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#but I wanted a distinctly masculine feel for this playlist
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Have you see sexy namjoon? I mean sexy namsuits? I mean sexy nukim?? The sound of song feels completely foreign to me. I can't say I like it. BUT I genuinely can't stop listening/humming it's verses. Idk why but the song is strangely addicting. Especially I can't stop watching/listening to Namjoon's part. That man is a menace in black suit. I'm confused about my own reaction haha. Do you know who balming tiger are?
Anon Ask 2: Thoughts on RM new Collab song Sexy Nukim??
Anon Ask 3: BPP Sexy Nukim is so hard to stream!! 😭😭 It sounds so different nothing goes well with it and I play it after Bad Decisions 😭. Do you have any good suggestions for playlists please? I want to support RM.
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Hi Anon(s),
This is the beauty of Chapter 2. The boys trying new things for themselves and sharing that work with ARMYs and millions of people to try out too.
Nearly all the people in Balming Tiger are staples of the local khh and k-alternative scene RM and Yoongi are still a part of, but the last time these guys as a group made a bit of a splash was in 2019 I think, with Armadillo. I thought Kolo Kolo (released 2020) was a better song but for whatever reason it didn't blow up as much as Armadillo did, and the group's fame has mostly remained limited to their niche communities. Balming Tiger are a bit unknown outside Korea, some members unknown even outside Sudogwon. Joon working with them on a song like Sexy Nukim seems like exactly the sort of thing he would do.
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They've remained active since then and if you want to keep up with them just follow the 88rising and H1ghr crowd.
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Think I said recently that Tae, and to a lesser extent Joon, are the members who act most like typical Korean guys, and Joon fully leans into that masculine energy in this song. He let's it all hang out. You're absolutely right that RM is the best rapper on this joint.
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NME, 2022
Joon can be a bit of a hiphop purist so seeing him take on a track like Sexy Nukim is both unsurprising and also illuminating. The song itself I'd rate an 8/10 and it would've been 9/10 if not for Mudd on that track. MTS is probably the most 'indie' or 'alternative' artist on the song but for some reason he tried to channel Lil Uzi Vert. Just... why? That verse from Mudd the Student at 1:45 was entirely unneeded, but with enough listens it makes Namjoon's entrance on the track so much more satisfying. Joon talked his shit and dear lord that shoutout to BTS at 2:45 is so hot.
Let's touch on the elephant in the hall: it's likely most people in the fandom aren't going to like this song. I've heard the MV is difficult for some people to watch as well. This is a very distinct sound even within hip hop/soul, and it's as far from k-pop as one can go. Like this is the actual experimental music in k-pop, not really the stuff executives at SM, JYP, and YG recycle in every comeback. I think there's a real opportunity for people to discover a whole new world of sounds if they give this song a chance. Which is why I feel a bit encouraged by Anon 1's reaction and Anon 3 asking for suggestions to make streaming more fun, because I imagine switching between Bad Decisions (last Tannie release) and Sexy Nukim could be a bit... disorienting. Though I also allow contrasts in my playlists (and will add one in this list).
I think it's alright if this song underperforms the others. RM's taste is distinctly old school & vibey hip hop - it's the foundational first principles stuff that he loves and excels in that's likely always going to get less traction than the trap/trendy styles SOPE lean more towards. There are also tough conversations the fandom is going to have in Chapter 2 about who is actually supporting all the members, and as I said in my post on JITB, it's a conversation that's already started.
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Anon 3, the way I stream changes often, it depends on how I feel and I've got several types of playlists to match those moods. I am streaming for Sexy Nukim now and these are five songs I played either at least two songs before or after it.
The Fugees - How Many Mics
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Logic - 44 More
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Lupe Fiasco - Paris, Tokyo
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J-Hope - STOP
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Tablo 출처 (Trace) ft. Scratch by DJ Tukutz ~~ [Contrast track]
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:)
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hardnoctlife · 4 years
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30 Days of Fanfic, Part One
I’m a little late to the party, so I figured I would post my answers in parts instead of individually.
You can find the original list of questions HERE.
1 – How did you get into fanfic?
How did you first get into writing fanfic, and what was the first fandom you wrote for? What do you think it was about that fandom that pulled you in?
For as long as I can remember I have been writing stories. Honestly, I think my first fanfiction was for FFVII. I came up wild ideas and detailed them to my friends on the playground in elementary school. I distinctly remember acting out scenarios like chocobo racing! Other than FFVII, I was also into Sailor Moon and other anime since I was in middle school. For the first fic I posted and shared online, I used fanfiction.net to share stories for Cowboy Bebop, Legend of Zelda, and Yu Yu Hakusho, (to name a few).
Colorful characters and engaging stories were what caught my eye, and the desire to explore them more and send more time with them is what drove me to write.
2 – What fandoms have you written in?
Name the fandoms you’ve written in, how much you’ve written in those fandoms, and if you still write in them.
Final Fantasy XV is the fandom that I have written the most for, but I’m starting to get back into FFVII as well. Other than that, I’ve dabbled in several others: Cowboy Bebop, Legend of Zelda, Yu Yu Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin…etc.
