#that fundamentally shifted how fandom was even possible

[swashbucklery]

i used to run cross country on the road where they filmed the bus scsene that buffy takes to leave sunnydale, before a chunk of the road fell into the ocean (pretty sure they also used it to film the end scene of DEBS) and I used to think about how Buffy was THERE. but your tags about the use of full of grace and that scene and the vibes — it’s been years since I thought about it but it all came rushing back. just. SO good.

There was something so - like, when that show was airing I was a few years younger than Buffy's canonical age, so in a lot of ways she felt like my cool older sister. I remember being like, I'm sure once I'm sixteen I'll also be mature enough to fight demons etc etc.

And now that I'm a grownup, I can look back at the show and both see its problems and see it's strengths. I can also look back at the extra layers that kid-me could not have picked up on - the way that in hindsight, sixteen is so young and one of the horrors of the show is the way that this girl, who is in many ways a kid and actually keeps saying please let me be a kid, is responsible for the entire world. The ways that translates into a metaphor (unintentional, let's not give Mr. W any credit here) for the ways in which girls are socialized and the ways that high-achieving, "strong," "smart" girls are still squeezed through the mold of misogyny and expected to be so much more than just to be enough.

Season 2 was the year I started watching the show and so it'll always be the season that Hits for me because it was the year I really started to get long-form TV and fall in love with characters in the medium. Buffy was my first fandom and the arc, at the time, of Angel turning and then Buffy having to put aside her heartbreak and fix it was. I don't know if it was actually something that hadn't been done before but in terms of what I could access on TV in my world, it was the pinnacle of the art form. I remember writing quotes from Passions in my teenage diary and being like Wow This Show Is So Deep, I Know How To Appreciate Art Now.

This was also, you have to understand/remember, pre-streaming anything. This was the year I learned how to use the record function on my family's VHS player so that I could watch the episodes without waiting for them to play in reruns. This was pre-Napster. If there was a moving song on a show you had to track down the artist, hope they had a CD out, get a ride to the mall to go to your local HMV and then buy the physical disc. This was also the era when there wasn't necessarily 100% crossover pop-cuture wise; if an American artist was Big it made it to Canadian stores but there were a lot of California indie bands that you just couldn't listen to if you didn't live in the US. Sarah McLachlan is Canadian and "Full of Grace" is the last track on Surfacing, which was an album everyone had at the time because "Building A Mystery" and "Adia" were huge on the radio that year. So it was also like - being able to sit with those feelings because I could actually access that song and listen to it again, you know?

#this is also incidentally one of the reasons #that i will fight the entire internet over dawn summers #and the internet backlash over her #because fuck you i was in this show's fandom and i was dawn summers' age #it was SO COOL to see a genuine teenager on this show #as a way of subverting the late-90s teen tv trope of teenagers that talk and act like adults #and i will never forget that feeling of super relating to like #yeah there's a character who gets to have buffy summers as her cool older sister #that's amazing #and then have the entire adult section of this fandom talk ENDLESSLY about how ANNOYING she was #anyway the point is season two was great #dawn summers is great #i have grown up to be giles and i'm embracing it #and there are things about how tv could be accessed in the 90s and early 2000s #that fundamentally shifted how fandom was even possible #and i love reflecting on it #not because it was better per se - teenage me would have KILLED for on-demand streaming and being able #to listen to official show tracklists on her iphone hours after the episode aired #but gosh was it a different way of relating to media #fandom nursing home roommates association #j swashbucklery mcinternetface: professional cryptid #night of the living anons #btvs

[aeor-is-for-reccing]

MODERN AU: A Shadowgast Rec List

This week, we have modern AU! Check under the cut for a whopping 24 fics that all take place in modern times, and don't forget to comment and kudos if you like them!

LOVE & OTHER ENCHANTMENTS by LivThael (2092, General) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

An imagined review and synopsis of a movie about a Shadowgast modern-setting bookstore AU.

Reccer says: Hilariously awful, I say with great love, and by that I mean it purposefully and artfully swan dives out of the AU tree and hits every trope on the way down. This was written to be as cursed as possible, and Liv really delivers both that and non-stop laughs. This is clearly a love letter to terrible romcoms, cliché fanfic tropes, and the Shadowgast fandom as a whole. A+ satire, PLEASE read this!

like 80/20 on the kinsey scale by jakia (2772, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Caleb bangs his hot TA and panics about it the next day. Beau did not sign up for listening to this.

Reccer says: Caleb -- who's only dated women before -- discovers he LOVES the D.

ask to be unbroken by chaotic_geeky (40038, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes, Unfinished Cliffhanger

Caleb gets a last minute chance to be a photographer at a big runway event. He meets the star model at the afterparty, and things go from there.

Reccer says: The premise is great, the story is excellent, and the characters are enthralling. It does end on an unfinished cliffhanger, but the beginning is so good it's worth it.

Fundamental Forces Other Than Gravity by mllekurtz (TheKnittingJedi) (40676, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

How cold, ruthless and lonely Essek Thelyss (a brilliant student with a secret) accidentally makes some friends and falls in love: a Shadowgast college AU.

Reccer says: This is a fantastic college AU! And the characterization is done so well it's phenomenal.

a smile is more than showing teeth by thought (13642, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

"you are welcome in Zadash should that be an option for you," Caleb had written, "and I would be pleased to set aside a few days to work with you in person." Or How to seduce your academic pen pal through basic kindness, stolen sweaters, and books. Mostly books.

Reccer says: This is the start of an incredible AU with two more after it in the series. I love this version of Essek and Caleb falling in love. SO MUCH.

Paradigm Shift by full_time_dreamer_behold (114291, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Caleb joins a law firm. He meets Essek, the IT manager. Things happen. They fall in love

Reccer says: It's a super sweet slow burn!! Essek and Beau have a really fun dynamic and the budding romance is very satisfying.

(your face in my hands is) everything good i need by mllekurtz (25884, Mature) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Academics Caleb and Essek are nerds and fall in love over the course of a conference

Reccer says: I liked it!

like colored indigo inscribed with my name by KmacKatie (kmackatie) (30648, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

An exploration of tradition, culture, what is worth sacrificing in finding yourself and family. Essek learns how to make a new family.

Reccer says: This is an incredible pic with a lot of beautiful world and culture building set into it. Though I love the idea that Essek knits, I am especially fond of the other handcrafts that the Dynasty may do culturally, and this one does such a great job with it. And the interpersonal relationships are absolutely incredible!

we learn to live with the pain, mosaic broken hearts by vegabondfirelily (5777, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Sometimes things don't go as planned. Caleb will always be there for Essek, though, even after a life-changing accident. Non-linear narrative, angst with a better ending

Reccer says: I love this pic, even if it makes me cry every time. It is emotional and brilliant.

the fire kept closest (burns most of all) by Mousecookie (21822, Mature) Reccer's Content Notes: Major Character Death

Takes place on a modern Rumblecusp, Essek and Caleb are volcanologists. Absolutely bonkers genre mashup of scifi disaster thriller ghost story romance that somehow works. There is a MCD warning but it is also tagged as Happy Ending and that does come through!

Reccer says: The writing style is like watching a movie and it made me cry both sad and happy tears.

Starting with your heart (bright heart) by 2manyboys (9914, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek and Caleb have been taking showers together, but it's totally platonic, they swear

Reccer says: I liked it!

scene: a shift in tempo by hanap (6790, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek, first soloist of Rosohna Ballet, comes across the mountains in an exchange to be Caleb's new partner.

Reccer says: A beautiful fic! I love the way the AU fits our characters so beautifully, and how it honors ballet while also subverting it just a little. Gorgeous!

A King in Cat's Clothes by royalgreen (1544, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Frumpkin is extremely suspicious of this interloper Essek who keeps visiting Frumpkin's domain (the cat cafe) and sniffing around Frumpkin's human

Reccer says: Frumpkin's POV is utterly hilarious. He is so angry that Essek is sweetly romancing Caleb.

read between the lines (everything is gradual) by SpottedEnchanse (SpottedEnchants) (3047, General) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

A series in which Caleb owns a cat cafe. It's amazing.

Reccer says: SpottedEnchanse's writing can do literally no wrong ever. It's like flossing for the brain

the golden thread around your neck whispered visions of my undoing by MarsBar2019 (191412, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek is the CEO of an arcane tech company in Roshona where Caleb gets a job as his personal assistant.

Reccer says: A tense slow burn that's sexy as hell, one of my favourite fics.

Sleep, With Benefits by KmacKatie (62272, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Caleb tries out his coworkers' mattress. That's definitely all and not that he has a major crush on Essek.

Reccer says: I liked it!

take chances by 06151126 (3021, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek left Formula One and came back, but his return isn't going well. He hires Caleb to help.

Reccer says: This is the second work in a series, and the whole thing is wonderful! Well written and honest, it's very cool to see how Essek and Caleb come together over the course.

Empire of Lights by mllekurtz (TheKnittingJedi) (17215, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Rosohnans call it the rainy season: a time of humid days, heavy showers, and suffocating heat. Caleb, who feels less and less like a stranger in the city he recently decided to call home, finds it's also a time for revelations.

Reccer says: This is a fantastic, sweet AU of our wizards getting together and I love it.

A mile high by Mousecookie (545, Mature) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Caleb and Essek (try to) get frisky in an airplane lavatory.

Reccer says: It's cute and funny.

The Kitchen Sink by mousecookie (17126, Mature) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek is a supermodel and Caleb is a jack-of-all-trades, and they keep meeting in increasingly unlikely circumstances. WIP with 6/12 chapters.

Reccer says: It's funny and the writing style is almost Pratchett-esque at times

The following fics each received 2 recs each!

Something to Believe in by AwesomeFroggy (108948, Teen) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Essek's mother sends him to Nicodranas as punishment, where unbeknownst to her he already has a friend. Jester thinks he'd really get along with her friend Caleb.

Reccer 1 says: I liked it! Reccer 2 says: This is an amazing incredible story! I love it so very much! The story is complete, though it is marked as one chapter left as no epilogue is out. Don't let that stop you from reading! I love every single second of this story so very much.

I’ve been lost before (and I’m lost again, I guess) by toneofjoy (165k, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

Rock climbing AU! Caleb is the new athlete to the gym and Essek takes over his training. Despite the specter of their pasts, feelings blossom.

Reccer 1 says: It's well written, most of the esoteric climbing stuff is explained well, and I really enjoy their characterizations. There's a good balance between the relationship-building and the climbing part. Reccer 2 says: This is top three Shadowgast stories ever. It's a wild, beautiful, heartfelt ride. It's worth every second of time it takes to read. Also, this will make you want to take up climbing or at least start watching climbing. It's so well written and enjoyable. Everyone should at least give it a try!

The Secret Romance of Caleb Widogast by Cardinal_Daughter (15680, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

All Caleb wants is a peaceful, romantic weekend alone with his boyfriend. The boyfriend none of his friends know about. Naturally, nothing goes quite as planned.

Reccer 1 says: a sweet and silly story where we get a glimpse of the absolute chaos of a M9 group chat Reccer 2 says: A fantastic AU with a brilliant sequel. I love it!

coping skills by eldritchmochi (251061, Explicit) Reccer's Content Notes: No Content Notes

BDSM fic for a disabled Essek and the trials he experiences

Reccer 1 says: There is so much good about this WIP! The depiction of both Essek’s disabilities and the kink community are so well done, and the characterization is super fun. Well written and super hot. Reccer 2 says: This is one of the best long fits out there for a modern prompt. It is an absolutely wonderful story, heartfelt and meaningful, and the characters have so much depth. And I'm a sucker for a well written chronic illness/chronic pain Essek, and this one is so realistic it walks the line to uncanny. I love this!

Aeor is for Lovers is an 18+ Shadowgast Discord server. The above fanfic recommendations were pulled from our community for this weekly event. All fics, unless otherwise specified, will primarily feature Shadowgast. Have any questions about what this is? Check out the FAQ! Next week, we’ll be back with WIPS

#shadowgast #caleb widogast #essek thelyss #critical role #cr fic recs #fan fiction rec list #aeor is for lovers #critical role fan fiction #cr fic #cr fics

[veil-of-exordia]

In Defence of Polonius: my take

Hating on Polonius has been standardized throughout both the fandom and the academic community of Hamlet.

The argument that I wish to make here is that Polonius's primary motivation for his actions is love. Not social reputation, not overcontrolling parental tendencies, not political gain. I opine that Polonius's love alone makes him a better parent and a more redeemable character than anyone else in the elder generation (Claudius, Gertrude, King Hamlet).

(Essay under cut, ~1.2k words)

A detail in the play that many seem to overlook is that Polonius's attitude towards Ophelia has a marked shift from Act 1 to Act 2. Act 1 is the part where he infantilizes Ophelia and essentially marks her as worthless if she has lost her chastity, and the part that people focus on. Act 2, on the other hand, has Ophelia enter with "I have been so affrighted!", clearly expressing distress at Hamlet's erratic behaviour. And here is the important bit:

Polonius no longer infantilizes Ophelia or verbally belittles her in any way from Act 2 onwards.

This alone demonstrates that Polonius's primary motivation for his actions is not some sort of misogyny or sexism - though I do not deny that he is misogynist/sexist to some extent, it is clear that his love for his daughter takes precedence over his prejudices because his immediate reaction to Ophelia's emotional turmoil is to act like the comforting parent every parent should be. This demonstrates remarkable emotional sensitivity, better than many contemporary real-life parents I might daresay.

