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whentranslatorscry · 6 months

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Vol 4 The Testament of Okitegami Kyouko

Chapter 1. Kakushidate Yakusuke Being Hospitalized (1/3)

Crunch! came a sound much like the crushing of an egg.

Its source: my body.

Oblivious to what had happened, utterly confused about how— such words were too flowery for the situation. Before the thought 'utterly confused' even had a chance to register, my consciousness faded. All I could glean was— so this is how it feels to die.

Well, if we could die whenever we wanted, life wouldn't be much of a struggle, and while life is fleeting, it is also stubborn to the core.

After hovering at death's door for a full week, I awoke in a hospital bed, learning that a middle school girl had fallen from the roof of a building, her body crashing down directly onto me as I walked home.

Somehow or other, it seems I'd cheated death.

If I was expected to savor this miracle however, to humbly thank the heavens for this misfortune that had fallen upon me quite literally—was a bit much. It made me want to curse the heavens and ask what grudge they held against me.

Simply in the sphere of my everyday life, I consistently and constantly am embroiled in all sorts of crimes, from the smallest to the most heinous. Each and every time suffering wrong accusations, continually treated like a suspect, shouldering blame to the extent that it feels like a backpack. After a long while, finally— for the first time in forever— I found a job. Why on earth did this have to happen as soon as I found a job.

To lay out the extent of the damage: I did survive, but my right arm and thigh were severely fractured, so it goes without saying that I can't work for the time being— forget work, I couldn’t even write or eat— needless to say, the job was done for.

Using the opportunity of drafting resumes to also start writing something like memoirs, given my present crippled state, I felt I might have to become a writer for real.

Hearing my words, Kondou-san who came to visit gave me a stern talking to.

"Might have to become a writer? Oh, you don't know how hard it is to be a writer!"

Kondou-san served at a major publishing company, Sakusousha, where in his early thirties he already held the position of the head of the Comics Weekly magazine department. Perhaps because of his previous stint in the novels department, he wasn't tolerant of careless remarks like those I had just made.

Before I could apologize for my blunder, Kondou-san chucked and said,

"Young people who underestimate writers are the ones who, unexpectedly, easily become writers—you've got real potential there. You could easily spin your everyday experiences into any number of books. This experience is indeed precious."

Was he mocking me? Or encouraging me? Both seemed possible, yet neither quite right. I figured I should take his words positively.

"And you know,"

Kondou-san went on, slicing a great deal of apple by the bed. It pained me to have my former boss do such a thing but, as an injured patient with a disabled right hand, all I could do was accept his kindness. Moreover, he would dislike it the most if I were to show such reserve—we are just friends now, and he wouldn't even allow me to use polite language.

"In the world of manga, a girl falling from the sky is quite a coveted event. But when it actually happens, it turns out to be such a tragedy... You've had your fair share of miserable experiences, but isn't being hospitalized quite rare for you?"

"Yeah, well, that's true. It's precious."

Considering what it was like, it would seem I got away with minor injuries, and according to the attending physician, as long as I remain conscious there would be no threat to my life. The broken bones, they weren't likely to cause any lasting damage either. The doctor assured me firmly that I could be discharged today if I was up to it—perhaps a polite way to hint that the hospital was running short of single rooms.

"Don't think like that, no need to stay any longer than necessary, not with hospital bills being what they are. My goodness, gotta thank your parents for that sturdy body of yours."

"I guess so. I'm filled with such gratitude I could cry..."

I never hesitated to tell people about the inconveniences of my tall stature, surpassing one hundred and ninety centimeters (and I believe it to be the very reason for my constantly attracting unwarranted attention and suspicion). But if it was thanks to my height that my life was saved this one time, I could only call it a blessing in disguise.

"They say broken bones mend stronger once they heal. Not that I need to be any stronger."

"Ha-ha, that's just folk wisdom, though."

Folk wisdom, is it?

"it's not muscle after all; can't magic itself back to health," he added on. As expected of Kondou-san, so learned and well read.

Speaking of, I seem to recall some Greek philosopher or other who supposedly died when a tortoise shell fell on him and cracked his skull. Although meeting the body of a fallen middle school girl could be said to be no less misfortunate, at least it didn't become the cause of my death. Maybe my luck was not as bad as it could be.

What's more, I wasn't the only one saved.

The fallen middle schooler also managed to escape death by a hair's breadth, thanks to my chance presence below to break her fall. She fell from the seventh floor of a mixed residential and commercial high-rise— under normal circumstances she should have been dead by now. It was because she had me as a cushion that she wasn't.

A middle schooler—to be precise, a first year in middle school.

A girl not yet twelve years old— at the most she could be called a child, not even an adolescent.

This too was why she was saved.

Had my hulking physique been a size smaller, or she been a grade higher, neither of us might have come out of it unscathed.

While I was now awake though, she was still hovering at death's door in some other hospital. Can't really say we both were unscathed. I couldn't know what state she was in, I'd just had heard that she was in a coma. But one thing can be assumed: it wasn't a state that would allow me to smugly proclaim, "It was thanks to my self-sacrifice that her life was spared."

…Not to mention that even if the treatment worked and she woke up fine, she may not thank me at all—because.

Because she'd jumped off that building of her own free will.

Yes—a suicide jump.

With a will and shoes neatly arranged.

With no hope of rescue, she'd aimed for the asphalt road.

A guy like me walking beneath her was just an unwanted interference with her resolve—a nuisance in her eyes. Hence, despite my good intentions, I got no gratitude in return.

Call me shallow if you will, but since I was heavily injured because of this and will almost certainly be fired, I was hoping I could at least be a hero for saving a child's life—when actually, I just served as a thing to break her fall in her attempt.

Well, if you consider what suffering must have led the twelve year old girl to decide to take her own life, maybe it's not something to say "just" about, and compared to witnessing her crashing to the ground a few seconds earlier, things could have turned out worse.

She may not thank me, she may blame me, and maybe I should be proud to have saved a life all the same—even if it was the result of a mere accident.

Even if it's the result of bad luck, that's how it is.

"Hahaha, you're such a nice guy."

Kondou-san was really mocking me now.

"I wonder why someone like you is always accused as a criminal. Couldn't get off even this time, could you."

"......"

To hear it depressed me very much.

Misfortune being already a daily occurrence, I could never not feel depressed when wrongly accused— this time, though, was depressing to an exceptional degree.

Simply walking down the street, someone fell from above and crushed me, landing me in hospital with major injuries....However, since both of our lives were saved by that incident, depending on how you look at it, it could be considered not a heroic tale, but at least a miraculous survival case, a positive thing.

But people saw nothing of the sort.

While I was unconscious all the TV broadcasts had apparently made it appear as if I had positioned myself under the fallen girl so as to deal her a final fatal blow.

What a final blow, she didn't even die— how do you have to twist and contort the facts to make it sound like that? In my haste I went through all the newspapers from the past week. The coverage was so outrageous I gave up halfway through reading.

In short, all the media pegged me as the culprit, accusing me of attempting to murder a middle schooler. Couldn't escape being implicated even with my life hanging by a thread— am I to carry this undeserved blame all the way to my grave? Truly an unprecedented, tailor-made misfortune just for me.

I considered my tendency to be falsely accused as having reached its peak.

I'd never fancied the thought of becoming a great detective, but it seemed I couldn't even be a victim. Perhaps because the "victim" was an underage schoolgirl, thankfully my name had not been plastered in the papers, which could maybe be counted as my solitary redemption.

But at this rate, it was only a matter of time until my real identity as 'secondhand bookstore clerk (25)' became public— not that it bothered me, but I felt terribly sorry for my boss who hired me.

"Secondhand bookstore clerk (25), eh? Who asked you to leave your job in publishing to work in a secondhand bookshop. That's what you get for having a foot in two boats."

It left me speechless how sharply those at the forefront of publishing could speak.

But it did feel a bit like betraying my old boss.

I worked at the publishing company under Kondou-san for a time, and I was falsely accused and dismissed without a chance to defend myself. So I didn't really owe the company anything special.

But that's neither here nor there. To say my present state is some kind of divine retribution would be overstating things a bit, don't you think?

"I doubt it'll actually come to that, but… just in case the police believe the media stories and come knocking, I should probably have a detective at the ready..."

I muttered to myself, only half in jest.

I wasn't sure what sort of detective to call for a situation like this still... My phone contacts had the business cards of several agencies, but I couldn't think of one offhand that specialized in dealing with falling girls. If anything, I'd love an expert at handling media circuses... A professional in media control, that would be...

That's when Kondou-san said,

"How about Okitegami-san?"

"Oh...? Nah, this kind of case is not suitable for Kyouko-san. Not Kyouko-san. Maybe it's the least suitable for her out of all the detectives out there."

Kyouko-san— Okitegami Kyouko. Calling her on was something I did in the past at Kondou-san's request; I'd introduced her to him as a detective. Should I say she was an oddball of a detective? A somewhat peculiar one, anyway.

Hence, she was perfectly suited to handle the trouble Kondou-san had been facing at the time. However, her particularities made her clearly unfit for this case.

From my numerous experiences (generally one should not have this many), recovering a normal life after being put through a media circus requires a long battle of endurance. Precisely because of this, there's absolutely no chance here for the detective with the fastest case-cracking rate to swoop in and "solve any case in a day".

"I was just thinking, what a blessing in disguise it would be to take this opportunity to get closer to her, you know?”

"Hahaaha… very funny, Kondou-san. You know as well as I do there's no chance for progress with Kyouko-san."

"Not with that attitude.”

He shrugged his shoulders, and continued.

"Well, since you'll get someone else to restore your image..."

He handed me a peeled apple.

"Could you call Okitegami-san for me?"

"Huh? What do you…"

"That is, I..."

He said.

"I've got another case that I would like the forgetful detective—to forget."

Kondou-san was not only a friend but a benefactor of mine. I of course had no reason to refuse him.

During my past stint working at the publishing company I had found myself wrongly accused, and it was only Kondou-san who spoke up for me. For him I wouldn't think twice about going through hell and high water.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I, Kakushidate Yakusuke, had been perennially awaiting an opportunity to repay his kindness. Yet on this particular day, the abruptness of his request akin to a sudden blow left me stunned beyond measure.

Could Kondou-san have gotten into some trouble while I was hospitalized? His predisposition to misfortune must be on par with mine. Most people wouldn't require a detective more than once or twice in their lifetime. Especially not in such a short period.

"Listen here Yakusuke. To me it's not as sudden a request as it seems, nor am I trying to exploit your situation. The problem I'm facing and the predicament you've fallen into aren't entirely unrelated."

"Not entirely unrelated?"

"Not only, it's largely related to you…if I must be honest with myself, it's causing me a great deal of trouble. I imagine you're pretty troubled as well, and though I probably don't measure up to your level of trouble, it's still a considerable headache."

Speaking up to here, Kondou-san showed a weary smile— which I had missed as my thoughts were consumed with my own stuff, but now that I looked at him, I couldn't help seeing the exhaustion on his usually vibrant face.

What could've happened in the week I was unconscious? It was apparently largely related to me, but I didn't have the slightest clue. My obliviousness wasn't anything new, though.

"Something up with Satoi-sensei again?"

That Satoi-sensei was Satoi Aritsugu, one of the manga artists Kondou-san edited for, and also a wildly popular author for the magazine he was chief editor of.

The robbery at Satoi-sensei's studio that I had introduced Kyouko-san to was the last time we met. Satoi-sensei had left an impression on me as the temperamental genius type, so I figured she was was good at getting into trouble as she was at drawing.

But I was totally off base. I'd make a terrible detective.

"Satoi-sensei is doing great! Better than ever. The incident seems to have inspired her creatively. And Kyouko-san's personality was like stimulation to her."

That's excellent news, though it made me feel anxious on a personal level. I had wanted to write about Kyouko-san's detective adventures before someone as brilliant as Satoi-sensei put them to manga.

It seemed she wasn't one to draw mystery manga, thankfully...

"Then is it another mangaka?"

"You catch on fast, Yakusuke."

I was actually quite embarrassed by his praise.

I just didn't believe Kondou-san had any personal troubles, hence I figured if he needed a detective it had to be about his editorial work.

Nothing more ordinary or mundane than that, really.

"Well, it's not a manga artist I work with directly... I doubt you've heard of him yet. Fumoto-sensei. Fumoto Shun."

As you might guess, I hadn't heard of him.

However, "yet" was the word here. I surmised this must be an up and coming new manga artist likely to gain more fame and recognition going forward.

#translation #okitegami kyouko #the testament of okitegami kyouko

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howlingmoonrise · 4 days

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20 Questions for Fic Writers

thank you for the tag @galvanizedfriend!!!!!!

How many works do you have on ao3? 45!

What's your total ao3 word count? 168,011 words

What fandoms do you write for? i'm an awful, awful fandom hopper :x but i write most consistently nowadays for petshop of horrors

Top five fics by kudos: 1) my dracula/barbie fic la petite mort is in first place, to the surprise of absolutely no one🤦‍♀️ 2) warrior, a post-movie shan yu/mulan oneshot 3) standing sentinel, an alien vs predator fix-it oneshot where lex goes with the predators and scar survives 4) surprising even me????? bonded, a soul eater soulmate au oneshot from 2014???? it has 8 comments total and half of them are my replies???? HOW. 5) not as surprisingly, in the woods somewhere, an ever after high cerise hood/daring charming au where daring accidentally ends up becoming the next riding hood. rare fandom/pair niche ftw!