3 – Favorite characters?
For each of the fandoms you have written in, what were/are your favorite characters to write? Why were they your favorite?
In FFXV, I love to write any of the four chocobros, mainly because their relationships are my favorite to explore. Prompto is my favorite of the four though, probably because I related to him the most while playing the game.
4 – Muse/special character?
Do you have a ‘muse’ character that speaks to you more than others, or that tries to push their way in, even when the fic isn’t about them? Who are they, and why did that character become your muse? Are they a canon character or OC?
I don’t really have a ‘muse’ character, though I tend to write mostly fics involving Prompto when it comes to FFXV. I think it’s because I am most comfortable with him and understand his personality the best.
5 – Envisioning characters?
Do you have techniques you use to help you visualize a character? Have you commissioned or created art to go with your fics, or provided references for readers or yourself?
I am a VERY visual person, so I love to commission art for for my fics. I also spend a lot of time creating mood boards and playlists to help inspire me.
6 – Gender preference?
When you write, do you have a gender preference for your protagonist and/or the rest of the cast? Is it the same or different from your own gender? Do you feel your own gender is well represented, and how do you go about accurately portraying genders different from your own?
I don’t mind writing male or female characters, though most of what I write tends to be male focused. Although I identify as female, I lean more masculine in my personality. I think it’s fun to play around with writing different facets of gender and bend gender norms.
7 – Fic affecting your view of a character?
Have you ever had a fic you’ve written change your opinion of a character? Or has a fic you’ve read changed your opinion on a character?
Definitely! There are certain ships I never would have considered if not for fic…sometimes prompts help me look at a character in a different way, and any well written story can change my opinion of a character for better or worse.
8 – OCs
Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they’re not Mary Sues? Explain your thoughts on OCs.
I do when the situation requires them, or a certain canon character doesn’t fit into a particular role. I try not to make OCs the star of the show when writing fanfiction, but when I do use them I feel like it’s important to weave them in naturally and make them as ‘human’ and believable as possible so they are well-liked and received by readers.
9 – Favorite pairings and your comfort zone
What are your favorite pairings to write in your fandoms? Have you ever gone outside your comfort zone and written a pairing you liked, but found you couldn’t write, or a pairing you didn’t like, and found you could?
I am a multi-shipper at heart, so in FFXV I enjoy any combination of the bro ships, though I lean more towards Promptis and Gladnis. I’ve experimented with writing other ships through prompts or events, and I am always pleasantly surprised by how fun it is. Really, I just love exploring relationships between characters in any shape or form.
10 – Writer’s block and procrastination
Have you ever experienced writer’s block or an impeded ability to write? How do you tackle a loss of motivation or executive dysfunction? How does procrastination hinder or help you?            
I don’t believe in ‘writer’s block,’ but I’ve definitely had low motivation days or days where I didn’t want to write. When that happens, I give myself a break and go and do something else, then come back later and try again. Sometimes, re-reading my work helps me to identify where I’m stuck, or I’ll rely on my trusty editor (wife) to give me pointers on where they think the story could go. When all else fails, sprints or telling myself to write X amount of words usually helps. Like any other skill or hobby, you get better the more you practice.
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Do y'all have any suggestions for long term dysphoria? Like episode management is nice but I don't have any way to get HRT for years and I have a super masculine body so it's becoming a huge problem day to day and I don't know what to do handle it Any help or advice is seriously appreciated
Ren says:
My circumstances are likely very different from yours, anon, but I’m also dealing with long-term dysphoria, and I can try to share a few thoughts on how I deal with it.
First of all, I want to ask (although I know it might be repetitive): have you been able to check out our dysphoria page? There are a lot of links there that might be helpful to you. Specifically, there’s a masterpost of dysphoria solutions for transfeminine folks here and a list of self-care dysphoria solutions here.
I share these links not because I’m certain you haven’t seen them yet (I hope you have!) but because I think they’re relevant to coping with long-term dysphoria. Episode management is important, but you’re right - over a stretch of years, it kind of feels like you’re patching up a badly broken bone with a tiny strip of band-aid.
For me, managing dysphoria long-term has been a combination of a few things. (Sorry it’s long - browser users can press J to skip the post on their dashboard!)
Identify the greatest risks during a dysphoric episode and have long-term solutions in place, ready to address them. I personally tend to gravitate towards self-harm behaviors during an acute episode. I’ve communicated what those behaviors are to the people who live with me, so that they can help me avoid them, or in a real bad situation, potentially help me recover from the ramifications without having to seek medical attention. I also take steps to make sure self-harm tools aren’t readily available to me, although since not everyone’s SH looks the same, this might not be reasonable for you.
Identify the things that help you to recover quickly and effectively - and keep them accessible to you. For me, it helps to talk about the worst of it for a little bit - just to get it out of my system - and then move onto shifting my focus. Listening to music (I have a dysphoria playlist full of songs that both validate my anger / frustration / sadness while also pushing me into a more positive headspace) really helps me, and distractions like video games or engaging videos are really important too. Most importantly here, try to put these resources in a place where you can easily look to them in a time of crisis! It can be all too easy to forget what to do when you’re in the thick of it.
