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lesbianrobin · 3 years

Note

What do you think are the good and bad aspects of each season of ST?

ok 1. thank u for this question omg and 2. this answer may or may not be a mess, but either way it’s long (almost 7k words lmao) bc i’m insane, which is why it’s under a cut. it’s still by no means an exhaustive list but these are the things that just kinda came to mind.

also i realize you asked “good and bad” and i wrote this whole post as “strengths and weaknesses” which um. is not Exactly what you asked. but close enough <3 i also ended up including a lot of au ideas ksjdckmn bc like i personally hate when people say a certain plot or whatever was bad without suggesting anything that could have improved it yknow so whenever possible i tried to provide Some idea for fixing the issues i had with the show!!

season 1

strengths (this is probably gonna be the longest section but that’s because a lot of these strengths also apply to s2/s3 by default)

nostalgia and authenticity

this one’s pretty simple, but i think that season one did a good job of blending classic eighties media homages (such as the many many e.t./el parallels) with explicit pop culture references (such as mike’s yoda impression, mentions of the x-men, etc) to create a show that’s essentially dripping in early eighties nostalgia without it feeling too forced. before st, i think the most popular depiction of the eighties in mainstream media was that overly exaggerated neon scrunchie aesthetic from the mid to late eighties, and it was usually done in a comedic sense first and foremost. st took a different approach, instead focusing on the early eighties, a time that’s often ignored in favor of going either Full Seventies or Full Eighties, and i think that this choice likely resonated with adults who lived through the eighties and hadn’t yet seen something that felt quite so accurate to their own adolescence. a lot of young people who watched st were totally unfamiliar with this period of time, unfamiliar with books/movies like “stand by me” that st borrows from heavily, and i think st lent more seriousness to the eighties than most young people had experienced so far, and this was refreshing and interesting!

the use of dnd in the show is also quite genius in a way i’m not sure i can articulate?? it isn’t something Everyone would have played at the time, but it’s something that existed within a different context back in the eighties than it does today, and it really lent a sort of authenticity to the naming of the show’s sci-fi elements. like, of course these kids would name parallel dimensions and monsters and superpowers after these similar things in their favorite game! it just feels so real and it grounds st in our reality moreso than you might expect from the typical sci-fi or horror universe.

utilization of existing tropes

almost every single character in st clearly originates from some popular trope. the plot itself is riddled with classic eighties movie tropes. almost every single element of stranger things can be clearly traced back to some iconic eighties film or just to, like, overused horror/sci-fi/mystery/coming-of-age movie tropes in general. this might sound like a bad thing, but it really works in st’s favor! starting off with familiar tropes gives st the ability to easily create a lot of complexity and make a big impact by selectively deviating from those familiar, comfortable tropes!! while el’s whole plot, hopper’s character, etc, are all examples of this in action, i think the steve/nancy/jonathan plot is the greatest example. even from the start, the fact that good girl barb dies while nancy is off having sex with her asshole boyfriend is an incredibly thorough inversion of the most well-known horror movie trope in the book. how often do girls in horror movies have sex for the first time, walk home alone in the dark of night, and live to tell the tale? nancy and jonathan’s dynamic at first glance is a sort of classic “good girl meets boy from the wrong side of the tracks, discovers he’s actually got a heart of gold” thing, but instead of following this well-trodden path, st diverged. nancy is brash, impulsive, and at times downright insensitive. jonathan is angry, bitter, and actually a bit of a creep at first. while they have the capacity to emotionally connect and support one another, they can also bring out each other’s darker side, which is not what we’ve come to expect from that initial tropey dynamic.

in addition, steve, the popular rich asshole boyfriend, is actually... a human being! unlike the cartoonishly evil jocks that we’ve come to expect (especially from eighties movies), steve has complexity. despite his initial immaturity and selfishness, he’s also kind to barb, he backs off when nancy says no, he’s gentle and sweet when they sleep together, his first big Dick Move of the season is in defense of nancy, he realizes the error of his ways after the fight and does what he can to fix it, he’s worried about nancy when he sees that she’s hurt at jonathan’s house, and to top it all off, he ends up saving both nancy and jonathan’s lives when he could have just walked away, and the three of them all work together to fight the demogorgon. like... steve began as the most stereotypical character of all time, and by the end of the season, he had one of the most compelling and unique arcs among the whole cast!

finally, at the very end of the season, instead of dumping steve for jonathan as expected, nancy ends up getting back together with steve, and they’re both on friendly terms with jonathan. i realize that i just kinda. summarized s1. but my POINT is that i don’t think the dynamics between the monster hunting trio would be nearly as fun and interesting had the characters of nancy, steve, and jonathan not been set up to follow certain paths that we already had charted in our own heads. like, within the first couple episodes of s1, it’s pretty obvious that nancy and steve are gonna break up, nancy will get with jonathan, and steve will either die or go full evil or just never be seen again. like, duh! you’ve seen this story a million times! you know that’s how it’s gonna go! so, when the story DOESN’T go that way, the impact of each character’s arc and the relationship dynamics become stronger due to their unexpected complexity and authenticity.

distinct plotlines separated by age group

this one’s rather obvious, but the way that the adults in s1 were essentially in a conspiracy thriller while the teens were in a horror flick and the kids were in a sci fi power-of-friendship story and all three converged at the end... wow. brilliant showstopping etc. not only was it just really well done and unique, it also gave stranger things near-universal appeal. like, there’s genuinely something for pretty much everyone in season one!

casting

obviously this applies to every season sorta by default, but when i think about what made season one So successful, i always think about the cast, and not just winona ryder. yes, she’s absolutely amazing in the show and it’s very doubtful that st would be as big as it is today without her name being attached to it from the start!! however, i think the greatest determining factor in st’s success is the casting of the kids, particularly millie bobby brown. like... el is just absolutely incredible. she’s amazing. this has all been said many times before so i won’t harp on it, but millie and the other kids are all So talented and charismatic and i think their casting has been instrumental to the show’s success.

strong visuals

the way that multicolored christmas lights which have been around for decades are now kinda like. a Stranger Things thing. jesus christ. those lights are probably the biggest stroke of stylistic genius on the show.

atmosphere and setting

this is probably like. the least important one here for me sdjncdsc because i think s2 and s3 both had like Even Better atmospheres and shit but s1 was good too and it laid the groundwork!! i know a lot of people would have preferred st be set somewhere more Spooky with lots of fog or giant forests or whatnot, and while i do enjoy thinking about alternate st settings and how they might alter the vibe, i think hawkins indiana was a good choice. as the duffers have said, placing stranger things in a fictional town allows them more flexibility than if they’d gone with their original plan of using montauk, new york. besides that, i think the plainness and like... flatness... of small-town indiana just Works. like, the fact that hawkins is never really scary on the surface is a big part of the horror in the lab’s actions and their impact. hawkins isn’t somewhere that people just disappear all the time. it isn’t somewhere known for strange occurrences (prior to s1, that is). it isn’t somewhere shrouded in mist and secrecy. hawkins on its surface seems like the sort of place with no secrets and nothing to fear, and that’s the point! the lab is out in the open! it’s right there! everything is so close to the surface, yet so far out of the public eye, and i think that really works.

the byers family’s whole deal (specifically the joyce/jonathan dynamic)

this is going here bc i miss it so bad in s2 and s3. i’m not one of those people who believe The Byers Are The Whole Point of the show, because st is and always has been an ensemble, and el, hopper, and the wheelers are just as instrumental to the plot as the byers, but ANYWAY, i do think the byers were one of the most interesting aspects of s1. joyce’s difficulties with supporting her sons as a poor and (implied mentally ill) single mother, jonathan’s stress as a result of having to earn money, care for his brother, and keep the house in order when his mother is unable to do so, and the resulting tension between them when will’s disappearance and supposed “death” brings the situation to a tipping point? holy shit! it’s so good! that argument after they see will’s “body” is just incredible and gut-wrenching. their relationship feels so real and messy and i think it’s just... good. also winona ryder REALLY acted her heart out and she carried a lot of s1 which i think people often forget to mention so i’m saying it here.

weaknesses

pacing/timing

ok so pacing is probably going to go in each season’s weaknesses, to be honest, because i think they all had a blend of some good and some bad pacing. good pacing is invisible pacing, though, so i probably won’t be putting it in any of the strengths sections and will only be focusing on it in the weaknesses. i’m also probably not going to talk about weird day/night cycle things, just because i don’t want to get nitpicky on timelines because that would require going back and rewatching things to double check timing which i don’t wanna do at the moment lmao. anyway, when i think of bad pacing in season one, i primarily think of two things: nancy’s little trip into the upside down and subsequent sleepover with jonathan, and the sort of staggered nature of the climax in the final episode. the latter is simple so i’ll explain it first: while i understand that each group’s respective climax is like part of a chain reaction and that’s why each big moment happens separately and at different times, i think that st is strongest when the whole group is together, and i think that makes the stakes feel higher too, so i’m not In Love with the way s1 separated everyone and gave each group their own climax.

okay, now on to the nancy/upside down thing! idk if i’ve ever talked about it before, but i think the worst decision made in s1 by far is the inclusion of nancy’s brief trip into the upside down, wherein she dives headfirst into another dimension with absolutely no backup, watches the demogorgon chow down, freaks out and runs around for a minute, and then leaves. like... what the fuck? even putting aside what an idiotic decision this was (because i do think nancy’s tendency to rush into things headfirst is an intentional and consistent character trait), it just kind of destroys any remaining suspense surrounding the demogorgon and the upside down, and it accomplishes basically nothing besides scaring nancy enough to have jonathan sleep over, which is lame. i will break it down.

