing the family line”, as would become Ubisoft’s flimsy correction to the storyline after the criticisms started rolling in. But I highly doubt they would be okay with alienating the bigots who seem to form the loudest portion of their player base. That would be too much of a risk to their bottom line.

To me, the romance plotline in Legacy of the First Blade was the inevitable result of Ubisoft wanting to tell a linear story with a non-linear structure. I think they did so without thinking through the implications of letting players choose their character's sexuality, only to then backtrack on it later because they needed Kassandra to have a baby. And what they seemed to take away from that was only that all forced romance is bad, without grasping the nuance of why that particular forced romance was so bad. This isn’t to say there should be any forced romance at all but that it should have served as a lesson of why one shouldn’t make a game with so much emphasis on player choice, only to take that choice away and even retroactively nullify those choices when it suits the needs of the plot. But that wasn't Ubisoft's takeaway. So in Valhalla, they pulled back. They made all player choices matter just a little bit less.

Eivor and Randvi’s relationship is inarguably handled with more care than any of the other romances in the game. It is inextricable from the narrative, whether it is a romantic relationship or a friendship. But despite any amount of blatantly obvious subtext that exists, Valhalla is still an RPG and the creators cannot confirm or deny any of the choices as correct or incorrect. And because they have to cater to all possible endings, they cannot address Eivor and Randvi’s relationship in any capacity because it might be misconstrued as being forced. Despite every overt piece of evidence that exists, Valhalla is still technically an RPG and at the end of the day, plenty of people did not choose Randvi. No amount of narrative director headcanons or heavy subtext will change the fact that Randvi is a seemingly meaningless choice in a sea of meaningless choices, and has now remained so permanently.

Ubisoft just really sucks as a company, actually

Everything that I am about to say in this section (and honestly, most of the next one as well) is conjecture because again, I don't know how certain creative decisions were reached behind the scenes. This isn't just about Randvi, or about Eivor's sexuality. It’s also about Ubisoft’s long and storied history of internal misconduct and suppression of marginalized voices. It's about Ubisoft's history of employee abuse in general. It's about the fact that Ubisoft suddenly decided to let players choose their gender, but only once they finally got around to making mainline titles starring women. Syndicate’s Jacob and Evie share the role of protagonist, and would have also shared equal screen time if Evie’s role hadn’t been significantly minimized throughout production in favour of her brother. Aya was originally meant to replace Bayek as the main playable character early on in Origins, but was later reduced to a side character who is only playable in a few missions throughout the game. Aya, the founder of the Hidden Ones. The order that would later evolve into the Assassins. The order that is the namesake of the entire franchise, just to be clear. Odyssey was originally conceived as Kassandra’s game, before the developers were made to allow players the choice to play as Alexios. Every female protagonist in the franchise thus far has been minimized in some way, and Eivor is unfortunately no different.

Assassin's Creed is a huge enough brand at this point that they could have easily released Odyssey with only Kassandra, and Valhalla with only Eivor. But instead of taking a "risk" and doing just that, they added the male options to cater to a small but vocal minority of misogynistic piss babies who don't want women to exist in their video games, period. At least, certainly not as fully realized characters with personalities and thoughts and feelings of their own. That would require acknowledging women as people, rather than as identical playthings that mostly exist as a social stealth mechanic for them to hide behind when they need a cover.

It’s especially funny because it was such a futile effort. That very same group of people was never not going to complain about Assassin’s Creed going “woke” for having female protagonists, even if they were optional. Those people were going to complain no matter what, and they absolutely have as evidenced by the fact that they've been having a conniption on Twitter for the past few months now that Eivor is suddenly getting even half of the attention from the marketing team that Havi has gotten for two years. The comments section on every official social media post featuring Eivor is a sea of people complaining about how “female” Eivor being canon makes no sense, how her voice sucks, how she is just the result of Ubisoft pandering to a “woke” demographic. The “fan” response could not be more blatantly misogynistic. What’s more, Ubisoft bases the trajectory of their games at least partially on fan responses. It’s a toxic feedback loop of them making creative decisions built on sexism and the fans responding in turn.

Ubisoft deciding to implement gender choice as a mechanic didn't happen because they suddenly had a change of heart after happily ignoring their female players for years. It happened because they got busted for the "women don't sell" comments and the company's history of burying sexual assault allegations, and because they finally caught on to the fact that catering to gamers that aren't cishet men might actually be profitable. And it wasn't for lack of trying from the devs within the company because again, Origins was originally conceived as being Aya's game, Evie and Jacob were at the very least supposed to have equal screen time when development on Syndicate was in the early stages, Elise's role in Unity was also reduced... you get the idea.

Letting people choose to play as a woman or letting people choose to play as a Queer person is great. But it's an obvious cop out when your company also has a history of suppressing those very same voices, has done next to nothing to remedy the toxic company culture that encourages that behaviour in the first place, and when you've been dragging your feet as a developer about making your games even just a bit more inclusive for years. It’s an empty gesture when those female characters need to be watered down just enough for their male counterparts to make some amount of sense in the story, and when the marketing for the game hides them away like some kind of shameful secret.

Suddenly making games starring female protagonists because you’ve realized that it might be profitable, while also making it optional anyway, isn’t exactly the win for representation they seem to think it is. Especially when the marketing favours the non-canon, male protagonists so totally that most people would assume Eivor and Kassandra are skins of their male counterparts. Because heaven forbid the poor baby boys have their escapist fantasy shaken if they have to play as a woman who’s better at getting girls than they are. Making your representation optional makes your representation look half-assed and while I absolutely adore Eivor and Kassandra, I mourn what they could have been if their stories were allowed to be fully theirs.

Perhaps I’m being overly harsh and Ubisoft simply decided to implement gender choice in Valhalla in good faith. I honestly wouldn’t care if I thought it had, or if AC games had always allowed players to choose their gender. But considering the company’s history, and considering the game’s marketing, I somehow doubt that. Especially when, in their first game featuring a canon male protagonist since before AC pivoted to RPGs, they are not giving players the option to choose their gender.

Hi Basim.

Now don’t get me wrong. I obviously understand why Mirage doesn’t allow players to choose their gender; Basim is a pre-existing character, and it really wouldn’t make sense. But it is so transparent that they are willing to jump through narrative hoops to explain why Alexios is playable as the Eagle Bearer, but the same thing can’t be done for Basim. I suppose the importance of coming up with convoluted reasons as to why your protagonist’s gender is so easily changeable fades away when you’re not trying to replace a woman.

But what’s this? By God it’s–it’s Mirage with a steel chair!

The final content update for Valhalla feels like a teaser for Mirage. Full stop. If you think I'm being too harsh or unfair, then that's your prerogative. But in The Last Chapter, in the long-awaited conclusion to Eivor’s story, we don't even get to play as Eivor. The entire questline (if it can even be considered that much) consists almost entirely of cutscenes, which we view through Basim's perspective while Eivor is relegated to a side character. It’s a collection of Eivor’s memories that are supposedly filtered by emotional intensity, as Basim puts it. Grief, longing, sadness: all emotions that I fail to see being presented in the memories they gave us, at least for the most part. For the first time in Valhalla, we are voyeurs to Eivor’s memories rather than experiencing her life through her own eyes. The role of the animus user in past Assassin’s Creed games has always been pretty unobtrusive, but The Last Chapter constantly reminds us that Basim is there and watching. "Animus magic," as Basim calls it, was less of a necessity to the plot and felt a lot more like Ubisoft's marketing department gone awry.

I'm thinking about what Basim says at the end of the base game, when he is in the modern day and speaking to Eivor's remains. When he says, "I can take from you anything I want... your memories, your skills, your secrets. They're all mine." It's so ironic because he really stole Eivor's ending right out from under her, and I would have to laugh if it didn’t suck so much. It's all I could think about while I was watching Basim flippantly scrub through some of Eivor's most "emotional" memories which for some reason include… saying goodbye to Guthrum, a character we spend very little time with in the grand scheme of things, and who Eivor has next to no emotional attachment to. I understand the desire to tie up loose ends in terms of the historical events that were happening around this time, and they absolutely should have done all that because Assassin’s Creed has always been, in part, an exploration of history. But it should not have happened at the cost of providing closure for characters who were such significant figures in Eivor’s life.

I thought the Roshan quest was fun and I loved her and Eivor’s dynamic, even if we only got a small glimpse of it. But it was development time that could have been spent on wrapping up Eivor’s narrative instead of making another timeline agnostic add-on stealth mission in a game that has always had notoriously janky stealth mechanics. I look forward to seeing more of Roshan in Mirage and can now rest easy knowing that she is going to survive to the end of that game (although I cannot fathom why they decided to spoil that so early on). But they used what was apparently very limited time to give us a quest, very clearly a nod to Mirage, that does more to promote their next AAA title than serve the narrative of Valhalla.

Using the ending of a game to lead into the next is fine and is to be expected. But that transition should not come at the cost of a resolution for the story you're leaving behind. And really, it seems there was far more thought put into Basim and William Miles' first meeting than how Eivor came to the decision to leave for Vinland.

I think Basim is an incredibly rich, complex character, and it will be interesting to see what direction they take his prequel. But as someone who has actually been really excited for Mirage, the way they've dealt with this transition between games has left me feeling so conflicted, not least of all because of how quickly Ubisoft dropped the ball on Valhalla as soon as Mirage was announced. I’m not sure I’ll be able to look at everything we will be gaining with Basim in the next game without also feeling bitter about everything we lost with Eivor. It’s not terribly surprising, since Ubisoft has never treated Eivor’s character with any amount of respect; not in the marketing, and not in most of the post-launch content that has come out in the past year.