What I’m emphasizing here is access. When dysphoric episodes are happening to you over and over again, over long stretches of time, they can feel less and less manageable and can get more and more harmful - but all this time passing means you have a lot of opportunity to evolve your strategies and make them easier. Make use of the time and experience you’re having with these episodes, and streamline your response to them so you can become a pro at nipping them in the bud.
Combat dysphoria with art. A huge way to push back for me (and so many other trans people!) has been to make or engage in art. Ever notice the sheer number of trans musicians, comic creators / illustrators / animators, or video game creators - amateur or otherwise? (There’s a distinctly and proudly transfeminine tradition of music-making and video game art, in particular.) Bandcamp, youtube, and itch.io (among many other places) are great places to seek inspiration from and share feelings with your community, and maybe even places for you to share what you’ve made. Making art isn’t as hard or inaccessible as it might seem - there’s tons of free programs for art-making of all kinds that give you lots of tools to work with, and there’s a growing pool of tutorials making all kinds of creative work accessible for newcomers. It’s a great distraction, and a great way to make sense of complicated feelings that can be otherwise hard to communicate.
Talk about your dysphoria. It really, really helps to find people with similar experiences and talk things through with them. Trans people all have different experiences and different ways of understanding them, but in the end, we’re speaking the same language in ways that cis family members and therapists might not be able to. Share your feelings with people who have been there - you don’t have to ask for advice, it’s okay to just vent. Getting your feelings out there and having them be heard by people who get it really does mean a lot - and being able to lean on the support of our community makes a huge difference in our quality of life and our ability to handle the bad parts.
Learn to recognize the signs of falling into the Pit. I know by now what it looks like when I’m starting to fall into an episode - and I’ve learned how to distract myself to keep myself afloat. Figure out what works for you, and start making it a habit to push yourself away from the pit before it can claim you. It’s always better to keep yourself at “background noise” level than “episode” level!
That’s where this self-care link comes in - there’s a lot of suggestions here for little things you can do over time to make yourself feel good and feel affirmed in your gender! Find a few things that help you, or brainstorm a list of other options, and make them habits in your day-to-day life. It won’t solve anything at a physiological level, sure, but it can reduce the background noise, and can help remind you who you are (and why you’re fighting to be that person).
Learn body neutrality. You don’t have to feel great about yourself, but just feeling “not bad” might be within reach. You can also think about non-body-related things that you like about yourself (or even just that are okay), like things you’re good at or enjoy, or qualities that make you feel good about who you are. Figure out little ways to continually remind yourself of these things, whether it’s engaging in those joyful things more often, putting up a list on the wall of things you like about yourself, making art about the things you like (or can tolerate) about who you are right now…
The key here is making habits. Help yourself to something small that makes you feel better multiple times a day, make the good feelings accessible and available to you even if you forget to seek them out, and you’ll genuinely start feeling better. You’ll be stronger, and better able to combat the horrible feelings that dysphoric episodes create. You might even have times where you genuinely feel good about yourself!
I know this is long, but all of these techniques are things that, over time, have durably reduced my dysphoria. I still have episodes, but they’re less frequent, less serious and less dangerous, and a lot easier for me to recover from - and in the meantime, I feel pretty much OK about my body and about who I am as a person.
Followers, are you dealing with long-term dysphoria? Have you formed any helpful habits or gotten into new hobbies that help you manage the background noise? How about ideas for little euphoria-inducing self-care habits?
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I absolutely love your writing. Is there any way we could get a nice fluffy (not that I don't love the smut, because I do) piece about coming home to Henry after having a really bad day and just having him take care of you? I need that in my life right now.
Thank you!! I agree, I’m not in a smut mood at the moment (despite the fact that 2 days ago that was THE mood) I’m all in the fluff! Hope that your day gets better Anon! I put this below the cut just because I like bad language 😝
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You were annoyed before you even walked in the door. No, not annoyed; you were pissed the fuck off. It was like the entire world had conspired against you today. Snow had fallen overnight meaning that all the idiots who can’t figure out how to drive with a little bit of precipitation on the ground messed up your morning commute to work, an already tight deadline for a project at work had been moved up, mandatory overtime was instated, one of your favorite coworkers found another job and would be leaving and what else? Oh yeah, awful clients had decided that it was the perfect day to pile on and yell at you about nonsense that was completely out of your control. Add to all of that the fact that someone had dropped your lunch out of the communal refrigerator at work, spilling the delicious goodness all over the floor, and not bothered to tell you meaning that you had nothing to eat that didn’t come out of a vending machine and it really wasn’t a surprise that your mood wasn’t all happy and rainbows. So even though you loved the man, the minute you saw your boyfriend sitting unexpectedly in your living room you couldn’t help but roll your eyes.
“You’re not supposed to be home today,” you grumbled as you stalked into the living room and threw your coat and bag into a chair. Fuck being organized. Remembering that your shit wasn’t where you normally put it was a problem for future you. Present you didn’t give a rat’s ass.