like, first of all, nancy just getting to waltz in and out of the upside down and get a good, long look at the demogorgon makes the entire thing far less mysterious, and by extension far less scary. like... before this scene, we the audience haven’t got a good look at the demogorgon. we’ve seen its silhouette briefly and we’ve seen a blurry picture of it, but nothing more, and i think that is far more effective at building fear than this jaunt nancy goes on which gives us a full view of the thing and makes it into less of a horrifying nightmare and into more of a humanoid animal. like, maybe this is just me, but i found the demogorgon far less intimidating after that scene than before. it also lets nancy and jonathan know For Sure that they’re right without providing any crucial information that they need to fight the demogorgon (aka it’s unnecessary to the plot), which removes a very compelling story element (the faith nancy and jonathan need to have in order to keep going against a vague and poorly understood enemy, the doubt they might have about each other and their own sanity, the possibility that they might be wrong, the trust they need to have in each other) a bit earlier in the plot than i believe is ideal. at the end of episode 5, nancy goes into the upside down and jonathan doesn’t know where she is and it’s intense!!! you’re thinking like, oh fuck, not only is nancy missing and fighting for her life now too, jonathan might be implicated in her disappearance!! some people already think he’s the one who killed will and people know that he took creepy pictures of barb and nancy before they both disappeared, maybe this is gonna cause some serious problems for him!! maybe nancy will find will in the upside down and she’ll help him survive!! fuck, maybe she’ll actually die!! this is huge!! and then episode 6 starts and they’re immediately like oh nevermind jonathan found the tree and got nancy out and she’s fine. my point with all of this is that nancy entering the upside down could have done A Lot in the grand scheme of the plot, but all it did was just... get jonathan to sleep over so he and nancy could have some awkward romance moments and steve could see them together and pick a fight. which could have honestly happened at Any point while nancy and jonathan were working together to hunt down the demogorgon, without ruining the demogorgon’s and the upside down’s mystique. so yeah <3

weird behavior and dumbass decisions that make no sense (aka the whole camera thing)

gonna go off about the teen plot again sorry but: why was nancy so unbothered and quick to forgive jonathan for taking those pictures? girl what the fuck are you doing? why wasn’t that a bigger deal? why was jonathan’s motivation for doing it so weak and why did they just kind of forget about the whole thing? why did nancy TRACK HIM DOWN AT THE FUNERAL HOME while he was PICKING OUT HIS BABY BROTHER’S CASKET to be like hey can you tell me what’s in this creepshot you took? it’s insane. it’s so insane. i mean i think the funeral home thing is hilarious and i don’t mind it being in the show necessarily but like my point here is that i think a lot of character decisions in s1 just kind of.. happened because they Needed to happen for the plot. like, they wrote this plot that required jonathan to be secretly taking pictures of the party and required him and nancy to work together after seeing something odd in the pictures, but they didn’t like... really consider what that event would mean for their characterization and relationship. the whole thing was sort of just dropped with minimal discussion and i think it did both nancy and jonathan’s characters a disservice and was really mishandled.

lighting and saturation/color grading

i am literally begging horror/sci-fi shows to let me see shit. i GET IT okay i understand that when you’re doing cgi effects it helps to keep the lights down and i’m not mad at any of the lighting in the demogorgon/upside down scenes!! i’m really not i think the demogorgon scenes in s1 all look sick!! but like... dude. the colors. where are they. why does everyone look like a vampire. i know blah blah this was probably an intentional stylistic choice intended to mimic film at the time blah blah but dude a lot of old movies are very colorful!! please just let people have color in their faces so everyone doesn’t look like a sheet of paper!!! also i’m white and not a professional lighting designer so yknow grain of salt but i think lucas was kinda poorly served by the lighting sometimes in s1. not Hugely so, not to the degree that i’ve seen poc be poorly served by lighting in other shows, but there were some times where it felt kinda like the lighting setup was just not designed with darker skin in mind.

horror

i just personally don’t find s1 very scary like... ever. i don’t think they were really Trying to be extremely scary yknow so i’m not counting this as a big deal, but i do think that each season has improved on the horror aspects. i think s1′s horror lies more in the mystery and the unknown than in what’s seen onscreen, and as i’ve said already, i think s1 kind of fumbled that suspense ball.

season 2

strengths

the possession plot

i’ll warn u rn this whole s2 strengths section is probably gonna be really short bc idk like. how much there is to really say i feel like it’s all so self-explanatory skjncmn. anyway yeah the possession plot!! eerie as fuck, and noah OWNED. so did winona tbh and finn and sean etc but like. noah. wow! i think the possession plot helped the show maintain a good amount of tension and suspense throughout the season, and a lot of scenes with possessed!will are flatout disturbing to watch. in a good way. i think the mindflayer and will’s possession were far more genuinely frightening than s1′s demogorgon, and it provided a new layer of depth and intrigue to the antagonist besides just “bad monster want eat people.”

tone and aesthetics

halloween season... literally halloween season. halloween season. that is all.

actually i will elaborate a bit and just say that i think s2 did a good job of having the sort of foreboding vibe that s1 was often going for, but without the annoying darkness and desaturation. so points for that.

also st2 is like one of the best Autumn pieces of media ever like it just. like steve and dustin on those train tracks with the fallen leaves all around them.... god. god the vibes are unparalleled. all of the halloween stuff also really contributes to the nostalgia st runs on yknow it makes you think about childhood and trick-or-treating and you kind of get transported like damn... i remember going to the rich neighborhoods to score the good candy..... idk i just think the whole thing is incredibly effective.

“babysitter” steve

by sending nancy and jonathan off together, the show created a problem: what to do with steve? this problem pushed them to create the unconventional and unexpected duo of steve and dustin, and the world is so much brighter for it. seriously though we all know steve and dustin are great i don’t need to argue that point. all i’ll add is that i think allowing steve to grow in this way, serving as a mentor figure and becoming genuine friends with someone so unexpected, really took the originality of his character to the next level. no longer content just to defy his archetype, in s2 steve begins branching out in ways that never would have been considered in s1, creating an incredibly complex and interesting person from the sort of character that most shows would have simply written out or killed off for convenience’s sake. and it works and steve and dustin are such a joy to watch and i love them. <3

the lucas/max plot

so first of all max mayfield is the most perfect baby girl on god’s green earth and idk what i would do without her but anyway. i think lumax is the best romantic relationship in the show and not just because they’re the only ones with like an age-appropriate approach to the whole thing. it’s also because their relationship accomplishes more than just putting the two of them in a relationship!! lucas and max spending time together motivates billy to do his evil shit, providing more conflict in the narrative, and it also helps establish max as part of the group in a relatively natural way while giving both her and lucas a great subplot. lucas (and dustin) has a crush on the new girl, they start spending some time together, and lucas ends up needing to decide whether he’ll keep the secret of the upside down and lose her, or risk both of their lives by telling her the truth. that’s a pretty big, character-defining decision that he gets to make!! max has to choose whether to trust this boy she barely knows and endanger herself, or to walk away and stay safe, yet another great character-defining choice that also contributes to the sense we get as an audience of max as somebody who’s incredibly lonely and desperate for love and connection. this post is way too long already and i have a ton more to say so i’ll stop now but yeah i think lumax really Works in the show without ever distracting or detracting from the overall plot and narrative in the way that some other ships (coughjancycough) often do.

balance between the normal and abnormal

s2 i think did a pretty solid job of melding daily life with more fantastical sci-fi horror elements. i enjoyed seeing so much of the kids at school in the first few episodes!! you really get a strong sense of where they’re at in life, what their daily lives are like, and you get a sort of gradual shift into madness that makes everything feel more grounded than i think it would if they had just leapt straight into the horror shit, yknow?

the el and hopper dynamic

go back and rewatch s2 and tell me that’s not one of the most moving portrayals of parenthood and trauma and growing up that you’ve ever seen. you can’t. or well you can but i won’t listen. i really can’t imagine stranger things without el and hopper’s relationship, and it’s my absolute favorite part of s2. their whole dynamic is so beautiful and complex, and gives them each amazing personal arcs in addition! the black hole scene is literally one of the show’s greatest moments of all time. any given scene between the two of them in s2 is just guaranteed to be heartwarming as well as heartbreaking, and i think that makes for an incredible show.

weaknesses

flashbacks

okay this applies to Every season they All have too many flashbacks but in s2 specifically... please stop showing me shit from season one. i watched it. i know what happened. you don’t need to spoon feed everything to me!! flashbacks can be a really helpful way of delivering information to an audience, but st has a bad habit of not only being kinda demeaning in how often they flash back to shit that the audience already knows, but they also have a bad habit of using flashbacks almost as a crutch to avoid having to deliver information subtly and naturally.

you know i gotta say it... the lost sister

this is so sad. the lost sister really is like a great concept for an st episode, and i’m not mad about the idea of st taking a break from the normal action to focus on one story for a full episode, but the execution of it was just dreadful. kali and her crew feel very over-the-top and stereotypical, and its placement in the season totally kills the tension and excitement that was built in “the spy.”

i think the lost sister honestly could have gone over far better, even with the stereotypical fake-feeling gang kali has, if they had just swapped it with “the spy” like... ok, the end of episode five has el setting off to find kali and will collapsing on the ground seizing. right? imagine if, instead of immediately following will to the lab, we’d followed el. we don’t know what’s happening with will, but it’s a very simple cliffhanger that leaves us on edge without making us feel cheated by the show cutting away. we follow el on her little journey, everything happens much the same as canon, and then at the end, el sees hopper in scrubs. she sees mike, screaming, sees that they’re both in danger. holy shit!!! what the fuck!!! what’s happened since we left will seizing on the ground??? we feel el’s fear and confusion. she decides to go home. and then... boom. “the lost sister” is over. now, we rewind, right back to will seizing on the ground, and “the spy” commences. we learn how they got into the danger that el saw in the end of “the lost sister,” and we sit on the edge of our seats all through “the spy” and “the mind flayer,” KNOWING that el is on her way back to save them but not knowing when she’ll arrive!! idk i don’t think that would have necessarily saved lost sister but i think it may have alleviated some of the issues that i and many others have with it, timing-wise.