Do you respond to comments? do you know when you reply mentally to things and then forget to actually do it irl? 😬 i have a really bad habit of opening comments on mobile, where i never type anything if i can help it, gush and draft the entire reply in my head, and then... yeah. i do eventually actually get to them all, but some will suffer through a year of no response before i pull up my sleeves and get to them. but dear gods do i try. the full answer is "yes, i do, and i absolutely love them all" but i feel very guilty about taking so long so i'll stick with "i try" 🙏🙏🙏

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? probably see you soon, a voltron legendary defender shidge fic, or songbird, a petshop of horrors angelica/p-chan oneshot with a bit of an experimental style. i think they're probably only fics i have that have a 100% unambiguously unhappy AND undeserved ending

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? i usually try to aim for at least an ambiguously happy ending, so most of them? buuuuut that being said, i'm gonna point to my earlier fics in the soul eater or the yuri on ice fandoms, i was a lot sappier back in those. i've gotten a taste for a bit of a crunchier ending since then.

Do you get hate on fics? not really. i did receive hate for my voltron ships directly on the blog, but we all know how rotten that fandom was lmfao

Do you write smut? occasionally? i feel like i was in my smut-writing peak back in the soul eater fandom, but i was VERY productive in writing fic in general back in those days, and that no longer holds true. i feel like i'm a lot more self-conscious in writing smut nowadays and about how badly my writing in that genre would sound - the ideas are willing, but the flesh is weak.

Craziest crossover: i hate that my writer's block has cockblocked me from going crazier since despite wanting to write even wilder ships but. once again. my dracula/barbie fic la petite mort.

Have you ever had a fic stolen? not exactly. as far as i'm aware, no one has taken it ipsis verbis, but i have seen unauthorized and uncredited translations of my works floating around.

Have you ever had a fic translated? *side-eyes paragraph above* yep! my works seem to get podficced more than anything though

Have you ever co-written a fic before? i started writing one in my old, old days in the danny phantom fandom (hello, first fandom!), but our email exchanges petered out and it never got finished or posted anywhere

All time favorite ship? how the FUCK am i supposed to chose. my dude. why would you do this to me. it changes with the fases of the moon.

What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will? i am 97.89% made of wips. 😬😬😬 there's just. so many. the first ones that come to mind is a magicstone (magica de spell/gladstone gander from the donald duck comics) angsty-ass oneshot, and also a jane darling/peter pan fic from peter pan 2 return to neverland, both of which i only ever posted snippets for a wip ask game years ago 😭😭😭 i also very much want to finish my shan yu/mulan longfic to the victor, the spoils and i have every intention of doing it but then i look back and. it's been half a decade already. rip.

What are your writing strengths? uhhhh. i find interesting dynamics ways of bringing characters together? i'm a rare/crack shipping bitch so i need to find a way of really selling what i'm writing so that people will read it, so i guess i've honed my skills in that direction. i also usually get comments complimenting my writing style, though my own taste for it varies wildly.

What are your writing weaknesses? apart from being in a semi-permanent state of writer's block and never finishing anything, you mean? where do i START. action scenes. comedy. not doing run-on overly-wordy sentences no one but me will understand. too many italics. FUCKING PLOT. why can't i write solely vibes and pining, WHY does plot have to haunt me while blowing raspberries at me for not knowing how to plan anything more complicated than a fairytale-level quest.

Thoughts on dialogue in another language? english already IS another language for me 😂 that being said, i don't generally like it unless it's an untranslateable pun term or plot-relevant, in which case footnotes are appreciated. exceptions are titles/honorifics/actual names of things.

First fandom you wrote in? danny phantom, all the way back in like... 2009? it was how i learned to speak/write english beyond the basics. it was very, very bad, but i'm glad i got to go through that and experiment so wildly in such an encouraging fandom.

Favorite fic you've written? cinq d'épées, my princess and the frog dr facillier/charlotte la bouff 15k oneshot LITERALLY EVERYONE IS SLEEPING ON. why do people keep gushing on the dracula/barbie fic when that fic is RIGHT THERE with far less views than most of my other fics and way better writing quality. i honestly hate reading my own writing and even i enjoy rereading that one, villain/heroine morally grey ships my beloved.

thanks again for tagging me!!! tagging @sandmancircus @acernor @nemainofthewater @produdfctititty @starfishride @malgraw @olderthannetfic if you guys feel like it!

#howl rambles a lot #tag meme #tag game

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themarcspector-hasmoved · 1 year

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title: see you again

who: matt murdock (daredevil) & cloud dardashti (original character)

universe: fic idea. better the devil you knew - basically a mix of tv & comic stuff

triggers: mentions kidnapping, canon typical violence, blood.

notes: drabble of cloud and devil man that’s been sitting in my drafts unfinished that i finally finished months later and just wanted to finally get out of my hair. i liked it and they are funny to me. also i love them your honor!

Claudia liked going to places where people never expected to find her when she went out on assignment. Especially as of late, since she did not want to be seen, heard, or thought of. She typically traveled during times where she knew she could avoid people she knew, and since she grew up in the New York City area, and her adoptive mother and her siblings still lived in different parts of city, she had to be extra careful. So careful, that her break spots had to be places people wouldn’t expected her to be.

Cloud assumed that going to a dive bar called Josie’s meant that people wouldn’t know who she was, though. And today her anonymity mattered more than anything since she had made a mistake earlier in the day.

She assumed, with that mistake in mind, that she would go in and order a few glasses of whipped cream vodka, get a little too drunk, and then she’d take an uber to a hotel and sleep, before she’d go and kill whoever she was supposed to kill to find answers, and maybe, just maybe, she'd be a step closer to finding her kid and help someone make sure their kid didn't suffer the same fate.

What she didn't expect was seeing her ex.

Her very irritating boy scout of an ex, mind you.

“You know, out of everyone I’d expect to walk through those doors, it was never you,” Matty told her, a soft smile on his face as he tapped his walking stick over by her stool, before he maneuvered his way onto the stool beside hers. He then gave a charming grin to where he likely heard her breathing. “You know, I want to say the perfume gave it away, but it was the awful choice in vodka.”

Claudia let out a laugh, despite not wanting to, and despite the fact that most people couldn’t smell vodka. Though she’s been gone for two years, she’s not considered dead because she texts her mother photos of the sights she sees and sends her sister flowers. But she is never ever around anymore.

Matty should hate her for it. Since, the last time she saw him, he opened up, when he rarely does, and she closed him out. Which is awful. But it happened. Then, she left.

“You've always really liked the perfume,” Claudia teased, surprised that she could be genuinely playful after only being playful for the sake of mostly manipulation these past few years.

It’s surprising, but Matt’s always brought out the best and the worst in her. She’s always loved and hated that about him. Because, despite her best and worst judgment, and despite her never ever being able to tell him how she feels, she’s always cared about him. “Always hated the whipped cream vodka, though — but really, everyone hates the whipped cream vodka, and I don’t really know why they do... it’s great stuff.” She smiled wider and she wished he could see that, which made her let out a soft, hmph.

There’s a hiccup of pause as she looked at his auburn hair, and then at his face a little longer than needed —- her heartbeat so loud she hears it in her ears. The room echoed with spirits and the few disjointed thoughts of others. And though that might typically have her set her jaw, she’s weirdly relaxed, currently.

“You’ve been gone for a while,” he replied. “How are you?” There’s something in his voice that sounded like he really cared and it made Cloud’s throat prickle just a bit because, again, today she really fucked up. And in the past, she fucked up with him.

Fucking Matty, was all she could think. Damn him. Caring.

She’s not one to open up. It’s complicated. Well, she's complicated. He knows this. “I’m fine,” she replied, happy he couldn’t see her face because she’s no longer relaxed and is giving one of those pulled, half-assed smiles. But her heartbeat says otherwise, it beats quickly and she’s sweating like crazy.

“‘Fine’ typically is what people say when they’re lying, Cloud. And it’s something you’ve always told me when you were lying to me. I had a way of ignoring it, to let you have your space, but I need to know: Where have you been? What have you been up to -- and why does your perfume have the distinct smell of blood to it? And most importantly, why do you smell like an open wound?” He asked, leaning in, near her ear, making her arch her brow. The word ‘boy scout’ again, coming to mind.

She does a heavy, dramatic sigh, no longer caught in her rose-tinted haze of memory involving him. Now she saw and remembered why she ran - hiding anything from him is impossible. "Don't know what you're talking about, Murdock…” she knew it was dumb to lie to the human lie detector but she could try. She only called him his last name when she wanted to distance herself from him.

He lifted her hand, pulled down her sleeve a little, then felt a thick layer of liquid sliding down her arm from a wound with his finger. “I’m talking about this. What happened?"

She immediately pulled her arm away, her expression sour. "I came here for a drink," she lied, the wound not bothering her due to a high pain tolerance - and it hadn’t during this whole conversation, since it was healing.

"You came here for an alibi." He accused, before he gave her an irritated glare.

“I have a valid reason for this. I don’t owe you an explanation for it,” she whispered in his ear, wiping the blood on her lap.

"That group?" he asked, letting out a sigh. “This is about them, isn’t it?”

"Yes."

"You know, doing this won't get you any close to finding your daughter. You're being used..."

"Are you saying I won't find Marta?"

"I'm saying, I can maybe help you. I'm saying you can stop whatever it is that’s hurting you and I can help. Whether you’re lying to me or not."

"Maybe?" Cloud asked. "Maybe doesn't sound convincing. I need to know you can."

They both sit there for a while after that. Silently. Minutes passing. Her avoiding looking at him and him clearly thinking hard because she can almost break her glass from the weight of it.

Then suddenly, Matt said it.

“I can get your daughter back…but you have to take a break...from whatever this is.”

She shrugged, and then patted his arm twice to show she agreed since he couldn’t see her. “Alright deal. I'll give you a week. If we don’t get her back by then, I get out of the Big Apple and do it the way I’ve been doing it — See how things go.”

She tapped his nose and he looked confused. She doubted he could be of any help, but she had an assignment in New York City, so might as well see where this goes --- right?

#fic shit tag #nosficideas*#writing: claudia dardashti | better the devil you knew #fic idea: better the devil you knew #c: claudia dardashti | the devil you knew #i just wanted to finish this. it's been in my drafts since i told rhi i'd write it post-she/h*lk #i am free of it now!!!#also i promised myself i'd post stuff instead of hoarding it and here i am

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ryosei-hime · 3 years

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Writer Tag Game

I got tagged by @ernmark

I’m terrible at tagging people in these so if you see this and want to do it, go for it!

How many works do you have on AO3?

I’m gonna start by saying that I have a larger chunk of fics on FF.net because I wrote more back when I used that instead. I also had a very long hiatus from writing fics at all due to mental health and life stuff.

Also I realized recently that a lot of my RvB fics didn’t end up on AO3 and I just left them here on tumblr which was the last time I was super active with fanfic back in 2014.

So, long way around to say, only 20 that are housed on AO3 specifically.

What's your total AO3 word count?

49,141

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Naptime is Best Time which was my most popular RvB fic. A little humorous Grimmons.

Stolitz Week Oneshots - Some of my most recent work since that event only ended recently. Very specifically I got a lot of those kudos after posting Confession which seems to be well-liked and makes me very happy.

Personal Space which is a HuskerDust chapter fic that deals with Husk’s insecurities regarding his demon form.

Sex and Therapy - An OCxRobo Fizz story in which an imp therapist buys a busted up second hand Fizzarolli Personal Companion with intents to help him professionally but uh. *points at the title* This one was very surprising to me because I don’t expect much if any attention to be given to my OC focused things. So that this one got enough to be on the top five makes me really happy.

Apologies - An Alix/Chat Noir fic that I did for a rare pair exchange. Another one that surprises me. : P Especially as I only watched the first season of Ladybug and often forget I even wrote it.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I try to and if the comment is longer, I definitely do. With shorter comments, it depends on my mood. I’m socially awkward and whether or not saying just thank you feels inane and unwanted as a response will vary with how I’m feeling. I definitely appreciate all comments! Even one word comments. : P But responding will vary based on my own mental processes and has nothing to do with the commenter or my appreciation for the comment. Some comments will make me particularly happy and I’ll read them over again but still not respond because I don’t have anything specific to say in response. It’s mostly a series of noises that can’t be conveyed in text.

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

Oh! That’s definitely Don’t Cry Usagi. A short fic speculating the long term effects of Naru's role as victim in Sailor Moon's crime-fighting life. I don’t do character death a lot but I had this idea and it wouldn’t leave me alone.

What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

I think I end up with a lot of happy endings. Like there’s probably suffering along the way but in the end things work out more often than not. So, I don’t think that I can say any one fic has a happier ending than another, really.

Do you write crossovers? If so, What is the craziest one you’ve ever written?

I was probably more prone to that when I was younger. I did have one that I never posted anywhere that involved Doctor Drakken from Kim Possible attempting to use a device to access a universe in which he had been successful in taking over the world (I think this was before a Stitch in Time came out) and learn how he did it. But of course the device malfunctions and sort of scatters universes. I used pretty much all the cartoons I was particularly interested in at the time.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I wouldn’t say hate. I’ve definitely received some weird responses though. And all on FF.net.