The post-launch that launched absolutely nothing

Darby has now said that The Last Chapter is meant as more of a direct follow up to the epilogue of the main campaign, to be played right after Gunnar's wedding. This is why they didn't feel the need to show a goodbye between Eivor and her people; the wedding functions as a sufficient goodbye to the Raven Clan.

But even if that was even remotely satisfying, it doesn't explain when Eivor came to accept her role as a sage, a role that she has yet to understand by the end of the base game, even if she is perhaps beginning to question it at the very least. It doesn't explain why it was never truly addressed in any of the some 100 plus hours of content that have been released for this game since then. It doesn't explain why Eivor and Randvi might finally pursue a relationship, only for Eivor to suddenly pick up and leave for Vinland, alone and permanently. It doesn’t explain why Eivor would leave for distant shores without saying goodbye to Ljufvina, or Vili, or Stowe and Erke, or Broder, or Oswald and Valdis, or Swanburrow, or any of the many other people whose relationships Eivor cherishes throughout the game.

If anything, The Last Chapter being played immediately after Gunnar's wedding and the rest of the Hamtunscire epilogue makes it even more important for Eivor to say goodbye to her people, because that whole arc only cements Eivor’s devotion to her people, as well as how much her “encounters” with Odin have shaken her faith. Even then, that doesn't even touch on when or why she came to the decision to leave in the first place.

Due to a “play anytime” approach that Ubisoft–for reasons I cannot even begin to fathom–decided to take with all the post-launch content for this game, all DLCs for Valhalla are exactly that: they can be played at any time. They go to great pains to avoid spoiling story points from the base game, they rarely make references to events from the base game and, perhaps most critically here, they don’t build on any of the plotlines of the base game.

Remember that pin we stuck in Odin earlier? Hi. He's back.

None of the DLCs released in post-launch–from Wrath of the Druids to The Siege of Paris, to smaller, free additions such as the River Raids–touch on Eivor’s connection to Odin or her understanding of it, or any of the other potential threads left behind by the base game. Other more mythologically inclined entries like the Mastery Challenges, Dawn of Ragnarok, and The Forgotten Saga scratch the surface of it, but never dig deep enough for Eivor to put two and two together. Even in the Odyssey crossover with Kassandra, who has intimate knowledge of the Isu and their artifacts, Eivor remains completely clueless about her role as a sage despite it being the perfect opportunity for her to learn more.

At no point is Eivor shown to make any wild revelations about her Isu heritage that could justify her decision to leave. There is a gaping hole in the narrative where that development should be, and therefore the jump from “everything else” to “I’m older now, and I want to learn from the god who lives in my head,” is unearned and comes from completely out of nowhere. The DLCs could have remedied this easily by giving us deeper insight into how Eivor interprets her visions, specifically how she interprets her relationship to Odin. They could have dug into how and when she comes to terms with that connection, and the same could be said for how she comes to know about all the other sages, including Harald, who Eivor and Sigurd suddenly seem to know about being the reincarnation of Freyr despite not seeing him in more than a decade and never mentioning it before. But they can’t, because the DLCs are playable at any time, and therefore cannot discuss things the player may not yet understand.

The brevity of this DLC was especially jarring, even as someone who went into this with low expectations. Because after two years worth of updates, including some sizable free ones, I thought that surely Eivor’s conclusion would be considered important enough to receive the time and attention it deserved. After all, Kassandra got her own surprise ending in the form of the Crossover Stories, announced completely out of nowhere two years after the last DLC for Odyssey was released. After all the time and effort and love that clearly went into that crossover, it seemed reasonable enough that the ending for Valhalla, a game that was still being supported, would have the same amount of effort put into it, if not more. Instead we got a barely there wrap-up that lasts maybe 45 minutes at most, if you’re being generous, and fails spectacularly at offering the catharsis that should be a no-brainer in a story where the main character’s death has been a mystery to be unraveled, right from the beginning.

Eivor is dead. She has been dead for centuries, buried across an ocean from everyone and everything she knew in life. The how and why of Eivor’s burial site is a question that follows us through her entire journey and throughout the entire game. One that was never resolved… until now, with some vague notion about leaving everything she has worked for and everyone she holds dear behind in an attempt to find herself, all with the help of an entity with whom her relationship has been tenuous at best. Eivor decides to banish the part of her that is Odin because she doesn’t like that part of herself. That second soul, the part of her that values personal glory above all else. Even in The Last Chapter, she describes Odin’s memories as “malicious.” So why backtrack so completely?

I have no idea.

It’s possible the developers weren’t given enough time to give this final chapter the breathing room it needed to make sense. It’s possible they had lost enthusiasm, and just wanted to rip the band-aid off and get this thing over with. It’s possible Ubisoft wanted to cobble together the scraps of a potentially satisfying ending so they could say they did it, before turning all of their attention to their next title. As it stands, I wish they had just left Valhalla alone, with an open ending, instead of providing a non-answer that feels like an afterthought. An incomplete conclusion to a story and a cast of characters that many of us still care so much about, but Ubisoft seemingly gave up on long ago.

Eivor deserved better.

The Raven Clan deserved better.

Valhalla deserved better.

We, the fans, deserved better.

If you actually read this far then there is a good chance that you also need therapy

This whole affair really reminds me of the last time I felt this profoundly disappointed by a piece of media I loved. It reminds me of how I felt after watching the second season finale of The Mandalorian, when it hit me that the whole season had just been a series of various cameos and fan service moments that only made sense to the plot at a stretch. It hit me that I had just spent the previous eight weeks watching the show runners completely sideline their main characters–Din Djarin and Grogu–and lose the plot in favour of promoting future Star Wars projects. When it seemed like all the good writing in the show previously had been entirely accidental. But the major difference between The Mandalorian and the ending of Valhalla is that I knew there would be another season of The Mandalorian to potentially patch things up and pick up on some of the plot threads that were dropped. For Valhalla, this is it. There is no more content upcoming that will patch this up and, in hindsight, there are plenty of other things added to this game in post launch that I think would have also made me feel the same way I feel right now if I knew they were the last piece of content we’d ever see.

Am I overthinking this? Perhaps. Am I being melodramatic? Probably. But to me, this ending for Eivor feels like yet another perfect example of what happens when corporate interests are allowed to dictate creative decisions.

I say all this as someone who has and will continue to defend a lot of Valhalla’s faults, because if writing this whole thing has done anything, it has served to remind me how good the core narrative of the base game really is. It has depth, it has heart, and I hope that other people who enjoyed it as much as I did–and are as disappointed by The Last Chapter as I am–are able to reconcile the beauty of Eivor’s character arc in the main game with the way it was seemingly undone in The Last Chapter.

I’m trying my very best to not let this ending retroactively take away all the joy I’ve found in this game for the past year. And in spite of how negative this critique has been, writing it has actually really helped me do just that. Because in writing this critique, I was also looking back on Valhalla’s narrative, its highs and lows, its major plot points, and I was re-watching clips. A speed run of Eivor’s greatest hits, if you will.

I was reminded of why I connected so strongly with Eivor in the first place. I was reminded of her strength, her kindheartedness, her love of children, her wit, the poetry of her dialogue, her sense of duty. I was reminded of her rage, her single mindedness, her sense of loyalty that is often to her own detriment when she offers it to those who don’t deserve it. I was reminded of her character arc from someone who spends so much of her life on a single minded quest for revenge, to someone who becomes a beloved leader to her people.

I was reminded of the Valhalla sequence at the end of the game, a sequence that still makes me cry just as much now as it did the first time I played it, if not more. When Eivor, who has spent most of her life feeling nothing but resentment and shame toward her dead father, finally learns to understand why he did what he did. When she understands why he laid down his axe, the very same axe she holds now, in the futile hope that his daughter, his wife, and the rest of his people would be spared, only for most of his people to be slaughtered anyway. When Eivor has finally realized, through years of acting as a leader to her people, why Varin did what he did, even in opposition to everything she has ever been taught to value. When she has grown enough to realize that she too would make the exact same choice her father did, her cowardly father, because she too would die in dishonour if it offered even the slightest chance to save her loved ones. When Eivor, who has spent her life trying to justify her existence by being useful, finally accepts that her parents died because they loved her and not because she didn't do enough. When Eivor is holding the very same axe now that her father held then and the High One himself is offering her wisdom and glory and power and she, like her father before her, drops her axe and turns her back and chooses love instead.

That is the version of Eivor I will remember. Not the hastily cobbled together ghost of her that we saw in The Last Chapter.

#this ending and this review is the reason i start therapy next week #like i mean not actually. but the timing lined up pretty perfectly did it not?#the main problem with assassin's creed is that it has potential to explore some really interesting ideas and concepts #but it's also owned by one of the most shit for brains companies i have ever fucking seen #anyway now that i've purged this from my system i will not be thinking about tlc ever again #unless anyone specifically asks #and for shitposting #and writing fix-it #because as we all know my hubris knows no bounds and my track record for finishing things i start is stellarrrrrr /s #assassin's creed #ac valhalla #eivor varinsdóttir #eivor varinsdottir #eivor wolfkissed #ac spoilers #ky posts text #this is a writing tag #ac.txt

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hazel-of-sodor · 4 months

Text

What's Lost is Found

Ch.19 Embrace

Other Stories

Other Chapters

Tendrils shot forward and the younger 47xx yelped as she was dragged clear off the rails and into her older sister's embrace, her crew diving to safety. The Uman crews just laughed as they helped them up.

"I thought you scrapped." Screech rumbled, tears of midnight black falling onto her runningboard with an acidic sizzle.

Tyto laughed unbelievingly, "You thought I was scrapped. We saw you scrapped!!"

"They didn't do a good enough job."

"Obviously." Tyto laughed, joyful tears were streaming down her face. "We thought you were gone forever."

Abbey was the first to catch on. "We?" She asked.