the nancy/jonathan sidequest

once again, the idea of nancy going off on her own little mission to find justice for barb after s1 is like. amazing. genuinely i love that plot for her and i can’t imagine anything better for her to have focused on in s2. unfortunately though i think her and jonathan’s little trip to see murray was just kind of... lame. the whole thing just felt like an excuse to get the two of them alone together, yknow? which is fine i guess people contrive all sorts of situations to get characters alone together for romance reasons but in this case i think it just really doesn’t work for me because of what it’s juxtaposed with. like, will is POSSESSED, and jonathan is just off on a mini road trip and sleeping with his bestie, and jonathan never seems to communicate to joyce/will that he left town, and joyce never like... thinks to tell him that will is like sick and fucked up and they’re looking at him in the lab??? like it’s so weird i know joyce always forgets about jonathan when shit’s happening with will but jfc you’d think at some point in that like... 72-ish-hour period where jonathan was out of town she would have thought about him. like at least once. maybe i’m forgetting something and she mentioned him sometime and i missed it but even still, i hate the juxtaposition of nancy and jonathan just like cheers-ing at murray’s place and sleeping together and whatnot while everyone else is dealing with possession or trying to hunt down dart yknow? it feels really boring in comparison and i think it could have been done far better. like it was SO insanely easy for them to get into the lab and get an admission of guilt and escape with it!! i think it might have been a lot more engaging if maybe someone from the lab tailed them to murray’s place and they had to like lose the tail and race to get the recording out to as many news outlets as possible before they got caught, or something like that. the tension in their plotline is completely resolved in episode four!! episodes five and six are just them screwing around and addressing envelopes. while there were a lot of strong ideas in this plotline (i really enjoy nancy going out of her way to get justice, and the fact that they have to water down the story to make it believable), i just think the focus on nancy and jonathan getting together hindered it a lot without adding a ton to the plot or their individual characters.

season 3

strengths

starcourt mall as a setting

while i don’t think the mall was utilized quite to its full potential (something i could make a separate post about if anyone’s interested), i do think that starcourt was a genius addition to the series. i’ve said this before, but building a new mall is a literal Perfect in-universe justification for a significant leap forward in fashion and aesthetics, and it provides a great location for characters to just... be characters. idk how else to articulate this i just think that the mall is a great setting to let people interact with each other and to bring people together who may not have been otherwise (i.e. scoops troop). not to mention how sick it was to see the mall get wrecked toward the end kdjncdkm like they were able to do so much more with the mall in terms of like The Finale than they could with just the byers house or the cabin or the school or even the lab. i love all the back tunnels they run through it’s such a fun like acknowledgement of how this glitzy eighties mall is just a real place where employees get shipments and take out the trash and shit idk it’s all about the perfect facade and what’s hidden what’s underneath what’s hiding in plain sight etc etc i’m just saying words now. anyway.

willingness to experiment and go against expectations

gay robin. neon aesthetics. giant fucking meat monster. i know some people hate both the neon and the meat monster but i personally think they were kind of amazing and like. yknow regardless of personal tastes i think it’s impossible to deny that s3 had a lot of incredible visuals, and they’re all visuals that just wouldn’t have been possible if the show were too afraid to stray from its s1 aesthetic. robin being canonically gay (and her resulting friendship with steve) and the season’s striking visuals are two things that most everyone (besides like homophobes skjncdknm) can agree were great, right? and they were both departures from where the show began and what we all expected!! so yeah i think while some of the experimentation in s3 wasn’t ideal it was also that experimentation that allowed for some of the season’s strongest elements to come about.

the hospital sequence (and the season’s action/horror scenes in general)

this one is fairly self-explanatory. while they may have underutilized the “body snatching” element of the season, the hospital sequence with nancy and jonathan fighting off their possessed bosses did an amazing job of building tension and creating a genuine sense of really intense and personal danger.

in general i think that s3 melded action and horror rather well, particularly in the sauna test, the hospital, and when the mindflayer busts through the roof of hop’s cabin. horror can come from many things, and in this case, st elicited horror largely from the feeling of helplessness, and it was really effective for me personally. i think it worked better for me than s1′s brand of horror because it doesn’t rely so much on a lack of knowledge or a sense of suspense that inevitable disappears upon a second viewing.

the body horror we got in s3 was also really fun! that’s it i just think all the blood and guts and slime were fun and i would like more of them. once again, the impacts of body horror are less dependent upon the viewer being in the dark or unsure as to what’s happening, and as such i think it tends to be a little more effective at eliciting reaction in the long term.

timing and mechanics of the battle of starcourt/finale

i think the battle of starcourt is just fucking awesome, and beyond that personal opinion, i think it’s the most high-stakes and intense finale of all three seasons, and this is for two main reasons! 1. el is out of commission, and 2. (almost) everyone is in the same cental location. this means that (almost) everyone is in danger all at once, and they are all working together at the same time to fight the same threat. s1/s2 have their groups more fragmented for the finales, and while i understand why in each case and i wouldn’t call either season’s finale necessarily weak, i do think the centralized nature of the s3 finale just Works on another level. in s1 and s2, large segments of the cast are already perfectly safe by the time el dispatches the primary threat. in s3, however, everybody save for dustin and erica is still in danger up until the last moment, and el is seemingly (you can def debate how much power she still had in her when she peeked into billy’s mind and whether the memory broke the mindflayer’s hold on him or if she was actually controlling him to some degree) completely vulnerable. this increases the tension and raises the stakes, making the finale a real crescendo to fortissimo as opposed to a series of little mezzo forte moments. i hope everyone reading this knows music idk how else to phrase that my brain is stupid.

emphasis on friendship and adolescence (but in a different way than s1/2)

this is definitely a controversial one but i think that s3 really did like... show a side of friendship that had been more or less unexplored thus far in the show. el and max were amazing, and i think it’s really nice that we got an opportunity to see the kids have some growing pains as well as see them support each other through Normal Adolescent Stuff like boyfriends and breakups instead of just like. death and trauma. this is maybe just a personal preference, but i think it can be really enlightening and provide a lot of depth when you get to see how characters respond to normal everyday conflict and not just how they respond to giant world-ending conflict!! letting el use her powers for goofy teenage shit like spying on boys and messing with mean girls at the mall is not only fun for her and the audience, but it also really emphasizes just how much those powers are a part of el, making it that much more devastating when she loses them at the end of the season.

weaknesses

tonal dissonance

so this is like. obvious. but it must still be said! i won’t go on and on about it since we all know this so i’ll try to like talk about it from an angle people don’t usually? anyway. it seems to me like they were maybe a little worried about s3 being too dark. while the choice to really lean into humor was definitely driven by the sorts of eighties teen films from which s3 drew inspiration (like fast times at ridgemont high), i think it was also done in an attempt to alleviate the more troubling implications of some events in the season, particularly the russian bunker plot. like, yeah, st can be incredibly dark, but if they’d played the whole “children being stuck inside of a foreign military base, tied up, tortured, and drugged” thing completely straight without the humorous elements that exist in canon, it had the potential to be like... disturbing on a new level. steve and robin don’t have powers like el yknow their kidnapping/torture doesn’t have any sci-fi elements to sorta soften the blow. they’re just innocent teenagers being brutalized and traumatized by grown men. so anyway yeah i think maybe the writers were concerned about this storyline coming off as too dark and they wanted it to be a little more whimsical but they ended up pushing way too hard in that direction and creating extreme dissonance at times. this goes for joyce/hopper/murray/alexei too, but to a lesser extent. i think the ridiculousness in that group felt a lot more like... realistic. but still.

newspaper plot

once again i feel like i don’t even need to say this skjdncmn we all know it was insane how the show basically ended up delivering the message “while misogyny is a serious problem poverty and classism are not” and i’ve said it on this blog a million times so i don’t need to repeat myself. i’ll focus on another weak point of this plot: the fact that it completely separates nancy and jonathan from everyone else. once again, the show’s preoccupation with j/ancy held them back! like... can you imagine a version of s3 where nancy and jonathan both worked in the mall? i have a lot of ideas about this possible au and like how the plot could play out differently if they worked in the mall but first of all it’s just more realistic, second of all it further utilizes the mall as a central setting, and third of all, it would bring everyone together. as it is in canon, nancy and jonathan were unnecessarily isolated from the rest of the group, and this isolation was detrimental to both of their characters. like, they only ever get to interact with each other! if they’d gotten summer jobs in the mall, they could have had more interactions with the kids/steve/robin, and they absolutely still could have had a similar argument! maybe in this case, nancy notices the rat thing (or something else odd) herself when taking out the trash behind the mall, and she wants jonathan to ditch work with her to check it out bc she thinks it may be related to the lab. jonathan doesn’t want to ditch work because he needs his job, nancy argues that they’re working shitty mall jobs anyway and who cares if they get fired, and we get more or less the same thing as s3 without the cartoonishly over-the-top misogyny. i mean honestly i think the rat shit could have been cut entirely it didn’t rly... accomplish much of anything. in my opinion. like imagine s3 without the rat plot you literally would not be missing anything except it would be more surprising when the dudes melted into goo at the hospital. so yeah i think it would have been better if nancy and jonathan had jobs at the mall, weren’t isolated from everybody else, and were maybe absorbed into the party’s plot or the scoops troop’s plot from very early on, allowing them to interact with more characters and have a less... dumb.... plot. like god splitting up nancy and jonathan between the party/scoops troop would have been So Much better i just. sdkjcnksdmn anyway yeah.