“There was an unexpected break in filming,” Henry replied as he gave you a quizzical look. “Are you alright, Gorgeous?”
You waved a hand and mumbled some sort of noncommittal response before storming off towards the kitchen. You could hear Henry standing up and trailing after you but his attention only served to increase your irritation.
“What’s wrong, Sweetheart?”
Grabbing a water bottle from the refrigerator, you turned to see Henry standing in the doorway looking very concerned. His dark brows were furrowed and lowered over his bright blue eyes in a way that made you immediately regret your abrasive behavior towards him.
“I’m sorry,” you said on a long and gusty sigh. “You know that I love you, Henry. I’m just- I’m having a really, spectacularly bad day and I was kinda counting on the fact that I could come home and just completely disappear. I just want to forget that the world exists and go cuddle in bed and not talk or think.”
Henry nodded and pursed his lips slightly, his eyes never leaving your face though he seemed to be lost in thought. You took the bottle of water and walked out of the kitchen, pausing just for a moment to peck a small kiss to his cheek before making your way to the bedroom. It wasn’t that you weren’t happy to see Henry, you had been dating for a while and he was the best boyfriend in the world, kind, funny, loving, but you were just having one of those days when you didn’t want to be around anyone and having him suddenly in your living space when you hadn’t been prepared for it was a bit off putting. Retreating under the covers, you set up your iPod to a playlist of some of your favorite songs and closed your eyes, wanting nothing more than to stop existing for just a couple of hours.
☆☆☆☆☆☆
The next thing you were really aware of was a soft caress of fingers along your cheekbone. The feather light touch ghosted along your jaw and then down along the side of your arm. As your eyes began to flutter open, you felt the bed shift as Henry leaned down to press a chaste kiss to the corner of your mouth. Your head turned slightly as you looked up at him somewhat dazedly. Flashing you one of his soft charming smiles, Henry slipped his hand around yours and nodded towards the bathroom, wordlessly indicating for you to follow him. A bit confused, you did what he wanted, bare feet slapping against the floor and the rustle of clothing making the only noise within the apartment.
Henry pushed open the bathroom door and led you inside with another soft smile. The room had been transformed. On almost every available surface small tea light candles were glowing, the warm orange flickering filling the room and chasing back shadows. Plush towels were laid out on a heating rack and the bathtub was filled with pleasantly toasty water, steam slowly rising from it in small swirling spirals. You could tell immediately that Henry had gone shopping because the water was foaming and giving off the distinctive scent of your favorite bath bomb. Sitting on a tray table near the tub was a glass of wine and a slice of cheesecake. Your eyes filled with tears looking over the lavish set up your boyfriend had laid out for you even though you had treated him so poorly.
“Henry-” you began with a watery sniff but the handsome man cut you off by placing one long finger against your lips. He shook his head at you and gave you a broad grin that showed off the dimple in his cheek before pulling your body close to his. Holding you against his broad chest, Henry stroked a hand down your back and touched his lips to the crown of your head in a barely there kiss, simultaneously forgiving you for your attitude and telling you that there was no reason to request forgiveness. You sighed into the embrace, your own arms wrapping around him as your eyes drifted shut and you stood enjoying the soft aroma of the bath bomb mixing with his own distinctly masculine odor.
Henry pulled back slightly so that he could see your face, leaning down a bit to rest his forehead against yours. His bright eyes searched yours for a few moments before he placed another kiss on the tip of your nose and began to remove your clothing. There was nothing sexual about the action, he simply wanted to pamper you and you were more than willing to let him. With practiced ease, the handsome man slipped you out of your garments and took your hand, leading you to the tub and steadying you as you slid into the water. Relaxation washed over you as though the warm liquid had pulled every care and trial of the day away the moment it touched your skin. A deep moan of appreciation left your lips and Henry gave a low chuckle before beginning to move away.
“Stay?” You looked up at him with pleading eyes.
“Of course, Gorgeous.” His smooth velvet voice was the soothing balm that your tired soul needed more than anything.
Henry slipped his pants off so that he could sit on the edge of the bathtub behind you with his legs in the water. His muscular calves surrounded your upper body while you reclined against the back of the tub, your head resting on his midsection. Strong hands moved delicately through your hair, pulling the strands up into a messy bun on the top of your head. You couldn’t help the smile that crossed your face; it would never fail to amuse you that Henry knew how to style and control your hair. He explained once that his own curls had a tendency to be unruly and as a result he had spent some time learning to manipulate them. A deep and contented sigh left your lips as he began to expertly roll and massage your neck and shoulders causing any remaining tension to evaporate on the spot.
“I really don’t deserve you,” you murmured in a low voice, loathe to disrupt the quiet peace of the bathroom.
“You deserve the world, Sweetheart,” Henry replied with an affectionate chuckle. “Bad day or not, you are always the best thing about my life.”
“Have I reminded you lately that you’re my favorite person ever?”
“You have,” he confirmed as his lips returned to the top of your head. “But I always enjoy hearing it.”