How does he respond to Ophelia after her expression of distress? He tells her "I'm sorry", not once but twice. The only other instances of someone saying "sorry" in the play are from Hamlet to Horatio. By contrast with all the other words of denial and deceit in the play, the use of this phrase alone is enough to draw our attention to a special type of vulnerability, openness and concern.

Furthermore, Polonius admits that he may very well be wrong. You'd expect a stuck-up pretentious hypocritical old man to vehemently deny any possibility that he might be mistaken, right? This is what Polonius says to Ophelia after the "sorry"s:

By heaven, it is as proper to our age To cast beyond ourselves in our opinions As it is common for the younger sort To lack discretion.

He admits that he can very well be an old fool. He admits that he might very well have arrived at hasty conclusions without consideration. He can be foolish, but he knows he can be foolish, and he is willing to step down and consider his daughter's words when she is distressed because he knows that his daughter's words and well-being matter.

This is the part where I argue that Polonius is a better parent than King Hamlet, Claudius, or Gertrude. None of these three are sensitive or considerate of Hamlet's grief; King Hamlet immediately places the burden of murder in Hamlet's hands, while Claudius and Gertrude tell Hamlet to essentially just cheer up and get over his father's death. Polonius does none of that. He doesn't tell Ophelia to just "get over Hamlet's attitude". He marches straight to the king to report the prince's behaviour. Polonius takes active action to address the source of Ophelia's troubles. Even if his methods aren't that appropriate or effective, he is trying to do what a supportive parent should be doing.

This is significant on multiple levels. In Act 1 Scene 2 (Laertes's send-off), both Polonius and Hamlet are present, but they do not interact or acknowledge each other at all. Polonius only displays interest in engaging with and spying on Hamlet after Ophelia has told him how Hamlet's erratic behaviour has unnerved her. People often say that Polonius deserved to die because he was nosy and overcontrolling. I'm saying that interpreting Polonius's fate in this way overlooks the fact that Polonius's fundamental motivation for spying/etc is that he loves his daughter. He died due to his love.

Another level of significance: Hamlet is the prince. If Polonius's primary goal was to preserve him and his family's sociopolitical status, he would not have dared to disagree with Hamlet out of all people. Indeed, he would probably encourage Hamlet and Ophelia's marriage to elevate his ties to the royal family. Polonius's choice to oppose Hamlet's behaviour rather than allow it demonstrates that he clearly values Ophelia's well-being over any sort of sociopolitical gain. He is not merely the sucking-up, sweet-talking politician stereotype that many characterize him as. He distinctly cares for his family over gaining power and influence.

Now, let's talk about Laertes. With misogyny being not a factor in their dynamic, it's much more easily accepted that Polonius's words of advice to Laertes are well-intended, even if somewhat hypocritical. The controversy arises when Polonius sends Reynaldo to...well, I wouldn't say spy on Laertes, but more of to fish out any rumours surrounding Laertes.

Polonius's instructions are as follows:

And there put on him What forgeries you please—marry, none so rank As may dishonor him, take heed of that, But, sir, such wanton, wild, and usual slips As are companions noted and most known To youth and liberty.

It's probably not the most moral or beneficial way to know what your son is up to, but Polonius is careful to limit Reynaldo to saying things that he thinks are not "so rank" to be dishonourable. All I see in this scene is Polonius worrying about what Laertes is up to in France.

The real question is whether Polonius is more concerned for his son's well-being or for the family's reputation. The answer lies in the very first line of Act 2:

Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo.

This establishes that the main purpose of Reynaldo's visit is to make sure Laertes is doing well. It's concern for Laertes's well-being that ultimately takes precedence over concern for the family reputation. Granted, if Laertes did end up having some scandal, Polonius would give him a full dressing-down - but like all of his other actions, Polonius sending Reynaldo off is first about love for Laertes and ensuring that he is living well in France, and only after that comes the concept of honour.

Conclusion:

Polonius is fundamentally sexist, sure. He parrots toxic social ideas of gender roles, sure. He isn't that smart with how he handles most things, sure. He's hypocritical, sure. He didn't raise his children all that well, sure. He is a man with many flaws. I get why people hate him for these.

But, at the end of the day, he tries to support and comfort his children when they undergo emotional turmoil. He is emotionally sensitive, and his children's words matter. He tries to make sure his children are okay, first and foremost, and he tries to address anything that threatens his children's well-being. His love for his children takes precedence over any sociopolitical concerns about family standing or otherwise, and concern for his children is his primary motive throughout the play for anything he does.

I don't think it's wise to condemn everything he does or says. I don't think he should be dismissed as merely a "meddling old fool". I don't think he's just a mocking caricature of calculating politicians. Polonius is a father who fiercely loves and protects his children the best that he can, and I think his efforts deserve acknowledgement if not respect, especially when compared to those of the other parental figures in the play.

#hamlet #shakespeare #hamlet analysis #shakespeare analysis #polonius #laertes #ophelia

[thesherrinfordfacility]

LWA: I'm going to be reactionary today (not to you), because I've now come across this persistent if small subset of viewers who are outraged that Aziraphale directly asks Crowley for things in S2. This despite S1's plot engine being driven predominantly by Crowley directly asking Aziraphale for things, one of them unjustifiable, and getting him to say yes to all of them. (S1 has Aziraphale indirectly asking for HAMLET, paint removal, and handcuff removal.) It's parallel structure that uses the dialogue shifts to open up new avenues for characterization...

Anyway, to avoid just grousing, I'd like to tie this into the question of greyness. Because despite our haste to endorse Crowley's position on living within grey areas, the script insists that he is not always correct or even good at it (any more than Aziraphale is always correct or good at it). Moreover, while I don't think the series has any profound or even accurate engagement with the concept of yin-yang, the fundamental point that the two characters embody necessary and complementary forces is crucial to the series' argument. (It's not an accident that a yin-yang symbol appears right behind them in the coffee shop during their ep1 conversation.) So, Crowley's asks:

The Arrangement: the Arrangement is a pragmatic exercise that enables them to engage in their favorite activity, namely, being lazy. The high comedy of this is that being lazy is the most moral thing they could possibly do in the GO universe. The full moral implications of the Arrangement are not visible to either character in both novel and series, although Novel!Aziraphale is much more aware of how it fractures the Good/Evil binary than TV!Aziraphale is. I know that the fandom likes to think of Crowley's work as being somehow noble, "giving humans choices" and all that, but the Nuremberg Defense he drops on his foot at the end of the novel calls this interpretation into question. Doing their jobs is "messing about" by the novel's moral standard, and the series is heading in that direction by the end of S2. Humans make choices just fine without Crowley intervening. In other words, the Arrangement is an apparently grey choice ("that would be /lying!/") that leads to a moral absolute in the novel and appears to be heading in that direction in the series--namely, that supernatural interference with human free will is wrong, full stop.

Averting Armageddon: AKA treason. Everything in the script obviously endorses Crowley's request and Aziraphale's agreement with it, although TV!Crowley has a potentially fatal moral lapse along the way (see #4). The plot structure of s1 is yin-yang in action, as Crowley loses most of his narrative drive after ep3 and Aziraphale correspondingly gains it.

Holy Water 1862/1967: for Aziraphale, the resolution to the Holy Water argument in 1967 is a true grey decision in which there is no good resolution from his POV, just a less bad one. It might have been less grey if 1862!Crowley had managed to restrain his immediate emotional response to Aziraphale's refusal and just denied that it was a suicide pill (cue the end of s2ep6 for Crowley deciding the emotional marriage proposal was a better option than relaying what he had discovered in Heaven). 1967 doesn't resolve the problem--yes, Crowley responds to Aziraphale's obvious pain, but is he responding in the way Aziraphale needs him to?--and the characters apparently never return to it. But the point is that Aziraphale can, in fact, negotiate grey areas successfully, if at great cost to himself.

Kill the Antichrist for me, as a treat: at some point you're going to ban me for discussing this! Here, both the novel and series are emphatic that /there is no grey area/. You cannot kill children, no excuse, doesn't matter if they're the Antichrist, still can't kill them. What's interesting is that TV!Crowley is 100% in the wrong here for committing a hit-and-run against Aziraphale with a trolley problem, but Aziraphale's initial response is /also/ wrong: it's "I've never killed anything before," not "killing children is wrong." Aziraphale falls victim to the trolley problem because he's /not/ in full right/wrong binary mode here! Crowley screws up by misclassifying a non-grey problem as a grey one, while Aziraphale also screws up by substituting a subjective objection for an absolute one. Ironically, that is, the problem in that subplot is not that Aziraphale is too different from Crowley, but that he's tiptoed too close to him. Meanwhile, Crowley shows himself unwittingly capable of risking Aziraphale's life--which is what he's doing here--for his own convenience. Like the Holy Water argument, the underlying problems in this conflict are never resolved.

And now Aziraphale in S2, where Aziraphale is learning how to ask for things:

Help with Gabriel: Aziraphale's decision to help Gabriel is an act of radical charity that brings him close to holy fool status, I think. It's possibly dangerous, there's no real reward, and Gabriel tried to murder him (erm, yes, that); then again, Gabriel-as-Jim is in full factory reset mode and is entirely helpless. Like a child, in fact, so see #4 above. I don't think "liking" or "not liking" Aziraphale's choice is relevant to the moral problems raised by the entire situation, which are extraordinarily difficult and stretch across multiple philosophical, theological, and political domains--what do you /do/ with a bad person in trouble?--and left for the viewer to chew on. My own reading is that the script endorses Aziraphale's decision to help despite the total lack of benefit to and potential danger to himself (he's still unsure how "awful" Gabriel/Jim is). Crowley, by contrast, does not ever appear to fully understand what Aziraphale is doing. His agreement is not an agreement, since it involves concealing the actual reason for his willingness to participate, and his initial response is to just abandon Gabriel/Jim. Of the two, it's Aziraphale who negotiates the extreme greyness of this particular grey area with more success. You can certainly argue that Aziraphale should have been more attuned to Crowley's anxieties, but then Crowley's decision to give away the whole darned body swap suggests that maybe Crowley should also have listened more to Crowley's anxieties.

Taking the Bentley: this exchange is Aziraphale reverse-Crowleying Crowley. In the Gabriel ask, Aziraphale is clear but doesn't do a good job arguing his case, and Crowley resorts to glowering silently. When he convinces Crowley to let him take the Bentley, though, he tries out the same kind of experimental button-pushing that Crowley does in s1ep1. No, he shouldn't have changed the Bentley when he drove it, but it's unclear how many of those changes are the Bentley's doing, and he had no way of knowing that Crowley could feel the alterations until Crowley yelled at him. A more significant problem is that it's not clear if Crowley fully /hears/ what Aziraphale is truly asking, which is for Crowley to acknowledge that they are sharing each other's lives. It would be easier for Crowley to hear that if Aziraphale would just come out with it, but...

Come to Heaven and be an angel again: now, /this/ request is definitely wrong, and Crowley correctly refuses. Crowley's refusal is in contrast to s1 Aziraphale, who sacrifices his own boundaries to Crowley in the Holy Water incident. (If you can see where I'm going here, between the Holy Water and the child killing, I think the problem is not Aziraphale refusing to give Crowley things and then giving in, but Aziraphale needing to learn that sometimes /Crowley/ should get an absolute no.) This is the bad side of Aziraphale's binary thought process on full display. The decision to go to Heaven on its own, though, strikes me as much more in tune with his decision to help Gabriel regardless of personal danger or potential reward, and the extraordinarily ambiguous closing shots are about as grey as you can get, right down to the lighting.

i can’t tell you how excited and trepidatious, in equal measure, i got at the words “going to be reactionary today”, LWA✨ - but it usually means some excellent Hot Tea is heading my way though, and this is no exception!!!

(i would never ban you for discussing your Favourite Bugbear, perish the thought!!! but i may well start cataloguing them in my favour for an apology dance, so proceed with caution)

at some really interesting points in the story, i think crowley betrays his own narrative, and the image that he holds of himself. i noted something - and this is quite tangential to your ask but humour me - from the coffee-shop scene, specifically in the part where bohemian rhapsody (BR) is playing at the time of him questioning aziraphale about what’s going on, and if he needs help. 

BR is a swift but a fairly complete story that follows the relatively basic hero-narrative structure. rundown to help illustrate my point: hero has issue, hero decides to solve said issue, hero goes on adventure, hero has conflict of conviction, and hero prevails. well, i don't think it's particularly accidental (because - of course it probably isn't) that the dialogue from "listen, something big is going on in heaven", up until crowley downs his caffeine nightmare, is overlayed with the section of BR that seems to fit best with the adventure mark of said structure, and that the rest of the song is missing. i'll come back to this in a minute. 

i like the note that crowley loses a lot of his narrative drive after ep3, but i'm wondering if it potentially happens earlier than that - specifically in ep1? his (as we know more solidly now from s2) tendency to insert himself as the hero? to my mind, his 'hero-narrative' in s1 is derailed quite quickly after inception, specifically in the main antichrist plot. he’s given the antichrist and delivers it (issue), wants to stop armageddon and enlists his counterpart to help (decision to resolve) and they decide to meddle in warlock’s childhood to ensure that the apocalypse never comes to fruition - so, by this point, we’re pretty much on par with the adventure mark in the structure.

but then we get to the bench scene, and crowley offers up the dilemma of the hellhound and… record scratch. aziraphale is obviously alarmed by this detail, one that has a direct bearing on how the rest of the narrative will go, and that crowley wouldn’t think/remember to share it at this point. crowley tries to claw it back, says that it won’t matter; if they’ve done their jobs right, because it will be sent away unnamed. he doesn’t consider that whilst they may have influenced the kid, the kid is ultimately going to do what it likes, and potentially unravel it all anyway.

aziraphale however does propose this eventuality (which by-the-by also serves to indicate perhaps how much aziraphale might understand humanity a bit more than crowley does - that a human child is of course going to name a stray dog and want to keep it), and crowley instead jumps straight into a solution that involves tempting aziraphale to kill a child. this is, loosely, crowley’s mark of having a conflict of conviction - that their plan will work - and he chooses a solution to that. whilst that solution would resolve it, it doesn’t take into account the world, and people, around him, nor indeed the consequences (harking back to our last chat).

what occurs thereafter is arguably aziraphale leading the overall story with his hero-narrative instead - from the point that he shakes off crowley’s suggestion, and proposes instead to stop the dog himself - and crowley’s grasp on his hero-narrative disintegrates (albeit the two re-converge in ep6). the precipitating events in s1 would not have occurred if aziraphale had not reached this proposed solution, or at least not in the way we ended up seeing them - as you said before, LWA, it’s highly doubtful that aziraphale would have survived, in any way, killing an innocent child. 