briefness of group reunion/separation of groups

remember in s2 at the beginning of “the gate,” where mike and hopper had a confrontation and max and el met for the first time and el hugged everyone and steve and nancy had their sad little moment together outside... where’s that energy? obviously the s2 reunion wasn’t that long either, but it made space for some significant emotional moments to take place. s3′s reunion had some hopper/el/mike resolution, but besides that... there was nothing, really. i just think that the whole group getting together in s3 was SO exciting and powerful the way they did it (with both the scoops troop and the adults having their own Big Moment reconnecting with team griswold family), but the emotional potential was more or less squandered.

i also think in s3 at times they were really stretching to keep everybody separated even though it made no sense. and like... in s1 the separation worked bc nobody else knew that (x group) was experiencing weird shit too, and beyond that, each group (as i mentioned in the s1 section) was sort of operating within their own genre and bringing something unique to the season. they’ve stopped doing that though! now, the groups aren’t separate bc each plot is tonally/structurally different, the groups are just separate bc... they need to be, because it’s a big ensemble cast and you can’t just have them all be together for a whole season or it would be way too difficult to coordinate things and keep the show dynamic. all this is to say that i’m excited for s4 because the location differences make it so there’s a Reason for each plot to be separate at the beginning, and i think that’ll work better.

general ridiculousness

i dont mean like i think it’s bad that they made jokes this is just me lumping in all the dumb shit like hopper not worrying about el and not wanting to check on the kids, him and joyce bickering long after they both know they and their children are in danger, max seemingly forgetting that billy is a racist abuser, etc etc. i think many of these are just a symptom of the show 1. trying desperately to keep the groups split up a certain way even though it may not make any sense, and 2. trying to fit into a certain genre/trope mold when their actual characters are more complex than the tropes they’re imitating. this is so fucking long already i am not gonna elaborate further rn but i trust u all know what i mean.

soooo... yeah, that’s about all! i mean it’s not all there are definitely many more things i could talk about and i know i focused sorta disproportionately on the teens which is my bad :/ but i’m done for now. thank you for asking, and apologies for the delay in responding!! i’m sure some people reading (if anyone read this far) will disagree with some of what i’ve said and that’s alright like i’m not The Authority on st or anything i’m just trying to talk about like my own thoughts yknow? so yeah luv u all i hope someone enjoyed reading this!!

#asks #em talks #lesbianrobin.canon #stranger things #if u actually read all this i love u and im sorry #these r just my opinions!! and im sure i misremembered some shit my brain is swiss cheese #i did my best tho

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dawnsdarkside · 3 years

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Just out of curiosity, how did you get into ChiLuc? what was the appeal of it for you? I'm curious to know why you think it works so well for Diluc please dont take this the wrong way!

oh lordy anon do u have any idea how much its gonna take out of me to not ramble out a whole fuccin novel... lemme just say from the start i got into it because of tea (aka cryoknights/hydrokissed) who was obviously my kaeya from the start and one day after we spent many hours discussing our two sad bros they randomly told me they didnt think they shipped either diluc or kaeya with anyone but were very suddenly considering childe and i was like. who ? because i hadnt met him yet dsjfhgfdshjg and they told me some abt him and i was just like huh. yea sure love who u love yknow and then fast-forward maybe a week when i actually ran into childe in-game and it only took like a day for me to be like 👀 wait actually,

thats how i got into it specifically !! as for the appeal lemme try to recap:

rivals

enemies to lovers

red / blue

hydro / pyro

grumpy / cheerful

grumpy actually has a rly soft heart / cheerful is actually devil incarnate

easily irritated / makes a point to get under your skin

hero with the personality of a bad guy / villain with the personality of a good guy

obviously traumatized / just as traumatized but not as obviously

daddy issues

battle couple

thats just the initial appeal though tbfh i could go on for approximately two hundred seventy-eight hours with just the stuff me and tea have talked about. youre welcome to ask about that too ofc but im guessing thats not the intel you were here for lmao

#chiluc #⌈ ✮ anonymous ⌋#anyway childe was accompanying diluc for most of his 3 year journey away from mondstadt and yall can pry this from my cold dead hands !!!!!!#trying to earn his trust and talk him into giving up the chase and going home #except they both get attached and catch feelings instead #its all very excruciating and slowburn #vaporize u could say #and heartbreaking knowing dilucs lil adventure ends when he faces off against the Eleven and barely makes it out alive #WOULD have died 'if not for an observer from the north (read: snezhnayan) who had been watching his progress for some time #and approved of his methods' literally word for word from childes stories #where its said he doesnt 'approve of their methods' abt the fatui (or maybe just the other harbingers ?? i cant remember)#anyway #dont get me started or i will not stop #childe canonly loves someone who can kick his ass and guess whos canonly one of the most fearsome fighters in teyvat #i will just talk on and on if i do not stop so i will just..........click 'post' now before i keep going off bc i sure Could

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valdotpng · 4 years

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Question. Do you have any specific resources you used to learn art and painting, etc?? Your style and skill is so so good and I'd love to see how you Do It

oh, gosh. i dont think i could ever answer this question in a truly satisfying manner, but i’ll try my best to do it!

learning art in general has just been a road of trial and error for me! looots of trial and error. im a ‘self-taught’ artist & i’ve been drawing since i was a toddler, so i’ve accumulated certain skills just bc i’ve been doing it for so dang long

that being said, i’ll share some links in a moment! but first, some advice from me to you, anon. just.. go wild. try new things and dont set too many rules for yourself, yknow what i mean? nowadays i tend to use lots of weird textured brushes + work on only one layer (which i hear is quite bad for when youre working on commissions, but i paint for myself so i dont gotta worry about correcting things all the time), and as a person struggling w/ a pretty severe case of OCD, i find it so liberating to be Forced to not give a shit through that painting method. just have fun! allow yourself to be messy, to make mistakes, and remember that you can just paint over them later. some of your ‘mistakes’ might even end up being the things that make your drawing look more interesting/organic, in the end! the ‘happy little accidents’ mindset just makes the whole process much more enjoyable imo :]

ALSO, an important thing to me was finding the right brushes for painting. just dl a shit ton of the ones that look fun to you (or make your own if your drawing program allows it!) and make an effort to try out each and every one of them at least once!! the brushes certainly arent that important-- you could paint a masterpiece with a simple square brush-- but more often than not i find my style being subtly influenced by the brushes that i use at the moment. its a thing worth considering!

another thing i should note is that, while im mostly happy with my art nowadays, i AM still learning, and i dont think i’ll ever stop learning, so, like, check in in a couple of years for some better tips i guess asuhdfuashfusdf

anyways, here are some resources that are/were very helpful to me:

when i need to browse for general art tips/tutorials/cheat sheets/etc, i usually go here: [link 1], [link 2], [link 3], [link 4], [link 5],

now, here are some specific posts ive collected over the years that really made me rethink how i approach composition and the like in my, uh, more ‘serious’ paintings: [link 1], [link 2], [link 3], [link 4], [link 5]

this [link] video series is a Godsend, its got some very good advice AND its got nice editing too, my hellbrain was actually able to focus and learn smth from a video tutorial for once

heres a nice post about practice and improvement that you should deffo read before using all of these resources

i also find it very helpful to just.. look at art that inspires you/ that you find appealing Right before painting? that way all of the techniques you might pick up while staring at other peoples art will stay fresh in your mind, so you’ll be more likely to try em out. (setting a drawing that you really like as a phone/desktop bg works well too since youll inevitably stare at it quite often)

i also really like seeing other peoples process, so i tend to watch speedpaints/analyse process gifs & photosets a lot! seeing how messy and abstract most drawings are in the early stages of painting is really comforting/reassuring to me :] heres a couple for u: [link 1], [link 2], [link 3], [link 4], [link 5], [link 6], [link 7], [link 8], and finally, [link 9] and [link 10] (3, 9 and 10 are the ones that inspire me the most atm)

as a bonus, heres one from me as well! (usually i only post these on my patreon, but ik times are tough rn and any of your spare money could (and should) go to a far better cause) im putting it under a read more bc it contains blood and self-impalement, so beware! (bloodborne bosses, man) i might make a speedpaint in the future, too, so watch out for that!

#good luck!#hope you have fun :]#Anonymous #gif #blood

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saltysmoothie · 3 years

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🌼, 🍄 - Serendipity. 🌻 , 🌿 - Veron. 🌸 - March

Oh boy this is gonna be a long one, strap right in

Serendipity

🌼 Who are this characters friends and found family? How did they meet, how long have they been friends for, could they ever be something more than just friends? What do they look for in a friend or a romantic partner?

Serendipity has a pretty alright relationship with her family, not perfect but it’s functional and her mom has made it clear that she cares about her daughter’s mental health and general wellbeing, her dad not quite as much but he’s not the worst. She’s got a younger brother as well named Kayden, and he’s cool, for as much as he is a little dweeb sometimes. She also has Ayana of course, who is the one person she can talk on a personal level to when it comes to her job as Good Karma. For now... let’s just say Serendipity wants to keep her identity of Good Karma away from her family, but with Ayana it’s completely fine to talk about both the goods and the bads of that job.

Ayana and Serendipity met in kind of an odd way, while Serendipity was on somewhat of a mission to check out a pretty haunted and weird area, and Ayana just happened to be hanging around there because she was also interested in the demons hanging there. After awhile, they just talked more to one another, and became better friends over time! As for the time frame they’re together in, it is ever changing in terms of their story but I can honestly say they stay friends for quite awhile, they meet about a month after Serendipity becomes Good Karma as well.

As for if they’d be more than friends well... Serendipity definitely harbors some unsaid feelings for Ayana. She’s never really had a friend who cared about her well-being or just her as a person, so it takes her such a long time to come to terms that she likes Ayana more than just a friend. She’s not 100% dense, she definitely ponders if her feelings are at all romantic sometimes, but it just takes her a few months, maybe a year or so to think about it, yknow? But Ayana is definitely the kind of partner she needs, romantic or not. Both because they bond so well, but also because she tends to be able to help her get down to a good level if she’s angry or anxious, and the same is pretty much mutual with how Serendipity helps Ayana, though in some separate ways. Theyre a good duo.