"Oh right!" Tyto smiled up at Screech. "Yes, Flying Scotsman rescued me and Eagle, along with several other Westerners from Cashmoore's, before taking us to Caomhnóir."

"Caomhnóir... Is real?" Enid asked, not quite daring to hope.

"Yep!" Tyto chirped, "he's good too. Scotsman was only able to give him a few hours notice but he had places for all of us."

Screech reluctantly set her back down onto the rails in front of her, although she didn't let go yet.

"Eagle and I are North Western engines now." She said proudly. "Our controller has already announced he doesn't plan to follow the modernization plan."

"The Other Railway can't be happy about that," Becca observed.

3219 snorted, "They really aren't, but the island has a history of home rule, and the Suddery council is backing Sir Topham Hatt."

"You are safe then?" Screech asked softly.

"As safe as we can be," Tyto said happily.

"Then I am content."

"Sir Topham Hatt is trying to get another of our siblings, but the Other Railway is being stubborn," Tyto explained.

"Same with us." Enid chimed in, "We've been trying to buy more engines for months, but we're blocked at every turn."

Tyto frowned, "We'll tell the others so they can pass it on to Caomhnóir, he may be able to help."

"Why not tell him yourself?" Blaidd asked curiously.

"I'm not sure which engine he is," Tyto admitted. "...or even if they are a he. Some of the others I've met said they were saved by a female engine. Honestly, it might be multiple engines."

"You didn't see them?" Enid said disappointedly.

"Only for a moment," Tyto explained, "and even then I'm not certain. I was barely awake when they directed Duck, a 57xx that's friends with Caomhnóir, to take me and Tyto to the works. Besides it's better if I don't know."

"You can't give away their identity if you don't know it." Una guessed.

"Exactly." Tyto nodded grimly, "the Other Railway is desperate to catch them. None of us that were put back into service know who they are at first. I think a few have since found out, but they feign ignorance either way."

3219 nodded, "One of the Other Railway's inspectors was almost killed last month. He tried to set a trap for them but almost got crushed. If Thomas had not been there..."

"Thomas?" Screech asked with a frown, the name was oddly familiar.

"Our No.1," Tyto explained, "Tiny little tank engine, like smaller than a 1400 small. He's got a little branchline running up into the hills. Cheeky to everyone, but a good sort with an almost Western work ethic."

"Ah," Screech said in realization, "My driver used to read some books about him to their daughter."

Tyto snorted, "Don't mention those to him. He had an accident a few years back when a cleaner fiddled with his controls. He ended up stuck in a house and needed his buffer beam and runningboard rebuilt. For some reason the author of those books wrote it like the whole thing was Thomas's fault."

"I take it he's not the author's biggest fan," Abbey said with a grin.

2319 laughed, "Apparently he wouldn't speak to him for a month after that. In any case, he barely snatched the inspector out of the way in time. The Fat Controller was furious."

"Fat Controller?" Miss Morgan asked.

"Sir Topham Hatt." Tyto clarified, "Apparently the engines called his dad that and it passed to him when he took over."

She frowned, "he really was angry at that incident. The North Western hasn't had a human death on the railway in decades and that was almost ruined by the inspector."

"You said human deaths," Screech noted.

"Trucks," Tyto and 2319 said in unison.

"Ah."

#ttte fanfic #rws fanfic #fanfic #U&D #U&DR #Uman and Din #Uman and Din Railway #eldritch #eldritch train #eldritch engine #engines that go bump in the night

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medakakurokami · 2 months

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I don't get why people stuck with gacha games in general like I'm not trying to maliciously throw shade here but mobage always truly seemed to me to embody actually self-destructive game design making all their ideas worse by nature.

Like I may have always felt the odd man out that I never got hooked on them, but now I feel the odd man out that it's strange I think they're actively *bad* games compared to their full priced alternatives.

Maybe people are just settled in with their stories and characters in mobage they like and have long since stopped caring or maybe even acquired a taste for the infinite grind and generally heavily automated gameplay

Is it not the same problem as live service games? Like why do we give paid $60 live service singleplayer games shit, if that model can make genuinely good experiences then why is it an issue?

Like I know I come across as a contrarian sometimes but I just like what I like and I try to like all sorts of games even if I think I won't like them. I think the closest I've come to enjoying a mobage is Priconne and that was, like everyone else playing, just for the art and characters and storylines. I didn't play much more than a month though because the gameplay loop was a soul sucking tedium, and now it's been discontinued so even if I wanted to power through to go see more character stories, I can't!

Which is another huge problem with mobage! I can think of at least 3 mobage I got temporarily invested in and are now defunct. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think there's any way to play those? Talk about delisted, there's no way to pirate or emulate those games. Even in paid titles that can happen with multiplayer titles, MMO's, and the very rare single player game, but that's almost a certainty with every mobage. We've seen some developers move their mobage off platform like Rockman X Dive and Grisaia Chronos Trigger. We also see them making full price console games like Little Noah and Azur Lane. I honestly sincerely hope this becomes the norm so that more people can experience the art that actually goes into the mobage but without the inherently anti-player designs put in place.

I know a lot of people still complain about mobage so maybe I'm beating a dead horse or preaching to the choir. But it just felt like recently we have just lost all pushback. This might be coming from a place of privelege cause I got the cash to buy paid releases consistently as I see ones that interest me. But I feel like if I went broke and had to choose between mobage and just emulating GBA games on my phone, I'd still be on the latter 100%

Edit:

I guess my question to mobage fans is like. Do you just not care about the infinite grind, FOMO, inevitable closing of the game, limited game mechanics, gacha and paywalled content, etc etc etc

Or do you see it as an inevitability of mobage and a capitalistic genie that could never be put back into the bottle, and you enjoy the mobage for what good they do have despite these issues being unresolvable

#long rant post sry

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choiliner · 5 months

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Alright, so about the whole Made In Abyss situation, I shared some of my opinions here, but I've been looking into it more closely so I could finally make up my mind about it. I don't really stan any of the idols involved in this controversy except for Soobin, so he's the one I'll be talking about, but I guess some of this might be applicable to those who only mentioned watching the anime.

I'm putting this under a read more bc it's long as fuck but anyway. I'll probably repeat myself a lot but I'm just trying to organize my thoughts. If you plan on coming for my head please read the full thing first.

First of all, once again, the whole "he said he does NOT recommend it" argument is not valid for me at all. As I've said before, just the fact that he mentioned it as something he was enjoying at the time is enough of a recommendation to most fans. Let's stop using that as an argument.

I watched an interesting deep dive about the anime where she talks about the controversial content, and I also took the time to read some long comments people left under that video. From what I've gathered, most of the problematic content is used in a way to make you see it as wrong and fucked up, much like other pieces of media have done multiple times before. The biggest problem is the use of children in those scenarios. Even though it's for shock value, it seems to be something that most of the people who enjoyed MiA have a big problem with.

It also seems that 99.99% of the people who have enjoyed it, enjoyed it for the world building and the main plot (the main character going into the abyss to look for her mother). I've watched/read some reviews (not linking them bc they're in Portuguese) and most people only really talk about these aspects, and how scary some parts are. When the problematic parts are mentioned, it's to complain that they aren't necessary and shouldn't be there. They acknowledge it's problematic and make it clear they're uncomfortable with that. It's a general consensus that people didn't like the problematic parts and they agree that they should've been removed. I got the same type of reaction/opinion from my friend's friends who watched the anime in question.

I've seen multiple people saying the Korean version of the anime is heavily censored to remove all the pedophiliac content. I've seen multiple (Korean) people saying they've watched it and it had none of those things that are being brought to light. I've seen people claiming that many of the things that are being brought up are actually from the original manga and the movie (which allegedly wasn't even aired in SK). Reportedly the 15+ rated version was being aired (and highly popular) in SK at the time. And to be honest, like I said in previous posts, if you remove all the problematic parts and you enjoy scary stories, then the anime sounds like a great option to watch.

"Soobin said once he watched 18+ rated animes, therefore he was DEFINITELY watching the original version": I don't think that's something you can claim for sure. 18+ doesn't always mean sexual, too. Plus, apparently even the 19+ rated version of the anime is censored in SK to remove the problematic parts?? So idk.

Even if he were watching the 19+ version, like I said, I haven't seen anyone who enjoyed the anime and DIDN'T have a problem with those problematic parts. Everyone seems weirded out by it. Plus, from what I've gathered, the more """subtle""" problematic parts are things you only really notice if you're watching it critically.

What's getting to me the most is: 1) He mentioned it over a YEAR ago, and somehow NOBODY cared about it at the time. It was only brought to light NOW, and it's only now that people are seeing a problem with it and pointing out what's wrong with the source material — something that went over everyone's heads at the time. Wouldn't anyone point this out earlier? 2) Would he honestly come out and say he's enjoying the anime on a livestream to thousands of watchers if he were watching the original version with all the gross CP stuff? Being an idol (and the leader of one of the most prominent groups we have in 4th gen, under one of the biggest kpop agencies), he's usually very cautious with what he can and cannot say. We've seen it before, and that's enough for me to think it's most likely not the case.

"Nobody should be promoting the work of a pedophile", yes, you're right, I agree with you 100% there!!! But I don't personally run a background check on the creators of every single piece of media I consume, and most people don't either. I don't know jack about the writers of most of the stuff I've watched. I highly doubt he'd go researching the background of the writers of everything he watches, so I don't think it's fair to hold this against anyone as an argument to cancel them.

I'm all for holding our favs accountable, I think it's important to call them out. I've unstanned people before because of problematic behaviors that made me feel like they didn't deserve the time I was putting into them, things that made me feel disgusted by them. But most of us have watched shows/movies with problematic themes, and it doesn't mean we condone them in real life. Of course, there's a limit and I wouldn't support someone actively enjoying basically CP, but considering everything I've said above, I genuinely don't think that's the case. In my head it doesn't make sense at all for me to think he'd just be like "heyyy I like borderline CP content it's so interesting <3", considering how much BigHit/HYBE is always up their asses when it comes to maintaining a good image.