(we see him distraught at the prospect of lying to god to save job's children, and bowing to the 'inevitable' of falling (despite him knowing that he likely did the right thing) - for him to actually kill the child antichrist would be bad enough, but to find out later that warlock wasn't the antichrist to begin with? aziraphale would surely have bypassed falling entirely and walked himself straight into hellfire)

the coffee-shop scene in s2, imo, suggests much the same; crowley learns of the “naked man” (issue), downs coffee (decision to resolve said issue), and abruptly leaves the table to go play hero (adventure). the rather aggressive overlay of BH, specifically the part of “will not let you go (let me go)” suggests to me that this is where we, and crowley, need to anticipate the upcoming conflict of conviction beat, and ask: what will crowley decide to do?

so we head into the bookshop, he discovers gabriel, and the So Did I argument ensues... and crowley resolves to storm out. he doesn’t explain to aziraphale why helping gabriel is a hard-no for him, and - again, as far as the narrative indicates - essentially abandons him. it isn’t until he learns of the book of life that he even resolves to go back to the bookshop, and fakes an apology to insert himself into the narrative that aziraphale is on… but what would have happened if he hadn’t learnt of the book?

that’s considerably unknowable, but regardless - the missing last verse and outro of BR arguably spells it out for us. by crowley walking out, abandoning aziraphale and betraying the narrative he set himself on, the result would have been the exact same as what we see at the end of s2. just like those lines in GOFLB later on in the episode, i think it’s rather telling that they were cut/left out.

so - in s1, crowley attempts to drag aziraphale along on his story where he gets to play hero, and immediately cocks it up with the antichrist ask, alienating aziraphale for the majority of the narrative up until aziraphale reconciles that heaven is not on the side of humanity like he and crowley are, and he immediately goes to bring crowley back into the fold. in s2, crowley drives himself back into the narrative a bit more successfully than his attempts in s1 (with calling aziraphale for check-ins, meeting up at the bandstand, etc) but arguably the damage has been done in s2, and aziraphale and he continue to be at odds for the rest of the show - not necessarily in ways that relate specifically to the gabriel/jim plot, but crowley abandoning aziraphale sets the tone for what's to come.

the thing is - and i may be skewered for this - i don’t think crowley operates in the grey as much as he likes to think he does. it’s all very well that he intellectually understands beyond a moral-dualistic concept, but he doesn’t always put his mouth where his money is:

it's fairly clear to the audience that he cares for aziraphale at the very least, and is concerned largely by his wellbeing and safety - and yet won’t tell him important information that would make aziraphale amenable to, or more receptive to, crowley playing hero and asserting his protectiveness. that, and the fact that he completely forgets to safeguard aziraphale when confronting jim in ep5.

he considers it wrong to hurt the innocent or cause them suffering, but drops graveyard guards down a huge shaft in a completely disproportionate response of self-defense, and only remarks that he might have “slightly overdone it” (oh, and attempts making his best friend kill a child - arguably still innocent regardless of their origin - so he doesn’t have the stain on his own conscience).

he is vocal of his vehemence of heaven/hell having any interference in his existence on earth - and that of aziraphale’s - but does not once stop to consider the moral implications of messing about with nina and maggie, or with warlock... or with any other humans as a supernatural entity, for that matter

as an example of the other way around - crowley obviously hates gabriel being in the bookshop, and the risk that it confers onto aziraphale's safety. and yet, in ep3, he is clearly showing some level of acceptance, patience, and camaraderie with him. this is probably subconsciously showing his recognition that jim is entirely innocent, but i dont think it's out of crowley suddenly understanding aziraphale's charitable, altruistic perspective in ep1 on protecting him; instead, it's perhaps because his level of thinking still slips into the binary: jim = good, gabriel = bad... something that i'm personally not convinced is completely fair in the first place (but that's a different post).

that’s not to say that aziraphale is any better - of course he’s not, and in some instances aziraphale is even worse in this regard - but the hypocrisy of crowley’s assertion that he exists beyond heaven and hell’s machinations is manifestly unsupported by his own actions and choices which, as he confirms in job, he has the free will to decide for himself.

i’m not quite sure how it’s possible to miss, in this respect, that regardless of interpreted historic trauma, that crowley (speaking specifically about tv!crowley here) is altogether not entirely a good person, grey or otherwise. he doesn’t really demonstrate a whole lot of that greyness - balance - with any great consistency. his decisions and attributes appear to be entirely based on his own agenda; saying in job that he’s on his “own side” is probably as close, for me, to true self-description as he gets as of the end of s2.

aziraphale on the other hand just doesn't seem to grasp what the greyness actually means. his intellectual analogue is very much on the dualistic, binary scale, and it's certainly not something he truly understands by the end of s2 either. whilst i do think he's able to separate heaven from god, and separate them both from angels, and then separate himself from all of it, he still holds to the belief that there is superiority in the absolute concept of good.

his comment on hell being "the bad guys" notwithstanding (which, given the events of ep5/ep6, is not a wholly incorrect assessment to be fair to him), it's his assertion that heaven remains the side "of truth, of light, of good" that gives pause. whilst he may acknowledge that it hasn't embodied this in some time, he at least believes that it was always meant to (which, to me, is odd, if you consider that 'heaven' was probably never meant to be good before the fall - because hell didn't exist to given heaven that level of definition - and was just meant to be). but aziraphale may have always considered god to be good. this is again not something supported in the narrative whatsoever; at 'best', god is completely amoral.

and even more interesting, as you said LWA, is that aziraphale is the one of the two of them that seems to land himself in predicaments that are grey, and is able to navigate it better in certain circumstances. those circumstances - the suggestion of killing the antichrist*, the giving of the holy water, the protecting of gabriel/jim, and returning to heaven to make a difference there - all pose a dilemma to aziraphale where it pulls into question what he fundamentally believes in morally. the fact that by proximity to crowley in s1 that he essentially betrays that (goes to shoot adam, gives crowley the holy water), but in s2, after some distance has been established between them, he sticks to his metaphorical guns (protects gabriel, goes to heaven), i think shows the true essence of where their dichotomy lies.

*i personally still consider this to be a grey decision, because i can see why crowley suggests it; the weighing up of one against the many. the issue i cannot reconcile is the tempting aziraphale into doing it instead of crowley... imo, don't suggest a grave, horrendous action if it's not one you're prepared to consider doing yourself, or at least communicate why you can't do it... but that's my personal take.

#the issue with LWA asks is they so neatly and beautifully sum up everything that i literally have nothing to add #but the effort they put in deserves a response so i end up going on tangents and discussing something arguably completely different #and look one day theyre probably going to run out of things to send to me so i have to make the most of them right :') #anyway yeah have a lukewarm take #good omens #ask

[jennycalendar]

buffy/giles? jenny/cordelia? angel/cordelia? spike/anya? dawn/xander? willow/kennedy? kennedy/anya?? (i know i'm late to this game but i want to hear all your opinions)

buffy/giles:

oh, man. my take on this is a little different from most. starts out like i have a certain position, but prepare yourself.

buffy/giles is so divorced from canon! the story itself took so many steps to remove the possibility of buffy and giles ever becoming a romantic relationship -- the Six Inch Rule is often cited in a lot of b/g fics (yes i read them. i read everything.) and it's very very clear that the show has placed giles in a paternal role. a lot of the b/g ship arguments seem to suggest that giles doesn't actually want to be buffy's dad, but i think that omits the rest of that sentence -- giles doesn't want to be buffy's dad because he feels like a good dad would not be sending their kid out to die, and he believes that the ultimate act of paternal devotion is to Not Be Buffy's Dad. and buffy herself CLEARLY wants giles to be her dad! this is a point of contention between them!

i have read some b/g fic because i am always curious, and the bulk of the fic that i HAVE read just absolutely refuses to engage with the canon messaging, instead choosing to say "all of the rest of you are reading canon wrong, giles and buffy have never had a father/daughter connection, and there's always been romantic potential here." i find this incredibly boring. i think that any exploration of buffy/giles HAS to incorporate that, at one point, she saw him as her dad, and HAS to explore how those feelings changed + the weirdness/messiness of this entire dynamic in the first place.

i am not gonna be one of those people who pearl-clutches -- buffy/giles is a long-established part of this fandom and i do not think that it does us any favors to pretend that they didn't build so much of the incredible giles content/infrastructure that's out there! even if it's not my thing, i can respect it. but part of the reason it's not my thing is bc i do not see a lot of it that actually engages with canon. much of it intensely mischaracterizes buffy AND presents giles as the Perfect Man Who Is Perfect, which, again, soooo not interesting to me. write some weird shit where the daddy issues are addressed instead of shaken off and shoved into a closet! that is literally what fanfiction is for!!!

jenny/cordelia:

iiiiiii can't see it. they're way too similar. i've read a couple of fics where cordelia has a crush on jenny but honestly just cannot buy it. i think cordelia wants to BE jenny (cool confident assertive lady with a geek ass little boyfriend, is not bothered by what people will think of her for dating said geek ass little boyfriend) which is a little different.

angel/cordelia:

14 year old celia will never not be crying about them. neither will 22 year old celia. the most perfect thing to ever exist. they invented friends to lovers. i truly think there's nothing like them in the entire buffyverse -- the people that they start out as are so fundamentally incompatible, and then the people they grow into through heartbreak and supernatural situations become SO ENTWINED!!! i love the idea of a second, enduring love that you grow into -- something that is not fated. of all the couples in the buffyverse, they're the ones who are actually, canonically best friends who enjoy each other's company w/ the love stuff blooming FROM THAT, and that will never not kill me.

spike/anya:

hot in the short term/for a fwb situation, but i think they probably work best as friends. i don't really have anything to justify this position, Simply Vibes.

dawn/xander

i am totally ambivalent. i understand that it happened in the comics, but it's so hard to look at them and imagine it when he's such a big brother to her in canon! on principle, though, i respect the idea of the dynamic shifting as she gets older, because i love the narrative notion of relationships evolving and changing shape as time goes on -- i actually really love this one fic i read where she's obsessed with this idea of becoming a Cool College Student and wooing him with her new attractiveness, and it doesn't SEEM to work (she even brings it up to him and goes "haha wasn't this so funny and stupid of me to think it could happen?") but there's a suggestion that his perspective on her might be gradually changing.

willow/kennedy

people hate kennedy so much and that makes me love this more. out of spite. 1) this was so clearly not a long-term thing, and 2) this becomes so fun to watch if you look at kennedy as Baby Jenny & recognize the subsequent implications of this.

kennedy/anya

a recipe for disaster, i think. they both wanna be in charge and spoiled by their partner. they would get into SO MANY FIGHTS.

#asks #brutally honest asks #not tagging this bc there's a lot contained in it!

[thatswhatsushesaid]

exploring various different "what if...?" scenarios for jgy in mdzs remains, as always, both my favourite and least favourite activity in this fandom, because a few things invariably end up happening:

I learn new things both about jgy and about other characters, which is always my favourite part of being part of any fandom, this is an unambiguously good thing, no complaints; but,

jgy also ends up skewered again in the unending game of mdzs disc horse because "see, if he'd just done this one thing differently, everything would've been fine!!" even though the textual support for "everything" being "fine" is pretty shaky at best. like the extent of narrative reverse-engineering we'd have to engage in to actually prove that is grounds for another close reading of the whole novel (and my inner huaisang is just like ugh, bestie that is so much work), and/or,

the disc horse eventually circles back to the proposals just not jiving with the reality of what jgy is given to work with in the canon.

ftr I am obviously fine with taking canon and adjusting it just a bit to make engaging with it in fic/RP more fun and enjoyable for me as someone who loves playing in the canon-divergent mdzs trash can of our hearts. but that's a separate matter from taking some of the scenarios I see proposed in these discussions and applying them as potential solutions to the real problems encountered by jgy, or wwx, or jc, or nmj in the novel. because to make some of these 'what if' scenarios in canon work:

either the fundamental building blocks of the mdzs cultivation world have to shift dramatically (e.g., jgy is able to marry lxc, or nhs, or jc, without anyone addressing the issue of marital unions where there is no possibility of producing heirs in a society so fixated on dynasties built on family hierarchies and bloodlines; or, jgy doesn't go along with jgs's demands and faces zero consequences for his filial impiety/secular disloyalty), and/or,

the core priorities/values of individual characters would have to change and result in different actions and outcomes than what we see presented in the text or on screen (e.g., nmj decides to trust jgy enough to intercede in his fucked up engagement to qin su specifically to help jgy, which means jgy has to trust nmj enough to reveal this information to him in the first place; or, jin zixuan and/or jiang yanli decide to take enough of an interest in jgy's situation to step in between him and jin guangshan and madam jin and provide him with material or emotional support during his first year and a half as a legitimized member of the lanling jin sect, which presumes that either of these characters would pursue a deeper emotional attachment to jgy than exists in the source material)

and ultimately I feel most of the fandom-proposed solutions to jgy's legion of canon problems fall into at least one of those two categories. which sucks for jgy, obviously! our special little guy is as doomed by the narrative as you can get! /sad violin music goes here

at the same time I also think it's useful to subject all of these proposed solutions to the test of "does this break the world? does this break the character?" because for every "yes, it breaks the world/character" answer we encounter, we're forced as as readers to confront how limited jgy's options are in canon.