🍄 What are your OCs favourite snacks? Their favourite comfort food which always cheers them up when they’re down? Favourite meal to make? Do they enjoy baking and cooking and are they any good in the kitchen?

OhHOHOHOHOH. This is such a good question because Serendipity loves food, she loves baking, and cooking as well. Baking is the one thing she thinks she’s really good at, even if she fails at like making cookies she doesn’t get down on herself, she’s really glad that she now knows better, there might’ve been something she missed and she’s gonna do better next time. Plus the process of putting ingredient together is pretty relaxing for her. Cooking is good too, less relaxing but hey you can do whatever with it. Put a shit ton of salt and pepper in that baby and it’s good(now that I think about it. She probably has awful taste skfgsjfgsj).

But in all honesty her favorite foods are penne pasta spaghetti and lemon poppyseed muffins. She loses her shit over those two specific foods.

Veron

🌻 What little things do they notice about people or the world around them that make them happy? What tiny little treasures do they find in the normal every day that makes the world seem a little brighter for them?

GOD THIS ONE IS HARD SJFGDH. For starters it hasn’t been too hard for Veron to perceive how Lynnet trusts them, like especially before they left they felt really confident in themselves because they knew when she had a moment to check up on them, she would hear them out on something even if it was really small. That just made them feel all the more better about making a presence among their crew, something they kinda struggled with before they joined the crew itself.

With the party, they were originally only a little more trusting of Quill since they were both sailors but they weren’t sure how Setac and Dedan would feel about them, but as time went by and the same thing happened with their crew, where they were just accepted in this ragtag group, and also just seeing how they fared on caring about each other, it just kinda makes them kinda emotional and happy that the group is as supportive of them as they are. If there was anything else in the world that reaches a similar feeling for them that brings happiness for them, it’s definitely the sound of rain or the ocean, or being able to just talk to other people about their interests.

🌿 What way does your OC show that they care without using words? What way do others show your OC that they’re cared about without using speech?

Oh interesting one.... Veron has a particular way of trying to show they care without words, and that’s appealing to the better interests of the person they are trying to demonstrate their level of care to. It can either be through being quiet while being with them, showing them things they enjoy to hopefully gather a connection with them on interests, or fighting alongside them and trying to make sure the other person is safe and sound throughout it all(if the person they cares about gets attacked they’ll try to rush over if they can, etc.). And even though they aren’t that great with touch, they make it clear that if they care about someone they don’t mind giving a hug if needed, and the other person wants it enough. But more often than not, they reach out with words, the idea of reaching out without words is still a rather new one, and while they think they’ve got a long ways to go in terms of developing care without words, I think they’re doing pretty good right now, trying the things they do.

March

🌸 What are some of their favourite things and why? List as many as you can think of!

Oh gosh!! March has a lot of interests, where do I even start. One of the most obvious ones is anime, she grew up on Sailor Moon and a lot of Magical Girl related media’s as she grew up, and now it’s just become a large part of her life now that she has so many plushies from said media’s and she’ll just ramble about those things on and on to people like August.

She also likes a good relaxing sim type game, Animal Crossing New Leaf or Stardew Valley or something akin to those she’s probably packed at least 1000 hours each into each, she LOVES those games/type of game to death.

Another thing she appreciates baking a lot as well, it’s a very common activity for her and August to get together to make something like ice cream, cookies, cake, or whatever since she grew up in a household that had a lot of bakers recipes passed into the family, and since then its been the one thing she can share with her friends that she is always glad to share.

Collecting cool and pretty looking rocks is one other she’s always loved, bring her to a mueseum and she practically loses her mind in the gift shop. Stim toys are also really exciting to collect as well.

#my ocs #ask #asks #ask meme #oc meme #thank you for the ask squish ; w ; !!!#god I really did write several paragraphs on these topics #that’s okay rambling about my ocs I only do once in awhile #serendipity #serendipity donner #veron #veron pulstus #march #march roesner

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itonje · 3 years

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orkney brothers fashion hcs maybe...anyways. i’m super bad at fashion history esp medieval fashion history so i’m rlly more talking abt how they use fashion except i DO think all of them tend to wear clothes on the warmer side (barring mordred) just bc. britain/scotland is cold lol. so that’s why i give gawaine and agravain furs when i draw them. (afaik orkney isn’t actually that cold for somewhere so northern though lol). gawaine i think is like very smart with what he wears if he’s at a function with all of arthur’s men + his own family i think he goes really extravagant, like very fancy rich colored richly made clothes lots of jewelry good shoes etc etc. he’ll also wear clothes specifically to appeal to the people he’s around. but when he’s on quests or whatever, or he’s in an unfamiliar environment he tones it back a lot and wears a lot of more simpler clothes, so he doesn’t standout or something, and people don’t really recognize him...for the anonymity of it all. though i don’t think he chooses practicality over opulence or whatever esp when it comes to battle i think he thinks opulence IS practicality yknow and if he’s going into something where he knows he’s going to standout he WILL look his best. also prefers bright colors, golden, violet, peacock green etc etc

anyways agravain i think is also very inclined to dressing richly, the difference is that i don’t think he rlly uses fashion to like manipulate his image, and he doesn’t ever STOP dressing fancily. i think he dresses very showy/distinct in whatever situation he finds himself in. however, also unlike gawaine, when agravain’s alone or around people he knows he actually prefers to dress in whatever’s comfortable. actually i think comfort is a huge thing for agravain as well even if his outfit looks awful or doesn’t fit the mien of whatever event he’s at as long as it’s a. very richly made and b. comfortable he will wear it. he likes to wear darker colors-dark green, black, deep brown

gaheris tends to wear his armor more than he wears clothes wrhsshdh (i hc lancelot to be the same way) even if he gets odd looks over it he thinks its comfortable (you know how heavy clothes feel rlly good? kinda like that to the extreme) and he really doesn’t care about presenting himself as ‘princely’ in the same way that agravain and gawaine do but for events and such he tends to dress nicely and fit for the occasion but never goes for like, show stoppingly good he just puts on whatever’s the cleanest and nicest looking. he tends to wear more neutral-warm colors (orange, dusky brown etc etc)

did you ever know someone who always like stole/took their parents clothes/jewelry etc etc??? (that is me LOL) but yeah that’s gareth except he does it to everyone in his family lol (esp when he was younger and had like 3 brothers before him wrhshsd) he really doesn’t care about like making a new sort of look for himself and usually follows the fashions of what the other knights are wearing, as long as he thinks its practical because practicality is > to him, and he doesn’t care abt getting his clothes dirty, (usually cause they aren’t his LOL). however, he doesn’t mind (and actually kinda prefers) getting his outfit picked out for him by his brothers/older family members, as long as they fit his personal guidelines and it doesn’t cost too much. wears soft, pastelish colors if he can-pale yellow, lavender, etc

mordred is definitely the odd one out here because he does have his own show off fashion style, but the thing is he actively picks things that are not really good looking? he doesn’t really go for ‘showy’ as in bright colors or richly made clothes, but more he wears whatever he wants even if they don’t fit the function he’s at at all. and he doesn’t dress comfortably, everything is too tight or too loose and very sheer, and even in private he still wears this stuff whsfhsdfh he’s sort of like agravain in that he wears a single type of outfit regardless of the situation but this doesn’t even serve a grander purpose like agravain he just. wears what he wants because that’s what he wants. however i do think this kind of makes his own personal statement (like gawaine’s use of fashion) to other people that well. he can do whatever he wants! he almost always wears black, but he’ll wear other dark colors occasionally

#finny.txt #sorry..this is cringe #but w.e i dont draw so this is the best way to get it all out afsjkl #also i think this is the most ive ever talked about gareth #sorry gareth. i love you but i think your cunty evil brothers are so much more interesting #arthuriana

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briarrosescurse · 4 years

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tagged by @prometheanglory ! thank u for the tag homie ily2 sorry for doing it So Late but pls keep on tagging me lolol

fic prefs: aaa i'm down for all sorts of fics ngl? it's SUPER hard to pick a fav bc every genre has its own qualities that makes it so good !! that said tho, i do like fics that handle more mature topics, actually? esp angst but more like angst in the direction of hurt/comfort? it feels rewarding in a way to suffer along with a character only for them to find their own happy ending, it just gives me a very hopeful feeling!

slow burn or love at first sight?: SLOW BURN FOR LIFE, im all for the Hot development in a relationship!!! there are just PLENTLY of possible directions u could go with slow burn, it holds so much potential !!! u can go Wild

fake dating or secretly dating?: secretly dating... there is just something Spicy about a relationship that has to be kept secret, whether it's because of serious stuff or just bc of sheer fear of embarrassment lmao

enemies to lovers or friends to lovers?: aaa hard to pick ngl,, i think i'll stick with enemies to lovers,,, the gradual development, maybe mixed with some teasing "oh u hated my guts so bad" "and i still do" "but u also love me dont u" hehe

"oh no there's only one bed" or long distance correspondence?: ooo no,,, there's only one bed,,, ig we have to share it,,, haha jk.... unless? ;)

hurt/comfort or amnesia?: HURT/COMFORT FOR LIIIIFEEEE

fantasy au or modern au?: tbh im down either ! depends always on the original www

mutual pining or domestic bliss?: mutual pining is SO GOOD,,, there's just smth.... Good abt witnessing a developing romance

smut or fluff?: jdjdj HARD PICK BUT,, i'll go with smut,,, smut takes a lot of skill to write, to actually make it sound appealing and just. right in the moment, yknow?