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

I only very, very recently starting doing so! Because you can only write a character that’s a sexbot for so long without it coming up. It was important that the second occurrence of full on sex in Sex and Therapy (I fade to blacked the first) actually be written because there was a lot of emotion and bonding involved in it that needed to be shown. Which is why I said fuck it and did the shorter one right before it as well. I had to accept I couldn’t tell that story without sex. It’s in the title! But now I’m more comfortable writing it, so I may be more prone to do so going forward.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I’m pretty sure I had a few snatched up by bots grabbing a bunch all at once. But not by a person that I am aware of.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not that I’m aware of.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I attempted to do so once with a 9/Labyrinth crossover. I failed you @ernmark. Forgive me. Actually, there was one other time where I was slightly more successful but it also never got posted anywhere or made it beyond a couple of rough drafts. It was a DBZ fic and I remember a much more talented writer was working with me and I was super grateful for their input and help because this was when I was like *maths* 13? I was super young. We were using yahoo chat to work on it together. And this much better/older writer treated me so nicely and wasn’t condescending at all. It was really nice of them. I will always remember you stranger from yahoo chat.

What’s your all-time favourite ship?

That definitely depends on the fandom. Since these are the two fandoms I’m active in right now: Stolitz is my favorite Helluva Boss ship and HuskerDust is my favorite Hazbin Hotel ship.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Okay, there are two fics I started a million years ago that I think about rewriting and finishing constantly. I even started to rewrite one of them more recently before Helluva/Hazbin took over my brain. One was Foutley’s Phone Buddies which was an As Told By Ginger fic focused on aged up Carl/Blake. The other Was Crouching Tigger, Hidden Rabbit which was a Tigger/Rabbit fic. That’s right. I ship the fuck out of Tigger and Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh.

What are your writing strengths?

Characters and dialogue. I’m someone with very low self-esteem or it used to be very low. I guess it’s gotten better but it’s still hard to say outright nice things about myself. But I’ve never had a problem saying I’m good at characters. Confessions is kind of a point of pride for me right now with that because of how much attention it’s received for being in character.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Plot and structure. I write primarily by instinct. And my instinct is primarily character driven. What makes it easy for me to just churn out character interactions without thinking makes it difficult for me when I have to stop and slow down long enough to figure out what’s actually supposed to be happening in the story and in what order for the best pacing. The more my wheels have to actually turn, the harder it is for me.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I’ll do it poorly with flagrant disregard for poor native speakers. I’m so sorry native speakers. I used bacha galupe for Angel in one recently. I didn’t even think about it. I just did it. And I’m pretty sure I learned that from the Golden Girls so how accurate it is or if it’s even spelled right is beyond me. But it’s out there now. I really only do this for words here and there though. If someone’s gonna do more than that, I’ll just write that they speak in the language.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

The Animorphs! I typed up Animorphs fic in like comic sans size fucking 30 or something and printed it out. I’ll never forget. That was in the late 1990s and my grandfather had just moved up from the printer that had the edges you had to tear off. So it was on this impressive pure white straight sheet of paper. So fancy and it had my giant ass fic on it. Only the best for my Andalite OC.

What’s your favourite fic you’ve written?

I’m still very fond of Naptime is Best Time after all these years. I think Sex and Therapy is gonna be special to me for being one of the longest chapter fics I’ve ever finished (I’ma finish it) because I’ve always been more of a oneshot person until recently. And Confessions will probably stay a favorite for a long time. So, yeah, I’ve just been happier with my recent stuff and being able to write fanfic again after so many years.

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prorevenge · 5 years

Text

Evil Stepfather gets what he deserves.

TLDR at the bottom.

When I was 15, my mom started dating a man she met on a dating website. I didn't like him the first time I met him and two months later he moved into the house.

About three weeks after he moved in, he took my skateboards, self-built halfpipe, ramps, BMX bike, ice hockey gear, and many other things to the dump one day while I was at school. He said he did this because he didn't want all of my crap cluttering up "his" garage.

Maybe two months later he punched me in the stomach for the first time because I got up from the dinner table without asking to be excused. From there it escalated into full-fledged beatdowns for the smallest perceived slight to his authority.

One day he decided to take my extensive Pokemon card collection, even more extensive comic book collection, My Game Boy and PS2 with all the assorted games, and my fantasy and sci-fi book collection and got rid of it all because "15 boys should be playing football and baseball, not being a fa**ot nerd playing with Polemon cards and reading comics and books"

I would like to add that he was a middle school teacher, and then his off time refereed and umpired local middle and high school sports games.

My mom never intervened, and in fact acquiesced when he demanded that she stop giving me lunch money, because "the little shit will just spend it on comics and other gay shit"

One day, I took maybe $3 and change out of his change jar so that I can buy a slice of pizza and some fruit punch during lunch at school, because I was tired of being hungry. My twin sister was always a bit of an asshole, and frequently blackmailed me into doing her chores from a young age. I was fed up and refused to do something, so she told him what I had done. This man actually called the police and pressed a larceny charge against me, and once the police had left beat me senseless.

At that point I ran away. When the cops found me and returned me to my home, I found out that he I've been trying to talk my mom into sending me away to military school or something of that nature. I ran away again, and between having run away several times and the larceny charge ended up turning 16 in juvenile detention.

I spent the next couple years miserable and afraid, frequently contemplating suicide. Once I left home, I didn't speak to my mom for several years. We eventually reconciled, and by that point they had married. I was a lot bigger then I had been as a young teenager, and had gotten into weightlifting so he no longer acted like he was going to punch me to make me flinch, much less actually hit me nd we basically avoided each other for the most part.

My mother found out that she had stage 4 cancer, and no longer wanted to waste any of the time she had left with him, so she had a lawyer draft up a separation agreement whereby he would receive a set amount of money upon separation, and would have 45 days to retrieve his belongings from the house. He had spent his entire inheritance in six months and then had to sell his mother's house that he grew up in in order to settle his debts shortly before they started dating oh, and my mother bought the house back from the bank before they married. She allowed him to keep the house and he moved back into his mother's house.

My mother passed away about nine months after their separation and despite the agreement have been allowing him to come and get his stuff piecemeal. I put an immediate end to that.

I sold his baseball card collection (around $14k) and his autographed sports memorabilia (roughly $11k) and also sold all of his woodworking equipment, along with several finished pieces of furniture that he had made ($6,500 I think).

I kept his mother's engagement ring (platinum band 3 diamonds roughly 2 Carats), wedding band, his coin collection (I also collect coins) and some tools and other odds and ends.

Around a month ago I ran into him at the grocery store. I told him what I had done as he was pushing his cart out towards his car and he took a swing at me multiple times. Several of these punches missed in the ones that they connect didn't have much effect because he's nowhere near as strong as he was 20 years ago in his forties, and I no longer a skinny little 15 year old. He continue to try to punch me as I called 911, and was actively ramming his grocery cart into my new Toyota as the police officers pulled into the parking lot.

He was arrested for assault, communicating threats, and destruction of property. As a result he lost his job (and pension) at the local Middle School, and because he had never learned how to save money while married to my somewhat wealthy mother ended up having to sell his mother's house because he hired an expensive lawyer thinking he could somehow beat the charges.

My nephew, who was on the football team made it well known to his friends that he not only had just been arrested and convicted of assault as well as other charges, but that he had also beat me as a child caused several parents to call for him to resign from refereeing and umpiring for local sports games.

My niece, and my girlfriend's much younger sister are enrolled at the middle school where he worked, and say that he was not only universally disliked, but when he came up to the school to get his belongings, he made a big scene and ended up hysterically crying as he was leaving. At least that's what they've heard from the kids who were attending summer school at the time.

His son, who he was equally abusive towards as a child refuse to take him in or help him out so he ended up having to take a job as a cashier at Walmart so that he could afford the rent on his crappy little trailer in an absolutely awful neighborhood.

Even though that Walmart is not the closest Walmart to my house, that is now the only place where I go grocery shopping or to purchase anything that I need. I purposely stand in line longer than I need to just so that he can be the one who has the pleasure of ringing up my purchases. The first time I went through his line he attempted to ring up multiple items more than one time to overcharge me and when I called him on it said that I was mistaken. I asked for a manager, and the manager believed him that it was an accident but he learned that he can't get away with that. The second time, I made sure to be as nice as possible and had to ask for a manager because he was overwhelmingly rude. The people in line behind me back me up and he got in some trouble for that.

Every time I go there and step into line, I see him die a little bit inside, and it may be Petty but it gives me such satisfaction. Sometimes I'll say that I'm paying with exact change and as I'm about to hand him the money I'll say "Oh! I didn't realize I had (rare coin from his collection) in my pocket! I guess I'll use my credit card"

I just sold his expensive ratcheting wrench set, and so on Monday when he works again I'm going to go buy my daughter one of their better above ground pools, and as he's ringing it out tell him "I know that (daughter) is just going to love this pool. It's not like I would have ever used those expensive ratcheting wrenches anyway"

TLDR; Asshole stepfather got rid of all of my prized possessions as a child and beat the crap out of me regularly. I ended up getting all of his prized possessions and selling most of them, and when I told him he tried to assault me in public, which resulted in criminal charges, losing his job, and his house. Now I get to see him all the time and rub his nose in it.

(source) story by (/u/Kveldson)

#prorevenge #by /u/Kveldson #pro revenge #revenge stories #pro revenge stories #pro #revenge #last10

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imaginingsoftly · 4 years

Text

It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time Pt. 7 - Morgan Reilly

Type: roommates to lovers, Y/N insert shorts

Requested: No

Warnings: concussions

(Y/N = Your name, Y/L/N = Your Last Name, Y/N’s POV to Morgans, POV change marked with a line)

A/N: Apparently I suck at writing deadlines, and I’m really sorry about that. Hopefully once my semester is over I’ll be able to write at a more consistent pace, but trying to do University online is different and challenging. Enjoy!

Y/N’s family was nothing like her, her brothers’ noise a sharp contrast to her quiet, and she was trying not to panic over the madness that was about to ensue. It was four days after Morgan’s concussion diagnosis, and it was only yesterday that he stopped cringing at the brightness of the sunlight coming into the apartment. The house and its inhabitants were going to be loud when her and Morgan showed up, no matter how much she had told them to tone it down for the sake of Morgan’s brain. She also knew that her brothers were more than likely suspicious of the kind of relationship she and Morgan really had, and that they would be observing her and Morgan’s interactions pretty closely.

“Remind me again how many brothers you have?” Morgan’s question brought Y/N back to the present.

“Four. All older. They played baseball and don’t watch much hockey, so they shouldn’t bombard you too much.” Morgan chuckled in the passenger seat as they sped down the highway towards Charlotte.

“I’m living with their baby sister, Y/N. I have a feeling they’re not going to leave me alone no matter how indifferent they are to my sport.” He was right, though it wasn’t that they didn’t want her to date (not that her and Mo were dating) so much as they didn’t trust athletes. They had loved her first college boyfriend, a guy from her dorm Freshman year that surfed and worked as a barista at one of the local beach cafes. Her second boyfriend was a baseball player, however, and the boys had freaked out. She guessed it was because they had been college baseball players themselves, and they didn’t want their sister going out with the type of guys that their teammates were in college. He had cheated on her after one weekend series on the road, so they ended up being right.

“They’ll get over it. They base everything off of their experiences in college baseball locker rooms, and those aren’t great places to be.” Morgan laughed, and Y/N turned off the highway and towards her house. The winding roads to get to her neighborhood were peaceful, and she could see Morgan relax into his seat as he stared at the leaves turning orange all around them.

“Tell me about your brothers. Were they good athletes?”

“They were good baseball players, though Bo was probably the best all around athlete. He could play any sport well. He’s the oldest, and he was the only one to go pro, got drafted out of Carolina in the second round by Seattle. Cal probably would have gone second round too, but he blew out his knee his junior year of college. He tried to play after that, but he was meant to be a catcher. His knees couldn’t take the position anymore and he wasn’t as good elsewhere in the field.” Y/N caught Morgan bending his left knee in discomfort, probably empathizing with Cal. It had been a gruesome recovery, and watching him try to re-learn how to walk had been one of the worst things Y/N had ever watched, though it was nothing compared to watching him realize he couldn’t play his position anymore.

“Davie was always a better lacrosse player, but they don’t really have lacrosse down here. He moved to baseball so he could hang out with the other kids in the neighborhood and maybe get a college scholarship. Josh was a pitcher until he needed Tommy Johns. He threw hard, like mid- 90’s by his Freshman year at State.” Come on, Y/N. Like Morgan was gonna know the significance of a fastball speed by a college kid. “That’s really rare,” she added quickly. “For a Freshman to have that kind of speed, with the location control he had? He was on a fast track to being drafted in the first round. He actually got drafted pretty low out of high school, but mom convinced him to go to college for a few years to at least start a degree.”

“Two of your brothers had career-ending injuries? That really sucks.” Morgan was looking at her incredulously, almost like he didn’t believe her.

“The knee thing runs in the family. My dad and his two brothers all had knee replacements before they turned thirty.” Morgan shuddered, and Y/N was inclined to do the same. Knee surgery was no joke. “I actually need one as well, but I’m trying to hold off for as long as I can. They don’t last forever, and I don’t want to go through the surgery twice.” Morgan shuddered again at her words, glancing at Y/N’s knees in alarm.

She turned the Jeep into her parent’s driveway as she spoke. It was long and twisting, and more than a little excessive. The original owners of the house must have really had a flair for the dramatic. The house came into view as they rounded the last corner, a shingled beauty that looked like it belonged on Nantucket rather than in the South.