#mdzs #mdzs meta #jin guangyao #my special little guy had a rough time and did some crimes and then died #i'm sad about it

[ahdriking]

So, Blue Blood is finished. And,,,, I have a lot of feelings about it. 

Let me tell you a story! Six months ago, I decided to open up and engage with tumblr for the first time in almost three years. It was a random evening, I was bored and had nothing to do, so I decided to see what was going on in the world that had once consumed my life, but which had been absent from it for quite some time. Almost immediately (a testament to how well past me curated my blog) I came across a gifset from Kinnporsche. Can’t remember what it was of, but it appealed to me enough that I hunted the show down on a whim and put it on.

And then my entire life changed.

I’m not being dramatic, I’m genuinely serious. I used to waste my days playing phone games and watching TV because I had gotten out of using my computer and accessing fandom, but after I watched Kinnporsche, I literally put down my phone and forgot about it so hard I literally broke it accidentally and have gone without one for five months. I reactivated my tumblr from its longtime slumber, I created a twitter for the first time ever, I logged into ao3 for the first time in almost two years, and I stepped into fandom with the burning passion of a woman who’s entire life had been consumed. Because this show made me feel more than any show I have ever watched has made me feel, more than any other piece of media has ever made me feel. I have never been so emotionally enraptured by a fictional relationship, one which was enriched by the most sensual and stimulating sex scenes I’ve ever seen captured on film, one which played into all of my interests like it had been tailor made for me. I have never been so intrigued by the potential of a plot or world. I didn’t even know such a thing was possible. I could never ever in a million years have prepared myself for it; to hope for something even close to a pale shade of what we got would have felt unreasonable before. And yet, Kinnporsche exists. Despite all reason, logic and odds, Kinn and Porsche exist. And I found it, while it was still airing at that, and got to participate in one of the most exciting and enrapturing tv show experiences I’ll probably ever have in my life.

Maybe it was in part due to the euphoria of the impossible happening, or maybe it was simply the novelty of experiencing passion for a creative IP for the first time in years, or maybe it was the enthusiasm of the community I found and the ability to connect with people again, but something fundamentally shifted in me because of this show, and not just in what I did in my spare time. A creative spirit I had not felt in years came roaring to life in me with an unholy vengeance the likes of which I have truly never experienced before. My generally poor mental health, which had numbed me for so long, was drowned out for days at a time by the most intense and compelling feelings of excitement and anticipation and adoration and obsession and fixation I’ve felt probably ever felt, a literally perfect cocktail of emotions that reactivated something long dormant in my mind. It left me inspired, more than I have ever been in my life– my ao3 can serve as proof! My greatest achievement before had been writing 50,000 words in a single year. I wrote that much within the first month and a half of watching the show. I went from averaging 12,000 words over 3 years to 200,000 in 6 months.

My point is, Kinnporsche was entirely unprecedented in my life, and it changed me down to my marrow. It made me capable of writing in a way I have never, ever been able to before. And that was why I found myself in the position of entertaining the idea of a longfic for the first time in *years*.

Some important context: I have never finished anything. I’ve been writing creatively since I was old enough to hold a pencil, dreaming about the stories I would one day tell, but the idea of ever being able to actually finish one? That sort of achievement felt out of reach all of my life. I just wasn’t good enough, and I was certain that I never would be. So thinking about writing a longfic so soon after taking up writing again really felt like a risky, no good idea. I promised myself I wouldn’t, not unless the idea was so good it just HAD to be attempted. Something genuinely exceptional.

It was a series of cascading coincidences that led me to Blue Blood. First, a particular photo of Apo with eyeliner. Then, a series of meta posts investigating the potential darkness of Kinn’s character. Finally, joining a discord server of people who were excited by and receptive of the initial ideas that intrigued me: fighter!porsche and dark mafia!Kinn. It was a perfect storm. And fuck me if it didn’t make me feel really, really excited by it. So I did the improbable: I started to plan.

One of my problems has always been that I start something without knowing how to finish it. I set off before I have the destination in mind, hoping to somehow figure it out along the way, but inevitably run out of steam and, without an ending in sight, the process feels hopeless. But I was determined not to do this for Blue Blood. So I comprehensively planned out the entire arc of the fic, and gave myself as much structure as I could (as I’ve told a few people, Blue Blood boils down to a 5+1 fic in structure. It’s 5 fights plus the final boss showdown(altho I only had to write 5 total cos I did a cheeky). And I really, really fucking liked it. It felt really fucking tangible. Writing the first chapter, after that, was the easiest thing in the world. Genuinely, chapter one was one of the most fun writing experiences I’ve ever had, it just fucking poured out of me. And the reception to it was amazing; the number of people who took a chance on the first chapter of a WIP, on a dark fic one at that, truly thrilled and excited me. So we were off to a good start.

But Blue Blood wouldn’t remain mine alone.

I picked up @kissporsche sometime after the first chapter, but before the second. We had exchanged a few random messages on tumblr, and they seemed like a really cool person, so when I wanted someone to take a look at my work I thought of them. All I wanted, initially, was someone to beta what I’d written and maybe give me a few encouraging comments. I sent her the doc, and waited to hear back. And what I got blew me the fuck away. I’ve had beta’s before, but never one who so comprehensively attacked the editing process, in such a way that I genuinely felt was perfectly targeted to identifying my weaknesses and expanding on my strengths. And not just that, but she was excited to just *talk* to me about it, she was excited for me to bounce ideas off of her and explore difficulties with her and just generally bitch about whatever with her. And she was more than open to the idea of working on the next chapter. And maybe the one after that.

Before I knew it my usually solitary and isolated experience writing fic was just a thing of the past. I suddenly had someone who would not only listen to my every random thought or concern I had, but who would genuinely encourage them and do the same right back at me. It was fucking INCREDIBLE. As a person who lives for feedback, I found myself writing things just to be able to send them to kissporsche for her edits and reactions. I found myself driven, almost supernaturally, to produce content just so we could pour over it together and explore it. It changed everything. It *was* everything.

Kissporsche is responsible for so many, many parts of this fic. From being instrumental in determining key plot factors, to being the reason for the switching POV’s, to being the saving grace of Porsche’s characterisation, to instigating and perpetuating the presence of Vegaspete, to fixing up my many grammatical errors and word repetitions, to encouraging me through hard times, to cheering for me through easy times, to being a voice of reason during the dark times. For being a friend when I needed one, a voice of love and support, one that cut through and silenced the worst of my insecurities. For being someone I could turn to for whatever I needed, for being someone who made me feel competent and capable, for being someone who I could rely on. For being someone who opened up to me and let me in and gave me nothing but love and acceptance and validation in return. There aren’t many people out there in the world like you, and I want you to know that I appreciate that fact. I know how lucky I am.

There were times when it was fucking hard and I struggled, and I thought very bleakly about the future of this fic. But never once, not even for a second, did I truly feel that I was going to abandon it. I couldn’t. I had someone waiting for me, with genuine and loud excitement, to carry on. And so I did. I carried on and I carried on and I carried on and then, all of a sudden, it was almost over. And I had nearly done it. *We* had nearly done it.

These last few weeks have been truly fucking insane. We’ve spent a lot of time losing our shit over the fact that it’s getting closer and closer to it being over. To it being finished. And now we’re finally here, we’re actually fucking finally here, at the final page. At the end. And it just feels surreal! It feels like a dream. It’s finished. 

Blue Blood is finished.

I’m proud of us! I’m proud of myself. I’m damn fucking proud of myself for writing this fic. I’m proud of the plot, I’m proud of the characters, I’m proud of the world, and I’m fucking proud of finishing it. I’ve proven to myself that it’s possible, that I’m capable, and it feels like an entire world of possibility has opened up as a result. Who knows what I might write next?

I know this was a lot, but it feels important to me to mark this event with such an introspective post, because I want to remember everything about this. I want to come back years from now and re-read this and remember exactly what it was like, exactly how it felt. And I want all of you to know what it meant. This fic has changed my life, as dramatic as that sounds. It has fundamentally changed me in more ways than I can really express. It will always be my first.

But not my last 😏

#blue blood #hoo boy this is quite a lot #but every damn word comes from my soul motherfuckers #its the end of an era #and i had to say goodbye properly

[princeescaluswords]

A lot of Scott haters generate very poor analysis of the show because they are operating on a fundamentally flawed premise, namely, that the characters they like have the same opinion of Scott that they do. (This isn't exclusive to Teen Wolf fandom, I've seen it in other fandoms, it's a common error fandoms make.) I may have problems with certain actions taken by Stiles but I would NEVER claim he doesn't love or care about Scott or would choose Derek of all people over him. That's not Stiles.

Nothing supports your conclusion more than fandom's "re-interpretaton" of Master Plan (2x12). In this episode, Stiles makes several very clear (and very emotional) statements about how he feels about the most important people in his life: his father, his mother, Lydia, and Scott. His actions conform completely to those statements.

He makes it clear he loves his father, Lydia, and Scott. He acts to protect his father, Lydia, and Scott. He lies, concealing the truth behind his kidnapping, to his father, because he doesn't want his father anywhere near the Hale-Argent feud. He shouts at Lydia to try to dissuade her from pursuing Jackson, revealing the depth of his feelings toward Lydia, the danger she is in, and how that is influenced by his own mother's death, but he still guides her to the climactic confrontation in the warehouse. He doesn't seek out Scott immediately because he knows that his kidnapping and beating is meant to apply pressure to Scott "And look at my face, huh? Come on, you actually think this was meant to hurt me?" In the aftermath, he reassures Scott that he has his back always.

Stiles always figures it out, and he recognizes the dangers that the people he loves are in, and he acts accordingly.

But then here comes fandom. Since the majority of fandom seems not to be all that attracted to Lydia, they don't care about her. Since the majority are busily projecting their own issues with their parents onto the Sheriff, they don't recognize how his position in law enforcement complicates his relationship with Stiles. Since the majority of the fandom are outraged that Derek isn't the main character, they are primed to see Scott in the worst possible light.

The fandom wants a Stiles who dwells exclusively on his own physical and emotional pain and who doesn't look at what has happened -- as the Canon Stiles does -- in terms of the health and safety of his family and friends. The fandom also wants a Stiles who worships Derek the way they do, so they conjure concern for the Hale pack, even though Stiles didn't mention Derek (and Derek didn't mention Stiles) during the final two episodes of Season 2. They want Stiles, as their stand-in, to make the case for shifting the focus of the show to Derek, so they perform incredible feats of doublethink, taking Stiles's earlier shots at Scott (which they have interpreted before as Stiles's way of showing his love for Scott) as literal, critical and damning judgment of Scott's value while simultaneously believing that Stiles would be shocked and blindsided by Scott's behavior.

Of course, to accomplish this new paradigm they have to eject 70% of canon. Derek didn't try to kill Lydia, Derek hasn't been alternatively brutal and manipulative toward his best friend, Isaac and Erica didn't attack Stiles on Derek's orders, and Derek didn't create the kanima which almost murdered Stiles's father. Fanon Stiles doesn't love Lydia enough to challenge Peter and Gerard, he doesn't care for and have faith in Scott enough to ignore his own physical and emotional trauma to support him , and he certainly didn't leave Boyd and Erica in the Argent basement in order to prioritize protecting his father. I imagine this level of editing is hard work.

Of course, when people like us point this out, they have two primary and contradictory declamations. "We're not bound by canon!" fandom cries only to follow that up immediately with "Why can't you let people enjoy things?" But by discarding canon to this degree, they're not just enjoying things: they're creating things. And when anyone creates something and puts it out for public consumption, the audience for it -- which includes you and me -- gets to react to that creation, just as we react to Teen Wolf.

And the red flags in their creation are consistent and widespread. Fanon Stiles is not Allison's friend and not in love with Lydia but still pays attention to their actions, he resents the fact that Scott simultaneously relies on him but doesn't do anything to discourage it, and desperately wants to be part of Derek "Like a hyperactive spaz" Hale's pack. Fanon Stiles cannot stand Scott because he hid his plan against Gerard from Stiles (even though there's no evidence Scott actually did that) but is more than willing to defend Derek's repeated instances of concealing information (the existence of the alpha, biting Jackson, the approach of the alpha pack, and Peter's resurrection). Fanon Stiles cannot forgive Scott for the Neck Grab of Destiny because it is morally wrong and crossed boundaries (regardless of the threat to Allison), but literally has not the slightest concern that Derek dispatched teenagers to execute an innocent Lydia repeatedly.