canon complement/missing scenes or fix it?: mmm def the first one, never rlly felt appealing the latter one ngl

one shot or multi chapter?: again ! im fine with either ! it honestly depends on my mood

kid fic or road trip?: ROAD TRIP!!! JUST THINK OF ALL THE FUN INTERACTIONS

reincarnation or character's death?: why dont we have both? :) JK but im going to go with reincarnation if it's like. involving a character's death? my heart just Clenches at the idea ngl

arranged marriage or accidental marriage?: ARRANGED MARRIAGE, ARRANGED MARRIAGE, ARRANGED MARR

neighbours or roommates?: roommates has always been a lot more fun imo, ur rlly more bound to spend time together

highschool romance or middle aged romance?: i'm an avid shoujo manga reader so. what are u expecting. ofc im gonna go with highschool romance, im an absolute sucker for it.

time travel or isolated together?: mmm. dont have rlly anything to say tbh. ig time travel?

sci-fi au or magic au?: aaa ngl im easily bored by sci-fi and with magic u can play around so much !!! so it's def magic uwu

body swap or genderbend?: nNNOOo BOTH IS RLLY GOOD THO,,, I CANT DECIDE, BOTH HAVE SO MUCH FUN POTENTIAL TO EXPLORE

angst or crack?: angst,,, angst can be so hot and painful and that exact pain makes it SO GOOD. GIVE ME ALL THE FEELIES, MAKE ME CRY, I WANT TO BE INVESTED

apocalyptic or mudane?: despite my frequent nightmares about apocalyptic scenarios (specifically zombies), i Live for apocalyptic fics.... esp if it differs itself from the original setting A LOT, it's fun to see certain characters in a whole new setting and how they'll adapt to it !!

aaaa im. unsure who to tag, i usually dont tag anyone but, literally anyone who sees this can do it but ! if i have to, i'll just tag u guys @choconanime @terrors-of-nightraven @noeyebunnynobunsu @glassormirrors @randomikemendegen @yukinonshi that is !! if none of u mind ! dont feel forced to do this, haha

#[other]#[tag meme]

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trinkerichi · 4 years

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feeling conflicted again uughh. long art ramble, kinda ns.fw mention under the cut

ive been drawing furry commissions for extra spending money lately cuz those ppl are LOADED and very generous about it. So ive been making cutesy chibi YCH bases!

but it’s the same problem i get EVERYWHERE else and im getting followed constantly by ppl like babyfurs and other fetishes like that (i cant tell if most of them are nsfw but its all uncomf to me) and sometimes i check the ppl who commission me and sometimes i dont. ive been very clear that i dont draw stuff like diapers or specifically fetish characters and so far everyone’s respected that, but i dont KNOW for sure yknow? And its been making me feel guilty because I know my art appeals to them. I draw cute stuff like care bears and chibis cuz its a comfort to me and I’ve been very openly against it being used for fetish stuff in the past.. But idk if ive just become used to it or what because I barely react when i see someone like that is interacting with my stuff now. It still BOTHERS me but i just expect it at this point. (And the last time i very openly stated how much it bothered me I was bombarded with shock porn in response so thats a thing.)

I just. I like that im making a bit of spending money by drawing chibi characters hugging stuffed animals and sleeping on pastel clouds, cuz thats the stuff i do best! But every so often i just feel horrible like I’m allowing my art to be associated with a fetish for babyish stuff. But even when i turn down a commissioner whos OVERTLY like that I STILL feel guilty for even HAVING an art style that attracts that kinda person! And I KNOW it’s not my fault! I developed the style I have with the intention of making it innocent and cheerful! But it feels... like I cant see it that way ever again.. I once had a week where I took requests to draw baby characters and I later deleted most of them because I was suddenly paranoid someone would assume I was a ddlg artist or something. That’s a worry I STILL have!

And this was a problem WAY before I started taking furry commissions by the way. I was accidentally tricked into fetish rps when i was still a minor and only used tumblr. And a few of the first commissions I ever did were for ppl who I later found out had secret abdl or baby pokemon porn blogs. The situation is actually a lot better now since I can lay out my terms and know when to deny people.

Ugh I dunno. I saw a younger friend earlier dealing with the same exact thing and just felt so bad for them... but at the same time felt guilty because I half feel like me continuing to draw stuff that I know attracts fetishists is Encouraging them???

Being an artist with an online presence is such a weird thing... All of this because I like drawing and think babies are cute... I hate how normalized all of this is. It can be really damaging to someone who’s just trying to make regular content...

#trinket rambles

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unproduciblesmackdown · 4 years

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Primez!

hell yeah thankyou!!! [2, 5, 17 been answered]

(3) maple - is there a hobby / skill that you’ve always wanted to try but never did?

i’m that theatre gay who’s never Really been in any theatre production. and there was an archery place like 10 min from where i grew up and i was like “ooh archery how cool” b/c i’m a gay but never tried it

(7) amber - share an unpopular opinion that you may have.

hardly unheard of but i Don’t Like the approach to astrology that ppl have been getting in the past few yrs like. the Joke someone on twitter had that we’re like, on the verge of some astrological discrimination lawsuit……..and idk ppl get like pseudo-christian-style Smug about it like, don’t apply this to everyone??? and it’s just strange to like. tell people what they’re like. or explain their characteristics via this really strange westernized vague concept of astrology rather than like, tell me about the life experiences that affect the way that you are. like it’s almost condescending and ppl are being way too serious about it sometimes in (see: the on the verge of the lawsuit thing lol)…..anyways and i guess some of my Killjoy tendencies make me like, haha i’m the Hater b/c idk i’m real opinionated. but a lot of the times it’s not Really b/c i hate other’s joy or some shit, it’s just crap along the lines of like, “these ideas abt love which are meant to be Very Romantic actually strike me as being the Less ideal interpretation of love between people and the potential therein? and colder? and unhealthier / more unpleasant / not as nice / etc etc etc as my ideas on romance which i guess seem like i’m wanting to just shoot down some Lovely Concepts but i’m like. that doesn’t seem lovely. i’m on the very of launching into another essay abt Isolation Isn’t Romantic and Romance As Very Human And Ordinary And Even Mundane Seems A Lot Better Than The More ~Magical~ Approach and did i mention romance should be the Opposite of isolating and yet it’s so taken for granted sometimes that you’ll know it’s True Love when you [bass boosted DIE FOR EACH OTHER] and stop giving a shit about anyone but this one other person and etccccccccc [me screaming for hours]”

and a lot of times things that i guess are would-be Cute / Charming / Wholesome / Positive / Etc start to grate on me if i have to see it too much and i’ll probably end up hating or resenting it but like, not because i hate happy stuff, but b/c it just like. is like, i like things to be Genuine, and it will just feel like this is Performing genuine…ness………..which i don’t like. b/c it’s being Not genuine to try to appeal on the grounds that it’s genuine? yknow. which also extends into the realm of “i hate this Cute music over this cute animal video. don’t tell me how to feel about it” and when something tries to be Surprising in the realm of like, pseudo-dissonant like. oh this is a cute harmless white girl on the ukulele but she just said “fuck” and “std’s” or some crap!!! whaaaaaat!!!!! like, i hate this actually? can i die

i could give a ted talk just showing vines that make it into plenty of people’s compilations and being like “this is why this vine is Not Funny (Enough)”

(also i do sometimes hate Having Fun. doge speak was so awful. of Course gop congress adopted it briefly in its original heyday. even now i hate the derivatives. i’m not about to rb something that contains the word birb. can i die)

also i think star wars is boring. i think cargo pants are fun and fine.

(11) orchard - share one thing that you’d like to happen this autumn.

we get confirmation that any Winston Footage is filmed for billions s5. soph i know that like, fitting in almost 3 hrs of subway travel / going into nj and back / probably having to do all this on a weekend / having like a 5 second window maybe makes it difficult but we all agree it’d make another epic gamer moment if you got to see lihn

(13) bonfire - describe your dream house.

lol being in my teenz in 2008 i haven’t thought about it much tbh. i think i’d like a pretty cozy (smallish) bedroom and just a lot of physical Niches yknow. i like to frequent very specific spots which are not too out in the open. and really everything would be kinda Cozy Smallish but not the kitchen. get some space there, and like, raised counters like for julia child being 6′2″ b/c Standard Height is not comfortable for me either at my tender 5′11″ or 6″ness. and i always think that those sitty spaces that are like, Depressed into the floor are fun. i know there’s a word for that, but whatever. there’s a bunch of very disparate color schemes i’d think i’d like, so like, idk if i’d just go for totally different Aesthetic Approaches from room to room to try to cover all of them lol

(19) pumpkin - do you think that humans are inherently good or bad?

i mean i think it’s more important to recognize that anyone is entirely capable of Doing good or bad, and arguing about what they Truly Are In Their Hearts is beside the point. but i also think the idea that like oooh if Polite Society crumbles enough we’ll all just be roving in bloodthirsty packs, looking to kill each other and loot / probably eat the corpses, etc etc ~dark gritty bold~ apocalyptic material that’s like wow yeah that’s really confronting the Uncomfortable True Nature of society. like, capitalism is already a brutal and inhumane situation to exist in, but it’s not some emergent expression of Human Nature like, oh, life is just like this, empty and alienating and unfulfilling unless you [physical violence b/c it is Genuine], or that people would turn on each other if we were in survival mode, like…..no. survival mode always entails helping others to survive like. yeah not for necessarily Every individual? but that’s just more of anyone’s capacity to Do good or bad. but humans as a species are not solitary, we’re social b/c that’s how we all exist in relation to each other, society is innate to us and not some Luxury that distances us from our True Natures. we communicate with each other and want to work together even beyond helping each other survive and want to connect to each other and total / imposed isolation is Bad for anyone. and i think that love and altruism are Human Nature too. like, it’s weird when it’s treated like some evolutionary mystery why humans (or individuals of other species) would exercise altruism and/or self-destruction (or the risk of it) for the sake of others? like “but it doesn’t make sense b/c for us survival means Passing On Genes, we protect ourselves and our ability to exist and procreate, and we protect those most genetically similar to us, down the line to favoring your most distant cousin over a random stranger,” etc etc What A Mystery Why We Are Altruistic!!! but it’s not?? like? we don’t just see ourselves as individuals and we recognize the self in the other, and that we are all just Arbitrarily the self that we happen to be, and are all The Other to everyone else’s Myself…..and why would humanity not Preserve itself beyond just individuals looking out for just their individual existence? we just like. don’t only prioritize the preservation of our own genetic code. why should it be a less Survivally Successful approach for any individual to look out for any other individual? of Course we give a shit about other randos who don’t have any familial or even any other personal connection to us at all b/c we just care about the survival of other humans.

