#his new albino wolf brother who is there to show ‘it’s okay to be different’ gets his horrible cgi head mounted on a wall | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

opinated-user · 1 year

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LO, writing a quadruple amputee: "She's bitter and angry, has no reason to live but her love interest, and has no external goals or social life."

Disney's Gargoyles, writing a Black blind man: "He's a published author, dog lover, helped found a dog shelter, has a bunch of nerdy author friends, has supportive parents, accepts nonhumans and their status as people, and since he's immune to magic that you have to see to be effected by, he is key to defeating a major villainous scheme. He goes on to be happily married in the comics, and is both one of the characters' closest friends and his most honest critic, pushing Hudson and himself not to give up on learning new things purely because of their ages."

Elfen Lied, writing a quadruple amputee teenage girl: "She's fighting a serial killer with the same psychic powers both were born with, is bi, loves Mayu deeply but will forego a relationship rather than risk Mayu's safety, is happily adopted by a dad she loves, loves her foster sisters, refuses to hurt innocent people in a setting where good and bad guys alike usually do, and does not see becoming disabled as the end of her life or a reason to give up on life."

Yuki Yuna Is A Hero, writing a teenage girl who uses a wheelchair: "She's a magical girl who's also a sniper, has a close circle of best friends, is independent to a fault, is a femme lesbian, is a huge history nerd, loves cooking, and even when the villains hit her with amnesia and forcibly try to take her identity from her, she's so dedicated to justice that she just ends up becoming a hero in a different way, because her driving motive is a desire for everyone to live happy, peaceful lives."

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, writing a deaf teenage girl for one episode: "This girl does karate and gymnastics, wants to be a teacher when she's older, is crushed on by two guys normally depicted as shallow because even they understand that being disabled doesn't make her any less cool or date-worthy, teases her younger brother, is friends with both popular and unpopular girls at school based on shared interests, and is immune to the villain of the episode's magic flute due to being deaf but singlehandedly defeats the villain because while he's arrogant and thinks he's undefeatable, she's smart enough to watch him carefully, formulate a plan and wear him out before fighting him."

Wolf's Rain, writing a blind, albino woman who suffers from chronic fatigue: "This is our ultimate hero who will save the world. She loves plants, animals, and her close circle of friends. Although the world has been unkind to her and often cruel, she refuses to let the world end, because she will not give into despair and instead will focus on those that have been good to her, in stark contrast to the abled villain who has had a really good life but is fixating on the handful of bad things that have happened to him. She is quiet and too serious sometimes but also curious, thoughtful and loves bad puns."

Katawa Shoujo: "All of the characters in this visual novel are disabled. No two have the same disability. Every single one is portrayed as a well-rounded character, a love interest, someone with struggles, dreams, hopes, and a bright future ahead of them whether you choose to befriend them or romance them, because they're friends with each other and with one another to depend on, goof off around, vent to and feel normal with, they'll be okay. All a person needs to be successful in life is to feel connected to others and supported by them."

Once you watch anime/watch cartoons/watch cheesy 90's shows/play visual novels, Lily's disabled character looks horrifically underwritten. Fall The Amputee is barely a character. There's no agency, no inner world, no future, nothing outside of "became disabled, hates being alive, serves her spouse".

I know we've all moved on to talking about her sexually predatory ways. But as a disabled person I'm so tired of "being disabled means your life is over and the best you can hope for is someone who's willing to fuck you". No. That's not how this works. That's not how life is. We do not exist to sexually service able bodied people. We do not exist to be comforted by your OC stand-in who's oh-so-noble for doing so.

To crib from a Disney song, since LO only watches Disney, cartoons, and BBT: "I can slay my own dragons, I can dream my own dreams. My knight in shining armor is me."

#lily orchard #other recommendations #lily orchard is ableist

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maddie-grove · 7 years

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The Stark Romance Saga--Book #3: A Fire in Winter

Previous Installments: Loved I Not Honor More (Book #1, Robb Stark/Jeyne Westerling), The Iron Scoundrel (Book #2, Theon Greyjoy/Asha “Not His Sister in This Universe” Harlaw), and Kissing the Kingslayer (Book #2.5, Catelyn Stark/Jaime Lannister).