When we interrogate them about the choices they made for their creation, they get defensive. If they're willing to rewrite that much of canon, why does their product consistently celebrate the white male characters and diminish or demonize female and/or minority characters? After all, as they'll state forever, they're not beholden to canon. Yet, there has been no other offered consistent explanation for the specificity of Fanon Stiles's behavior from the fandom, because they obviously can't come out and say that they wanted to discard Canon Stiles's fantastic personality and actions for one that takes revenge for a Latino being the main protagonist and not a white man.

BUT IT'S NOT RACISM.

#stiles stilinski #scott mccall #derek hale #scott mccall defense squad #fandom racism #save stiles from his fans #master plan #masterplan

[jebiknights]

This isn't me trying to shift blame or anything, but I will say I think something fandom seems to fundamentally misunderstand about Anakin's insecurities and issues with the Council, is that he wasn't actually power hungry really at all. He consistently expressed discomfort with certain responsibilities - especially power over others. He had a strong sense of duty, but also felt that he knew where he was best suited, and didn't think he should be wasting time on things that he felt others could handle.

And his biggest issue with the Council and Mace Windu? Was that he felt they didn't respect him.

Anakin very clearly functions off of the mindset that "respect is earned and not given". While the members of the Council arguably have done plenty to earn that respect, Anakin - especially with his background of being a former slave - is not going to see just the rank of Master and a seat on the Council as proof of their accomplishments and therefore worthy of respect. Especially when he feels that they don't respect him in return.

In ROTS when he complains about getting a seat on the Council but not the title of Master is unfair, he isn't just protesting because he thinks he's owed the title or anything or because he's whiny. He feels that by granting him a council seat but no title means they don't respect him. It's hard for him to see that just him getting a seat on the Council is an honor, when by keeping him at Knight it feels like they are still keeping him below them. (It also doesn't help that any of Anakin's own efforts to work through his emotions healthily or by talking to the other Jedi are always undermined by Palpatine sowing doubt in his ear, but that's another post.)

I think that's where a lot of his perceived arrogance comes from, too. Not to say he can't be a cocky little shit, but also anyone who knows Anakin as a character knows how deeply insecure and anxious he is as well. He's not really asking people to sing his praises (he will point to his men and Padawan and their efforts just as much), just that people acknowledge that he does good work and is therefore worthy of respect.

Respect is just, so, so important to Anakin. One of the first things Anakin says on screen is that he's Anakin Skywalker and "I'm a person", demanding respect and autonomy for himself when he has none.

He also consistently wields disrespect as a weapon, I think some like to see him as simply irreverent but I really do think it's something he does on purpose. Age is not necessarily a factor, nor is skill or position. So much of it is about treatment of him and treatment of others, that is what he is measuring the world by.

Of course, this doesn't always pan out in his favor (gestures at Palpatine) but I just don't think it's as malicious on either side of the constant disputes between Anakin and the Council as some people make it out to be. I don't think that the Council viewed him as lesser really when Qui-Gon brought him before the Council, it's easy to see how a recently enslaved 9 year old would view that interaction poorly. And it can be very hard to shake first impressions. I also think that Anakin feeling disrespected can come across as really childish to the Council when you forget the context of his upbringing and how important respect can be for people in bad situations.

It's something that very much carries over into his time as Vader too, considering that Vader is known for going after disrespectful and maliciously incompetent officers and not normally his troopers or those further down the rankings.

(I could honestly use even more examples if I dove into Legends with this, but was trying to keep it mostly canon verse for this post, so I'll end it here.)

Just! The thing Anakin values possibly even more than loyalty is! Proper respect!

#anakin skywalker #darth vader #revenge of the sith #jedi council #star wars meta #sw meta #note this is NOT jedi negative i think its just a miscommunication that became insurmountable in the end #anakin #vader #comm chatter

[seek--rest]

Almost a year and a half later and the ending to NWH still pisses me off with how it disrespected MJ as a character. Peter’s relationship with MJ is supposed to be one of the most important and defining relationships of his life, but in the MCU she’s just a high school girlfriend he dated for a few months. And yeah, the choice to ‘break up’ with her and the way he did it is incredibly important and defining, but the relationship itself is going to become more and more inconsequential the more time passes. Which to be fair, is how most breakups tend to be. Except peter dated her so briefly that he’ll probably be entirely over her in less than a year. A few years MAX. Now, if they did the intelligent thing and make the home trilogy take place post-college and had Peter and MJ be a long term established relationship from the beginning that we saw develop and grow even further over the course of three movies, then Peter choosing to leave her after a memory wipe would actually mean something. But they didn’t. So she’s just a girl that Peter knew for a few years and dated for a few months and he’ll be completely over her by the next movie. If we ever get another movie. And as an MJ fan that just doesn’t sit right with me.

I think there’s an important shift here where I disagree with you on a fundamental thing.

Peter will not be forgetting MJ anytime soon.

MJ, on the other hand, already has.

I agree, it’s offensive how they treated MJ in the MCU trilogy. Full stop end of story. But I think the memory wipe— something I was adamantly against for MONTHS before NWH— only works because they have no relationship to speak of. A OMD ending for the sake of tearing them apart after years together makes it reductive, but there is no love story to tear apart. There is no connection that binds them in this way. Peter, who made this decision to step away, will not be forgetting MJ at all— if anything his feelings might be stronger because of it. He’ll still try and move forward, I would think because that’s what Peter Parker will always do but I do not agree that he’ll forget her.

MJ— who has no memory of Peter— has and imo, she will be the one who could easily discount her memories if/when she gets them back. It was SUCH a big pet peeve of mine to see fics written and PRAISED where it’s been five, ten years since the events of NWH and BOTH Peter and MJ never dated anyone else, never loved anyone else, always felt like they were missing something… only for the memories to return and for MJ to be still blindly devoted to Peter after a decade of living without him.

It is such a gross slap in the face from a fandom that claims to love MJ to make her so codependent, so simple minded and so shallow that she’s still desperately in love with a boy she dated for four months at most when she was seventeen that a DECADE later she completely ignores that time away (and worse, for the fics that made Peter all but stalk her, to IMMEDIATELY forgive him and then jump into bed with him). That to me is insulting to MJ’s character and I’ll forever think everyone who gobbled up those fics as people who didn’t give a shit about MJ as much as they claimed, they just wanted romantic fantasy that could be boiled down to misogynistic tropes.

I don’t have the most confidence in the MCU to treat MJ— and their eventual coming back together— right. But I do have hope, if only because they took concepts I openly despised as a possibility in NWH (May dying, the multiverse, the OMD ending) and made it work so well.

Lighting might not strike twice. But I can hope until I’m proven wrong.

Just as I can hope that if the writers are still scrolling through ao3, they are not so continually horrible to treat MJ just as badly as so much of fandom did.

#seek speaks #petermj #spideychelle #petermjane

[not-this-guy]

Once again, picking at your brain for your thoughts

What’re your reasons/ideas behind your top hc’s for Bro

i'm brain dead right now after a full shift so let me give you the long short list and a more general explanation of my general fascination with this guy

the basis of my takes and hcs on bro stem from approaching him and viewing him as a person who is flawed and wrong and misguided, but a person and not a generic one faced boogeyman. he is an abuser, he has a lack of boundaries and he has violent tendencies, but i don't look at it in a vacuum because unlike dave who's only ever seen what bro allowed him to see, we can look at him as a whole.

i picked him up a couple years ago in a group roleplay server, mainly as a "i don't trust anyone else to write him/haha wouldn't it be funny if" and since then he's been living rent free in my head - but he's out grown what canon gave us.

and the fundamentals of that are:

0 | SPITE, DISGUST AND FRUSTRATION: he is a fascinating character in his own right, but goddamn is he polarising and one prone to settle in the extremes of fandom perception to the point that people have to fucking tag him as a trigger warning nowadays, which makes people unwilling to interact and engage in more nuanced discussions of him out of avoidance of being harassed which is understandable. however this kind of left him as a character to the wolves, and now a lot of his more recent works and his entire tag in general in whatever site you use has been trashed by incestuous pedophiles - which makes people even less wiling to interact with the concepts brought up in his character. and honestly fuck that. i'm willing to endure dealing w their bullshit directly n i'm willing to call these people what they are (groomers sharing csa material for personal gratification and desensitisation) and i'm not giving them free reign of bro's tag anymore. these freaks should be rightfully shunned and mocked and judged where ever they go because they're too deep in self-denial to ever change.

I | EXTRAPOLATION: with alpha dirk's introduction we were left with a question, how could this kid end up like his beta session self? what could possibly drive the dirk we grow to like and see multiple facets of become this shell of a man? and boy do i love assuming and explaining shit away for people who are barely characters in their own right. free reign to do whatever i want baby.

II | BRAIN DAMAGE: the answer to that question is to chip away at the soul and to scramble a man's sense of reality. i haven't really been in the headspace for it but id love to one day fully explore the horrors of Bro and Lil Cal's codependency for those 30 some years. with that as a base (but not an excuse) i started to slowly piece him back together, and working with the 'undesirables' of mental illness. he is an unmedicafed paranoid schizophrenic with hoarding tendencies who was diagnosed with aspergers as a child... and then punished for it, being effectively abandoned by the system to fates whims and blamed for never having his needs met. his one solid connection at any point in time was lil cal. but instead of villanizing him for having these traits... i see him as someone who was trying to help, but was misguided by his closest confidant and blinded by his over controlling paranoid nature and compulsory need to one up people. everything bro did, he did to help dave... he just never stopped to think about if he was going about it the right way, because he saw dave as an extension of himself and thus of course thought his behaviour was appropriate, because he is acting as who he wished he had when he himself was a kid.

III | PROJECTING AND RELATABILITY: damn he just like me fr. aka on top of all of that, i've grown to attach some of my own traits onto him and vice versa as a means of coping with my own backstory and as a backwards way of acknowledging that my feelings are valid... by allowing bro strider of all people to also go through them and changing myself to have compassion for him.

there's more but look i forgot and m done eating my cold burger.

#🆒 #📩 #🧢 #passing out like snoooore mimimimi snoooore #I am not proof reading this if its legible it's legible

[lindwurmkai]

who's up for another round of tumblr user lindwurmkai criticising what other people are complaining about? 👉😏👉

no but for real tho. there is a whole, idk, phenomenon i often encounter on here where being rightfully exasperated with certain "popular" behaviours (example: wanting a "canon" answer for every question you have about a piece of media) turns into condescending mockery of anyone who ever behaves that way and treating it like it's completely bizarre when in fact it can simply be an expression of autism.

which makes it all the more puzzling when i see a dozen fellow autistics reblog the post, too. (this was not directly inspired by whoever last put a similar post on my dash btw. i've been meaning to write this for days)

another example is "the curtains are just blue" but i've talked about that before. and struggling to understand that fiction follows different rules than real life!! plus several other aspects of "basic media literacy" that can actually be quite difficult to grasp for a lot of people.

"why does it even matter if something is canon or not? why do you need a wiki for everything? who cares what the character's 'real' favourite colour is?" maybe because to some people, learning fun facts about wizards or dragons isn't fundamentally different than learning fun facts about trains or dinosaurs. i'm not saying we don't understand that they're fictional, but that the desire to find out more is the same. and speaking from personal experience, it never even occurred to me that authors who didn't care about the details of their worlds and characters beyond what was in the story might exist until i literally learned about it on tumblr in my 20s. i understood that tolkien was a bit of an outlier but assumed it was just a matter of degree.

people always blame mega franchises and cinemasins or occasionally the american school system for some reason. or social media. and it's probably true that each of those things have contributed to an increase in certain behaviours that you may find annoying! it's definitely true that certain franchises have contributed to a shift in the average person's default assumptions regarding new media they come across. so i completely understand where the exasperation comes from, don't worry

but this is like the difference between criticising fandom trends and criticising individual fans' preferences all over again, except worse because this time it's ableist. you would not believe the things i didn't understand about fiction a decade ago, and a decade ago i was already 27. seeing people get condescended to for the same misunderstandings when some of them are even younger really sucks.

it is possible for the same behaviour to have more than one cause. maybe that one person really watched too much cinemasins while another doesn't even know what that is and yet analyses media the same way because it's how their brain approaches fiction intuitively. maybe one person didn't pay attention in english class while another tried so, so hard to understand the material and still couldn't. maybe one person thinks there's a canon answer to everything because that's what their two previous favourite franchises were like while another is simply applying the "gathering dinosaur facts" approach to fiction and has yet to realise not every author operates like tolkien.

for a long time i couldn't distinguish between plot-relevant details and extra fluff because to me the point of a story was to introduce me to a new world with fun new characters in it. of course 3 pages of infodumping wasn't a problem! of course the character's hair colour was important! the idea of authors answering questions with "it doesn't matter, feel free to imagine whatever you want" would have confused me so much if i had encountered it back then. i already knew how to invent my own stories, but i wanted to know more about this story???

just because i've (mostly) figured it all out now doesn't mean i don't remember being that person everyone loves to mock these days.

#also my ability to identify metaphors varies wildly based on various factors #which is funny because i can hardly form a coherent sentence without accidentally using two metaphors #throws this rambling post at you and runs away #weirdo chronicles

[narutakijune]

About ATLA Relationship Arcs

So, this is me, finally trying to write some meta after lurking in my little tumblr corner for months! Hi!