A peaceful silence fell between you as he continued to soothe the muscles in your neck and back. As though he could read your mind, Henry reached out and snagged the glass of wine from the nearby tray, passing it to you just as you thought about how nice it would be to enjoy the drink while soaking. With another contented sigh you took a long sip of the sweet liquid before speaking.
“You’ve set the bar very high here, Henry. The next time you have a bad day, I’m going to have to pull out all the stops to make it better.”
You could feel his torso rumble behind your head as he gave a small laugh at that. “Well then, I look forward to my next bad day, Gorgeous.”
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girlbookwrm · 5 years
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i DO recommend these fics, but this ISN’T actually a rec list
a while ago i did a meta about Bucky Barnes and the Winter Soldier and Hydra and the headcanons I put in The Terror of Knowing, and I mentioned that I wanted to compile a long-ass list of fics that inspired The Hundred Year Playlist and ppl (hi @conlatio and @marveluc) asked about it SO HERE, AT LONG FUCKING LAST, IT IS.
Fanfiction, like every other art form that has ever existed in the history of ever, is all about synthesis: combining pre-existing elements to make something new. It’s the making something new thing that’s exciting. (If you’re not making something new with your found material, that’s called plaigiarism and it’s distinctly uncool.)
When I was in college and grad school, if we used material from other scholars to make a new idea, we made sure to include a bibliography. 
Now this is fic, so like. Everyone knows that we’re using found material. We put the fandom in the tags and everything. But there’s a lot of unseen inspiration, because it’s harder to tag all the fics and metas you read that gave you ideas and inspiration along the way.
I’m... making an attempt.
These are some, SOME of the fics that inspired the headcanons and characterizations and whatnot that then got incorporated into THYP. I’ve been reading MCU fic since 2014 (possibly earlier) and I didn’t even start thinking about THYP until 2017, so there’s probably a lot of stuff that went into my subconscious that I’ve forgotten about. I’m @ing the authors and sources when I know them, but if any of yall want me to like, un-@you (is that a thing??) or if any of you know of authors who have tumblrs that I DIDN’T @ but should have, pls let me knoooowwww
A (Probably Incomplete, but at least Attempted) Fanfic Bibliography for The Hundred Year Playlist
by Seriously I Don’t Have More Important Things To Do? Astonishing.
PLEASE HEED THE WARNINGS IN THE FICS THEMSELVES. THYP may be rated T for Teen (and even that I debate about tbh, given all the swears and violence) but most of these fics are very emphatically not.  some of them will probably squick you out, some of them might be triggering, so take care of yourselves.
I’ve divided the list into sections by the story they inspired, but all of these stories inspired all the parts of THYP, this is a very very very rough categorization. Think of it as my fanfic n headcanon spice rack. some stories are going to have more or less of one spice or another.
Dreamers With Empty Hands
All the Angels and the Saints by @cesperanza
"You're a brutal person, you know that? You're always rummaging through my guts with your bare hands!" and then Bucky turned away, his long, muscled back curving as he sat on the edge of the bed, hunched and struggling for breath. Steve wanted to draw him, and he also wanted to blot the image from his memory: this picture of Bucky in despair.
Speranza’s Socialist Steve is deeply flawed in a way that people don’t usually write him and i love it so much??? He’s angry, and egotistical, and righteous in a way that’s hard on the people around him and I was like YESGOOD MORE PLS. It’s also a masterful example of how to write a story that’s ostensibly Steve-POV but still manages to make Bucky not only a main player, but a driving force. It’s about Steve, on the surface, sure. But it’s also about Bucky, because Steve is about Bucky and I just *clenches fist* love it.
cascades. 
This fic. THIS FIC. Hngh. Okay so this fic is good on so many levels, but for THYP, the takeaway was me very gently lifting the Bucky-Steve-Barnes Family dynamic and then adding more swears to get to my take on the Bucky-Steve-Barnes Family Dynamic. Namely: 
“Steve was a bit of a Barnes, too, wasn’t he,” she says.
“He was ours,” says Rebecca, shrugging. “We were his.”
i crie???
More Man Than You
“You’re very pretty,” she said, and Steve tensed up.
“I’m not a fairy.”
“No, you’re not, are you?”
this fic has a study guide. and that’s literally all I feel I need to say about it. It’s an exploration of queer culture and masculinity in the 30s and 40s, thinly veiled as stucky fanfiction. (It’s also pretty brutal so I’ll reiterate that you need to heed the goddamn warnings)
Also, lest yall think I came up with Billy Thompson in a vacuum, I didn’t. In this fic, there’s a violent mob runner called Duke, and Steve comes up with a plan to take him down, and Bucky makes sure that there’s a Different plan that Steve doesn’t know about.  It’s all executed a little differently in this fic, but the idea lodged in my brain and got reused in THYP, and kind of became a central theme.
Good Morning Heartache, What’s New?