The Style

Sweeping old-school Susannah Leigh or Jennifer Wilde, but less offensive.

The Leads

Jon Snow, 20 years old, rising star in the Night’s Watch and (HE THOUGHT!) Lord Ned Stark’s illegitimate son. Tries very hard to be good and never admit to himself that he wants anything that the Night’s Watch can’t give him. Secretly full of hurt feelings and pent-up sexual energy, but he’s hoping to wear himself out with fighting, ranging, and Wall-maintenance for the rest of his life so he’ll never have to deal with it. Has a bad-ass albino wolf-dog, Ghost.

Ygritte, 23 years old, a wildling spearwife who longs for unity among the Free Folk and an end to the Others. Fiercely proud and righteously angry with the “kneelers” who have trapped her and her people beyond the Wall. Otherwise has a friendly and mischievous nature. Fond of archery, music, and pretty lads. Quietly grieving for family and clan members lost to the Others. Will never admit that her loss and displacement has made her feel lonely.

The Prologue

The confrontation between Jon and Catelyn at Bran’s bedside, largely unchanged. Jon, half-determined to prove himself in the Night’s Watch and half-resentful that all the adults responsible for him agreed so swiftly that he should join, visits his comatose half-brother despite his reluctance to anger Catelyn. He says goodbye to Bran and tries to offer sympathy to Catelyn, only to be harshly rebuffed. (Catelyn probably just snaps at him to get out, as in the show, rather than offer up the book’s crueler, more deliberate “it should have been you.”) He also reflects on how much he’s going to miss his dad and siblings.

The Set-Up

Not that different from canon, except for the part where she dies. Jon, marginally wiser and older, is on a dangerous mission in the Skirling Pass with Qhorin Halfhand, grizzled old Night’s Watch veteran. Jon reflects a bit about how he came to this literal and metaphorical pass (basically, he learned not to be a thoughtless dick to his smallfolk peers, plus it turns out White Walkers are real). Then Ygritte and her raiding party descend upon Jon and Qhorin. Jon manages to capture her, but they have a Moment and he lets her go instead of killing her. Later, he and Qhorin are surrounded by the Free Folk (including Ygritte, who personally captures him right back). As per the mission, Jon kills Qhorin and pretends to join the Free Folk. Despite their differences and the complicated situation, Jon and Ygritte find themselves liking each other. They’re sleeping under the same furs at night, and one thing leads to another. (The consent issues in the book might still fly in a romance novel today, but I found it unnecessarily unpleasant and complicated even in ASOIAF; didn’t Jon have enough painful issues around sex with the bastard stigma?) They keep on doing it, and the cave scene happens verbatim.

Then comes the raid on the Gift, where the wildlings attack an old man and Jon, horrified, comes to his defense. Having blown his cover, he rides back to the wall, full of arrows and regret. Ygritte consequently realizes that Jon turned his cloak on her and vows to hate him forever.

And that’s when things get weird.

The Middle

After making it back to the Wall and recovering from his injuries, Jon finds himself in another pickle: some of the senior members of the Night’s Watch want him executed for killing Qhorin and doin’ it with a wildling. Despite Maester Aemon’s arguments on his behalf, things aren’t looking too good for Jon...until he’s kidnapped and thrown on a ship in the dead of night by some mysterious Essosi dudes who turn out to be Unsullied. One of the Unsullied (a Common-Tongue-speaking fellow who named himself Drogon the Human after one of the instruments of his freedom) eventually explains that Jon is secretly the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark. It turns out that Daenerys Targaryen left Slaver’s Bay in the hands of the former slaves (who are doing quite nicely, as they had a plan in place that only needed some judicious use of dragons to work) and sailed to her birthplace of Dragonstone, where her people discovered Rhaegar’s secret diary (sample passage: “I’m going to use dishonest means to get fifteen-year-old Lyanna Stark to run away and have PROPHECY BABIES with me!”). Now Daenerys wants an alliance between her forces and the North...and how better to do that than to marry the half-Northern, half-Targaryen Jon Snow?