Although I’ve tried to tag properly, if you are a Kat*anger and just want to enjoy your favourite couple in peace, this might not be the post for you. I am not trying to bash characters but I do have a lot of critical stuff to say about the writing.

Anyway, you have been warned and here is my story about my personal first Atla experience: I watched the show this year for the first time, and after the end of Book 1 I decided to look up spoilers, because after what happened to Yue, I wanted to make sure that Zuko and Iroh would be ok. So I knew what was going to happen: Kat*ang endgame and absolutely no Zutara at all. Still, by the end of Book 3, I was convinced that I had read wrong - that there would be an epilogue with a different ending or at least that Aang would only get together with Katara post-show- in that Korra series or something - because anything else wouldn’t make sense- right?

….

After I got over my shock and surprise, I went online and found out about that decade-long aggressive passionate ship war and how even the showrunners got involved.

And then I really worried that I might have missed a few points. Apparently ”Aang and Katara were the DNA of the show”, according to the creators themselves, and “Zutara could never have happened”.

Another popular anti-ZK argument I found was: Why do you always go on about Katara and Zuko? Just look at Zuko and Aang! They are the hero/ anti-hero and each other’s foils, their relationship is much more meaningful!”

So I tried to find out what it was that I apparently couldn’t see.

(Another disclaimer: I love analysing stories (like many Zutarians apparently) and this will get long and rambly. If you get bored to tears when people start talking about “narrative structure” you will probably not like this.)

Talking about narrative structure, I do believe that, in order to let your story, your characters and their relationships really shine, a good basic structure is important. There should be a recognizable development and individual parts of the story that build upon each other and lead to consequences and change, until there is a completed arc - because it is all about the journey that takes you to a satisfying ending, right? So that’s what I tried to do, with my personal Kat*ang vs. Zutara take, I tried to look at the structure and development of their relationship arcs.

The argument that threw me off track for a while is that compared to Aang and Zuko, Zuko and Katara’s relationship is not supposed to be that relevant for the plot. After all, Zuko is the foil, the anti-hero, the deuteragonist to Aang, who is the hero protagonist.

This is all true of course. But then why is it that in every finale, Zuko’s main opponent (and later ally) is not Aang but Katara? Why is it that their sun/moon, red/blue, fire/water dichotomy is so obviously highlighted?

I think one reason why Zuko and Katara are paired off so frequently in the story - as opposite elements, as opponents and as allies - is that they BOTH are Aang’s deuteragonists. While Zuko also acts as antagonist and Aang’s foil/mirror, Katara takes over the more traditional deuteragonist role of confidant / best friend/ narrator.

Protagonist Aang is what connects them, although they are on opposite sides: Both need Aang because he represents their hope to save their world. Very simply put, Katara protects him, so he can make the world a safer place again, and Zuko wants to capture him, so he can go home and be safe again. That rivalry between them is already established in the first episode, even before they meet each other: Katara, who hopes that the Avatar will return (as she tells everyone in the intro), and Zuko, who seems to be obsessed with finding him for more sinister reasons.

And just to make sure, I am not talking here about the characters’ feelings and emotions! This is just about the abstract roles they have been assigned within the narrative.

When regarding Zutara’s special connection to Aang and their rivalry with each other, it makes absolute sense to stress their “same but different”ness as well, visually and metaphorically: Red and blue, fire and water, sun and moon, arguably Painted Lady/Blue Spirit, and, when you put into account their story arc, also Oma and Shu.

With this basis, which puts them together and sets them apart simultaneously, their relationship already becomes very dynamic and interesting, even before you consider any romantic potential.

And here’s another thing, Zuko and Katara also have their own story arc within the main plot. Although they don’t have many scenes together before Zuko joins the Gaang, when they do meet there is always a new shift in their relationship and in quite a few cases their interactions are important for the main plot as well. If you just look at their “end fights” at each book’s finale, there is an obvious and consequential build-up, like any decent story arc should have:

Book 1 starts with Zuko as the powered-up enemy and Katara as the weak newbie waterbender. Both are battling over Aang. At the end of Book 1, they are finally established as equally powerful fighters but still fundamentally different (You rise with the moon, I rise with the sun!)

In CoD at the end of Book 2 happens the next step: they realize that they are not different at all! But Aang still doesn’t represent the same for them and they end up on opposing sides of the war again.

In the Book 3 finale, when Zuko has completed his own (anti-) hero's journey and Aang represents the same “hope” for both of them, they do not only join forces: Their “same but different”- traits make them such a uniquely suited match that they are even able to save each other’s lives during their fight with Azula (who in turn happens to be Katara and Zuko’s antagonist/mirror/foil).

And in addition to their own story arc they even get an individual recurring theme, which also appears in every book whenever their relationship status changes: The lost mothers, especially Katara’s mother.

In Book 1, Katara’s necklace (the symbol of Kiya) plays not only a major part in two of Zuko’s capture attempts, it is the reason for their very first one-one one encounter in the story.

Their first friendly connection in COD in Book 2 happens because they start talking about their mothers. And in Book 3, their final reconciliation (sealed with a very cathartic hug) happens after their life-changing trip which is, of course, all about Katara’s mother.

Again, I am not even trying to analyse their characters and motivations within the story - there are many metas that have already done that much better, more detailed and with screenshots. This is just dry structure and tropes and themes. But I think people recognize and connect with a well-structured arc, even subconsciously, which is one of the reasons that makes Zutara such a compelling couple. They complete and contrast each other, their relationship dynamic constantly changes, builds up, falls apart, reconnects. Such a setup is the perfect playground for a lot of creative takes on what-ifs and alternative scenarios and of course, shipping them romantically is extremely tempting - think of all the possibilities! It’s no wonder that the Zutara fandom is still so active decades after the end of the show. And it’s also no wonder that the Zutarians are known for “over-analysing everything”. You can only over-analyse if there is anything that gives you enough food to analyse to begin with. Which brings me to

KAT*ANG

I just go right to the top and take the quote from Br*yke themselves:

Kata*ng was in the DNA of the thing from the start…. [Zutara] was just dark and intriguing.

If you read this quote and then start watching the show, I would (grudgingly) agree that:

Aang and Katara understand and complement each other really well. Aang gives her the chance to have fun and go on adventures and in turn, Katara is his fiercest supporter from the very beginning, something that he really needs after he lost all his people AND has to find out that the world thinks the war is sort of his fault. In turn, the journey to the North Pole is as important to Katara as it is to Aang, because it is her dream to learn waterbending properly. That’s what she literally says when Sokka & Co try to banish Aang: (Sokka: Where do you think you’re going? Katara: To find a waterbender. Aang is taking me to the North Pole.) In that way, they are friends who give and take equally and are equally taken care of. They even have the last Airbender/ last Southern Waterbender status that connects them. The few times they have a fight, Aang does something in the end to redeem himself (perform some heroic feat) and Katara sees that she is right to believe in him.

Aang has this very sweet crush on her and it will be very sweet and wholesome when Katara will return his feelings at the end of their adventure after he has hit puberty. On the other side, there is also some heavy shipbaiting with Zuko: I save you from the pirates. The betrothal necklace. June and her excellent shipping taste. But in the end they are enemies, they barely know each other and, come on, it would be too dark and intriguing! There is no real threat against friends to lovers Kat*ang, the soft heart of the story. It’s very straightforward and there are a lot of simple “the hero saves the day” scenes for Aang but that’s fine! It’s not really my kind of ship but that’s not the point, it works for the story they want to tell.

End of Book 1.

In my - probably harsh- opinion, everything you really need to know about the Kat*ang relationship has been told by this point. If you want to be really mean, already by Book 1, episode 3.

That explains maybe why many (not all! but many) pro-KA arguments sound as if their shippers have not watched Book 2 and 3 at all. The Book 1 synopsis also perfectly sums up Bry*ke’s quote above. But then Book 2 and 3 are still there and I don’t know what happened but it seems as if they somehow decided that the Kat*ang story does not need any new and lasting input. Maybe because they were afraid that too much new development and change would stray too far away from their original Kat*ang vision. But there are still 2 more books and more adventures and Kat*ang somehow has to be kept apart until the finale.

So the tension in their potential romance is based largely on the question whether or not Katara will return Aang’s feelings. In general I don’t have a problem with that will-she-won’t she-technique. It works well in books where the love interest is not a POV or in shows/ movies where the love interest is not one of the main characters. But Katara is not only the female lead but also arguably the narrative voice of the whole story! As a result, this kind of writing makes Katara look as if she doesn’t have any agency in their relationship, which is not surprisingly a very popular anti-KA criticism.

Additionally, since her dream - learning waterbending - has been fulfilled by the end of Book 1, the relationship work becomes a bit one-sided. Of course Aang is the hero and his journey is the heart of the story. But in order to highlight their special connection it would have helped to give Katara another personal agenda, which Aang could have supported in some way. She is still the last Southern Waterbender and he the Last Airbender but this is not really explored in the Kat*ang relationship. And her other personal agenda, her mother, is already reserved for the Zutara arc.

Instead, in Book 2 and 3 the Kat*ang story is somehow all over the place. Of course there is new conflict and a few romantic scenes as well. But obstacles are either introduced too late or just dropped when not needed anymore, conflict is not resolved and their flirty, romantic moments never lead anywhere- and if they do, they lead to more conflict that is not resolved (yes, I am looking at you, EIP Kiss!).

Take for example Katara’s very sudden argument that they cannot be together now because there is a war going on. We hear her saying that for the first time in the very last episode (EIP) before the 4-part finale. That is too late to have any impact! That she has these kinds of thoughts was never even alluded to before. Not once.

Or the pattern Aang runs away/ is flaky - Katara is upset - Aang comes back and does his hero thing - Katara is relieved. In regards to their relationship arc, nothing changes here between Book 1 and the finale, only the stakes for Aang’s heroic performances get higher.

Or Katara being the one who is able to calm Aang down when he cannot control the Avatar state (which, in my personal opinion, is neither romantic nor healthy). This is also connected to the problem with the seventh Chakra, that Aang needs to let go of his attachment for her. I will be angry forever with how they wasted this for a possible relationship development! That Aang has to decide to either do his duty or save his forever girl (because let’s be fair, he did try to let go and only ran when he had the vision of Katara in danger) - that’s a fantastic setup!

But no, it doesn’t have any real consequences for Kat*ang at all. Instead there were only half-baked attempts – Aang does lie about his failed practice with Guru Pathik but the ultimate reason why his chakra is blocked is Azula, not his decision to run. Aang does try to let go of Katara for a little bit but then Azula shoots him. Nothing in Book 3 shows any change in his feelings that could have been a result of his instant let-it-go. If anything, he gets weirdly obsessive - which could have been used as a side effect of his blocked chakra but – again, no, nothing happens.

I suspect the whole thing was just introduced to create temporary drama for poor Aang, but it is never explained why Katara holds him back, what aspect of the attachment is blocking him or what would happen if he did let her go. Maybe they tried to make a statement about how love is more important than Avatar rules – which would have been fine but it’s also never properly explored. Instead, as soon as that plot point becomes inconvenient it’s simply dropped like a random rock™.

Compare all that to the Zutara arc, where both characters’ feelings about each other are always very much in the open, and where every interaction causes lasting effects in their relationship. Yes, it is unfair to compare that to Kat*ang, because up to the end of Book 3, Zuko and Katara almost never meet, while Aang and Katara spend almost every episode together – of course they cannot do meaningful things all the time. But on the other side, with Kat*ang, there would have been a great chance to show a subtle, gradual build-up instead.

It also doesn’t help that the Zutara arc seems hellbent on sabotaging every romantic moment Aang is allowed to enjoy:

There is Kat*angs first maybe-kiss in the dark before the background of the Oma and Shu legend. But it does not lead anywhere. Instead, Zuko and Katara almost reenact the legend itself in the Book 2 finale as two real enemies to almost-friends, including a glowy rocks-backdrop and the right costume colours, just so nobody misses the message.

In Footloose The Headband, Aang and Katara have a really sweet dance together, and everybody can see how they almost intuitively know each other's moves. This could be a great hint on how well they will fight together in the finale. But is it plot-relevant? No, because the final tag team is Katara and Zuko! While Aang gets paired off with random rock™.

Then there is Aang’s riding off to battle- kiss in DotBS, which Katara is not even allowed to enjoy, because keeping her feelings vague is apparently more important than character development at this point. It is the only romantic moment that gets mentioned again, but in a way that sinks the former cute and wholesome ship into the deep ocean, and the reason is - Aang is jealous of Zuko!

If all of this was only done for the sake of shipbaiting, then it really went out of control at some point.

In the end, the showrunners still had their reasons to choose Kat*ang, maybe because that corresponded more to their own vision, and there are still enough people out there who agree with them. Which is absolutely fine! In the end, what matters most is how you personally connect to the characters and nobody needs to defend their personal taste. But the typical anti-ZK claim, that all the Zutarians with their crazy analysis and rambling meta essays are reaching and delusional and that they desperately try to construct something that isn’t there, is not only a very lazy argument but simply not true.

And I’d claim that in spite of the canon choice, Zutara is technically the better written relationship. By far.

#zutara #antikataang #anti kataang #anti-kataang #atla critical #atla writing critical #long post #atla meta

[beauty-and-passion]

A (not so) brief post about my favourite Sanders Sides ships

It all started with this ask:

I just wanted to write a short answer, I swear. Just a short answer with a tiny little explanation about why I like these ships in particular.

But then I got a bit carried away, my explanations became longer and so here I am, writing a full post.