Y/N grinned at the shock that entered Morgan’s face, and the grin grew even larger when three tall bodies came flying out of the house and into the driveway. Her brothers were about as different as baseball players could look, and each looked like their position. Cal was a bit slimmer than he had been as a catcher, his legs not the tree trunks they’d been for most of her life. Josh was a beanpole, there was no other word for it. He was tall and all limbs, especially in contrast to Davie, who was compact and reminiscent of his hero Pedroia. Bo was absent, probably busy doing whatever professional athletes did in the offseason when they thought they were too good for their family.

Morgan hung back as Y/N ran forward, and she almost felt bad for leaving him behind until her brothers swept her up into a group hug. It was comforting to be surrounded by them again, even if she was disappointed at the missing eldest. They were all yelling in her ears as she pulled back, gesturing for Morgan to come forward. “This is Morgan. He’s concussed, so please be gentle.” Morgan rolled his eyes at her words and she could tell he wanted to protest her instructions.

Josh was the first to step forward, and he was the only one who even remotely matched Morgan in height. It was comical to her, seeing the boys that usually dwarfed her looking small themselves, especially as they tried to puff up and look vaguely threatening.

“I’m Josh. It’s nice to meet you, man.” Morgan shook his hand with a smile as Josh was jostled out of the way by Cal, who opted for a fist-bump instead.

“Cal. What exactly are your intentions with my sister?” Y/N groaned and punched Cal’s shoulder from her place to Morgan’s left as the other boys laughed. Morgan turned red, gaping at Cal.

“Told you they would do this, bud. Good luck.” Y/N clapped his shoulder and took off in the direction of the house, hoping that Morgan would follow her. He did, thankfully, but so did the rest of the boys. The moved as a clump of noise into the house and through to the kitchen in the back, where Y/N’s mother was grumbling to herself over the stove. She looked up when Y/N entered, and dropped the spoon she was holding to hug her youngest child.

________________________________________________________________

More than anyone else, Y/N looked like her mother. Those same curls tumbled down her mom’s back, though they were strands which had escaped from the messy bun sitting at her neck. They were nearly the same height, and the laugh lines at the corner of Y/N’s mom’s eyes and mouth were the same that would probably grace Y/N’s face as she got older. Y/N squeezed her mom one more time before letting go, though she kept an arm around her mother’s waist as she turned towards Morgan. “Ma, this is Morgan. Morgan, my mom.”

“Call me Jo, honey,” she said, startling Morgan as she swept him into a hug as well. It surprised him, how much he needed the hug, though he supposed that mom hugs just meant more than any other kind. “I’ve heard a lot about you.” Morgan looked up to find Y/N blushing slightly, and she stuck her tongue out at him when he raised an eyebrow at her over Jo’s shoulder.

Y/N’s house was loud with the presence of her brothers, no matter how much Y/N and Jo tried to shush them. They eventually took their noise outside, where they constructed a makeshift batting cage and took turns hitting against Josh’s pitching. Jo tried to get Morgan to relax on the couch until dinner, going athlete-mom-mode with the whole “resting a head injury” spiel, though she finally relented when he said he’d sit on a stool and not try to help anymore. Y/N laughed as Morgan bickered with her mom, and he was almost tempted to keep it going just to hear her laugh some more. It was nice to see her relaxed in the place she grew up, floating around the kitchen with the person who’d taught her how to cook.

It was like watching a ballet as they cooked. They would come so close to colliding that Morgan almost shouted out warnings several times, but yet somehow they’d always managed to dance out of the way in time to avoid each other. The longer he sat there on the stool, the more Jo threw over random questions about his life, and hockey, and his own family. It felt home-y in a way that Thanksgiving, American or Canadian, hadn’t felt since he was a kid.

Y/N’s dad came home right as Jo finished telling a story about Y/N breaking her finger trying to catch a foul ball. Morgan was doubled over in his stool, nearly crying with laughter as Jo choked out the story in between her own laughs. Y/N happily interrupted the story to run to her father, shouting out a “hey” as she launched herself at him. Her dad was intimidating, tall and well-built with gray hair that somehow managed to look youthful and not old. He was obviously a former athlete, and Y/N’s stories about him playing college ball came to mind.

“You must be Morgan.” Y/N’s father stepped away from Y/N to hold his hand out at Morgan, who stood hastily.

“Yes, sir. It’s nice to meet you.” Y/N and Jo laughed behind their hands at the exchange.

“Sir? It’s Bill. I’m not old enough to be called sir.” Y/N laughed, patting him on the shoulder. Morgan nodded at Bill, and tried not to look as intimidated as he felt. He was never nervous around his actual girlfriends’ parents, and now his roommate’s had him all flustered. Maybe his concussion was actually as bad as the doctor said.

Bill’s casual stare-down with Morgan ended as a small towel smacked the side of Bill’s head. “You’re a hell of a lot older than you think you are, Billy. Now help me with the dishes.” Morgan met Y/N’s eyes to find her smiling at him already. He smiled back, and the two missed the knowing look exchanged between Jo and Bill.

Dinner was fantastic, and Morgan almost didn’t want to leave at the end of the night. The Y/L/N family table was chaotic, for sure, and sometimes a little too loud for his concussion to appreciate, but it felt like family. He was grateful to have been accepted into the fold so easily, like he’d been there for years.

“Thank you, Jo and Bill, this was fantastic.” Jo swept Morgan into another tight hug with a whispered “good luck on the rest of the season” and a brief kiss on the cheek. Bill was a little more formal, shaking his hand firmly.

Y/N’s brothers finally showed their true stripes. They all bro-hugged him, and all three had a whispered threat and a “take care of her” to mumble into his ear. Clearly they hadn’t bought that they were just friends. He nodded anyway. Y/N was his roommate, after all, so he would take care of her.

They were secure in Y/N’s Jeep and on the highway before either spoke. “Thanks, Red Sox. I really needed that.” Morgan stared out at the road in front of them. “It’s easy to forget just how much you miss your family, and then the holidays come around and it’s like a punch to the face.”

Y/N reached out with her right hand and found Morgan’s, squeezing gently. “I’ve got your back, bud, remember? My family is yours.” Morgan tried to ignore the jolt sent through his body when she took his hand, especially as his heart thudded over her willingness to share her family with him.

They didn’t speak again after that, and Morgan fell asleep in the passenger’s seat, as was apparently becoming tradition for them. He woke when Y/N shook his shoulder gently, and he trudged sleepily behind her back up to the apartment.

It was something Morgan never would have done fully awake, but he was sleepy and there are no rules after midnight, so he pulled Y/N into a hug once she had locked the door behind them. She pulled him closer instantly, squeezing just a little. Y/N really gave the best hugs. She squeezed people just enough, and she was never the first to let go. Her hugs were therapeutic, and for a second he forgot about the concussion and missing his team and his family as his mind narrowed onto the feeling of her arms wrapped around his waist and her head tucked just under his shoulder. “Goodnight, Y/N,” he whispered.

“Goodnight, Morgan.”

#morgan rielly imagine #good idea ML #nhl imagines #nhl imagine

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comicteaparty · 4 years

Text

June 13th-June 19th, 2020 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from June 13th, 2020 to June 19th, 2020. The chat focused on the following question:

What is your physical and digital workspace like when you’re working on your story?

🌈ERROR404 🌈

LOL it really depends on what stage I'm in of the process - My storyboarding space is at home, as comfortable as I can be, a beer and some food at the ready and pure silence. The cats have to be freshly fed, otherwise I'll be harassed and lose my headspace entirely LOL. I usually work on my story boards digitally, just at a very small scale, with my script/outline on my computer and working on my ipad! The double screen helps a LOT, although i would just print out the script if I had access to a printer, haha. When I'm working on the actual page itself, it's a very different story. I usually just try and work on it in tiny little batches during the day when I'm stuck at home, and usually work around the animals as best i can, lmao. Truthfully, I really prefer to be in a coffee shop when I'm working on finishing pages, it makes me so much more productive than i am in this house with so many things to take care of right in front of me, but, obviously, that's a bit difficult to do these days. ;; I usually reserve food and drink until after I pass a milestone in inking/sketching to help motivate me to keep going for as much as I can before taking a break, and I need some kind of music or video playing in the background to keep myself from being absolutely bored out of my mind. My shading process, since it's in black and white, is very easy and i can finish it in one setting, easy, no matter what I'm working with. I also work digitally for my pages, of course, although I don't need more than my ipad and clip studio for it!

DaeofthePast

freshly fed cats

🌈ERROR404 🌈

They are BEASTS when hungry, the little bastards (love them)

I may only work in peace when they're post-food napping lmao

DaeofthePast

we only have one, but same

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I work almost entirely in the corner of my IKEA couch at home I used to work at a proper desk with a Cintiq, but when I switched to Procreate on an iPad, I migrated to the couch and surrounded myself with a nest of clothes and blankets and books and... here I am, bein' cozy. With terrible posture But when I was between jobs last year, I did rent a little coworking space down the street so I could get out of my pajamas and go get comic stuff done there. It was a godsend. I like drawing at my favorite coffee shop every so often too, but I tend to hide my work while I draw, and there, everyone can look over my shoulder The coworking space had a tall artist desk that was rarely used, so I often grabbed that one. Not cheap, but to stave off cabin fever, heck yes, worth it.

🌈ERROR404 🌈

Ahhh I've been really thinking about getting a studio space one of these days I really shouldn't rn, with my finances as they are, but I could REALLY make use of one recently

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I loved the space I used last year. They recently had to close for... current-event reasons... and are going to reopen with all sorts of plexiglass barriers between the desks I feel so bad for them. Good studio spaces are wonderful, I would support them again if I ever was out of a job!

🌈ERROR404 🌈

it's good they've found ways to make it safer, though!

carcarchu

My old workspace was in the basement of my home in canada and it was always perpetually freezing even in the summer and i was frequently visited by spiders so my current workspace is a huge improvement in that regard. I do miss my old ergonomic desk chair though. I'm definitely not the kind of person who can draw in bed or on the couch. I need to be in workmode and having a designated space just for that is necessary for me to get in the right headspace for that.

DaeofthePast

my workspace rn is just my desk with my laptop and my drawing tablet. my laptop is stacked on top of a pile of books so i can see the screen (otherwise my tablet blocks my line of sight). it's kinda simple

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

Depends. I have a Cintiq Mobile Studio, so I can draw pretty much every where and sometimes in the oddest position, but most of the time I am on my desk with the cintiq hooked up to a second monitor so I don't have to look down so much.(edited)

Holmeaa - working on WAYFINDERS

For Wayfinders: Thumbnails are somewhere cozy and the only physical work. Me and Q sit and plan them out together. The rest of wayfinders are made on Photoshop, and flat colors in clip paint studio. In the world I would love a nice studio place in an office with others. During corentine I have been working from home, and I am not that good at it, being quite the extrovert. Before corentine I was in a artist residency where I worked on Wayfinders which had a workstation and all the programs we could need. It is so nice and me and Q are going to return there when it opens up again!

Miranda

I have an iPad so usually on the couch, cozied up with coffee and pillows and blankets. But sometimes at the table. But usually on the couch like the gremlin I am

FeatherNotes(Krispy)

I have a large drafting table, a mini drafting table, and a lapdesk in my papasan when we ink/draw! Toning and letters are all done on the desktop in its own space

Miranda

I need to get a good lap desk. But that sounds like a grand setup!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

My first time hearing about a lapdesk

Omg I need one

FeatherNotes(Krispy)

They are the best things ever Mine has just the pencil holder !(some come with cup holders and its a waste of space imo)

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

Wow I like your setup of the drafting tables

FeatherNotes(Krispy)

I wanna show pics of them....if im allowed in this chat?

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

I hope so, I'm not sure which channel we can post studio photos at? I did see some did before?

FeatherNotes(Krispy)

Ill post in shop talk since creator babble gets archived

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

my current space is uh.... a bit better than my last one. I used to work on an old writers desk for a decade and I did most of my comic work sitting there cramped up with my desktop taking most of the space. Now I have an L shaped desk where I have my desktop on the shorter end. The longer end it's my pen, pencils, and watercolor stuff. my display tablet occupy the space at times so switching from digital and traditional without worrying about setup hassle is a lot better than what I dealt with before lol.

I'm glad the days I had to curl up and draw with no privacy are long gone now

kayotics

I’ve got a little drafting table where I draw all my comic pages. I’m messy with my pens so they’re kind of strewn about until I start to lose them. Then I put them back. I’m not particularly neat. I spend most of the comic process off the computer, so most of my digital work is just on an iPad where I can sit anywhere. I try to keep good lighting around my drafting table and there’s always loose eraser shavings all over.

Natasha Berlin (Pot of Gold)

I got myself a lil corner desk by the dining table. Not as well-lit as I'd like, but it's decently ergonomic and I started putting posters on my wall Plus I can leave work mindset easily by turning off my computer and forgetting about the dark corner in the dining room XD(edited)

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

My desk is really sloppy and covered in all kinds of junk. I have a harmonica, a ball of yarn, a bunch of ink bottles, etc on my desk. I have my sketchbook under my tablet and usually a notebook somewhere for writing. My tablet sits to the right of my laptop (on top of sketchbook) while I'm not using it and when I'm using it it goes over my computer keyboard. I sometimes have a glass of water or some food sitting to the lefthand side

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

The only thing I wanna share about my workspace is this

once i spent over three hours looking for that damned pen

never again

🌈ERROR404 🌈

Ajkdhfkjs the models for hte magazine im crying

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Oh my God

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

mad giggling

Deo101 [Millennium]

youre gonna manage to lose the string

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

omg

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

i know in my heart deo is right but still i hope

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

You should weld a metal chain to it

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Watch me lose the whole tablet

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Oh nooo

I believe in you!