On the other hand, I still think he shouldn't have mentioned it. As he said it himself, it's disturbing (which is what that word translated as "provocative" meant), so even without all the CP stuff it's still not something he should've mentioned by name to an audience of mostly young fans, a majority of which are very impressionable. It's even worse if he was watching the 19+ version even if it's still allegedly censored in SK. If I remember correctly, he has mentioned animes without mentioning their names before (or maybe that was just once? I'm not sure), so he could've just done that.

However, I personally don't think there's enough reason for me to unstan him, at least for the time being. After doing research for hours on end and doing my best to think logically and objectively, it doesn't make sense for me to do that.

Of course, you are entitled to stop liking a celebrity for whatever reason, or even for no reason at all. It's your right, there's nothing wrong with it, and please don't let ANYONE tell you otherwise!!! But if you decide to unstan, please let's be level-headed about this and not go around throwing people under the bus without knowing the full story. You can call people out and dislike them without being disrespectful towards others. And please don't go around calling people pedophiles, that is a VERY heavy word that shouldn't be thrown around so lightly.

I did my research and I'm still reading/watching stuff about it, and I think it's important for everyone to do the same rather than jumping on an extremist bandwagon (be it to defend or to condemn anyone). Your opinion is always valid as long as it is yours, not someone else's. I'm just sharing mine, and you have a right to disagree if you want to, but let's all be civil about this, alright?

You're free to mute Soobin's tag or even unfollow me, if you want. I'll keep him out of my blog for a few more days, probably, considering how fresh all of this still is.

#🌙.txt

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gloriousburden · 6 months

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Ok not to talk about that series, but i just gotta say that i can’t help but be… i don’t know, i guess grateful? that marvel decided to let this mischaracterization happen to the variant™️ instead of to our loki. (since we all know that it would happen eventually because they don’t care about his character or anything he’s been through. hence his characterization in ragnarok too.) but i do mourn what our loki could’ve been everyday. and how much he deserved a solo project or even just another thor movie that would’ve dived into LITERALLY ANYTHING about him. there was so much potential, but instead they killed him off because they needed someone to open up the doors to the multiverse or literally whatever tf.

the series could’ve been about literally anyone. that’s just how non loki centered it is despite it literally being called LOKI. i hate that they’re trying to push this variant as the “new loki”, and that our loki is “irrelevant” and “flawed” now when he literally was perfect before he was killed off (and before ragnarok.) if this was what new “loki” content would consist of, they should’ve just let him go since clearly no one at marvel understands anything about him anymore.

(oh and not to mention that they originally wanted to kill loki off in the dark world, which actually explains a lot.)

also this is sort of unrelated to the original rant but i just gotta say that i really and truly wish that lokius/mobius fans would stop acting as if they’re so much more morally superior than sylki/sylvie fans. neither of them actually understand loki or care about him, and they both need to stop claiming that they are loki fans. because in reality, they’re just fans of the variant and who they can ship him with. if they actually understood loki, they would dislike the series as much as the rest of us do. it’s written by people who don’t get anything about loki besides…

“haha he’s thor’s younger brother who’s jealous and so evil… he commits evil acts JUST for the fun of it and without any true reasoning. oh and he’s such a narcissist guys… it’s not like he’s been trying to prove himself (mind you this is something an actual narcissist wouldn’t feel they have to do btw. but since the writers couldn’t see through the Very Obvious facade that loki puts up in response to the way he’s been ignored, belittled, neglected, etc… they think he’s a narcissist.) to not only odin, but to everyone else around him in the first two movies he was in. and since he’s privileged, it must mean he can’t have any kind of struggles and is overreacting. yass put him in a time loop where he continuously gets physically assaulted 😍 that’ll show him for sure.”

and then sylki/sylvie fans, and lokius/mobius fans will ignore how bad this writing is, just because loki was dumbed down enough to be shipped with their mediocre ass characters. if you can ignore the VERY OBVIOUS mischaracterization of loki’s character, then you are not a loki fan. you’re just a fan of the series and the characters in it. both lokius and sylki shippers are Um… not that great to put it kindly, but lokius shippers specifically have this weird superiority complex over sylki shippers/sylvie fans in general even though they ALSO don’t really know one thing about loki’s character outside of the mischaracterization from the series, and from fanon.

anyway putting this gif here because it’s cute and one of my faves ^_^

#loki #anti loki series #anti lokius #anti mobius #anti sylki #anti sylvie #loki meta #loki series criticism #anti ragnarok #ragnarok critism #loki series negativity #loki deserves better #mcu loki #anti loki show #loki show critical #loki show criticism #loki series critical #loki ��#2011 2013 loki supremacy

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mercurytrinemoon · 10 months

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DOJA CAT AND THE POWER OF ECLIPSES

I've seen a lot of discussions surrounding Doja Cat recently so I thought it's the perfect moment to talk about her chart and how of a great astrological example she is. So let's goooo

Diving straight into the topic of her fame, Doja's MC falls in her 11th whole sign house, ruled by the Sun, which is placed right at her ascendant. This means her career is strongly tied with groups of people and the internet and her image and persona plays a big role in her success. Her Sun is also conjunct the north node, which underlines the luminary's presence and lights it up even more - makes her shine, so to speak. On top of that, she was actually born around 2 days before the solar eclipse - and eclipses seem to be important in her life.

With that in mind, let's look back at a past event that helped her skyrocket into fame (and one of my favorite astrological cases).

In 2017-2018, at the age of 22, Doja went through her 11th house profection year. Now remember I said her MC falls in her 11th house so it's going to be extra special in terms of recognition - on top of it being about friends, fans and internet.

On August 10th 2018, she self-released a song titled "Mooo!", which later became a viral internet hit. Just a day later there was a solar eclipse in Leo, her 11th house. Jupiter also happened to be in Scorpio, right on top of her Venus. Interestingly, her progressed Venus was getting super close to her natal Jupiter at that time (so we had a some sorts of a double whammy with Venus-Jupiter aspects).

I guess you could say that, once again, astrology worked.

We now know what triggered her fame. But what makes her so multifaceted, quirky and cameleon-like then? Her chart shows someone who gets easily bored and has way too many creative ideas: Mercury in her 1st whole sign house (which explains why so many people thought she might be a Gemini rising) and Sagittarius Mars in the 3rd house. Mercury gives her the constant need for trying new things, trying on different masks and personas, as well as making her a little mischevious. Sagittarius Mars is probably one of the most bratty and outspoken Mars placement to exist - place it in the 3rd house and you get not only a sharp tongue, an incredible wit and a creative mind, but also someone who's not afraid to speak up for their beliefs or calling people out on their bs and can potentially be, well, "canceled" for it (also with a malefic in the 3rd house, I've read she dropped out of school, which makes sense). But what doesn't kill her makes her stronger, as she has a domicile Jupiter co-present with it - that adds to the preachyness that she's often displaying. The other malefic, Saturn is also attacking her Jupiter with a square and Moon with an opposition, which can point to some sorts of resistance or judgment from the public. Either way, all eyes are on her - and the more people find her controversial, the more she's looked at.

Speaking of controversies, for a few years now she's been under the influence of Uranus, which was hovering around the middle degrees of Taurus and opposing her Scorpio Venus. This could very much be one of the factors of her booming success and her unpredictable moves - especially those involving how she presents herself, her fashion and the visual content she's been releasing. As of right now, Uranus is finally moving away from those degrees but I checked her transits from last year when she shocked everyone by shaving off her head (I mean, personally I'd say you go, you, but the general public is dumb as per usual) and astrology did not disappoint. At the very beginning of August, when she broke the news with her new look, that Uranus was tightly conjunct Mars and the south node. This speaks of a sudden cutting, a sudden reinvention - and one that is far from the conventional. It was opposing her Venus, which not only rules beauty overall but her ascendant as well (her body) - she literally cut her hair and cut herself from the old, polished look. Jupiter was also in Aries, opposing her Mercury and trining her natal Jupiter - and since it's a planet of freedom, she did something that she felt was freeing for her. Jupiter said "live your truth".

Doja's a Libra, an intellectual sign that thrives on ideas, but one that is ruled by Venus, which makes people subconsciously expect it to be balanced and "easy on the eye". Keep in mind her Venus (the dispositor of her Sun and the ruler of her ascendant) is in its detriment, which can add to the friction between what she likes and what others find appealing. So people expect her to be a certain way and when she doesn't fit that "perfect" image, she's being met with slander. But with Venus in Scorpio - a planet that is so important in her chart and one that went through a Uranus transit - she's just channeling that darker, mysterious kind of stylistic theme, as this is far from being a bubbly placement.

And what's next? As Uranus is backing away from the opposition to her Venus, it's starting to trine her Moon, which she has natally. So I wouldn't be surprised if, well, she keeps surprising the audience even more.

She also wiped out her instagram account just a few months ago, around the time of Sun-Jupiter conjunction and the eclipse that happened at 29 degrees of Aries - opposing her Sun and ascendant. Soon the nodes will change their signs and we'll step into eclipses in the Aries-Libra axis for a couple of years, so I'm already curious what she's going to present to us, especially during the upcoming Libra season.