One small clarification before starting: ships don’t have a place in my analyses. If I talk about connections between Sides, these connections are always in terms of friendships, cooperation or familial relationships. The romantic aspect is something different and I may joke about it sometimes, but it’s just a joke.

There is a time and space for romantic relationships - and it looks like that time has come. 

______________________________

Janus and Patton

I've always liked the canonical ship, in (almost) every fandom. So of course I like the canonical ship of this fandom as well :P

Jokes aside, this ship is incredibly mature, very interesting and terribly hard to talk about. The nature of these two characters, their roles and the episodes that had them involved proved how these two speak the same language, work in the same field and, ultimately, need each other.

* More similar that we think

If we look at them on a superficial level, Janus and Patton are completely opposites: one is cynical and cold, the other is a ball of sunshine. One is dark and suave, the other is goofy and bright. Janus' moral is "step on others and only care about yourself", Patton's moral is "help others because they are more important than you".

These differences became clearer over time, the more we learned about Janus and compared him with Patton. However, along these differences, some similarities started to emerge. Some qualities.

Janus and Patton want what's good for Thomas. They are humble enough to recognize their mistakes (the latest example was POF). They have a strong empathy. They’re kind. They’re mature adults (even if Patton doesn’t show it too often). And they both love and use puns.

But that’s not all. Along with these qualities, we found out that these two have similar flaws: they are both liars. They are incredibly persuasive to the point of manipulation. They have a huge influence over the mind (and the other Sides). They both deal with denial.

And this isn't just important, but it's a fundamental point for their character growth. Why? Because if they have similar flaws, if they are both liars and manipulators, then they cannot deceive each other.

And this is HUGE, especially for Patton! By his own admission, Patton lied multiple times, especially about his feelings (the Nostalgia episodes) and his thoughts (the most recent wedding/callback saga).

He always got away with it, because he was lying to other Sides and Thomas. But what would the point be, to lie to the literal embodiment of lies? Janus already knows what of his words are lies and what not, so it would be absolutely useless to do it.

Therefore, if Patton cannot lie to Janus, he cannot pretend everything is alright when it's not or hide his thoughts on a certain topic. He cannot shift the attention somewhere else or let a conversation drop. That means Patton cannot avoid confrontation about his thoughts/feelings and oh boy if he really needs to talk about them - especially with someone mature like Janus.

And yes, having someone who is able to see past your lies means being a lot vulnerable... but also a lot freerer. With Janus, Patton won’t have to pretend to be the strongest one: he can allow himself to be weak and confused, because if he doesn’t have an answer or if the weight of decisions is too much to carry, he has Janus with whom he can share it.

* A foundation of mutual respect

This point has never been fully addressed, but it was very well implied by their words/behaviours since Janus’ first appearance.

The first proof we have is CLBG: after Deceit revealed himself and disappeared, all the Sides and Thomas went through various degrees of shock, frustration and anger. Patton, on the other hand, was the only one who showed a pretty calm demeanor.

He should've been the angriest, considering that Janus took HIS place and pretended to be HIM the whole time. And yet, not only Patton didn't show any resentment, but he didn't talk bad about Janus (even if he had all the reasons to) and he even justified the other Side’s actions to Thomas:

[Patton]: Kiddo, simply put, Deceit is an inner coach that acts with the one intention of self-preservation.

Patton could’ve said anything, to make Janus appear as the worst. And his words could've had a lot of influence on Thomas, considering they were coming from his heart.

However, Patton didn't say anything too bad about Janus - not even in the following episodes.

Then we reach POF: Patton's monologue about his morals went so dramatically bad, he turned into a giant frog with abs and Janus had to sweep in to save Thomas.

In that moment, he could've said ANYTHING to make Patton appear as the worst Side ever. He had his chance on a silver plate: Patton was wrong, he had been wrong the whole time, he was literally ready to fight Thomas.

And yet, Janus took Patton's defense:

[Deceit]: He didn't mislead you on purpose, Thomas. I don't think the little guy... or... the big frog is capable of that sort of thing.

In addition to that, let’s consider Janus' whole attitude towards Patton in SvS: he basically spent an entire episode trying to make Patton understand his point.

[Deceit]: You can defend him all you like... But you can't change the facts. Is Thomas an innocent little lamb? Let's let them be the judge of that.

Why did he insist so much on this? Why not tricking Patton like he did with Roman or ignoring him like he did with Logan?

Because Janus knows how important Patton's role is and his whole behaviour shows respect towards the other Side. Unlike the others, who tend to diminish/forget Patton’s importance, Janus never did and always tried to reach him in the most honest, difficult way: through dialogue and confrontation.

And when he failed, instead of disregarding Patton’s importance, he just kept trying again, until his message finally reached the other Side.

* The perfect working partner

POF proved Patton can't bear the weight of the decision-making process all by himself. He needs another Side who can help him and Janus perfectly fills this role.

But why Janus? Why not Logan? Logan is a very mature Side, he can deal with a lot of stress, he's extremely organized and knows a lot. Surely he can help Patton with the decision-making process, right?

Not exactly. For his own admission, morals and ethics are not Logan's area of expertise (as it should be: logic can’t be influenced by what’s considered “good” or “bad”: logic is neutral). Secondly, Logic isn't an emotional-driven Side: logic is way less affected by emotions than other Sides - especially compared to Patton, who is the embodiment of emotions.

What Patton needs is a mature Side with a grey mentality, humble enough to respect him/not diminish his role, from his same area of expertise and enough emotional-driven to connect with him on an emotional/empathetic level.

And Janus is the only one who fills all those points. Even the latter, as we saw in the last part of POF:

[Patton]: Janus... Do you think there's a limit... on how many times someone can say sorry... before you have to admit... that they're just bad for you? [Janus]: Oh, definitely not. I'd love for someone to ruin Thomas' entire life one apology at a time. [Patton]: Okay. [Janus]: (After seeing Patton's reaction)The reality is that... it depends.

Janus' answer changed, the moment he realized Patton didn't get his sarcasm, by switching from ironic to honest. This is the kind of emotional connection Patton needs, something that doesn’t require words, but a small gesture that says more than a thousand words (yes, I’m also talking about that gaze and the small nod in the end card).

If we add to all of that the detail that Janus can nullify Patton's excuses and see past his lies, we have the perfect partner to help him grow up.

But this cooperation isn’t just one-sided: Janus needs Patton just as much as Patton needs him.

Why? First of all, to have a seat at the table. After years hiding, Janus can finally talk to Thomas, introduce his cynical mentality, make Thomas a little more selfish and help him grow up.

Secondly, by cooperating with Patton, Janus will become a better Side: he will learn to compromise, to work together and, most importantly, to trust Patton. And this is a particularly important point because, as I said in my analysis of POF, Janus isn’t used to trust others and he doesn’t want them to see past his barriers. Working with Patton might be exactly what he needs to trust the other Sides and lower these barriers, even a tiny bit.

* The romantic possibility

Considering all of the above points, the idea that their cooperation could evolve into something romantic-driven isn't so strange. The elements are all here, there's nothing weird to add nor need to bend canon, in order to make the ship happen. Their mutual acceptance can easily become need, learning more about each other can easily evolve into desiring each other and friendship could grow into passion.

And, of course, let's not forget marriage. These two can only end up in marriage. I mean, one is a dad, the other is a mom witch, so they are a perfect match XD

My point is: this ship isn't just a “cute couple being cute”. It's about dialogues. Conversations about themselves, their different points of view, their morals, their cooperation, how to help Thomas and the other Sides. It's based on listening to each other, on knowing each other a little more every day. On being silly together, working and failing together, going down and getting up, because there is someone by your side to lend a helping hand.

This is what makes Janus and Patton the most realistic, mature couple. And that's probably why it's so hard to perfectly nail it.

______________________________

Logan and Remus

Here it is, the couple that blew up after one episode and was confirmed in the most recent Aside.

But seriously, these two have a huge potential - first as friends/working partners, then as romantic partners. Logan and Remus need each other and the reasons are pretty clear:

- Having an interlocutor

Remus is Unleashed Creativity, a volcano of ideas in constant need of new stimuli, no matter if they are considered good or bad. After all "good and bad are all made up nonsense", as he said.

Logan is a walking encyclopedia in search of someone who wants to listen to him. He's pure, undiluted knowledge because that's what logic should be. No morals about what's good and what's bad, no emotions, nothing but neutral knowledge.

Considering that, it’s pretty clear these two have to come into contact. But what would they gain?

Well, Remus would have the stimuli he desperately craves. And Logan?

Logan would gain an incredibly smart interlocutor. And I’m not saying it because I am biased towards Remus, but because the canonical episodes showed us how smart he is. In both DWIT and WTIT Remus proved to be a quick thinker, with a sharp intellect and an even sharper eye. He's silly and over the top, but he's not an idiot and he uses everything he has for his own creative needs, no matter how small it is.

Just imagine this cleverness applied to everything Logan might say to him. Remus wouldn’t be the only one to benefit from it, but the whole creative process and, ultimately, Thomas himself, who will have better, richer ideas.

- Gaining a place

At this moment in time (just after WTIT) Remus has not been fully accepted yet. He is tolerated and his presence is a nuisance, but he’s neither wanted, nor banished. He’s just here and he has no voice on any matter.

Also because no one wants to give him a chance to prove how useful and worthy he can be. Thomas barely tolerates him, Patton does his best to ignore him, Roman doesn’t even want to see him and Virgil would rather not have any of the Others present.

The only Core Side who accepts Remus’ presence and is willing to give him a chance is Logan. He spent the entire DWIT to explain why Remus is useful for Thomas and shouldn’t be ignored, while in WTIT, he said: "There will be a time and place for you" - thus implying that, one day, Remus will finally be able to show how worthy he can be.

This is exactly what Remus needs: a Core Side who doesn’t see him as a nuisance or a villain, but as a fundamental part of Thomas that can be helpful, in his own way. Someone willing to give him a seat at the table (at least in the future). And, most importantly, someone who is powerful enough to control him.

Remus is and will always be a force of nature. He will never rest or stop being chaotic. This is why he needs someone strong by his side, someone who can’t be overcomed by his dark thoughts and that can put him back on track if necessary. And Logan proved to be perfect for this role not once, but twice.

- Understanding on a deeper level

However this cooperation won’t be beneficial just for Remus. As I said before, Remus could be a clever interlocutor for Logan. And this cleverness isn’t just related to creativity, but also to emotional understanding.

The Core Sides have known Logan for almost thirty years and yet, they have no idea of the inner turmoil raging inside him. They keep ignoring and dismissing him, clearly thinking everything is fine.

It took Remus one single day to realize what Logan’s problem is, how deeply frustrated he is and how much he’s actually angry at Thomas. Less than 24 hours and Remus knows Logan better than his long time friends.

That’s exactly what Logan needs. Someone sharp enough to notice his behaviour, find out the root of the problem and make Logan face it, instead of dismissing it because who cares (yes, Roman, I am talking about you and your “You'll be fine, Rome didn't fall in a day.”)

- The romantic possibility

I think almost all the fandom agrees that these two would have a great sex life. After all, Remus is the embodiment of Thomas' sexual urges, so he would definitely go for a very physical relationship.

But having a good sex life implies a lot of other great things: good chemistry, no comunication issues, great stability and greater trust. And, even more important, the desire to try new things together. Logan and Remus are both very curious Sides, they both want to know new things and experience them: so their relationship would probably be based on discussing new ideas, testing them and finding out together if they are good or not.

And this doesn't apply to just the sexual aspect: even just the romantic aspect or the working aspect of their relationship could have these characteristics. Logan and Remus can motivate each other, learn from one another and find new things together. They are clever enough to stimulate each other's mind, curious enough to do stuff together to learn something new and honest enough to not withdraw their opinions on any matter.

______________________________

Roman and Virgil

I am just recently starting to warm up to this couple, so I will keep this part short.

Just as it was for the previous two couples, these two can work together because canon made them work. The first part of their whole relationship is already all canonically established: at first Roman saw Virgil as a villain, then he slowly realized he could be a friend. Now moving from friends to lovers isn’t so difficult.

^ No need to demonstrate

Roman needs someone like Virgil, because Virgil is on his same level. Sure, Virgil’s mentality is way more gray-ish, but he still has a lot to learn, just like Roman.

Having someone on his side, who is on his same level is a huge relief: with Virgil, Roman doesn't have to pretend, nor to show off, nor to be dashing and perfect all the time. He knows Virgil won't care less, so he can relax. And for someone who is used to working all the time, having a moment of quiet with someone who has zero espectations is exactly what Roman needs.

Same goes for Virgil: he knows Roman won't care if he's gloomy and dark, because Roman already saw that side of him and appreciates him anyway. So no need to pretend to be different. He can relax too. And, because of his anxious nature, relaxing is exactly what he also needs.

So if they both need to relax, that implies they also need time to do it. And without expectations, without feeling like the other “is better than me and I’m slowing him down”, they can really take all the time they need, to grow at their own pace.

^ Growing together

Virgil and Roman’s is not a one-sided relationship, in which one knows more than the other and helps the other reach his level: since they are on the same level, if one of them learns something new, then it’s a victory for them both, because the other will be motivated to do more/learn more as well.

This isn’t just something I think, but something we saw in canon. During AA-part 2, Roman clearly stated that Virgil “make us... better”, thus implying that Virgil acted as a motivator for him.

Then we had FWSA and here we saw this sentence applied the other way around: Roman was the motivator and, thanks to him, Virgil overcame his own anxiety to push Thomas towards Nico. The final result was a victory for them both: Roman got the romance he’s desperately craving, Virgil found out a new aspect of himself: his bravery.