Jon’s not so sure. He’s going through a crisis, feeling undermined in his Northern identity and family relationships but definitely not feeling like a Targaryen either. He’s doubts that his illegitimate Targaryen half brings anything to the table politically, partly because he doesn’t share Daenerys’s view that Westeros wants a Targaryen restoration. Finally, although Daenerys is lovely and charming and kind and brave, he can’t feel anything romantic for her...and it’s not just because she’s his aunt, which is kind of weird. No, he also misses Ygritte, and it kills him that he’ll never see her again. After Daenerys guarantees that she’ll help all his family members and the smallfolk and the wildlings, though, he knows marriage is the best choice. Because nothing will get them good PR like marrying in the Sept of Baelor, they agree to postpone the wedding until after they take King’s Landing.

Meanwhile, Ygritte has been having a rough time. After surviving the Battle of the Ice, she and a small band of Free Folk try to eke out a living north of the Wall while planning their next move. (Without Jon’s leadership, the Free Folk never have the option to go south.) Her group is attacked by White Walkers and becomes even smaller. Heartbroken and lonelier than ever, Ygritte is at a loss...until she realizes that she’s pregnant. At first she feels happy, then pissed off about being happy, then worried how she’s going to raise a child in this frozen horror show. At last, she swallows her pride and resolves to go see Jon at the Wall. Obviously he doesn’t love her, but she figures he’ll feel obligated to help her, the baby, and maybe even the Free Folk as a whole. Unfortunately, when she sneaks into Castle Black, she finds out that Jon mysteriously disappeared right before he was supposed to be executed. “Oh, fuck, no,” she says, but she’s not sure what to do other than go to Winterfell and inform his family that some bullshit is happening.

During Ygritte’s journey to Winterfell, Daenerys and her army successfully take King’s Landing. I won’t go into details, but the victory is just difficult enough to keep the battle from being anticlimactic. It happens just after Tyrion’s escape from King’s Landing, so the only remaining Lannisters are Cersei, Tommen, and Kevan. (Jaime is, at Catelyn’s secret request, in the Riverlands searchng for Arya.) Kevan dies in battle; Cersei and Tommen disappear mysteriously. The Tyrells and most of the other families shrug and side with Daenerys fairly quickly, because she has dragons. The smallfolk are like, “Huh, well, maybe she won’t be a volatile sadist like Joffrey; after all, most of the Targaryens weren’t like Aerys.” Their doubts are further assuaged when Daenerys’s policies turn out to be relatively egalitarian. Jon is happily reunited with Sansa (more about her later), even though they weren’t super-close as children, but is heartbroken to find no sign of Arya. He and Daenerys begin to make wedding plans.

Ygritte gets to Winterfell and is greeted by sympathetic new mom Jeyne Westerling and a moody, troubled Bran. (Robb and Catelyn are fighting in the Riverlands again; Rickon’s actually doing swell for once.) They’re both happy to offer a home to their unborn niece/nephew and its mother; Bran even takes her reports of the White Walkers seriously and starts to confer with the other bannermen as the Stark in Winterfell. Yet Ygritte isn’t anywhere near happy. Seeing Jon’s home has made her see how different their worlds are, plus she’s angry and hurt that he was off marrying his aunt while she thought he was dead. She’s about to head back north when Bran and Jeyne persuade her that Jon would never truly want to marry his aunt and sometimes you just to risk everything for love, respectively. Ygritte realizes they’re right and rides hell-for-leather to King’s Landing.

The Conclusion

The wedding’s about to happen. Sansa, initially enchanted by her secretly royal half-brother’s imminent marriage to a beautiful young queen, senses that all is not well and asks Jon if he really wants to go through with it. He says no, but he has to go through with it because it’s his duty and he’ll lose what little honor he has if he backs out. Sansa realizes that his motives are all wrapped up in bastard stigma and talks about how she used to think that everyone, including herself, would be okay if they just did what society told them to do, but then she discovered that the world was wrong. Her speech affects Jon, but not enough for him to call off the wedding so late...until Ygritte appears on the steps of the Sept of Baelor, out of breath and vocally angry with him for leaving her behind.