#astrology #mercurytrinemoon #astro notes #astrology notes #celebrity chart #doja cat

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masonscig · 1 year

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can i ask why people in the fandom seem to really dislike mishka? (censoring her name and such) this is not meant in an offensive way to you or to anyone else, i’m just new here and kind of confused. like did she do something legitimately wrong or are people just irked by the writing of the new book? hope you have a great day <3

OH yeah sorry i can definitely see how that's confusing to new people LMAO

so, it's a bit of both imo – i've been here since 2020, shortly after book 2 dropped, so my perspective is a lot different than newer fans

so, one of the reasons i censor her name, is because tumblr changed the search functions – used to be, when you looked up something, it was only things that were in that exact word order in a tag – so if you spelled t/w/c wrong in some way, it'd only show up results that were misspelled, if that makes sense

but now, it's like if you look up any word, random posts that mention it anywhere in the post will show up too – and i would rather not open myself up to the m*shka bootlickers bc i just do not have time for that LMFAO

i rarely maintag things these days because i just don't want to be perceived by so much of this fandom, but that's just a me thing

also, in terms of what she did "wrong"... on top of problematic stuff in text, there's a few things i can think of off the top of my head:

encouraging white/washed art by reblogging on to her dev blog while knowingly having the official skintone palette locked behind a paywall (patreon)

when called out for the above, they did vet their pieces i guess – by only reblogging black and white pieces, and art of detectives. then they stopped reblogging art completely

posting a white hand for a morgan instagram edit – and taking hours to delete the harassment in the replies, some of which being actually racist comments with slurs pointed at black people

in a q&a video, referred to m as an "attack dog", which was super insensitive, considering the consistent comparison of m to an animal across all platforms (text, tumblr posts, patreon content)

her treatment of f over the years, both in text and outside of it. her asks were a huge reason that the fandom has an infantilized view of f and they don't even consider them to be a love interest (much less one that gets physically intimate). they see them as a child. this bullet point is a massive one that would take too long to explain. i could probably write an essay on how problematic it is to immediately "other" your singular black character by literally making them an otherworldly alien, but i do not have the time

how she writes nb/trans characters. from what my friends have said who code dive, they get the same dialogue and variants that women do. obviously if you don't code dive or play with nb characters you probably wouldn't notice, but there are a good chunk of people in the fandom who play with nb oc's so... this is something that should be better, but it's not

to add to the above, she said she was getting sensitivity readers but... did they do anything? look at book 3 and tell me if they actually did anything (i have a feeling maybe those sensitivity readers were white queer people)

overall, it's very hard to explain and condense the fuckery my mutuals and i have seen both m*shka do over the years, and what her fans have let slide/incidents they've coddled her up during.

sadly, she doesn't take hard stances on things. she just lets things happen and that just. doesn't bode well if your argument for all these mistakes is "ignorance". if she's getting 10k a month on patreon plus sales (not to mention the fact she's a grown ass woman), then... it's the bare minimum to ask for her to be mindful of her audience and to do better.

and also book 3 sucks xoxo

#the last line was a joke btw i just thought it'd be funny LMAO #TY FOR THE ASK I HOPE U HAVE A GREAT DAY TOO <3 #i know i have other asks to get to but i jumped at this one bc i should probably clarify this for anyone following me LMAO #but yeah all in all it feels like the fandom is back at square one bc of rampant whitewashing #no im not tagging this as fandom critical this is m*shka critical #also i'm not linking receipts or anything bc it's exhausting – ask anyone and they can tell u im not lying #IF THERE'S ANYTHING ELSE I MISSED SOUND OFF IN THE COMMENTS HATERS <3333333 #asks

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howlingday · 6 months

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Hey Howling, thanks for the advice before! I know asking questions isn't how most people expect advice, but it does work since it forces us to sit down and think a little bigger.

So thanks for that.

I guess that brings another question/advice/opinion I've been meaning to ask you.

When it comes to creating content to share, whether fanfic or original, what motivates you?

Cuz' the more serious I tend to get about an idea, the more I freak out about how much of my own personal time I inevitably start devoting to it.

Which is great in one sense... cuz I get lost into my wondrous world of writing headspace...

... and short little drabbles, and silly prompts are great fun! I really do enjoy them!

But when it comes to fanfics, swimming super deep in the depths of my untethered imagination honestly scares me...

Because who knows if all my effort will be shrugged at and forgotten by the fans or other creators, when I could have been doing something original...?

Or if... when I finally do stick my head up out of the depths of any fandom...

...I'll find that back in the real world, above the surface, the tide of my life will have changed, and I'll realize how much the shore has shifted and moved on...

... alongside my loved ones who will have made new memories without me, every time I insisted on spending just a little more time diving deep, as they never had the urge to go exploring with me...

... all because I was so focused diving into the fandom of someone else's waters.

Sorry, if it got a little heavy, (and I get it if this doesn't get posted), but as someone who gets lost spending months at a time thinking up of new ideas, I wanted your insight on what makes fanfic writing worth it.

Small prompts are fun and a great way to use time, but lengthy-novels and time-consuming art?

What do you think?

Oof... Really aimed right at a very tender and sensitive weak point of mine, to be honest.

But first of all, I'm glad my advice helped you out with your thought process for building your world.

Now, I'mma be really real with you about the whole "time" thing. One of, if not the most absolute worst thought I could ever think of is "how much of my time was this really worth?" Because one thing I find myself often being during my "slumps" is a nihilist. I'll be in my groove, popping out funny ideas and neat little plot points when BAM! I ask myself "What is this all amounting to? Is this something that's going to matter in ten years? Or five years? Next year? What am I going to do in the real world?"

THIS IS THE POTENTIALLY WORST MINDSET YOU COULD POSSIBLY EXPERIENCE.

What helps me out of it is to, well, keep doing it. Get my idea out there and see how much people love it. Keep going at it, build yourself and your style, and learn from your prior mistakes and the mistakes of others.

As for the OTHER aspects in my life, it boils down to numerous factors, because on top of the multiple dozen drafts of asks I have saved for later, I also have my job, my stack of video games to beat and or give up on, my 3000+ YouTube Watch Later list, my MMA classes, and whatever I've got planned with my friends. I remember in college, there was a critical thinking class that said,

"YOU DON'T MAKE TIME, YOU BORROW IT FROM SOMETHING ELSE."

I see the small prompts, incorrect quotes, and spitposts as just fun little writing exercises to just get out there. Definitely play around with them if and when you can.

I hope the advice I gave helps and didn't just sound like me whining. Honestly, the best way to get good at all aspects of writing, including planning, dreaming, and actually writing is to keep doing it. And kinda let it all blend together in your life. If I see or hear something funny or inspiring or just plain awesome, I'll pop it into an incorrect quote and send it out! People love it? Great! No? Oh, well...

But always, always, always...

KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!

#my thoughts #my advice #my answers #writing #me #my life

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crush3dmary · 8 months

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Pissgate? Oh?

Okay so I got 3 asks about this so it's time to spill some tea. This is some of the most insane drama I've dealt with in the Tales fandom to date and that's saying something. No holds barred here, I'm sharing this all because I don't have a ton of tales people following me here anymore lmao.

So this story goes back to 2020 when I was writing my fic absurdities and echoes, which includes a torture scene. To put it one way, it kept going in uh, directions I didn't want it to go (read: Zelos kept ending up with a finger in his ass) so I decided to do a spin off fic to get All That out of my system. The fic was initially supposed to be a one off horny thing but it eventually evolved into a whole Bad End AU where the crestoria party are sacrificed to Kasque and Aegis is kept as the personal pet of the twins. It's called Abominations against God if you want to look it up but to be honest you probably shouldn't, and don't read it unless you read the tags. Anyways, in abominations, I was trying to think of ways to humiliate Aegis so I ended up making him piss himself which was an accident, no pun intended.

So anyways, I wrote that, and a now ex friend who isn't relevant to the story was like "that was hot can you write one with Vicious" and the perks of being my friend is that since I have no limits I'll write you whatever freaky shit you want. So I wrote a Vicious piss fic, dropped the google doc in the group chat, and jokingly said "PayPal me 30 dollars and I'll post it". Someone actually did, and I'm a they of my word, so I was like fuck it we ball and posted it on anon.

Now enter the bane of my fucking existence and two of the biggest pains in my fucking neck for the last 3 years, two big name fans who we will call S and K because I don't do subtlety and I don't care if they see this. If you are active in the English twitter crestoria sphere you will almost certainly have encountered them. Anyways, these two are the definition of hypocrite purity wankers. They go on and on about freaks in the fandom and how disgusting all the r18 content is, but then they post monsterfucking smut on an alt ao3 account. I wish I could make this up. So anyways, I posted my anon fic, and then someone else posted an anon piss fic right after in solidarity which was cool. But then S and K take to twitter and complain about all the "unsanitary" content, as they put it, in the ao3 tag. I can't speak for the other one but mine at least was tagged thoroughly and you knew what you were getting into when you clicked it. Basically it was a stupid thing to complain about because if you don't like the content you can just not engage with it. They had their little hissy fit, I ended up blocking them later for being a pain in my ass, and the story ends there right? Wrong!

I have another, also unrelated friend who's into piss and I wrote something for them for their birthday and I was like "I'm not posting this because of what happened last time". They said they had a piss fic they wanted to post, and that they'd post theirs if I posted mine. So I was like, cool, let's do this. Solidarity! And OF COURSE, guess who has a problem with it?

S and K go on a tirade about all the disgusting fics in the tag again and how the crestoria fandom is full of sex crazed freaks or whatever (which is again really rich coming from people who pearl clutch and then post smut on an alt account in the same breath). In comes anon #2 again, who dive bombed in with their own piss fic the first time, posting another like the absolute legend they are. However, in the author's note they put something like "proud to be one of the 3 people keeping the crestoria tag horny" in reference to S and K's little temper tantrum... And this made them FLIP THEIR SHIT.

Literally, they freaked out soooo bad. They were talking about how because of this author's note people were stalking them and trying to trigger them on purpose and the most ridiculous shit. All the while... If you don't like the content and you KNOW that you don't like the content... What are you doing in the author's note? And people ROASTED them for that. Because none of this would have been a problem if they had just ignored it and moved on. But no, they had to open the fics up, look at the author's notes, and make a big stink about the whole thing just because they didn't like the content.