^ The romantic possibility

These two are a walking “enemies to friends to lovers” trope, so I don’t think there’s anything else to add XD

Only that they would both be quite passionate. One is Thomas’ romantic side, the other is heavily influenced by emotions: if the good one takes Virgil, he would probably be a very passionate partner.

______________________________

Two couples I understand

Janus and Remus -> I understand the appeal of this one and it would kinda make sense, especially from Remus’ point of view. Remus has (probably) sexual fantasies about anything, so I wouldn't be too surprised if he has a whole collection of sexual fantasies about the Side who is closest to him.

But also, I see them too much like father and son/bestest friends to imagine them having a romantic relationship.

So my take is more like that: Remus has sexual fantasies about Janus, just like he has sexual fantasies about anyone. They are his way to show his affection, how much he cares about Janus and wants to protect him.

But Remus is Remus and he's prone to lose control. That's why, since he reached adolescence and started to develop the sexual aspect, Janus put clear limits that give Remus enough space to express his fantasies, but never past a certain point.

So Remus can be very touchy (because, well, he's Remus) and extremely physical in showing his affections, but never go below a certain point. He can talk in full details about all his sexual fantasies to Janus, but never try to sexually force him. He can try to seduce him or propose sexual things, but never pretend he will accept.

And so, over time, it became a sort of internal joke between them: Remus tells his fantasies at the breakfast table, while Janus rolls his eyes with a "very interesting", they have a laugh, they keep going with their day. Remus wants to cuddle, Janus will cuddle. Remus proposes sex, Janus will just laugh and give him a forehead kiss.

In other words, they are the kind of friends who you can find sprawled on a couch, one on top of the other and imagine they're a couple, while that's just how they read a book together.

Logan and Roman -> This couple isn’t bad at all and I really like the idea of these two having a sorta-romantic crush on each other. It can lead to a lot of poetic/romantic possibilities.

The only problem is: Logan is logic, therefore he would destroy all the romance with one sentence XD and the romantic, poetic scene evoked would turn into these two arguing like madmen.

So, well, maybe the hate-sex would be great, but they would definitely spend too much time arguing. Still, I am very curious about it, so I will keep searching for stuff about them.

#sanders sides ships #sanders sides #janus sanders #patton sanders #logan sanders #remus sanders #roman sanders #virgil sanders #moceit #intrulogical #prinxiety #and a sprinkle of #dukeceit #logince #I know I have pretty basic tastes #it takes me a lot to warm to a couple #I blame the fandom for making these so appealing #i couldn't help myself

[ocdhuacheng]

The thing that often bothers me the most with the genderbending (wrt Xie Lian) is that the fandom doesn't acknowledge how (strongly) against adopting a female form XL was when SQX tried to persuade him. Like. It was smth very on the nose. But ppl also don't acknowledge that XL doesn't enjoy cross-dressing, either, it's just smth he doesn't feel bothered by anymore (after centuries of the world beating you down, shame isn't smth you care about) and goes ahead with if he has to for a job (plus: annoying fanservice). So, there is a fundamental lack of wanting to acknowledge that gender isn't part of XL's character arc. At all. (He very much likes being a guy.) It is a little for SQX, only. Hua Cheng has this whole shape-shifting shtick, so a case could be made.

(Similarly, I don't get the rare fem!FengQing... Have ppl read/watched their reaction to possibly dressing up as brides???)

Also, that beefleaf is hailed as this lesbian icon ship when I am pretty sure that He Xuan is never thrilled to be female but only goes along with SQX's pestering... I have seen ppl start tgcf because of lesbian beefleaf only to be disappointed and... not cool.

I have nothing against genderbending myself. Not the biggest fan of it but it can be fun sometimes (like. If ppl were to explore canon stuff with it. I have never seen or read about SQX's relationship with gender; e.g. their feelings about it, feelings about having grown up as a girl, SW's disapproval etc. - there is so much one could do, but ppl water it down or erase the struggles altogether. And don't get me started on the glaring lack of female form HC. If he were the preferred bottom, we'd never see an end of content). It just bothers me how often characterization isn't considered in these cases.

And I think you brought your feelings about it across well! I get what you mean and you are right.

yeah like people can headcanon what they want wrt gender but given that the canon indicates xie lian is completely comfortable as a man and very much NOT comfortable as a woman its very sus that everyone turns to him as the one to be ~turned into a female~ in fanworks and not hua cheng, who canonically shapeshifts into a feminine body sometimes.

one of my mutuals said that the watsonian (within the text) explanation for xie lian constantly crossdressing is legit while the doylist (authors intent) explanation is that mxtx wants to make people think of him simply as a feminine uke or the wife or whatever. and theyre right. which is why if tgcf were written by a gay or bi man i would be completely comfortable with the crossdressing/pretending to be pregnant woman arcs, but its not so whenever i read those sections i get vaguely annoyed at them.

though those arcs were also pretty transmisogynist with how much mxtx kept having to remind us over and over about how "weird" and "degenerate" xie lian looked or whatever. but thats another conversation

also about beefleaf............ saaame. i thought they were lesbians u_u (i mean i knew that mxtx would never write a lesbian because i dont think she knows lesbians exist, BUT you know what i mean) i was so disappointed when mxtx had to specifically say that he xuan did not enjoy being in a feminine body and just went along with it to appease sqx. like that felt like such a slap in the face. whatever. my city now

and it would have been awesome if mxtx had gone into sqx's feelings on gender more..... like even just devoting an extra or two for it. especially after they loose their powers, i want to see their feelings on gender then! because it seems like after they become mortal everyone always just views them as a man by default, and their genderfluidity is never mentioned again!! i want to see sqx, who had become used to being able to change their appearance, have to deal with no longer being able to do that. and to be able to accept that this doesn't make them any less genderfluid/trans, and they can be a woman even if they cant shapeshift anymore. i think that would be a nice little character study to have included.

#.txt #tgcf #asks #anonymous #sorry for always being late replying to asks im very bad at remembering :') #Also SO true about the hua cheng female form thing #I wonder why mxtx didn’t want to show us that 🤨🧐🤔

[olderthannetfic]

Ah, I do see your points, anon. I'm not going to post all your asks publicly because if you really feel that unsafe, it's probably best not to have a bigass chunk of your text for people to analyze and try to guess your identity from. I think one of the best points you made is about how close to home it hits when the non-fave is not only your fave but is similar to you in some way like demographic. You're not wrong for having those emotions. I do wonder if they make it hard to see how some other people feel similarly embattled on other axes.

TBH, I think one of the big problems here is that the large aggregate patterns you're talking about are racist, but most individual fics and fans are not really the problem. It's hard to know how to talk about this or who to tell to "fix" it when we're looking at free, hobbyist art.

A lot of people's tastes are certainly formed by shitty society, but once they're formed, they don't change fast if at all. Asking someone to rewrite their libido is a big ask, yet tumblr does it all the time as though it's as simple as snapping your fingers.

This leaves me with the sense that a lot of tumblr is... like... the political lesbians of porn fic or something: desire is not real, only choosing based on logic and politics. Or maybe people are so asexual that they just don't understand the lizard brain's "YES!" at some porn things and complete indifference to others?

I don't think it's great if great swaths of people feel like bottom!Nicky is super hot and top!Nicky fundamentally isn't, but I also don't think they can necessarily just turn it off like flipping a switch.

(If someone reading this doesn't like their current tastes and wants to attempt to alter them, I do think it's possible. What you should do is line up a large slate of media that prominently features characters of the ethnicity or whatever that you don't find hot/interesting. These should be leads whose emotional development drives the plot and is supposed to be central to the audience's enjoyment of the media. Watch/read/etc. this media all the time. All. The. Time. Try out many pieces because you won't like every character or every show, and we're looking for genuine enjoyment, not the fandom equivalent of a pity fuck. Spend enough time on this, and your unconscious sense of who's hot and interesting will eventually shift somewhat. This is a project you should expect to take a few years.)

But I digress.

The one tweet thing is a very toxic pattern. If TOG fandom is doing that, guys, please try to be more conscious of holding the actors of color to a higher standard (or the women or whomever). I know this often comes from a place of paying more attention to our own and wanting to set a good standard, but the effect is that minorities can't fuck up ever while white dudes get infinite passes.

Okay, on to the fic thing... Gotta say, my instant reaction to that description is "Ooh!"--as it would be for the same scenario with the characters reversed. (Ships who start out trying to kill each other are my favorite! x1000 if they're resurrecting style immortals and they literally do.) I can see how it would feel like slamming into a brick wall if you aren't kinky in just the right way and you didn't know it was coming though.

Part of why I react so strongly to a lot of discourse that runs along these lines is that I am a naturally extremely kinky person. It's not so much about what I do (which as a deeply lazy person in a long distance relationship is essentially nothing), but it's absolutely how I'm wired.

And I can tell you that my quotidian experience in fandom is sharing something I don't even realize is a big deal only to have someone I like, respect, and trust react in horror and tell me that it's triggering and awful and should not be allowed in fandom spaces because it makes "people" unsafe. It's such an instant, kneejerk reaction they don't even realize I was sharing it because it spoke to the very core of me. Lesson learned, friend. Lesson learned.

That sounds a bit off topic, I know, but bear with me: The point of that anecdote is that it's pretty common for me to get people trying to raise my awareness of things I have already thought deeply about while denying my essential humanity and not even realizing. As a kinky person who likes to make my fave the top (and generally a conflicted sadist), this constant request to explain and justify is exhausting.

I doubt most of the top!Joe fans have this precise problem simply because people who make their fave the top are much less common in fandom than people who make their fave the bottom, but I see a similar pattern with fans who are just fundamentally wired for rape fantasies (one of the most common fantasies that exists) vs. fans who just don't get rape fantasies at all. Or substitute your BDSM/kinky/messed up fantasy trope of choice. Covertly radical feminist attitudes towards kink and power are on the rise in fandom, and as a naturally kinky person, boy do I notice it!

I know that it feels like crucial activism to share these insights about why the ratio of top!Joe is hurtful, and the pain you feel is real. But it's also the case that it's a big ask to want people to listen. (Not me. Obviously, I routinely choose to engage with discourse. I mean overall.) The reason for that is that you're only seeing a fraction of what they do or who they are, and you don't know how many previous people they've listened to how many previous times. It's a very different situation from someone whose job is making some major TV series or movie or something. That person does, in my opinion, owe you some amount of listening.

Now, I'm not saying no top Joe fan was ever a jerk. I'll bet they were. There's a tendency to be rude and to publicly air your schadenfreude when you feel like everyone has been yelling at you. What I am saying is that a lot of the problem here boils down to conflicting needs, and that means there isn't a good solution. It's a situation where people are genuinely hurt, but I don't necessarily agree that other people have harmed them.

I like that you did an actual count of the explicit fics, btw. It's good to look at the real numbers. I see too little of that in these situations. My off the cuff reaction is that 2/3 to 1/3 is not a bad ratio at all compared to many fandoms, but yeah, it definitely shows a strong trend, and that can be painful. (I have a fandom where I think there's maybe like 1 bottom so-and-so fic in the entire zine era fandom. One. It's pretty extreme.)

I guess my thinking here overall is: What is the practical solution? What are we hoping to gain? What is reasonable to ask of people?

And it can't be "Well, if they would just listen..." That's just a sneaky way of saying "If you haven't done it my way, it's because you haven't listened to me yet."

So the question I would ask of people is this:

What does a non-racist fic where Joe tops look like?

What does a non-racist sex pollen, dubcon, or even noncon fic where Joe tops look like?

And if you say the latter is impossible... well... sadists exist everywhere in the world. So do doms. So do people who prefer to top in a purely physical sense. People with rape fantasies where they're the rapist exist (people who are not actually rapists, I mean). None of this is restricted to any one group. We can't categorically say fic like that about Joe is coming from a place of racism without denying the fundamental humanity of kinky MENA people who'd want to make Joe like themselves or like their ideal partner. (Yes, I agree this won't be the majority of fic writers writing top!Joe, but this is a place to start for figuring out what the better version would look like.)

IDK, maybe you're that kinkster yourself, but your asks gave me the vibe that you don't really get the drive towards those darker kinds of fics and what might be motivating it besides stereotypes and shittiness.

If we can answer these kinds of questions, we can better critique the way people write what they write without telling them all of their taste is bad and they should just stop writing. Even if we think the latter is true, it isn't going to get us anywhere. Figuring out how to make Joe more multidimensional in the fic they already want to write or finding very specific wording that should be avoided might actually work.

Beyond that, the actions I think are productive would be running prompt fests, exchanges, or other events for bottom!Joe or for top!Joe where he's the main character and the fics are required to be from his POV. Themed collections and recs lists are great. (I've seen a bit of this going around in TOG fandom in the past, and that's an excellent approach! Keep it up!) Positive actions tend to work better here. Make more of what you want. Promote what you want to see.

I don't mean this in some fluffy magical thinking way: you aren't going to change that ratio radically just by the power of positivity. But I've seen this kind of thing play out in many, many fandoms, and going after the people who write what you don't like, even in a well-intentioned effort to educate and even in a polite, kind way doesn't do much. A few people feel guilty. A few feel defensive. A lot ignore you. The overall fic doesn't change. It's not a good use of your limited time and energy.

I'm off to look up that fic to see what I think of it in practice, but I'm going to post this before tumblr manages to eat it.