anyways! no yeah so i think that Love and Altruism are intrinsic human nature. like creativity and communication. we aren’t like, always doomed to destroy each other b/c That’s Humans For You. denying the humanity in others inherently requires actually just reducing one’s own humanity, yknow??? re: human nature anyways. i know we’re all still technically human regardless of how we act. and that the self-destructive destruction of others is a feature of humanity, but i don’t think it’s one which is Inherent or Inevitable. i.e. the Self-Destruction thing. capitalism is out here threatening everyone’s existence and just so happens to require placing the Wealthy Few above the worth of the lives of all the rest, who are the cheap labor force rather than Just As Human as the richest. anyways. mostly Good! but the point is still that anyone can do Bad regardless so like, who cares if you have some good in your heart, bitch we all do.

(23) ghost - is there someone that you miss having in your life?

still a bit effed up on missing the theoretical concept of an in-person group of people who are consistent in genuinely enjoying / being enthusiastic about time spent with you. one reason it’s theoretical is that i’ve never Really had a whole in-person friend group exaactly. and it’s theoretical b/c idk, it’s not easy for me to feel comfortable Being Myself around others and like, i like being in groups as a rando amongst strangers really easily, but if it’s like, we’re all in a group and talking and stuff, i can just go into [stifled mode] real easily, idk, it’s hard to say whether the times i’ve been Uncomfortable in groups like that is just like, it not being the right people, or that i just will always like smaller groups or just one-on-one or smthing i dunnooooo. either way i get depressed about Wouldn’t It Be Nice though so idk? i guess i would still ideally seek it out. but i also can’t feel like i can actually expect this to happen. on a related note i forgot to mention Briony Atkins as this minor character who is very like me in being someone who is outwardly v withdrawn and quiet and comes across as not speaking b/c she has nothing to say but in reality she’s a passionate and boisterous person who just rarely shows / expresses it around others. i’m out here never talking (and getting the chance to talk aloud and it’s like a mile a minute all at once trying to compensate) and being pretty quiet and people get surprised when i have An Opinion even though i’m super opinionated lol and i just find it really hard to be myself around others unless i’m operating completely on my own and beholden to no one, but even then. anxious

#i'm Not being very cryptidly with all these............#Anonymous

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timdrakegeocities · 5 years

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very interesting to me how the line between anna and rapunzel kin is so thin and vague because theyre like... the same character how did they get away with this... but the Details are different. intetesting to me that way more people are into rapunzel... i feel like the subtle differences add up a lot like its easy to be like oh i have mommy issues so im rapunzel yknow vs people still argue about whether annas parents are bad or not... like anna doesnt experience Abuse but its this very pointed loneliness that didnt need to happen. and like the fact that you dont need to presume they were straight up neglectful adds to it bc regardless of what their parents Did she still Felt that badly. which is like. yknow. really kin like thats the adhd probably. but its nonspecific and uncommon to portray so while for me im like oh god oh fuck kin other people are like... ‘hm this doesnt process i dont have any opinion about it im just gonna focus on elsa’ yknow. and i dont think theres that many elsa kinnies...? im not certain...? i wanna like look into this more tbh i need to diagnose it. elsa is easy i think to be a fan of but less easy to identify with because her struggles are so melodramatic/unrealistic but also metaphorical like... its hard to be like ‘yes thats me’ but very easy to be like ‘oh i get it and i care’ yknow. and anna specifically being in the shadow of a character thats like that is what makes her this intriguing... middle ground... oddly realistic character... to me yknow... theyre playing with deep concepts. its serious. rapunzel is what happens when they intentionally set out to do a parable about realistic abuse and shes Good because of that and very accessible because of that which is why you have not just kinnies but like normies who stan intensely, like theyd count as kin if they knew it existed, there are a Lot of those.... but anna is like. what you get when things are just. weird. you slip through the cracks. thats the entire appeal. its that deep :(

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ubassembly · 5 years

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Hi! I hope you're doing well. For the Pokemon ask meme, would you like to answer the questions for Pokedex, Ultra Ball, and Shadow Ball? Thank you!

: D ! HI! ANd thank you, you too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pokédex (Your perfect/favorite team): this one is kind of tough to answer, coz i dont really use set teams and i am very indecisive! like i just sorta add pokemon whenever i feel like it on an impulse, and switch through them pretty quickly? like ill have a whole other team and a half in the pc that i take out sometimes to mix with whoever im using at the time. so im not really sure how to answer this! sorry for not having a better/more specific response!

Ultra Ball (Favorite Pseudo-legendary(ies): I’m! gonna use this question to ramble a little, like more than the previous one so sorry in advance this is gonna be long? theres not too many pseudo-legendaries so im just gonna list them! and say stuff that way!! mini list in this ask list! im only talking about the final evolution coz if it was the whole line thisd be WAY too long

Dragonite: its so round and huggable!! and cute!!!! i really like the darker colour it was in gen 5/dpp! its also super interesting how the wing colour of its shiny has gone back to how it was in gen 2 now. in general dragonite is great i dont think its one of my favourites compared to some of the others but its still very good!!! so cute, so so cute.

Tyranitar: this one is probably my actual least favourite, its not bad i do like it a lot it just appeals to me less, not really for me yknow? but its very cool!! i wanna hunt one in gen 2, speaking of shinies its interesting to me how its normal mega goes from blue pattern to red, but its shiny is the same colour. its sprite in silver is the best it looks like it missed the bus and is just now processing that D :

Salamence: its! so! flat! just a squished lizard that has a batarang attached to its back! i love salamence a lot its very very good, its name is hard to spell though. why is its mouth orange in its shiny but its mega has a pink mouth, thats a weird thing to change. they really did change its colours a lot actually just, slowly over time, looking at these sprites. thats cool! i prefer the red to the orange, though the darker blue of gen 3 is very nice : O !salamence!! is very very good! veryverygood/10!

Metagross: I LOVE METAGROSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVE!! METAGROSS!!!!!!! one of my favourite pokemon just in general!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love it i love it so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! the shiny is perfect and how its mega references its normal colours and the normal mega references its shiny? PERFECT!, gold n silver together i love in general!!! and steel and psychic are a couple of my favourite types!!!!!! I love metagross so SO much!! im gonna stop talking here coz if i dont ill just keep repeating my self but i really love metagross a lot a lot alot!! it with the beldum following it that image apart of the pseudo legendary thing its SO cute

Garchomp: garchomp is cool!! i think in my brain its on level with tyranitar? i dont have much of an attachment to it and i sorta forget it exists. but its cool I like it!!!!!!!! its shiny mega is SO good, love that! also pokemon gender differences are so stupid. and it looked better in sprites i think, it looks like they reused its sprite from dpp for black and white, i didnt know that! but, yeah! garchomp is pretty neat! i like its name

Hydreigon: HYDREIGON IS ANOTher one of my super super favourites!!!!! its so cool and its shiny is creepy like zombie colours, love love green and purple together!!! and its a dark type i love dark types!!!!!!!!!!!!!! did you see the deino hand puppet thats a part of the new pseudo legenday thing theyre doing i want it its so cute sfjksfd. YEAH!!! i love hydreigon a lot a lot a lot a lot a lot a lot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i dont have much to say though aside from

Goodra: GOODRA I LOVE GOODRA TOO AAH!!!!!! its like dragonite but slime, love that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! its shiny and normal both have perfect colours, see i love green and purple i just said that wow!!!!!!!! i dont have much to say with this one either coz its just the model, but i love it a lot alot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kommo-o: KOMMO-O is So cool!!!!!!! i used to not like it much but i like it more now!!!!!!!! the shiny is so great and its normal colours are nice as hell too!!!!!!! grey and yellow i love that i love that!!! i have, less to say here than even goodra but thats ok coz holy shit this is long im so so so sorry. kommo-o is great though!!!! yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

so like putting that over in my head my favourites are metagross, hydreigon and goodra, followed then by kommo-o, then salamence/dragonite then garchomp/tyranitar at last. but i do love them all a lot!!

Shadow Ball (Favorite Ghost types(s): all of them? all of them, yes! all. ghost is one of my favourite favourite types so!! all of them!! if i could i would totally list them all like i did the pseudo legendaries and say something about each of them though, i love them all all all a LOT!! dhelmise is worth mentioning though as one of my absolute favourites!! sableye and drifloon and shedinja have a nostalgic attachment, and blacephalon i need to mention just out of obligation coz of my url. also frillish and jellicent deserve more love. and polteageistthis is the truth about it youll learn to never doubt it the whole affair is shrouded in living mystery..and ill stop there, but!! yes i love them all SO much

#asks #pokemongoexcitement #OK SORRY FOR THIS #BEING SO LONG #THANK YOU SO SO MUCH THIS WAS FUN #i love rambling about pokemon #also this is totally unrelated but i just #got enough coins in go to get that vileplume shirt #ive wanted since it was put in the game #im excited to get it and i just need to share that!#asks!