Eventually they locked their accounts for a bit when they started getting backlash but this is always going to be a big reason I will ALWAYS be on the "don't like don't read" train. Because you might not be into it, it might not be your ship, your kink, whatever, but it tickles someone's fancy, and you freaking out about how disgusting and degenerate it is will make the people who enjoy it think YOU think they're disgusting and degenerate. Do I have a piss kink? Honestly that's irrelevant at this point, but ultimately I support everyone's right to make whatever content they want and to have the people who don't want to see it utilize the block and mute functions. They're there for a reason.

Anyways, peace and love ✌️

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surreality51 · 1 year

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Hi, I just wanted to say your ask to Emungere is the reason I have fallen in to the Fedal rabbit hole - so thank you!! I would NEVER have looked them up if I'm not following the Hannibal fandom and her Tumblr. I know next to nothing about tennis in real life but two days ago I saw the hand holding and shirtless posts (among others) from you...My heart just goes to Rafa :D I am now completely converted and wanted to read/watch everything about them. Any suggestions where I should start? Thanks!

Welcome, anon!

I just joined two months ago myself, so I'm new too, but so far everyone on tennisblr has been lovely. I've also delved headlong into Fedal, and there is a ton of great content you can sink your teeth into. I'll put everything I know in this long post, but tennis mutuals feel free to jump in with more recs!

Tumblr peeps

Cool people to follow on tumblr <-everyone on @hubillusion's list is awesome

@tennisandlife is another awesome blog to follow, even though they stopped posting in 2020. I literally spent 3 hours going through their archive, there is SO MUCH quality Fedal content.

@tennis-out-of-context is also fun, although it's not exclusively Fedal content.

Books on Federer and/or Nadal

Rafa: My Story by Rafael Nadal and John Carlin. A must-read for any Rafa fan. Rafa in his own words, through 2011. What I love most is getting Rafa's insights into his own game, his approach and preparation for matches, his journey.

The Master: The Long Run and Beautiful Game of Roger Federer by Christopher Clarey. Probably the most comprehensive Federer biography to date, published in August 2021. Clarey traces the development of Federer from boyhood to 2020 in an attempt to figure out the how and why of Federer. Along the way you get a lot of insights into Roger's game, his team, but Roger himself still remains somewhat inscrutable and untouchable. Not unlike the man himself. If you contrast this to the confessional approach in Rafa, where you actually get into Rafa's head, you could make the argument that the distance in The Master is due to the difference between biography vs autobiography, but I also think it's very fitting for Rafa's personality vs Roger's. Still, given the challenge of the task, Clarey does a commendable job in attempting to unravel Federer. A must-read for any Roger fan.

Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal: The Lives and Careers of Two Tennis Legends by Sebastian Fest (2018). This was the third book I read, and I assumed that it would retread much of the content from the other two books, but I was pleasantly surprised. Sure, the book rehashes many of the key moments in their rivalry, such as Wimbledon 2008, but it also covers a lot of the behind-the-scenes things that the other two books don't--things like the ATP Players Council and Roger/Rafa's political fallout in 2011-12, Rafa's knee injuries and treatments, how the anti-doping measures impact players, etc. A good supplement that gives an interesting view into the challenges of being a professional tennis player.

I haven't read the following yet, but I'm hoping to get my hands on them soon:

Roger Federer: The Biography by Rene Stauffer

The Roger Federer Effect: Rivals, Friends, Fans and How the Maestro Changed Their Lives by Simon Cambers, Simon Graf

Fedegraphica: A Graphic Biography of the Genius of Roger Federer by Mark Hodgkinson

(I love Rafa, but you can probably guess which half of Fedal comes out on top for me)

Fanfics

I'm not going to recommend specific fics, but rather favorite writers on AO3. Any Fedal from these writers is awesome, you can't go wrong.

Mystivy - everything from mystivy is the best. I just finished reading the "Joy" series, which is simply beautiful. Only parts 1 and 2 are written; part 3 looks like it was never posted so it's technically an incomplete series.

emungere - you know emungere, so no need for me to explain how amazing her writing is. "Wild Card" is the fic I needed when I first dived into Fedal. You must be logged in on AO3 to view emungere’s tennis rpf.

rilla - "The Long Experience of Love" is probably my favorite Fedal fic overall, even though it's an abandoned WIP.

Serenade - mostly ficlets, but each one is incredibly insightful and makes you go "oof." “Tennis Is Not A Game You Play Alone” has my favorite line from any Fedal fic: Rafa met his gaze, dark eyes unreadable. "I would rather lose to you," he said, "than win everything in a world where you never exist."

eliane - I haven’t actually read any of eliane’s fics but I’ve seen multiple recs, so this is next on my to-read list. Must be logged in to read on AO3.

louise_lux - I also haven’t read any of louise_lux’s solo work, but I read the joint fics she co-wrote with emungere and they were fuckin’ hot. Also on my to-read list.

Video

Strokes of Genius - feature-length documentary of the 2008 Wimbledon final. You can find it on YouTube (here's one link but not sure it works. I watched it on these links: part 1, part 2, part 3) Also the Rafa and Roger bonus features.

Rafael Nadal Academy - 4-episode documentary series on Amazon Prime. Takes you into the daily life and operations of Rafa’s tennis academy in Manacor. You meet the staff there and follow the stories of 8 students who are pursuing their tennis dreams. And of course you see Rafa in the episodes too, but it’s primarily about the academy. I wish they would do a season 2.

The bazillion videos from 2017, 2019, and 2022 Laver Cup on YouTube. Fedal played doubles in 2017 and 2022, and were supposed to play doubles in 2019 but Rafa got a wrist injury.

Roger Federer: Everywhere Is Home: documentary of Federer’s 2019 Latin America exhibition tour, produced by ESPN: Vimeo

Roger Federer: The Reunion: documentary of the 2020 Match in Africa charity exhibition match with Rafael Nadal. Available for rent or purchase on Vimeo

NBC/Credit Suisse documentary about the art installation project that Roger was part of: Portrait of a Champion

Rafa Nadal Academy’s Instagram has tons of videos and photos of Rafa as well. Here’s a video about when Roger visited the Academy for its grand opening in October 2016. You can find other videos from the grand opening on YouTube, like the press conference and speeches.

I want to say that there’s a 20-min or 40-min documentary about Federer vs Nadal in the 2017 Australian Open produced by AO Films or something like that, but I can’t find it now. :( Maybe other tennisblr folks can help? Found it!

YouTube also has highlights or full matches online. I recommend 2008 Wimbledon final, 2017 Australian Open final, and 2019 Wimbledon semifinal, and their associated press conferences/interviews.

Miscellaneous

ASAP Sports Transcripts does the English transcripts of pre & post-match press conferences for multiple sports, including tennis. Here’s the archive of Federer’s press conference transcripts and here’s Nadal’s.

Rafa’s diary from his old website (copied by someone on LiveJournal for posterity).

I read somewhere that Rafa wrote a couple of tour diaries or blogs for the ATP tour way bay when as well, but I can’t find them. Tennis mutuals, any help? Is that the same as the link to Rafa’s diary from his old website?

Rafa Nadal Fans website - I haven’t really looked at this, but at first glance it looks like a ton of Rafa content.

Stalk Follow them on official social media accounts for Roger, Rafa, Severin Luthi, Rafa Nadal Academy, etc.

Tons of interviews and articles from major publications such as New York Times, Sports Illustrated, GQ, you name it. Just google “Roger Federer cover story” or “Rafael Nadal interview.” There’s also the tons of interviews and articles in Spanish, French (L’Equipe), German (Blick, Tages-Anzeiger), etc, some of which you can translate on Google Translate.

#fedal #roger federer #rafael nadal #at this point I've read over a thousand pages about the lives of these two idiots #masterpost #thank you for coming to my TED talk

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baronaliswritingcorner · 6 months

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How's It Going?

Yes, I'm alive! No, I'm not taking autographs. As you can see, I finally have a Tumblr! Took me what -- a solid decade+? Anyway...

Perhaps the first question from fellow Felannie/Three Houses fic peeps might be "How's it going?". My answer? Well...okayish.

Not terrible; not great. Just okay. I guess you could say to appreciate what I have, but between "I currently have absolutely zero willpower and confidence to further my writing -- a passion I've endured for nearly two decades despite the innate difficulties in autism/ADHD" and "my game journo career just up and evaporated after nine years of hard work", that's a tough balance. (Seriously, when it comes to fanfics, my mind's just an empty blank. Can't come up with anything. Zilch. Nada. Nothing. Maybe it's FETH burnout but it's like this for most anything.)

So then, why the "Writing Corner" name? Well, just naming it "Baron Ali" didn't sit with me, but I suppose you could say it's a reminder of my aspirations. In the midst of my retreat from writing, I've just been quietly playing video games and studying Japanese/piano, but I know I'm not really content with that. I could go and rattle off everything I want to do -- be it unimpeded writing day in, day out to proper time management to maintaining a proper sleep schedule *cough* *cough* -- but rather than pretend I have any grandiose expectations for this Tumblr, for now I'd like for you to think of this blog as a way to keep in touch with fandom.

As I refuse to crawl back to Twitter -- no judgement towards those who're still holding out, but I refuse to compromise my values on that front -- I confess it's been awfully lonely without the constant feedback loop of human connection, and Tumblr may well rekindle that spark. While I'm not writing in any "official" capacity, this may well bolster whatever's coming next, whenever that may be. Not a bad deal.