The Night War by @praximeter
IF YOU HAVEN’T READ THIS WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE. This is... honestly, just one of the finest pieces of fiction i just 
HNNNNGH
I don’t know that I can point to any specific part of this fic and say “this gave me that idea” it was more the... the feel of it. The way the Normandy invasion is written and the way the trauma is handled and the way Steve is just slightly to the left of being a real soldier and especially this:
He asked me with a smile on his face what goes through my mind when I line up my shot—God and country? Pearl Harbor? Uncle Sam? —and I stared at him struck dumb from the question so long that I think he thought I was just plain stupid. The fact is that it is none of those things—not even close. It is sick, numb fear and careful, barely breathing so that I don’t miss. I must never miss. And then when I shoot, an awful thought curls up from my trigger finger to my heart “how many mothers must be praying I will miss?”
The Thirteen Letters
oh you didn’t really think that Not Easily Conquered wasn’t going to be on this list, didja? OF COURSE IT’S ON THE LIST. But possibly not for the reason you might think. That fic is legen-fucking-dary of course, and the scene where Steve gets stabbed was obviously very inspirational for that bit in GMHWN where Steve gets shot in the thigh, but the scene that really got teeth into my brain and Would Not Let Go was the one where the Howlies meet the Winged Victory of Samothrace and 
Bucky knows the truth now. It is a deep and insurmountable truth. She has no face. Like the operative whose head he beat in, like the boy who he killed one month into active duty, even like Bucky himself, Nike is faceless. Bucky feels unprepared, or like he should have brought an offering.
Beside him Steve quakes before the oldest and the only god.
look my fixation with statues didn’t come from nowhere is what i’m saying ok
Sincerely, Your Pal
This fic haunts me because i hate the ending. not because it’s not good (It IS good) or because it’s not the right ending for the story (it IS the right ending for the story) but just because i  h a t e  i t. I just like happy endings is all, and resolutions, and this fic is why THYP will have a happy ending.
But also, I really liked the way this fic dealt with Bucky in Basic and lines like this really caught in my brain:
And of course I want to kill some Nazis I guess but not because they’re people. Not because I actually want people to die because I don’t.
And that sentiment definitely fed into how I write Bucky especially.
The Terror of Knowing
there must have been a moment by @redstarwhitestar (magdaliny’s marvel sideblog)
Listen, I’ve been trying to make sure that there’s a good spread of writers on this list but magdaliny is the exception. Magdaliny is the exception for a lot of things and there must have been a moment when we could have said no is always the first fic I think of when I think of a fic about Bucky’s time as the Soldier. Which is ironic, because it’s very much about his time after that, but that first chapter made uhhhhhhhhhhh an impression.
The fractured nature of the narrative, the way that the reader can piece together a coherent timeline but the main character can’t... that was very influential on TTOK. example:
“Kill him,” the officer says.
The subject says: “Why?”
“Kill him,” the officer says.
The subject makes a mess.
“Kill him cleanly,” the officer says. “Good! Good lad.”
I’ll build a house inside of you
Another magdaliny G I F T, an AU where Nat is much younger and Bucky is her dad, and if you think that didn’t affect the way I write Bucky and Nat’s relationship in THYP, then you are dreaming. 
Past the praises of the handlers, above the hot wet smell of cordite and blood, Natalia can hear crashing and shouting down the hall.
“—goddamn animals, they're little girls, they're just kids, you fucking—”
Her father screams in English, in Mandarin, in Russian, and then he just screams.
I know that’s a super sad excerpt but listen and hear me when I say this fic is actually really good and wholesome and it’s got A+++ OCs and All The Widows and it’s just really good ok
Memory
Bucky is hard AF to write and very few people write him half so well as magdaliny but one of those people is emilyenrose and this fic is M A S T E R F U L. Bittersweet and achingly perfect. It contains this beautiful moment that really stuck with me, where Steve is comparing the post WS “James” to the Pre War “Bucky” and realizes... 
He truly hadn't known James all that well. James hadn't let him. Hadn't wanted him to. Hadn't wanted anyone near him, ever—
—the way Bucky went, when he was miserable, when he was angry...
and that, to me, was kind of key when I went on to write the Soldier, because the Soldier IS Bucky, even when he isn’t.
Fool For Sacrifice
Dona Nobis Pacem
THIS GODDAMN FIC came to me outta FUCKING NOWHERE, I’d already written the first draft for FFS, I’d already started posting it, for crying out loud. And then all of a sudden I stumble upon THIS and i just
It’s already fading, just hours after the skirmish.  And the wounds Sam stitched will heal without a mark.  And the welts on Steve’s chest will disappear.  Like all of it never happened. 
Fuck the serum. He keeps thinking it, saying it.  Maybe if there were some goddamn scars, it’d be easier to process the damage.
This fic is heavy af, it’s like the 65k word version of That Chapter in FFS Where Steve Hits Rock Bottom. This was the fic I read when I was ramping myself up to tackle That Moment
three white horses
This is the other fic I read to ramp up for That Scene, and I think that probably shows in the way I wrote it. It is also is a Strong Contender for the title of Heavyweight Fic That Convinced Me Buck Is Jewish. Honestly I cannot praise this fic enough.