TaliePlume

My workspace is a black table with a white, yellow, blue and green tablecloth with 3 black chairs. It's next to the kitchen. On it, is my laptop and the left side is my clipboard, 3 blue folders full of writing. Then above it, is 3 sketchbooks and another blue folder from a class that I took in community college.

June 16, 2020

sagaholmgaard

I have one long desk at almost three meters. On the left side is all my coffee and tea supplies, in the middle is my work space and on the right is my dining table xD I get everything done from there, despite having a mobilestudio so I COULD sit anywhere and work, lol. It's a blessing during holiday seasons to be able to bring it everywhere, but at some I like my designated working space. Although I am moving in a few weeks, so who knows what my new workspace will be

Moral_Gutpunch

My workspace is anywhere I can draw or write. It's more of a "Will I be interrupted over something petty or stupid" issue than space. Not that I don't want more space.

Mitzi (Trophallaxis)

My workspace is a big, broken corner desk I managed to lug out of an old apartment when it was gonna be trashed. Before then, I'd just draw in bed. I don't remember, but I'm pretty sure the folding chair I sit at is a similar affair. It's got a Dollar General throw pillow on it so I can at least say I'm trying to save my back. The top of the desk is a mess of mostly old bottles and cans, pencils, incense ash, and my old tarot deck. I love this setup dearly. This is the first time I've ever had my own desk space, much less a space I can decorate or leave as messy as I want. Got my own art up on the walls with sticky tack and all! Also the cat's scratching post is directly behind me, because we've learned the cat won't use it unless it's as in the way as possible. What can ya do, lol.

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Oh cats...

Desnik

I got spoiled with an adjustable desk. It is six feet long, and has a whiteboard top for noodling with dry erase markers

my main computer is set up on an adjustable stand so it floats over the desk, and then I have my cintiq, which we tried to mount on a similar stand but then it was just too heavy

I keep my dice collection nearby because fidgeting helps think things through sometimes

and rolling to make odd decisions never hurts

lately during the quarantine I've been sharing the office with my spouse so we've had to establish rules over when it's okay to bug each other(edited)

oh yeah and we also have a whiteboard installed in the office, and it rules!(edited)

Shizamura 🌟 O Sarilho

Mine is pretty simple: I have a laptop that's long stopped being portable and is now mostly just sitting at my desk at all times and a 19 inch Ugee as my display. I usually keep a lot of stuff on top of my desk, but it's mostly just a mess because I have been using it for work too for a while now

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

I suppose I'll talk about my setup too :) My main setup is where I do digital art. I share an office with my SO, so we both have workspaces on opposite walls from each other. I work on a corner desk that holds my beefy computer, two monitors, and a Huion Kamvas GT-191. That's where I draw my comic and pretty much everything else done digitally. Ngl, it's a mess right now. I have comic notes and location floor plans in sketchbooks and DnD character sheets spread out all over the surface, and random pens and sticky notes. In the corner of the room, we have a nice large-format printer where I produce prints for conventions. I actually sketch my pages on an iPad pro in Procreate, so during the sketch phase, sometimes I'll just bundle up on my couch and do it, or before quarantine, sometimes I'd sketch on the go. My other workspace (which hasn't gotten much love as of late tbh) is a drafting table in the corner of our living room. I keep a tabletop easel on it and my Copic markers, as well as whatever I'm working on at the moment. (RN it's some ink washes.) The drawers hold all my ink, pencils, erasers, etc. Next to the drafting table is where I keep all my large charcoal, graphite, and oil pastel drawings (mostly school projects), and my large paintings. Other than that, I have a nifty little cart where I keep painting supplies :) I will say, this setup is by far an enormous improvement from my previous setups.

#ctparchive #comics #webcomics #indie comics #comic chat #comic discussion #comic tea party #ctp #creator interview #comic creator interview #creator babble

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gothammite · 5 years

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You have the most god brained takes. batcest ships constitute child abuse/incest and is Therefore Bad but.. the very concept of Batman and Robin—a guy allowing a literal minor to fight crime with him at night, which is endangering said minor’s life—isn’t child abuse?? I mean it would certainly be considered as much irl. Especially since the second Robin fuckin died and everything.

ok im. not quite sure of how to read this ask because im not sure how much of the beginning is sarcasm (but maybe it’s just blatant sarcasm and i cant see it). if your ask is not at all sarcastic in any way, i apologize ahead of time.

this ended up being a lot longer than i thought, and maybe i’m just repeating myself and talking in circles im concussed so it’s probably likely, but i had to respond to this sorry

here’s the thing: there is some suspended belief in some aspects when it comes to the idea of a child fighting crime (specifically when theyre under the age of ten, but above it as well). i personally subscribe to the scene from young justice, specifically, when diana confronts bruce about the age of robin (dick, to be more precise), which explains that bruce saw dick’s need to bring his family’s murderers to justice and wanted to help him do so. there are actual, in world stipulations that explain (albeit, with some grains of salt taken) why a child is allowed to fight crime. in this case, as well, there is very little real world equivalent, and in fact, this is part of a bigger genre, specifically the young adult one (percy jackson, anyone? harry potter? animorphs? others, whose names are escaping me, but have the same age issue?)... yes, their ages are young. but it’s more of the empowerment of young people to believe in their voices as a whole. k. a. applegate literally has a quote about war based on backlash from her last book, saying “pretty soon you'll all be of voting age, and of draft age. so when someone proposes a war, remember that even the most necessary wars, even the rare wars where the lines of good and evil are clear and clean, end with a lot of people dead, a lot of people crippled, and a lot of orphans, widows and grieving parents.”

you’re probably wondering what my point here is. but i’m right there, i promise. simply put: there is no in-world stipulation of why batcest would be considered okay in terms of the canon and the comics. there are no moments, even brief, when the boys and cass don’t consider each other to be siblings. moreover, they are considered bruce’s sons and daughter, specifically. they’re his kids. and in the real world, people are still fighting to be considered family when adoption is in the picture. anti-adoption is a legitimate stance that people take. my father has been on the receiving end of it. my aunt has been on the receiving end of it. i’ve been told that my grandparents are not my grandparents. and de-legitimizing families is now, more than ever, an issue that we should all consider grave and serious. and don’t even get me started on the age gaps and the pedophilia, because that’s definitely still a legitimate thing in the comics universe, too, and i will simply not even touch that.

so... yes. i do kind of see what you’re saying. but the minute a wave of real life adult men go out with their children and say that they’re inspired by batman and robin, and they’re going to fight crime, and the child gets mortally wounded, i will eat my words. but i can bet you that that won’t happen before someone tries to tell my dad that his parents aren’t actually his parents.

#anons #anti batcest

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imagitory · 5 years

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D-Views: Aladdin (with guest input!)

Hi, everyone! Welcome to another installment of D-Views, my on-going written review series where I take a look at Disney-produced and/or owned properties, as well as occasionally non-Disney films that were influenced by Disney’s success! For more of these reviews, you may consult my “Disney reviews” tag, where I’ve discussed such films as Treasure Planet, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, and Dreamworks’ The Prince of Egypt!

Today I’ll be doing something a little different. In lieu of the live-action Aladdin remake premiering in less than two weeks, I decided it’d be best to re-watch the original 1992 classic, and I invited two of my good friends, Christina and Jen, to help me analyze it. I will note any of their input when it arises, and hopefully you’ll enjoy hearing three voices for the price of one!

Aladdin was released in the midst of the Disney Renaissance in the 1990′s, sandwiched between the landmark hits Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King. Out of Disney’s biggest blockbusters, Aladdin is easily the most “of its time” -- it relies on pop culture references for its humor and uses era-specific slang (i.e. ”NOT!” and “Made you look!”) more than most Disney films do and features a celebrity voice in a prominent role, which was quite uncommon, compared to previous Disney projects. (The best examples I can think of prior to this was having John Hurt, Peter Ustinov, and Vincent Price play villains in The Black Cauldron, Robin Hood, and The Great Mouse Detective, but...yeah, as amazing and well-renown as those men are, they weren’t insanely popular media stars of the time the way that Robin Williams was.) One could attribute this “hipper” aspect at least in part to Jeffrey Katzenberg, who was head of Disney’s animation department at the time, and Disney CEO Michael Eisner, both of whom put a lot of focus in following what was popular and marketable. (Katzenberg later put all of his attention and focus on molding Pocahontas into a historical-fiction retelling of Romeo and Juliet as he assumed a forbidden love story would be a hit, while Eisner kicked The Rescuers Down Under to the curb a year before Beauty and the Beast came out all because it didn’t break the box office opening weekend.) Fortunately the approach paid off and Aladdin was a big success, fueling two direct-to-video sequels, a spin-off TV series, and a show at Disney’s California Adventure that transformed into a full Broadway musical. Even now it’s still very well-loved by Disney fans, many of whom are now looking forward to the live-action remake coming out this month. As my followers might know, I’m still very on-the-fence about the remake myself, as I haven’t reacted very warmly to Disney’s other recent live-action remakes, but my two cohorts Jen and Christina are much less cynical about the prospect, so hopefully any commentary we might make about what we’ve learned about the remake compared to the original will be minimal. Now that our context is framed, let’s board this magic carpet of a movie and see where it takes us!

To start with, Arabian Nights is just such a fantastic musical introduction to this story! Aladdin was the last project that lyricist Howard Ashman worked on before his premature death in 1992, and like in the rest of his work, the word play in the songs he wrote for this movie (Arabian Nights, Friend Like Me and Prince Ali) is just masterful. Arabian Nights in particular just emanates “adventure” -- it was later used as the opening theme for the Aladdin TV series, and it got me so pumped up whenever I watched it, just as much as it probably excited those who first saw the movie in theaters. Fun fact: while listening to the intro, one might notice the names Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio credited as two of the film’s screenwriters, alongside directors John Musker and Ron Clements -- down the road, Elliot and Rossio would also write the screenplay for The Road to El Dorado, join the writing team for Shrek, and be the main writing force behind the Pirates of the Caribbean films.

As much as I rarely go for films that market themselves as comedies, I feel like Aladdin handles its comedy really well. From the beginning, we see the comedic, spontaneous tone in the peddler’s narration scene, and that tone is taken on by Gilbert Gottfried as Iago until Robin Williams reappears as the Genie later. It makes it so that, unlike Mulan where the comedy kind of starts and ends with Mushu, the comedy is a constant fixture in the story, never distracting from the plot and never feeling out of place.

One niche interest of mine that I rarely get to delve into is color psychology, and oh BOY, does this film give me a lot to talk about there! Aladdin’s production designer, Richard Wende, used a very simple, yet striking color palette for the film that favors blues, reds, and golds. The effect is a beautifully lush setting while maintaining a “desert” feel: any greens that appear really stick out, like when Aladdin and Genie arrive in an oasis after escaping the Cave of Wonders. It also makes it so that when the background is mostly red or gold, any blue shades draw focus, or when the scene takes place at night and is mostly shades of blue, anything red or gold likewise draws focus. This post goes into the color symbolism more deeply, but generally blue is representative of good characters, while red represents evil, with gold being a sort of middle ground. Primary colors often are used in properties marketed toward children (ex. Team Valor/Instinct/Mystic in Pokemon Go, Snow White having all three colors on her dress), so it’s understandable that so many kids from the 90′s gravitated toward this movie, but the palette never feels restricted or simple. The deep, saturated fusion of reds and blues and reds and yellows creates a lot of texture despite the limited color range, and it beautifully communicates the heat of the locations and creates a unique visual style for the film. I’ve noticed that in the trailers for the remake, this color symbolism was discarded in favor of a more “Bollywood” look, not unlike how the Beauty and the Beast remake likewise ignored the color symbolism of Belle being the only villager to wear blue (which accents how much she stands apart from the crowd) and decided to dress a lot of people in blue during the opening number Belle. I can only hope the decision means the film is just choosing to make Agrabah more like India than Arabia, rather than this just being a stylistic choice with no substance, but I think the subtle color psychology in the original film is very clever short-hand for the audience, even if they’ll likely not be able to consciously express how the color palette affected their viewing experience.

As Jafar and his stooge Gazeem come across the Cave of Wonders, I’m reminded of how awesome the Cave’s design is. It was made primarily with CG animation, yet the CGI is never distracting: on the contrary, it fuses together beautifully with the rest of the hand-drawn background. Even the sandy texture on the Cave is very well rendered. Christina also noted a neat detail I hadn’t picked up on before: the tiger head has an earring in one ear, just like the Genie whose lamp lives inside the Cave!