For the record, I keep my fandom persona "underground", so to speak. This proves a convenient outlet for unfiltered musings and the like -- and I'd love to dive into all that! -- but this means there's certain subjects (mainly my writing background) I can't dive into. Unfortunately for you Stella fans, I'm undecided whether said privacy'll extend to any pics of my lovable doggo. Rest assured, she's doing well! (And for the record, yes, I'm still maintaining my "No Discord/Gift Exchange" policy, so please no invites for either.)

So, yes, you can think of this name as a promised ideal. I don't think I'll be starting out with fics right away, but daily diaries and gaming opinions and the like will be a good springboard. Oh, and cute pics and gorgeous fanart and obnoxious memes -- am I doing this Tumblr thing right? I'm no good with HTML, so I'll be keeping things minimalist for now, but I would like to add some pages...

Anyway, see you around!

#catching up #pinned post #about me

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meeblo · 2 months

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MMMH how about... 7 (character you used to like but now hate because of fanon), and 8 (common fanon opinion you hate)?

questions from this ask game

7. what character did you begin to hate not because of canon but because how how the fandom acts about them?

To be honest, there aren't really any characters I outright hate or dislike due to fandom treatment of them. I'm fairly good at compartmentalizing in my head my interpretation of the canon vs what other people are saying; if the fandom has one prominent take I don't care for, I can usually just ignore it fairly well. I guess the closest character would be Suzuran. I haven't grown to hate her due to the fandom, but I definitely don't have any motivation to really dive that deeply into the events she's in for fear of being mistaken as part of That Crowd. There are a lot of red flags on "Suzuran fans" that I want to stay far, far away from. One of these days I'll probably reread and reevaluate Twilight of Wolumonde but mostly for the Mudrock and Folinic content.

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

There's a few widespread ones that are annoying. "Kal'tsit talks too much" is always tiring to see, because the Kal'tsit monologues in many story segments are often some of Arknight's most interesting explorations of its themes. Most instances of "I wish [character that is still alive in the story] died" are missing a whole lot of points about why they're still alive and what the game is saying with that. Honestly there's probably a lot more I'm just not thinking of right now but as said above I don't really put much thought into fandom stuff I feel is flagrantly misinterpreting the story, so not much is coming to mind even though I know I've seen a lot I disagree with.

#arknights #ask

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with-the-flickers-of-light · 11 months

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Ok, so.

[deep breath]

Since this is a Taylor Swift fan blog (even if it's one with zero (0) followers), it feels important to address my thoughts on the Matty Healy situationship.

Warning, this is going to be a post critical of the relationship. I absolutely do not believe that being a fan means that I have to support all of Swift's decisions. Also, content warning for swearing, light discussion of exploitative/abusive pornography, anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, and just general shittiness.

If you want anything tagged or fact-checked, please let me know!

Before diving in, my general thoughts on celebrity relationships:

As a general rule, I don't believe in speculating about celebrities' relationships. I am only really looking into Healy now since the publicization of the Swift/Healy relationship seems to be quite intentional at this point. And while I don't believe in holding women to a higher standard than men, or in erasing their professional achievements to gossip about their personal lives, I also believe that we as consumers get to choose who we support. Professionals are entitled to privacy, yes, but "privacy" is not a free pass to ignore moral wrongs.

For me, my basic stance is that I understand "The Man", but that many of the behaviors discussed therein should not be appropriate for anyone, whether a man or not. So no, this isn't about me being a misogynist and overriding Swift's professional achievements with gossip about her love life. This is about me pointing out that no one is free from accountability -- whether or not the media holds you accountable, somebody will.

I do believe the rich and famous have at least some responsibility to do good in the world. You have privilege, you have a platform. Hell, the world could refuse to ever give you another cent and you'd probably remain better-off for the rest of your life than most people. And especially if you choose to cultivate parasocial relationships with your fans, you have to realize that making shitty choices will feel like personal betrayals to them. As a celebrity, you know that your public decisions will be held under scrutiny and that they will impact the general population, because you hold influence.

And finally, on the nature of romantic relationships: I identify as aromantic-asexual, so I will be the first to admit that I do not understand all the urges that go into dubiously intelligent relationships. Nonetheless, I hold that while attraction may be involuntary, a relationship is a choice. (There are, of course, cases of abuse where the "relationship" is really not a choice on one side, but based on all we've seen I do not think Swift/Healy is one of them.)

That said, we arrive at the issue of Healy.

Healy is not the kind of person I am interested in supporting, financially or otherwise. I'm not going to list off all his crap -- it's well-known enough to be on Wikipedia at this point. (Which I hear is in a bit of an editing war? Never a good sign, y'all.) This post is about my response, because you can find the facts elsewhere (and you've probably already read them elsewhere).

If he was middle-of-the-road questionable -- like, if all he did was eat raw meat -- it could be excused. Whatever, I'm not going to ever be a fan of that, but I'm also not going to give a damn aside from doing a double-take at the headline and then sighing.

The licking fingers and kissing fans thing... that's. A, uh. It's a choice. That's the point where I'm kind of like... what? But sure, I guess you could argue that it's a morally gray area, because it's weird, and dubiously consensual, but I dunno, fans could be into that or something? Definitely not something I'm into, but pending further investigation on the case, I could bring myself to just roll my eyes at another trashbag.

And then we get into his recent, shitty statements. "It was just a joke/ironic/satire" is a bullshit excuse and in the year 2023, we all know it. If you're a celebrity who has a PR team, I sure as hell know that you know it. I am willing to forgive misguided jokes if they were from a bygone era and the offender has since apologized for the harm they caused.

Hell, maybe I could bring myself to accept the "ironic Nazi salute"; sure, maybe he was trying to bring awareness to Trump/Kanye-gate by drawing that parallel. I could convince myself that he really was acting in good faith, because there is a maybe possibly potentially decent outcome he could've been angling at.

To be clear, I don't believe it. I think we all know to not do the Nazi salute, even in satire.

But even if I did, well.

I am not willing to forgive Healy "joking" about masturbating to exploitative pornography of black women in the year 2023, without even an apology (to the best of my knowledge). I'm not going to speculate on whether or not he really was joking, but whether it was a fact or a joke, it's fucking disgusting. Whether it's a stage personality, a joke, an ironic comment, or satire, if it's you causing harm, then it's shitty. At best, it's ignorant and reckless; at worst, it's... I don't even know what to say. And again, in the year 2023, it's not hard to tell what could be harmful in said "joke" about porn, so I don't put much stock in the "ignorant" column.

There is no possible good outcome from a "joke" like that, which means there is no possible positive spin for me to try to play. There is no reason to be that shitty.

The evidence is clear and simple, and it leads to the conclusion that supporting Healy is not something I can be at all interested in or tolerant of.

What about the good things he's said?

Well, let's keep this short and sweet: human decency is not a transaction. Good actions don't cancel out bad actions, except for when the good action is a fucking good apology that genuinely seeks to make reparations for the bad action.

Okay, but why should Swift take responsibility for that?

Straight up, whether or not Swift is a "feminist" is irrelevant to this conversation -- this is the standard I apply to people regardless of what beliefs they claim (although it would come with an extra helping of hypocrisy if you do want to claim to support women and POC). What's relevant is that she has chosen to publicly and positively associate herself with a known piece of shit. And being in a relationship with Healy is tacitly supporting his views. There is no way she -- a self-proclaimed "mastermind", a "calculated/smart businesswoman" -- doesn't know this.

There is no professional benefit to associating with Healy, either. The David O'Russell movie could be hand-waved with "it was a professional opportunity". Where the Crawdads Sing could be reasoned away as "separating art from artist". But her dating life is 100% a personal choice. The only benefit to dating Healy is dating Healy. There's no other opportunity here, just the chance to spend time with and tacitly support a dirtbag.

(I know that she knows that "they're nice to me" does not magically make a shitty man a good person. You know how I know that? Because that's what she said during Scooter-gate. So there are no excuses here.)

She is a grown woman fully capable of cognitively processing the consequences of publicly supporting Healy. I don't care what she says in "Don't Blame Me", I am blaming her, because it's her own damn choice. She is making the choice, consciously and with no other benefits, to publicly take the side of someone known for racist and sexist behaviors.

And that's something that we can absolutely hold her accountable for.

Because at this point, supporting Swift is also tacitly affirming Healy's problematic behavior.

So how does this situation resolve?

There are 3 parties in this situation: Swift, Healy, and the fanbase. At least one of us has to step up and do better.

Swift could wake up, realize just how bad this is, and do better.

Healy could have an epiphany where he realizes just how bad his actions have been, and make a concerted effort to do better and make reparations.

We as a fanbase could walk away, because we are unwilling to tolerate the bullshit.

At this point, it seems kind of unlikely that wither Swift or Healy are going to change for the better. That leaves it up to us.

And now for the tricky part: deciding what to do as a fan.

Blech. It's easy enough to come to the conclusion that Swift's recent behavior has been unpalatable. It's harder to figure out what to do about that.

As fans, I know that there are a lot of emotions involved. There's the parasocial relationship that you want to hang onto; there's the importance her music may have played for you personally; there's basic appreciation for the technical construction of her work. And I know there's definitely the undying hope that maybe this is all a misunderstanding and maybe she really is better than this.

Either way, to me, there are 3 steps to getting clean from supporting problematic artists:

Stop public support. There's a time for silence, and there's a time to fucking speak now. Stop wearing merchandise, or repurpose it. Don't keep running a stan account as if nothing has happened.

Stop active financial support. Don't put money into her. Don't buy albums, merchandise, or concert tickets.

Stop passive financial support. That's streaming on Spotify, things where you might not be paying, but she's still getting money.

And then the final step is severing emotional connections. Stop singing her music for fun; stop listening to already-purchased music. I don't include this in the 3-step process because in my opinion, it's not a prerequisite to cut out a problematic artist's art to stop supporting the problematic artist (unless that art is reflective of their shittiness). What you choose to do in private without any interaction with the artist is your own business. It impacts no one but you if you continue listening to your existing downloads of Swift's music.