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bbeelzemon · 6 years

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To Be Super

Wow my first piece of writing in years! Hopefully you guys like it, I’m a bit rusty LOL. So here’s an Incredibles 2 fanfic!

This is a prequel of sorts, from Screech’s perspective, about him getting inspired to become a superhero. Details are left sorta vague, since we don’t know... anything about his secret identity. Oh well! Also one thing to note, I headcanon Metroville to be located on the west coast, since a lot of it is modeled after California. And I headcanon Screech to be living on the east coast somewhere, so he’s a couple hours ahead of the Metroville events.

Anyway, enjoy!

Word count: 2048

He sat watching the television, starting to doze off on the couch. It was getting pretty late, but he had no desire to go to his room and go to bed. The light coming from the television set was the only source of illumination in the room. As he was absentmindedly flipping through the channels, his interest was caught with a breaking news scene.

It was being filmed in Metroville, it said, where a large plane-like vehicle just crashed into the ground. As people started to crowd around it, the vehicle broke apart and released a giant spherical object. He sat up in his seat as the sphere suddenly sprouted long robotic legs and started crushing cars. He couldn't help but think back to when he was a kid, and when this sort of thing happened, superheroes would show up to save the day.

But that was a long time ago. As a kid he always dreamed about helping people with his powers. Once superheroes were deemed unsafe and illegal, however, he was forced to stop using his powers in public. That doesn't mean he stopped using them entirely, but he kept it hidden from others, for the most part. For a while he had tried to moonlight hero work once he was older, but he quickly found out that a sonic screech just is not stealthy in the slightest. And being able to turn your head all the way around can't really help anyone, except maybe scaring a bad guy.

Now no longer tired, his attention was focused entirely on the news. A man with rocket boots was addressing the crowd, calling himself a super. It was obvious to him that all of his "powers" were coming from gadgets; he wasn't really a super. Disappointed, he sulked back into his seat. The robot knocked him out and continued to rampage. Suddenly, there was a flash of red on the screen, then another, then a flash of blue. Could it truly be? Supers?! Real supers! But they were all in hiding, hero work was illegal, how could there be supers? Suddenly he felt like a kid again, watching superheroes on the news and wishing he could help people with his powers like that.

He got up and moved closer to the screen, getting a better look at the supers battling the robot. Two of them, actually, one, two, three... four of them had matching red outfits. Two of them were really small, were they... children? Were the four of them... a family? He had always felt alienated by his family; he was the only super out of all of them. He always figured the gene for superpowers must be recessive or something, and seeing these superpowered kids next to their superpowered parents solidified that for him.

The kids both looked younger than 15, so he figured they must have been born after superheroes were made illegal. It broke his heart to think about these children having to grow up hiding their powers, ashamed of them. He was a kid when they were made illegal but these kids would have been born into it, knowing no other life. But maybe, just maybe, it was all changing. After all, they were using their powers in public now, right?

The camera focused on the superhero in the blue and white suit using ice-based powers. He cocked his head and squinted; he knew he knew who that was, he just had to remember... His eyes blinked open and a big smile appeared on his face. Frozone! That superhero's name is Frozone! It's been so long since he saw any supers, he had nearly forgotten. How could he forget, Frozone was one of the classics! What about the other two adults? Were they classic superheroes too, from when he was a kid and they were always saving the day?

The man in red looked like a powerhouse, he obviously had super strength... Which supers had super strength? He immediately thought of Meta Man, but remembered he had died. Couldn't be him. Next he thought of Hypershock, but quickly dismissed that once he realized the man on the television didn't have a jetpack of any kind. That left just Mr. Incredible, but this guy didn't look like Mr. Incredible. At all. Mr. Incredible wore blue, not red! He leaned in close to the screen, so much that his eyes were starting to strain, to look at the man's face better. No, looking at his face, his big chin, his blond hair, the 'i' insignia on his chest... this was definitely Mr. Incredible. God, he's gotten fat! Good to know that even supers can let themselves go.

Lastly, he looked at the red headed woman in a matching outfit to Mr. Incredible's. One look at her super stretchy limbs and he immediately recognized her as Elastigirl. Oh, Elastigirl! People always thought he had crush on her as a kid, but really she was just his favorite. Regardless of his feelings, he had always considered her the gold standard of superheroes. She seemed so versatile, other supers had such specific powers, like fire, or ESP, or a sonic screech, but she could use hers anywhere, in any situation. Not to mention, she hardly ever caused any unnecessary destruction to her surroundings, or to other people. Now there is a woman who knows what she's doing!

He looked at her supersuit again, noticing the 'i' insignia on it, and how it is completely identical to the insignia on Mr. Incredible's suit. Did she marry Mr. Incredible? Were those kids hers? Theirs? It seemed somehow comforting to know that behind these superhero identities, they had normal lives; besides their powers, they were normal people. Like him. And it gave him hope that maybe someday this could be him. Helping people, being accepted. Being a superhero. Even just knowing that there were still indeed supers out there helped him to feel not so... alone. To not feel like he's the only super left. Like no one else remembers them. But now he knows there's at least five, or maybe six if you count that gadget guy from earlier, Syn-something... So yeah, at least five other supers, he nodded.

Elastigirl held the remote and started pressing the buttons on it, Frozone was trying to freeze the robot in its tracks, and Mr. Incredible must've thrown a discarded robot claw at it or something because it launched right through the robot and tore its power core out. Now that's how it's done! A smile spread across his face and he started clapping quietly at the television screen. He couldn't stop smiling as he thought that maybe, just maybe, superheroes are coming back. Maybe they'll be accepted again. Maybe he can be accepted again. And maybe he can make a difference in the lives of others.

He knew he would not be getting any sleep tonight, he was much too excited. He practically ran to his garage and grabbed some paper. He would be a superhero. He grabbed a pencil. He would help others. He started drawing. And he was going to look cool doing it. Half of the appeal of superheroes, besides, yknow, saving the day, was the costume! A superhero had to be a character, someone that others could idolize and look up to. What would his costume's theme be? Maybe something bird-like, birds had very screechy voices like him, not to mention he definitely had the nose for it. But what kind of bird? He cocked his head in thought, before it came to him. An owl! Owls can turn their heads around just like he can! Well, not just like he can. He can turn his head farther than an owl can, but they come the closest.

As he was designing the suit, he drew wings without thinking about it. Once he realized he had drawn them, he started to wonder if he could actually build them. It was one thing to make and sew a cool suit, but it would be an entirely different thing to actually build something mechanical from scratch like functional wings. He had studied robotics and engineering in college, so maybe he could figure it out... Yes, he would be able to build them, he wouldn't rest until he completely finished them. Well, he might have to rest at some point, but he would definitely be pulling a lot of all-nighters. Good thing he was a night owl.

----------

A couple weeks later, he put on his completed suit all together for the first time. He looked in the mirror, everything was perfect. It was exactly how he had imagined it on that first night, when his spirit had been reignited by seeing superheroes, real superheroes, out in public, saving the day. It was just like he remembered from when he was a kid. And now, he could be one of those superheroes that some other young supers might look up to someday, to look back fondly on when they become real superheroes too. He knew he could make a big difference, he just didn't know where to start.

He lived by himself, in a fairly small town without much crime. There was a big city about an hour's drive away, maybe thirty minutes as the owl flies, but he hadn't taken his new wings out for such a long flight yet and didn't know if they would be up for it. It seemed too risky, he probably needed to test them more. For the time being, he just sat on his couch and turned the television on.

Flipping through the channels, he once again happened upon breaking news involving superheroes. The footage showed the "Incredibles" family and Frozone battling against a large drill, apparently run by some villain called "The Underminer" or something. After they stopped the drill, Frozone quickly skated away and the "Incredibles" were arrested. It was a harsh reality check, remembering that despite the changing public opinion, superheroes were still very illegal.

A frown started to cross his face. He sighed and was about to take his cowl off when he heard a knock at the door. He doesn't usually get visitors, especially at this time of day, so he crept up to the door quietly and listened against it. He didn't hear anything, but a card was slid under the door. He kept listening for a minute, but after deciding there was no one there, he picked up the card and read it.

"To whom it may concern,

It has come to our attention that you may have super powers. Do not be afraid, we are on your side. We would like to make supers like you legal again. We are sending this letter to several people who have been on our radar as potentially being supers, and this includes you. The superheroes aren't gone. You're still here. And together we can make a difference for supers everywhere. Please consider joining us. If you agree, you will be housed in the great city of New Urbem, considered by some to be like a superhero's playground. We will show you off to the public performing heroic deeds and raise the public opinion of superheroes, and maybe someday we can help restore the supers' legal statuses. But we can't do it without your help. Help us change the world. If you are interested or have any questions, please call the number on this card.

Your new friend, Winston Deavor

DevTech"

He stepped back, knees weak, and practically fell onto his couch. Him? Being a real superhero? For the first time since he was a kid it no longer seems like a far fetched dream, it no longer seems like a crazy fantasy, it seems like something real. Something that could happen, something that will happen. Hands shaking slightly, he turned over the card and found the phone number for DevTech listed on the back. His grip on the card tightened, as if he lets go then it may disappear forever. He felt like he might fall over, but he stood up anyway and made his way over to the phone. He dialed the number and waited for the other line to pick up. Heart racing, he just said five simple words.

"This is Screech. I'm in."

#my style of writing is quirky but i hope you all enjoy it!#yknow with the narrative questions and the 'yknow's #anyway tumblr not supporting tab spaces is literally killing me tumblr you are literally killing me #got to go back and add them all by hand hfhndjfhfj #just watch in going to write about him having a garage #and 2 days later disney will announce he lives in like an apartment or something hdgdjdkd #i hate relying on headcanon i feel like i disappoint people with that but let's forget about that for right now ok!#also i headcanon very strongly that he is engineering wise very smart #because he made his own wings

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