After the Cave of Wonders devours Gazeem, declaring that it will only allow the “diamond in the rough” inside, we meet our title character and resident “diamond,” Aladdin. Voicing Aladdin is Scott Weinger, or Steve of Full House fame, who brings such charm, energy, and personality to the role. I honestly think it’d be hard for anyone else to match the sheer likability rippling out of Scott’s voice. Accompanying Weinger and Robin Williams in this stellar cast are Broadway actor Jonathan Freeman as Jafar (who has since gone on to play the character in everything from TV shows to the Broadway musical), raucous comic Gilbert Gottfried as Iago, and three voice-acting legends -- Frank Welker (who voices Shaggy and Scooby Doo) as Abu and Rajah; Jim Cummings (the current voices of Winnie the Pooh and Tigger) as Razoul; and Corey Burton (who is best known for playing Ansem the Wise in Kingdom Hearts) as Prince Tiger-Fucker Achmed. Even Jasmine, who was voiced by the at-the-time-fresh-faced actress Linda Larkin, had her singing voice done by Broadway legend Lea Salonga, fresh off her success premiering the title role in Miss Saigon. Even though many of these names aren’t celebrities like Robin Williams, and so I would hesitate to call this an “all-star cast” exactly, it doesn’t change how much talent was accrued by Disney’s casting agents!

Unlike most main characters in a Disney musical, Aladdin doesn’t get a full solo number to call his own. Originally Howard Ashman wrote a song for Aladdin called Proud of Your Boy, where Aladdin sings to his mother (who played a large role in early drafts of the story) about how he’ll make good for her. Unfortunately the story’s focus on Aladdin and his mother’s relationship ended up taking focus away from Aladdin and Jasmine’s romance and Aladdin’s character arc to accept himself, so the screenwriters ultimately had to cut the mother character from the story, at which point the song no longer fit. The decision was very difficult for the filmmakers at the time, given that it was one of the last things Ashman wrote and it’s such a beautiful, raw song, but I ultimately think it was the right decision. Putting Aladdin on his own with no one but Abu for company and giving Jasmine no emotional support outside of her naïve, misguided father and her pet and only friend Rajah I think goes a long way to explain why they’re such kindred spirits. Aladdin and Jasmine each become the friend and support that the other needed. (This is also why Christina and I are concerned about the inclusion of a servant/friend for Jasmine, as the choice would likely weaken any rationale Jasmine could have for leaving the palace and for connecting so instantly with Aladdin.) Plus I think Aladdin’s reprise of One Jump Ahead is just as beautifully raw as Proud of Your Boy, just with a slightly different message and less words. I really feel Aladdin’s frustration and yearning for something better, and Aladdin’s singing voice Brad Kane is able to stuff so much pathos into such a short tune that a longer song isn’t even necessary. And fortunately Proud of Your Boy was later utilized in the Broadway musical version of Aladdin, so it got its dues eventually.

At the palace, we meet our heroine, Jasmine, who was Christina’s favorite Disney character as a kid and who I personally think is the prettiest of the Disney princesses. Jasmine was designed by supervising animator Mark Henn, who modeled her after a picture of his little sister, which honestly is so sweet that I can’t stand it. What I really like about Jasmine in comparison to other Disney princesses is that she is fiery, but clever: determined, but calculating: proud, yet compassionate. It’s this balance that makes her interesting: in my mind, Jasmine is the ultimate Slytherin Disney princess (with just as Slytherin of a prince!), because unlike Ariel, she isn’t reckless in her rebellion. What’s also very cool about Jasmine is that her circumstances are a perfect contrast to Aladdin, placing them in a more romantic Prince and the Pauper set-up where they envy each other, and yet they want the same thing: freedom. In fact, all of our protagonists do -- namely, Aladdin, Jasmine, and Genie. Aladdin wants freedom from his poverty. Jasmine wants freedom from her privilege. Genie wants freedom from his purpose. They all have different cages, but they all want to be free to live their own lives, and it’s through Aladdin learning to empathize with Jasmine and Genie and see their respective prisons as clearly as his own that he grows as a character. (For a video that delves into this thought process further, please consult this piece by ScreenPrism -- it’s just beautifully done!)

Throughout the film, three animals emerge over and over -- the cobra, the elephant, and the tiger. Tigers -- which we see not only in obvious examples like Rajah and the Cave of Wonders, but also as a carving in the back of the Sultan’s throne -- are generally associated with courage and heraldry, not unlike their feline cousins, lions. The heraldry aspect I think is most relevant here -- only one who is deemed worthy, namely Aladdin, may enter the Cave of Wonders and access the wealth of kings, and when Jasmine runs away from home, she leaves Rajah, a symbol of her noble heritage, behind. Elephants in comparison are associated with wisdom and more notably royal power. In the film, Abu is transformed into an elephant steed for Aladdin when he becomes Prince Ali, and even the Sultan sits in a throne decorated with a statue of an elephant. As for the cobra, it’s entirely connected to Jafar, first as his magic scepter and then as a form Jafar takes on himself. Snakes overall are associated with many things like healing, rebirth, eternity, and the dichotomy of good and evil, but cobras specifically are the most poisonous snakes on earth. Legends even claim that Cleopatra, the last Pharaoh of Egypt, committed suicide by cobra bite. I reckon that meaning is more than enough reason for it to represent Jafar.

Through the use of a bizarre storm-making machine powered by Iago running on a treadmill-like wheel that Christina, Jen, and I thoroughly don’t understand and kind of find hilariously ridiculous, Jafar is able to discover the identity of the elusive “diamond in the rough.” He then sends the guards out to arrest Aladdin so as to coerce him into aiding him in his goal to enter the Cave, but in the process gets caught by Jasmine as he’s exiting one of the secret passages. Jen brought up the lovely point that Jafar seems to be the only person who knows about these passages in the palace, even though the Sultan presumably was raised in the palace just like Jasmine was -- this isn’t necessarily a problem, but it does make both her and me want to know the story behind this! Was Jafar basically raised in the palace too? Did Jafar partially create those passages? Were they forgotten after years of non-use and Jafar came across them by chance? It seems like there could be some fun explanation here, if someone wanted to write a fic or fan theory about it.

Okay, I really don’t want to express my concerns about the remake yet again, but I just have to say this flat-out -- there is no way that Abu in the remake could be as funny as he is in the animated film. Let’s be honest, CG characters in live-action films are almost never very charming if they’re more on the cartoony side compared to the so-called “realistic” world they’re supposed to inhabit. You can have very likable, well-developed CG characters -- just look at Aslan in The Chronicles of Narnia -- but he wasn’t solely comic relief the way Abu is, and Abu’s comedy in particular relies on a lot of cartoon-like squash and stretch that would be difficult to recreate in CG for a live-action movie. Best case scenario, you’d have something like Pip in Enchanted, which is only irritating and visually out-of-place sometimes, but alternatively, you might get something like Alvin and the Chipmunks (where the humor falls flat), Dobby in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (where it’s clear he was never actually there the whole time), and/or the enchanted objects in the live-action Beauty and the Beast (where the characters end up looking creepy, like something out of the Uncanny Valley). Basically if they want Abu to work in the live-action setting, it’s likely they’d have to make him more like an actual animal, which as I said would make it so he is a lot less funny.

Anyway, not long after Abu unlocks Aladdin’s shackles, Jafar arrives to bust him out, disguised as an old man. Just as Jafar’s storm-making machine makes no sense, the three of us all concluded that his disguise makes no sense. Not only does Jafar suddenly look a good foot and a half shorter, which even with him crouching shouldn’t be possible, but he’s changed his teeth with no visible dentures (which would’ve slurred his speech anyway) and he can get rid of all of the white hair and beard he put on just by ripping off the beard in a single gesture. As Jen brought up, even the Evil Queen used a potion to turn into the Hag: if Jafar had used magic, these sort of physical changes would make sense, but he didn’t.

Back to the Cave of Wonders again, and now I get to talk about one of the most revolutionary aspects of Aladdin: the Magic Carpet. Our sweet little Carpet is a perfect fusion of CG and hand-drawn animation -- supervising animator Randy Cartwright drew the outline and tassels of Carpet with so much personality and silent comedy, and rather than have to animate Carpet’s detailed pattern in every single frame as the fabric folded and contorted, the pencil tests were handed to the CG artists, who melded the pattern perfectly to the line work, making it one perfectly cohesive character. Carpet’s pattern also has allusions to different parts of the film, including the Cave of Wonders, the magic lamp, and the flames that appear when Abu touches the red gem. Even if the technology of CG animation is much more advanced now than it was in 90s, it doesn’t change how seamless the finished result is.

As mentioned, the Cave doesn’t remain safe for our hero very long. When Abu snatches up a gem after being warned not to touch anything, the whole place starts to fall apart, raging with lava and fire. Christina brought up the question of why the Cave would allow Abu inside, since he wasn’t the diamond in the rough (yes, Abu was hidden in Aladdin’s vest, but the Cave was magical, did it really not know he was there?), but I almost wonder if it was an issue of Aladdin having trusted Abu when he shouldn’t have, which would end up being the true mistake in this scenario. Regardless, the CGI in this particular escape sequence is some of the more outdated material of the film. The flight on Carpet is still kind of fun, as it probably would make for a very exciting thrill ride, but it still looks incredibly fake, especially in comparison to other CG elements used in other scenes. Honestly, I’d say this Cave chase and the tower used in the “ends of the earth” sequence later are the worst instances of outdated CGI in this movie.

And finally, at long last, we get to the big, blue guy himself, the Genie. As much as I wouldn’t say Genie steals the show, as Aladdin has such a likable hero and heroine and an excellent villain, Jen, Christina, and I will say categorically that Aladdin would not be as good of a movie as it is without Genie and without Robin Williams. The directors Ron Clements and John Musker wrote the character with Robin in mind, but thought there’d be no way they’d ever get him -- fortunately Eric Goldberg, the supervising animator for Genie, got the idea to make an animation of Genie speaking a piece of one of Robin’s comedy routines, and the animation amazingly won Robin over and got him on board. And really, it is that flawless combination of Robin’s acting and Goldberg’s animation that really makes Genie as likable as he is. Even Robin’s humor, which still is very funny, is not what makes Genie as great of a character as he is, in my opinion -- if anything, I’d say it’s how much sincerity Robin gives the role. Genie is never a sidekick in this movie, as he has his own distinct motivations and feelings separate to the main character and their goals, and Robin just makes you feel so much for Genie and his own desire for freedom. One quote of Genie’s that has stuck with me since I was a kid thanks to Robin’s beautiful delivery is “To be my own master -- such a thing would be greater than all the magic and all the treasures in all the world.” It makes it so his humor is a sign of how resilient Genie is, despite how unhappy his circumstances are, which is something I understand very well as someone who has suffered from depression and I’m quite sure Robin himself understood very well too. I think it’s why so many people found Robin so likable and felt so much for the characters he portrayed over the years.

Speaking on Friend Like Me specifically, I’m afraid I’ll have to go off on a bit of a tangent and share a story with all of you. The day that Robin Williams passed away, I was working at the World of Color show at Disney’s Calfornia Adventure. When the Friend Like Me segment came on, I danced along to the music while in the walkway outside the show, trying to keep the grief off of my face and just make others happy, the way Robin used to. As the segment ended, everyone applauded like crazy. Then, all of a sudden, we Cast Members became aware of a strange, sputtering, almost sobbing sound. One of the show fountains in the water had gotten out of alignment and it sputtered softly in the background as the next segment (Touch the Sky) began, before after a minute slowly quieting and coming to a stop. It was as if the show was crying for Robin, this person who had given so much joy to so many people. And this, among other reasons, is why I feel so very sorry for poor Will Smith, who somehow has to try to fill the shoes that Robin wore. Jen, Christina, and I aren’t very optimistic about his prospects (I still personally might have offered the role to Wayne Brady instead, given that he can sing, he has done comedy, and he worked with Robin in the past), as even Dan Castellanetta, who voiced Genie in the Aladdin TV series, was never able to match Robin no matter how hard he tried.

On the note of Genie’s motivation, as well, we hear about it in a scene accompanied by the beautiful instrumental “To Be Free.” It’s one of my favorite pieces of instrumental music from the film, which became one of Christina’s favorite songs from the Aladdin musical, To Be Free, which is a solo sung by Jasmine. As very pretty and appropriate the song is from Jasmine, I do also really appreciate the number accompanying Genie’s monologue. The instrumental comes across as more spontaneous and thoughtful, like it’s making itself up as it goes along, until it gets to the sincere, meaningful line about freedom, at which point the melody that inspired the song To Be Free's chorus starts.

Another neat touch with Genie is his use of Yiddisms, such as “punim,” meaning face. Of course, Genie’s animator Eric Goldberg is Jewish, and the idea of Genie being Jewish as well I just find so unbelievably charming, particularly when you place him in an Arabian-like setting full of (presumably) Muslim characters, given that the Sultan at one point references Allah. Therefore Genie and Aladdin’s (adorable) friendship could be thought of as a friendship between a Jewish person and a Muslim! I think that’s really cool!

We return to the palace, where the Sultan scolds Jafar for Aladdin’s supposed execution, only for Aladdin to burst onto the scene, dressed as the dashing Prince Ali. During this scene, Christina noted the fun juxtaposition of Jafar’s fashion choices compared to the Sultan, Genie as a human, and Aladdin as Ali. All of them wear very similar robes and turbans, but the Sultan, Genie, and Aladdin wear turbans with more rounded, floppy feathers, which Jafar’s feather is sharp and straight. Aladdin’s and the Sultan’s feather even flop into their faces sometimes, whereas Jafar’s is rigid as a board. As Jen likewise pointed out, Jafar’s design gives him this pointed, slender look not unlike Dr. Facilier in future Disney project The Princess and the Frog. The shoulder pads on his shoulders also serve to give him this sort of sharp “T” shape, contrasted to the more rounded and well-proportioned characters. Couple that with a black/red color scheme that contrasts the more saintly tannish-white of the other three, and it really does communicate the “black cloud” nature that Jafar’s supervising animator Andreas Deja wanted to give the character, to compliment the “Severus Snape” level of dry sardonicism Jonathan Freeman gave the character.