I think the thing that stuck hardest about the Steve in three white horses is the way he feels ghostly himself, like he’s only drifting through the present, and somehow most of his living happens in the past. It’s very beautifully done, and very subtly done, and it’s my go to fic if I am in Dire Need of a Good Clean Crie.
It’s getting an extra long excerpt because This Is My List And Neither God Nor Man Can Stop Me.
Steve's fingers touch metal when he reaches into the second-to-last box, and he feels the blood drain out of his face even before he's looked down. He knows the feel of it too well. He'd know it blind, a hundred years from now. It's Bucky's not-a-medal.
It'd been Bucky's grandfather's, or maybe his great-grandfather's, made of the kind of sterling silver that tarnishes if you look at it funny, so Bucky had always been polishing it; he'd traded cigarettes to the mess staff for baking soda and vinegar, during the war, but the thing was still soot-black half the time, like it is now. It'd been a fool's errand, wearing a thing like that in Axis territory, but Bucky'd worn it on his chain like the rest of the guys wore their Christophers and Michaels, and HYDRA'd ignored it. It was a subtle thing, though: nothing like wearing a Magen David, or the implacable H on Bucky's tags, just a thin slice of metal with a stylized branch and an oblique squiggle Steve only knows is the Hebrew word for life because Bucky told him so.
Bucky'd had a curious mix of reverence and irreverence about it, the same mixture that seemed to colour the whole of his religious life. He'd teased Steve sometimes, saying, “No, wait, you gotta kiss it before you enter the building, you schmuck, what are you, some kinda heathen?” with his legs around Steve's waist. Bucky hadn't complained when Steve had carried on with an inch of silver between his teeth, but Steve had offhandedly called it Bucky's good luck charm once, and Bucky'd blown up; it's not a superstition, he said, it's not a fucking amulet. He'd apologized later, and he'd explained, and said it was a touchy subject, just ingrained. Jews weren't supposed to believe in luck. Bucky'd thought maybe it was the opposite: maybe luck didn't believe in Jews.
Sparked Up Like a Book of Matches
AH YES, THE FIC THAT TAUGHT ME ABOUT LIL AUDREY JOKES. SIPPY CUPS OF SUPERBOOZE! A ROBOT CALLED SHITCAN!! WHAT MORE COULD YOU NEED IN A FIC??? I really like the way it addresses Steve being in the future is all
This one could probably also fall into the list of fics that inspired DWEH, in part because of This, which stuck with me Hard and heavily influenced the opening:
“...You ever have scarlet fever?"
Sam shakes his head.
"It starts in your throat, like an itch, and as your fever starts to climb, your tongue swells up and turns white and that's when they know, really, even before the rash, that it's scarlet fever. You can't swallow, it hurts so much. You're freezing and your joints ache and your fever keeps spiking and you start to hallucinate. I, uh, I thought things were crawling on me and there were voices that I didn't recognize whispering things that didn't make any sense. My mom had to fight me just to get me to drink broth, but I threw it up most of the time, anyway. Then I got pneumonia from being so worn down from the scarlet fever and I was so lucky, Sam. Nobody seems to understand how I lucky I was to make it through. Talking to people today, to make them understand I'd have to tell them I survived bird flu only to fall sick with Ebola."
listen. For reasons I can’t fully explain, I really wanted to read that happening so i wrote it, and this is what being a writer is All About.
Actually, on a second thought, I might be able to explain it: it’s because an experience like that is Capital F Formative, and I really wanted to explore how there’s a tiny sick kid rattling around inside Captain Beefcake’s souped up bod.
(And an additional shoutout to Steve Rogers’ American Captain, a webcomic that now exists only in the Wayback Machine, but which was L O V E L Y and I sincerely hope that the artist knows that)
No Hope for the Weary
Strays
This fic? is so fluffy?? Like literally so fluffy. But this fic (and, obviously, Infinite Coffee) were very much behind the inclusion of the God Damn Starbucks, and also the source of a lot of my headcanons about Barnes & Rogers: Secret Millennials. For Example: Bucky’s Notes on How To Be A Millennial:
- Lots of coffee. Travel mugs or paper cups from Starbucks place. Often looks guilty for drinking, obv derive pleasure from doing so. Unknown as to why. Investigate further? Why is there one every two blocks if no one wants it there? 
Infinite Coffee and Protection Detail
This is another fandom classic that needs very little introduction. A+ characterization, A+ OCs, Utterly Charming from start to finish, and the originator of a very distinct way of talking that got very strongly coded in my brain as Winter Soldier Bucky.
He passes within 4 m of Barnes on his way back to his building. The mission imperative achieves a Doppler effect.
contactContactCONTACTContactcontact
Aw.
If They Haven’t Learned Your Name by @silentwalrus1
If I had to point to one (1) fic and say “Blame This Fic for THYP” it would be this one: the Fic that my roommate and The Gal Pal know as “The One With the USS Motherfucker.” This might seem like an odd statement, because if you’ve read them both, I don’t think you’d necessarily put them in the same class. silentwalrus is a genius of hilarity and THYP is a big pile of The Sads. ITHLYN is delightfully unassuming and I’m sometimes embarrassed by how pretentious THYP ended up being. 