With all that in mind, for now, I'm not deactivating this blog. I'm going to let my queue finish itself off. And then I'm probably going to write a few reflections on some of her more questionable lyrics, because I do think there are some... interesting things in there that deserve to be discussed.

When all's said and done, though, this blog is probably going to go into indefinite hiatus, because I'm not interested in running a hate-blog, nor am I willing to continue running a fan-blog.

So. Yeah. That's where I'm at.

#taylor swift (critical)#matty healy (critical)#oh my god why was the suggested tag healy x reader slkjfddsf #swift/healy (critical)#essay (ish)#personal #not proofread #why am i like this

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something-about-sunflowers · 1 year

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Alright, this might be a long post so, fair warning lmao.

I realize my previous post may sound like I’m doing some deep dive conspiracy exposé or something, just getting out ahead of it: this isn’t that. This is mostly speculation and educated guesses. For the sake of clarity, this is just how I am reading the situation and may not, in fact, reflect what is actually happening (Even though, I’m pretty positive it is).

Disclaimer aside, I’m gonna get into why (I think) Izzy and the real living human beings who are fans of Izzy are getting so much aggressive hate. And why there’s so much inflammatory discourse around the character.

The gist of it is:

1. Its Ship War Bull Shit

2. The Entitlement

3. Silencing And Scare Tactics

4. We’re Not Falling For It

5. As Good Of A Solution As We’re Gonna Get (At Least Until Something Big Changes In Fan Culture As We Know It)

Now, actually Getting Into All That:

1. Its Ship War Bull Shit

Exactly what it says on the tin. I’m not saying and I don’t want to imply that everybody with their own preferred non-Izzy ships are the ones encouraging and participating in this behavior. What I am saying is that a non-zero number of, particularly Blackbonnet/Gentlebeard, shippers (though this isn’t unique to them) don’t like seeing other people ship Izzy with one (or more) of the characters in their ship. The same could be said for other fan favorites/popular ships as well. Jim, Lucius, Frenchie, etc. There is almost always another popular ship that the other party is involved in.

Though this does go beyond shipping as well. The way I see it, even people who don’t have ‘overlapping’ ships (or who don’t have ships at all and simply like Izzy on his own merit) are a target because of association with other fans who do. Whether that is actual interactions with said other fans or only imagined by way of them both being fans of Izzy.

This idea of a zero-sum game where, if people ship Blackhands that means there’s less people who ship Blackbonnet/Gentlebeard! (Or Ouizzy vs Room People, or Sprizzy vs Lucius’ polycule, or Jim/Izzy vs Tealoranges) is a false one. Multi shippers exist. Some people are more than capable of shipping two overlapping pairings with no problems. Sometimes people just don’t ship your ship. Its unreasonable to be mad at a Tealoranges shipper for not shipping Blackbonnet/Gentlebeard, so should it be unreasonable to be mad at a Blackhands/Gentlehands/Ouizzy/Sprizzy/etc shipper for not shipping your preferred ship.

Which brings me to my next point, being:

2. The Entitlement

Hi. I’m someone who is very particular in my ships. I have a handful that I like and I don’t particularly like to see ones that I don’t like, especially if they involve a character I ship with someone else. The difference between me and The Problem is that I am fully aware that my fandom experience is my own responsibility. If I don’t like something, its on me to remove myself from situations where I might encounter said thing. I don’t go into tags for ships I don’t like. I don’t go into tags for characters I don’t like. If I read a fic that deals with topics or ships that I don’t like I simply back out and move on with my day (provided the fic was properly tagged, please make sure you’re tagging your fics properly).

The Problem comes when people don’t take responsibility for their own fandom experience and expect everyone else to cater to their tastes. You are not entitled to other people’s: time, energy, enjoyment. If you are not paying someone, they don’t owe you anything.

I understand it can be frustrating when it seems like there’s not enough content for something you enjoy but there’s an apparent abundance of content for something you don’t but the only person who’s problem that is? Is you. Be the change you want to see in the world. If you think there’s a lack of content for your preferred thing? Go make content for that thing. If you don’t think you have the talent to make content for the thing? Do it anyway. Talent is not inherent and practice doesn’t make perfect but it does make improvements and for every imperfect thing you do make you’re increasing the amount of the thing you like. If you’re not inclined to make then consider commissioning someone. If you can’t be bothered to do either though? You’re not allowed to complain about a lack of content because you are part of the problem.

The entitlement doesn’t do you any favors either. When I joined this fandom I was over the moon for Blackbonnet/Gentlebeard. Now? I only read it if its written by a small handful of people because I don’t/can’t trust that anyone outside of those people aren’t going to be Weird About Izzy (and unnecessarily aggro at me about it). I don’t engage with the content for it anymore because The Problem has made it unsafe to do so. I have no intentions of making any sort of content for it now either. I do not cater to bullies and, for my own sake, I don’t care if ‘innocent’ people get caught in the crossfire. They are missing out on content because of people they are either passively allowing to remain in their spaces or actively encouraging. I am not the only one who has adopted this policy in light of The Problem.

Again, you are not entitled to other people’s: time, energy, enjoyment. If you make your spaces inhospitable for them, they are well within their rights to remove themselves from said spaces and blacklist the community from their own spaces.

Speaking of inhospitality:

3. Silencing And Scare Tactics

This is where the issue really lies. Fueled by The Entitlement, The Problem decides the best way to avoid/discourage content they don’t like is to make it seem like said content causes harm. Basically: ‘Its Problematic!’

This is where the ‘Izzy is racist/homophobic/a colonizer/etc comes from. It doesn’t matter what the canon says. It doesn’t matter if its interpretation or bad faith or anything else. ‘Izzy is a bigot’ is by and large, true or not, a silencing tactic to scare people into complying with the demands of The Problem. Its why ‘and that makes you an apologist/part of the problem’ always follows. Regardless of whether or not the person being told this is a part of any of the groups Izzy has allegedly wronged (for the sake of being part of those groups).

Its why several BIPOC have been accused of racism for being fans of Izzy. Why abuse survivors have been called abuse apologists for liking him.

The average person, when interacting with the fandom, will hear the loudest voices yelling ‘Izzy is problematic and so are you if you like him’ and avoid the topic for fear of coming across as problematic themselves. They won’t bother looking into the accusations because there is a risk in digging deeper and moreso of speaking out. ‘Its Problematic’ is a shield to hide the abuse being thrown at people who would really rather just be minding their own business.

Which isn’t to say its bulletproof, since:

4. We’re Not Falling For It

Which means that we’re being, perhaps not just as loud but, as loud as we can be about it all being Bull Shit. To some this might come across as apologia and ignoring the actual wrongs the character has done, its not. What it is is disputing false accusations towards the character and towards ourselves. Its quoting Word Of God and citing canon and saying ‘hey, this interpretation doesn’t really match up with the themes of the show’. Its poking holes.

Which The Problem doesn’t like.

Which leads to doubling down on accusations towards the fans. ‘Racist/abuse apologist/etc’. Over a fictional character. This isn’t to say that no Izzy fan is (consciously or unconsciously) racist, though the same could be said for fans of any character, just that its not because of association with the character. Personally, I think there is more issue with removing the agency from a BIPOC character and making all their faults be the fault of their white henchman (and all their virtues being attributed to the influence of their white boyfriend), but that’s just me.

What it also leads to is death threats and suicide bait. Which, I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a much worse offense than ‘liking the wrong fictional character’.

The excessive vitriol (the anon hate, the doxxing, the death threats, the outlandish accusations) comes from the fact that we’re doing our damnedest to show that The Problem is an actual problem and they don’t like having the spotlight shining on their bad side.

Which leads me to my last point:

5. As Good Of A Solution As We’re Gonna Get (At Least Until Something Big Changes In Fan Culture As We Know It)

The best thing we can do, until something big changes, is to remove the spotlight entirely. Deplatform the worst of them as we’re able to, which means not debating and not correcting (This’ll be especially difficult for me, I like to argue lol. Though, if you’re like me, you could also make a separate post disputing the argument after you’ve blocked the original poster. Just make sure you don’t mention their name/@ when you do, otherwise you’re just giving them back their platform by giving people access to them again.), and block liberally.

Blocking is a solution to two problems: 1. It avoids the possibility of seeing bad faith takes that you might want to argue with, and 2. It keeps The Problem from having access to you. It also provides you with a way to report The Problem if they do that fun thing they like to do and go around blocks to get to you anyway.

I know I’m probably not saying anything we didn’t already know, but I think its a good thing to remind people (and myself) of sometimes. We’re not The Problem, we deserve to have a space where we can enjoy ourselves in the fandom without harassment, and we have at least some level of ability to make that possible. This is hardly the first or only fandom to be experiencing this sort of issue, but given its the fandom we’re in right now, we gotta do what we can to make sure its a safe one (Which means, anybody who isn’t experiencing this, but who isn’t speaking out about it? Maybe start doing that. Its not just us that need your help, its fandom as a whole. Many voices make changes.).

#the dork is being a dork #izzy hands #edward teach #stede bonnet #jim jimenez #lucius spriggs #oluwande boodhari #frenchie ofmd #there are simply too many ship names for me to tag here so i will not bother #i am tagging other popular characters because this is a fucking psa #hey #if you didn't know this shit was going on in the izzy enjoyer side of the fandom?#now you do #can yall give us a hand with this issue and call it out if you see it?#this is not debating whether or not the meta of 'izzy is a bigot' is a valid interpretation of the canon #AND I WILL NOT BE ENGAGING WITH REPLIES THAT APPROACH FROM THAT INTERPRETATION (FOR OR AGAINST)#where was this essay energy when i was in school lmfao

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