Even though the Sultan is very impressed by “Prince Ali,” Jasmine most certainly is not. Genie counsels Aladdin (with a few outdated pop culture references) that he should tell her the truth -- the nice thing about the pop culture references is that, really, even if you don’t get the jokes, you can still understand them, and the jokes still drive dialogue and plot forward enough that those lines don’t feel like a waste of time. I mean, I didn’t get most of the jokes as a kid, and it didn’t hurt anything for me -- I still thought the Genie was funny because of his comedic timing and odd voices. (Oh yes, and since Jen brought this up while we were watching this -- Aladdin does not say “take off your clothes” while up on Jasmine’s balcony: the line that Weigner improvised for when Aladdin is trying to shoo Rajah away is “take off and go.” Get your brains out of the gutter.)

Fortunately Aladdin is able to soften Jasmine enough that she gives him a chance, and the two go on a magic carpet ride (a.k.a. the fastest world tour ever, as Christina described it! LOL). Accompanying this scene is, in my opinion, the single most romantic song in the Disney canon. A Whole New World was the very first song Alan Menken and Tim Rice wrote together. After the loss of his good friend and most constant collaborator, Howard Ashman, Menken was very nervous about working with someone else. Fortunately, as soon as he and Tim Rice met, they came together pretty quickly while working on the aforementioned love song, which ended up taking some inspiration from their circumstances as new collaborators in its melody and lyrics. So yes, one could listen to this song and some of its lines -- a new, fantastic point of view -- but when I’m way up here, it’s crystal clear that now I’m in a whole new world with you -- unbelievable sights, indescribable feelings -- with new horizons to pursue -- every moment, red letter -- let me share this whole new world with you -- as being not just about these two characters falling in love, but also about a brand new, exciting friendship.

Aladdin and Jasmine connect, Jafar is banished from the palace, and the Sultan blesses Jasmine’s decision to court “Prince Ali” -- but yeah, just as everything looks like everything’s coming up roses, things start to fall apart when Aladdin breaks his promise to set Genie free. (Another fun story: when I first saw this scene in the Aladdin Musical Spectacular at Disney California Adventure way back in the day, I couldn’t stop myself from yelling “BOO!” from the audience. The people around me giggled. Then the actor playing Genie, without looking away from the actor playing Aladdin, raised a hand and pointed out at the audience. “You hear that?” he said. “That’s my THOUGHTS.” I died laughing.) But yes, thanks to Aladdin’s mistake, Jafar is able to take advantage of the situation and snatch Genie for himself, singing his own quasi-solo, Prince Ali (reprise). Like Aladdin, Jafar doesn’t get a full number to call his own, but fortunately he doesn’t end up needing one: Prince Ali (reprise) is more than powerful enough on its own, and it concludes with the most amazing, deranged laugh in Disney history. Really, as good as some other Disney villain laughs are, I would say that Jafar’s is easily the best.

Jafar becomes the Sultan of Agrabah, imprisoning both Jasmine and the Sultan and banishing Aladdin to the ends of the earth. Even if Jasmine’s a prisoner, though, she is no damsel: in Christina’s words, she’s the Princess Leia to Jafar’s Jabba the Hutt, clever and proud as ever and ready to do whatever is necessary to break free...even if it means kissing our villain in order to distract him long enough for Aladdin to try to snatch back the lamp. (Insert a cringe from all three of us here.) Alas, the ruse fails, and Jafar discovers that Aladdin has returned alive and well. The “Battle” track used for this climax is just epic accompaniment, easily being up there among some of the best “final confrontation” instrumental tracks in Disney history like Sleeping Beauty’s “Battle With the Forces of Evil” and The Great Mouse Detective’s “Big Ben Chase.” The visuals as well are also thrilling -- speaking as someone with acute ophidiophobia, Jafar turning into a giant cobra is pretty terrifying.

Despite all of the odds being against him, our diamond in the rough street rat nonetheless is able to outsmart Jafar, and Jafar, tricked into the form of a Genie, is imprisoned in his own pitch black lamp, possessing all of the power he longed for but ignorantly sacrificing the power of autonomy he had already. (As Jen said, and I quote, “Karma, bitch!”) I just adore how Aladdin outwitted Jafar too: not only does it really suit his Slytherin personality to win through craftiness rather than just brute force, but it also perfectly showcases the difference between Aladdin and Jafar: namely, that Aladdin knows empathy, and Jafar does not. Jafar only sees what Genie has that he doesn’t have, supreme magical power, and longs to possess it -- Aladdin sees Genie’s circumstances fully and knows that he is both amazingly powerful in a magical sense and utterly powerless when it comes to making his own choices.

Accompanying the film’s resolution is the beautiful instrumental “Happy End in Agrabah,” which dips into lighthearted whimsy, resignation, bittersweet joy and exhilaration, alongside echoes of both “To Be Free“ and A Whole New World. Aladdin gives Genie his greatest desire -- his freedom -- and in the process makes, in Jen’s words, the most selfless wish you could make...for only a diamond in the rough would make a wish for someone else, not for himself. And as Jen also pointed out, the Sultan follows Aladdin’s lead, giving Jasmine her freedom just as Aladdin gave Genie his. Our story ends with all of our protagonists earning the freedom that they’ve so longed for -- the freedom to achieve their own happiness -- through their love of each other.

Aladdin may be very “of its era” from a humor point of view, but it’s a movie that truly becomes more resonant with age. When Jen, Christina, and I were kids, we all enjoyed this movie’s flights of fantasy, humor, characters, and songs, but as adults, we can feel for these characters and their desire for freedom more than ever. We can understand how similar these individual characters are, and how even though they’re all in different prisons with different advantages and disadvantages, they all need the same key to unlock their cages -- love and empathy. However much the new Aladdin film diverges from the animated version, I only hope that they remember that core of the movie and how it is integrated into the entire story, from how much Aladdin wishes people would “look closer” when looking at him to Genie’s last words to Aladdin being that “no matter what anybody says, [Aladdin will] always be a prince to [Genie.]” And if it doesn’t, well, we still have the 1992 original...

...and Christina, Jen, and I give that movie three thumbs up!

#d-views #disney reviews #disney #aladdin #reviews #tory jen and christina watch together!!#opinion #analysis #oh boy here i go #aladdin (2019)

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gibaraltar · 5 years

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idk where im gonna put all my headcanons in the long run but look. ok Titanfall and thus Apex are in the nebulous far future, but with the drawbacks of technology having to be generally very practical due to (I assume) the wars, the comparatively sudden large-scale exploration into deep space, and so on. CW: surgery, dysphoria, trans health What im trying to say is trans healthcare has come a really long way, probably. I think that despite this, its kind of function over form even though the form aspect is beyond what we might expect today. Things like minimization/avoiding of scarring are important and possible to an extent we see only rarely now, but i think only prioritized in high visibility areas or if its the primary concern of the patient. Instead, the focus is keeping or improving functionality and lining up the form with the patient’s vision on an individual level, and as such results and expectations are pretty highly variable! tl;dr while I drew trans mirage with top surgery scars for me, pretty much, I do have a few hcs on how mirage being trans would pan out in canon context (i have been percolating for a WHILE so this is long):

1) Always Knew he pretty much looks like a cis dude. He went on puberty blockers/similar early (thanks to supportive mother and brothers) and has a pretty much fully functional bottom situation, & what little scar care there was, it was easier when he was younger and had the time and space and spent more time staying at home fiddling with tech, so there isnt much that “gives it away” per se. As an nb/trans guy i really like this one because like. personally, the idea of just. a reasonable amount of effort to pretty much align my brain and body seems appealing! but probably the only way this one gets drawn by me is finishing a trans gibraltar/trans mirage comic idea i had where they were both like “i have something to tell you before we-- WAIT HOLD ON YOU TOO???” because it would actually involve the things that would make this different from just drawing mirage cis lmao,,, All said its not exactly unrealistic for mirage to just be running around like “IM TRANS AND LOVE MY KINGS QUEENS AND EVERYTHING OTHER AND INBETWEENS IN THE TRANS COMMUNITY ✊🏽😤 RESPECT AND GRATITUDE LEGENDS ONLY!!!!!” rather than being stealth LOL 2) The Classic transitioned a little later but has still been on T for like a decade+. Did have to have non-minor top surgery, but this would have been not apparent if he could sit still, wait the appropriate time after surgery, and practice proper care but he absolutely could not for the life of him LMAO he fidgeted, took off anything uncomfortable a little earlier than he should have, and started working out and running around doing errands too quick. In his defense, I’d imagine this was when he and his mother were realizing they might be alone for longer than they’d hoped (and also during a tumultuous wartime period where Mirage may have also been trying to keep fit in case of being drafted or wanting to follow his brothers) but not sure how that would line up timeline wise. This would be the one I drew! I like to think that while sometimes he regrets not taking better care of them, for the most part, the scars are a point of pride. 3) The Homebody absolutely no surgery, partially out of feeling he didn’t need it, but also out of discomfort and questioning. Still on hormones though, and slowly coming around to at least considering surgery instead of putting it out of his mind or dismissing it. I have also drawn this Mirage but its nsfw lmao so i cant... show it... here at least. This is also Big Projection candidate #1. im valid though ok AAAANYWAY I always have like infinite sometimes clashing hcs for this stuff so to me none of these are more valid than another and ofc however you personally envision trans mirage and also trans care in the titanfall/apex universe is equally valid, i just. this is the only place i can say this stuff out loud LMAO so!! fwiw the other trans hcs i have are for Gibraltar, Lifeline, and Octane but also everyone is trans i dont make the rules 🤷🏽

#headcanons #long post #apex #personal #about: elliott witt #files this away for myself #trans stuff

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marveldc-imagines-hub · 6 years

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Ice Packs (Wade Wilson x Reader)

A/N: This is one of the many non-requested pieces I’ve had in my drafts forever, and I was recently really drawn to finally writing the piece. It ended up taking a different turn than I expected, but I’m really proud of how in

Warnings for swearing and some sexual humor because, duh, it’s Deadpool aaaaaannnd a little bit of angst maybe. Is this considered angst? I don’t know. Also, minor Deadpool 2 spoilers (mention of Cable, Domino, and the events regarding Vanessa) but Deadpool 2 spoilers nonetheless; this piece takes place after it.