“I’m sorry,” he tells Daenerys, who nods in a gracious and dignified manner. She’s secretly relieved that she doesn’t have to make a third political marriage and can just concentrate on ruling for a while (plus banging Daario Naharis on the sly).

Then Jon tells Ygritte everything he’s learned: he thought he was wrong to love her and break his vows, but instead he was wrong to leave her. He never dared to hope she would want him back, but if she’s come all this way, maybe she would be willing to marry him?

“You’re only saying that because I’m pregnant!” Ygritte shouts. Then she goes on for a little while about his precious duty and precious honor.

“You’re pregnant?!” Jon finally interrupts.

“Wait, what?” says Ygritte. But she’s convinced, finally, that he meant what he said. Otherwise, why would he give up marrying Daenerys in such a publicly embarassing way?

Daenerys gives a hastily improvised speech about how Jon and Ygritte’s marriage symbolizes unity between all different types of people in Westeros. The crowd is like, “huh,” but the wine is flowing pretty freely and it’s something to talk about.

Jon and Ygritte head north the next day, Sansa in tow, and are joyously reunited with Bran, Rickon, Jeyne, Robb, and the rest of the Winterfell household. (Theon and Asha send them a pineapple from the Summer Islands for the wedding, but it’s probably called something stupid like a spineapple.) In private, Catelyn stiffly thanks Jon for bringing back Sansa and apologizes for being unkind to him as a child; it doesn’t really change the past, but he can appreciate it for what it is. Jon and Ygritte are married in the Godswood. Afterwards, there’s a feast. It’s not entirely a happy occasion, though, because they all feel the absence of Arya deeply. A place is set for her at the table, though, in hopes that one day she’ll come home.

The Epilogue

Jon and Ygritte are living together at the Wall. Reforms have been made to the Night’s Watch, partly thanks to Daenerys’s unconventional views and partly thanks to the North’s commitment to fighting the White Walkers. Members can now enlist for ten-year shifts, not just for life; women can join; and, perhaps most pertinently, members can marry!!! So Jon goes down on Ygritte and it’s 100% legit.

Subplots

Sansa goes through most of her A Storm of Swords plot. Now released from her betrothal with Joffrey, she thinks she’s found allies in the Tyrells; however, her planned escape via marriage to Willas Tyrell is scotched when she and Tyrion Lannister are forced to marry by Tywin. Under the circumstances, she cannot love him, yet she appreciates his decency towards her and feels sorry for him because his family is cruel to him. When Joffrey dies, she and Tyrion are both arrested, leaving her to wonder whether he left her to share the blame for the crime; she feels betrayed, somehow, by the possibility. (Littlefinger tried to get her out, but there was a hitch in the plan, so he shrugged and sailed to the Vale without her.) She’s overjoyed to be returned to her family, yet she feels like she doesn’t quite fit with them after her experiences.

“Arry,” still suffering from amnesia and now calling herself “Nan” (short for Nymeria), has escaped from Harrenhal with her friends Gendry and Hot Pie. They join up with the Brotherhood without Banners, where she finds some small measure of peace. However, she’s still massively traumatized and troubled by her lack of identity. It becomes less painful, eventually, to stop wondering who she was and move on with her life. (Let’s assume that Beric Dondarrion et al never got a good enough look at her in King’s Landing to identify her.) At one point, Sandor Clegane tries to kidnap her, insisting that she’s Arya Stark, but she thinks he has worse intentions than ransoming her and manages to run back to the Brotherhood.

Bran, also traumatized by the events of The Iron Scoundrel, continues to have troubling psychic visions. Taking action against the White Walkers as the Stark in Winterfell helps, but he still struggles with feelings of helplessness and isolation. Also, he knows his mom is secretly in love with Jaime Lannister and understandably thinks that’s really fucked up.

Sam and Gilly fall in love as they journey from Craster’s Keep to the Nightfort and then try to deal with all the crazy shit happening at Castle Black. They get married once the Night’s Watch reforms take place (perhaps in the epilogue?) in a subsequent novella.

#the stark romance saga #asoiaf #asoiaf au #jon snow #ygritte

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