I would technically put this under the list of fics that heavily influenced NHFTW on account of the way it portrays Bucky going by gradual degrees from murderbot to mostly human person, but listen I could never write Cryptid!Bucky the way Silentwalrus has. It’s magnificent. And TBH the level of Intensity in ITHLYN’s Steve has is something I aspire to, and the Sam Characterization is On Point, and both those things influenced FFS, 112%. Nat’s Chaotic Slav Energy in this fic is OFF THE GODDAMN CHARTS and I LOVE IT. Every single side character, down to the spaceship is given the kind of care, attention, and characterization that just... it cannot be beat, my dudes.
16/10 highest recommendation. I could not possibly pick a single paragraph from this behemoth but uhhhhh
Two minutes in there’s a grunt and a slippery, gritty noise somewhere to her left, and then the Soldier barrels past at breakneck speed, vanishing down another tunnel. A second later Steve careens around the corner, bounces off the opposite wall and crashes away after him, so fast he’s nearly a blur. Natasha’s brain, entirely of its own accord, provides her with the utterly unhelpful accompaniment of a Yakety Sax soundtrack.
that’s it. that’s the fic.
Also, this fic is Stoutly To Blame for the playlist aspect of the hundred year playlist? Silentwalrus really got me good with Grounds for Divorce by Elbow, one of my all time favorite songs, which was then paired with one of my all time favorite chapters. By the time Caravan Palace’s Lone Digger made an appearance, I was sunk. This fic introduced me to Lyube, and gave me a new appreciation(?) for dubstep. So many of the songs ITHLYN used ended up in my Very Long Stucky Playlist, though I think the only one that then went on to become part of the Hundred Year Playlist: Upside Down and Inside Out by OK GO.
And Finally, the Coup De What The Fuck Ever:
Ain’t No Grave by @spitandvinegar
yet another fandom classic... I wasn’t sure where to put this fic, but I couldn’t NOT include it in the list. Spitandvinegar’s Steve is charming and so? Sweet? and the ANG Bucky is a delightful foulmouthed mess of a person, and the Sam/Claire pairing is something I DIDN’T KNOW I NEEDED, BUT I VERY MUCH NEEDED IT and I don’t know that I can point to a single thing and be like: Ah Yes, This Bit, but this is definitely one of my faves:
Imagine you live in this country, right? And there's a brutal war, and you witness and maybe participate in a horrific amount of violence, and you lose absolutely everyone you care about. Then you end up in this other country, where the culture and ways of doing things are completely foreign to you, and random assholes make fun of you for how you dress and act and talk while you're still coming to grips with the fact that everyone you love is gone and you can never go home again. Meanwhile, everyone around you is like "smile, motherfucker, you're in the Land of Plenty now, where there's a Starbucks on every corner and 500 channels on TV. You should be grateful! Why aren't you acting more grateful?" So you have to pretend to be grateful while you're dying inside. Sound like an traumatized, orphaned refugee? Also sounds like Steve fucking Rogers, Captain Goddamn America. Except that most refugees were part of a community of other people who were going through the same thing. Steve is all alone, the last damn unicorn, if the last unicorn had horrible screaming nightmares about the time when it helped to liberate Buchenwald.
Usually this explanation yields a "huh." People don't want Sad Refugee Steve: they want Captain America, Indestructible Defender of Freedom. But that doesn't mean that Sam isn't right, because he is right, goddamnit. So yeah, Sam's a little protective of Steve. And if the last unicorn finds out that its best damn unicorn friend in the whole world is actually alive, then damn straight, Sam's heading out with a tranq gun and bringing that damn unicorn in and starting a goddamn unicorn wildlife refuge in his backyard. Or something like that: at a certain point the metaphor kind of gets away from him.
Til The End of the Timeline
I’ve recced this so many times you’ve probably all gotten sick of hearing about it, but it’s an invaluable goddamn resource and you should all check it out. 
A Shit Ton of Metas and Blogs, some of which are tagged with THYP Research but especially @steve-rogers-new-york and @hansbekhart‘s How To Brooklyn and @historicallyaccuratesteve
and last but certainly not least
LITERALLY EVERYTHING @quietnighty READS HOLY SHIT
If you’re looking for a common thread through all the above recs, it’s that almost all of them have podfics, and the vast majority of those podfics are by Quietnight. I am, and always have been, an audio learner. I read my writing aloud when I’m editing, I listen to audiobooks when I’m commuting, and when I’m cleaning, and when I’m playing computer games, because I like stories, and I especially like listening to stories. Quietnight’s podfics are Of The Highest Quality, and her taste in fic is Impeccable.
hooooly shit this post is long wow okay. I can’t promise I won’t add more to this later, but I’m leaving it for now because goddamn. it’s as complete as I can make it at this time. I’ve added a “THYP Fanfic Bibliography” tag in my bookmarks, and incidentally I really need to make sure I’ve gone through and kudosed all of these because goddamn.
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