Anyway, enjoy!

~~~

Tapping on the window of your (number) floor apartment drew your attention away from the evening activity you were pursuing. Upon further inspection--turning your head a few degrees to the right in order to peer out said window--you felt yourself relax as you recognized the white-eyed, masked face looking back at you.

“Hold on a sec, Wade--I mean Deadpool.” You hummed softly as you sat your things aside. Pulling the plush blanket draped over your shoulders closer against your person, you stood and shuffled over to the window. With the suited and warm-bodied antihero leaning close to the glass, probably to keep himself from falling down the apartment building’s side, the glass panes were becoming increasingly foggy.

“Heya, [Y/N]!” Wade greeted, tumbling through the window after you opened it. Now that he was in a lighted area, you noticed darker patches of red on his bodysuit, which was scuffed and torn in places. Still, despite his looks the smell of dirt and blood that clung to him, the behind-the-mask, avocado-looking man seemed cheerful enough.

That is, until he made his way to your couch, walking stiffly and softly grunting every couple of steps.

Immediately, your brows furrowed in confusion and worry. You had been friends with Wade long enough that he had incredible healing abilities and, even if he was in pain, he rarely showed as much.

“Wade, are you okay?”

“Hey, hey, hey!” The antihero, despite his currently distressed situation, was at your side in moments, tugging you against him and covering your mouth with a gloved hand. With comically shifty eyes in every direction, he continued, “The mask isn’t off, little troublemaker! Anyone could hear and figure out my secret identity!”

You rolled your eyes and swatted the undoubtedly dirty glove off away from your face. Using the sleeve of your sweater to scrub your face clean from any possible grime, you replied, “I’m the only one here, nutjob. Don’t contaminate me with your filth, jackass.”

Wade--Deadpool--gasped softly and placed an oh so delicate hand over his chest, feigning hurt. “You’ve wounded my soul, [Y/N].” After a moment of waiting for a reaction that wouldn’t come, he dropped the act and, chuckling, agreed. “Yeah, that fight was brutal. You’re probably right not to touch me.”

“Seriously, though, Livepuddle, what’s wrong?” Watching him continue his hobbling to your couch, despite the fact that you had just told him to stop his contamination, you were filled with concern again. Perhaps his healing abilities had disappeared somehow?

“Oh, yanno--” He waved his hand dismissively as he plopped onto the couch and stressed across it. “--just a little stiff after war. I may have been impaled once or a few times, and not in the fun way. Also, it’s Livingpuddle. If you’re going to insult my shitty superhero title, at least do it right.”

“Same difference, ballsack-lookin’ dipshit.” Sitting on the nearby end table’s edge, you tried to steer the conversation back to the topic of your concern, “Normally, that’s not enough to make you groan and hobble a drunk old dude. Seriously, Wade, what’s going on? Did you lose your healing or something? Is it bad?”

The blank eyes of the Deadpool mask shifted slightly as Wade glanced over your concerned face. After a moment, he sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face. “Dammit, [Y/N], why’d you have to do those sad eyes? You know I hate sad eyes. I don’t deserve sad e--” The man stopped in the middle of the phrase and jerked his head to seemingly stare at the wall in which the window he had climbed in was occupied. “Hey! Stop listening to 500 Miles by The Proclaimers when you’re writing something heartfelt and sad! At least listen to Cher or something!”

“Wade, now’s not the time for your weird, out of body bullshit,” you grumbled. You had been friends with him long enough to have witnessed these many of these strange, loud monologues; therefore, they weren’t very surprising but they could certainly be annoying when you were trying to have a serious conversation.

“I’ll admit, that song has a good twang to it but it’s way overplayed.”

You couldn’t tell whether that comment was in reply to you, or if he was still having an imaginary argument. In mild frustration, you reached out to grab his wrist, in hopes of also grabbing his attention once again--

Only to have him hiss slightly and yank his arm away.

The two of you shared a wide-eyed look, yours of surprise and his of… Well, you couldn’t be sure. As the realization of situation donned on you, you retracted your hand and instead rested it in your lap with it’s twin.

“Is it the cancer?” you asked softly.

Yet another soft grunt escaped mask-covered lips as Wade looked away and gently squeezed the wrist you had tried to grab.

You gave him time to choose his words and, eventually, he spoke again, “Sometimes it hurts. A lot. Especially after regenerating and healing, it gets really bad in places. The pain from a fight isn’t s bad.”

“I’m so sorry, Wade.”

“Don’t be. I don’t need the pity.”

“It’s not pity, it’s empathy.”

“I don’t deserve any of it.”

Thick silence bloomed again in the dim light of your apartment living room, and you leaned back on your hands as you tried to think up a way to help your friend. Slowly, an idea formed.

“I’ll be fine,” Wade murmured after a few more minutes of gruesome silence.

“What if we numb it out of you?” you thought aloud in response.

Even with the mask covering the antihero’s face, you could tell his eyes were glittering with a dark humor. “What? With death or alcohol and drugs? Maybe all three?” Then the humor lightened a bit, and you could vaguely see the grin and wiggling of eyebrows behind red fabric. “Or maybe another, more physical activity?”

“Shut up and undress, Wade.” You hopped up from the end table and walked towards the kitchen, hyperfocused on your fridge.

“Hah, fourth time’s the charm!” Wade jumped up after you, albeit slower than he normally would have, and marched after you. “The kitchen? How inviting, [Y/N].”

“Stop that. I’m getting ice.”

“Ice?”

You nodded. “And lots of it.”

When you gave no other response, Wade sighed and leaned against the kitchen doorway--only to grunt softly and pull away again. “Enlighten me, you teasing little minx.”

You visibly cringed at the pet name and, after grabbing all the ice packs and ice trays in your freezer to place then on the counter nearby.

“It might work, or it might not. Either way, it’s worth a shot-- Hey, that rhymed! Anyway, I know it’s unlikely that it’ll take away all of the pain, but people use ice baths to for muscles and pain and stuff pretty often so--”

“Waterloo’s good, but what about Super Trouper with that Cher appearance? Now that had tears in my eyes! When the old cast danced with the new one? Iconic!”

You huffed as you tossed the last couple ice packs into your bathtub, which was now partially filled with water, every non-food icy item from your freezer, and several bags of ice you’d accumulated after a trip to the gas station down the street. “Could you please stop talking to the voices in your head?”

Wade scoffed from his current perch. He was sitting gingerly on the edge of the closed toilet next to where you stood. He had stripped out of his suit and its dangerous accessories--you had to lend him a pair of boxers that you’d often but no longer would use for sleep shorts in the process--and now skeptically awaited the ice bath you were preparing for him. You had also helped him clean off the blood and grime from his battle earlier that night, and now you could tell by the newer looking scars and pinker patches of skin where Wade’s skin and a smaller appendage or two had regenerated.

“I’m not talking to the voices in my head,” he replied, as if that were assuring, “I’m talking to the narrator. See, Super Trouper’s a bop!”

“What the fuck, Wade.” Rolling your eyes, you stepped away from the tub to admire your work. After making sure it reached your standards, you gestured for Wade to stand--which he did unwillingly, followed by a low grunt. “Get in the tub.”

“I’d be much more willing to do so if I had a buddy to join me.” Despite the pain he was still in, the scarred man managed a toothy smirk to go along with his flirty words. “Perhaps, take a chance on me--?”

“Sir, get in the tub before I physically fight you into it.”

“Kinky,” was his only reply. Realizing he was getting nowhere in the current situation, Wade got to his feet and stepped into the tub. If he gained goosebumps, they weren’t visible on his scarred body from you vantage point; however, he gave a shiver and a quick “Woo!” in response to the cold before dipping his other foot in. Placing one hand on the shower wall and the other on the rim of the tub, he slowly lowered himself into the icy water and adjusted said ice around himself.

You took his place on the toilet lid and watched in anticipation. Of course, you weren’t expecting anything to happen very quickly; you weren’t really sure what you were expecting at all, considering the circumstances and the person you were trying to help. Still, if Wade’s pain worsened for some reason, or he started to turned purple and blue before the pain started to lessen, you wanted to make sure that he knew he didn’t have to stay in the ice bath if it was a useless endeavor.

However, as you watched, Wade began to relax in his icy spa. He was a little too tall to fit in the small apartment tub, so his feet rested on the edge and he sunk sunk down until only the tops of his shoulder, neck, and head were above the water. He rested his head next to the faucet, closing his eyes and sighing, and for a moment he seemed more serene then you’ve ever seen him.

He was in pain frequently, you knew, due to the cancer he still endured and the constant regenerating that he dealt with as a bodily defense against it. He was in pain more than frequently, actually, but some days it was worse than others and he hated showing the pain either way.

You were pulled from your heavy thoughts when Wade shifted, turning his head and opening his eyes once more. Seemingly calmer and a bit hesitant now, he shifted and raised one arm out of the tub. While reaching the wet hand out to you, he muttered, “Thanks for worrying about me.”

You responded by gripping his hand and squeezed. “I know it’s difficult to bounce back after losing someone. I also know that while people like Cable and Domino care but they’re smart enough to not get in your way. I, on the other hand, am dense and will continue to bother and irritate you out of affection.”

Wade Wilson didn’t talk. However, you could see the different kind of pain that bloomed in his gaze--before he closed his eyes and turned his head away again. You would have thought he was upset with you if he hadn’t squeezed your hand.

It was quiet after that. You continued to tightly hold Wade’s hand while he rested, keeping a close eye on his condition. It could have easily been some hours, and eventually, he began to doze off, his head slowly tilting back in your direction and leaning against the rim of the bathtub. You took that moment to rest your head on his--if it roused him, he didn’t show it--and mentally wished him well, as if the connection would take your thoughts and slam it into his own head to the point that the wish would come true. Then, you gently shook him awake to move him to a more comfortable spot as thoughts of napping with frostbite creeped into your mind.

Dramatic? Perhaps, but still a risk you weren’t a fan of taking.

#imagines-hub #marvel #mcu #deadpool #wade wilson #deadpool headcanons #deadpool imagines #deadpool x reader #wade wilson imagines #wade wilson x reader #wade wilson headcanons #deadpool 2 #marvel x reader #marvel headcanons #marvel imagines #mcu x reader #mcu imagines #mcu headcanons

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kierongillen · 6 years

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Writer Notes: the Wicked + the Divine 37

Spoilers, obv.

It's a strange job, writing. You think you know something, and you do, and then you realise it's something else. Or rather, something else as well.

While I'd advise against hard categories, there's certainly types of writers. When I was on a panel with Hickman, I believe he described me as god. Which amused me. He was saying that I'm the sort of writer who works like a Christian god, knowing the place and positioning of every leaf, every tree beam, every mote of dust. I see writing as a sprawling machine. I'm the Watchmaker.

This isn't quite the same thing as being a complete planner, but my decisions are deliberate. I'm not someone who doesn't generally know why he's doing something.

Writers who lean more improvisational talk often about looking back and realising what their theme was, or what they were mining and not aware of. I rarely get that. Or rather, it happens so rarely, that I tend to remember almost every occasion I get that perspective. Frankly, more common is making a decision for a reason, forgetting why, and then reverse engineering my own thought process years down the line and realising why past-me made what I felt was the only reasonable decision.

Which isn't to say that's everything. I know what I'm doing for a plan, but there's also the magic of ideas. What hits me, what feels right, places I want to go, and then only realise along the way exactly what part of me is having a conversation with me. This is normally stuff that I'm hiding from myself a little. This is stuff I have trouble admitting. This isn't just stuff that is bad about myself – there's lots of stuff which is bad about myself which I'm explicitly interrogating – but stuff I may not want to deal with until down the path. There's been a few of them. Not many, but a few.

Which makes this issue strange, as it's ended up being both.

It's an issue which was mainly conceived of before the first issue was drawn, set up entirely in issue 3, and has been thought about and talked about internally since (both internally team WicDiv and internally in my own head).

And then, only when the issue drops, do I realise what part of myself I've been mining for a character all along, while consciously thinking I was keeping her at arm’s reach, because I'm petrified of her. It's actually a realisation that's made me alter some things in my daily cycle, as I recognise the place they're from, and why it's bad for me.

As I said, writing is an interesting job. I don't consciously do it for these reasons... but I must do, at least on some level. "What is wrong with us?" is at the heart of most my work, which translates to "What is wrong with me?"

Of course, this is also not exactly necessarily relevant for you, and not the primary thrust of any of this, but it's there, and as these are writer notes, you're going to get some of it. Weird issue.

Preamble over.

Jamie/Matt's Cover: Foreshadowing the darkness section of the issue. We like doing a minimalistic one now and again.

Erica Henderson: This is just an amazing cover. After Squirrel Girl, you'd have an idea what an Erica cover would be, and it wouldn't be this wonderful homage to the the Caravaggio picture. Having a Gentle Annie cover this late is a good thing as well. In love with this.

IFC

The "Ananke. Or Ananke?" was a cut and paste error. We're just relieved it happens now, as I was petrified of typoing an Ananke when I meant Minerva or vice versa for the whole run.

Page 3-14

I suspect by now the past/present structure is pretty clear. We change it up considerably, with what they're showing. Issue 34 was the (majority) of the structure Ananke is working under. 35 is an example of what she does when things go right. 36 is showing the scale of what she did, and a taste of the tactics and so on. 37 is showing what happens when it goes wrong. I suspect by actively saying this in the notes, this is where a certain stripe of reader will try and work out what the other two bits of information are, but relax, we're nearly there and we'll tell you soon enough.

I had drafts of this when the past sequence was longer, but I cut it to the bone. After last issue, I wanted to spend the majority of the issue in the present day. If I could do it in 2 pages, that'd give me 18 pages for the present day.

In my longer drafts, I played with having the opening being 2 pages – so the falling apart starts on a page turn – and the reincarnation was over two pages, so featured a more active freak out that the sensory deprivation is over. Even with space, I'd have likely lost it – scrambling and that kind of panic in comics eats up panels, and isn't always effective. Cutting it to the three panels, showing the highly naturalistic magical appearance, and a single panel of the semi-comatose Minerva, clearly having been through hell.

(I'm going with Minerva as a name, as it's the name we know her by.)

A few words about what Matt did in colours – this just makes me want to go on holiday. Just weird and sad and horrible. Also, a note about "freaking out not always working in comics"? An expression like that does at the bottom of the page.

And then we have the black pages.

So, we're trying to show complete sensory deprivation for ninety years. How do you do it? I've seen people do deprivation comics, and they do it with a panel. For obvious reasons, because by definition nothing happens. In a standard comics world, we would do something like drop a CAP at the start of the page when she's back...

CAP: I SPENT THE LAST 90 YEARS IN NOTHINGNESS.

And then perhaps, if we really wanted to hand hold, on panel 2 add a...

CAP: THEN I WAS BACK.

But we're not a normal comic. Can we try and to show not tell? Try and get people to have the sense of what that actually is, and force a confrontation of the reality of it (or at least a fraction of the reality of it). Of course we can. As I joke in the back, if we were feeling really fancy, we'd have done 90 black pages.

As the issue was crammed with more interstitials than usual, there was no way this could possibly fit inside a normal sized issue. So we upped the issue size and, equally obviously, kept the price the same, because we're not complete shits.

Now, we're aware that some people won't get it. Some people may not have realised, despite the fact we've done it all the way through, that we've never done less than 20 pages of comics. We've often done more.

We actually put more of a tell than we normally would, in that we mention in the backmatter about how this actually cost us more money than usual, which we ate. Our general go-to motivation is to try and give people stuff they're not expecting, make them think about the form (and structure in life) from every possible angle. Yes, we're over four years into the comic, and we're still pushing stuff where we can.

There was a lot more here (as in, about a thousand words) but I'll spare you – fundamentally, I was fascinated that even with me trying to leave more space for the readers in this final year, we still do those little pushes, which is a symptom of a streak of control-freakery. Thinking about that and my feelings around it finally made me have the realisation I mentioned above – specifically, a “Oh – I know what part of me goes into Morrigan.” All the characters in WicDiv are me, I say. She was an exception. I felt I was mining a lot of things with her, but not necessary myself. I was always scared of her, but she was me all along. Deleting the above is in part about recognising my own control-freakery. I'm increasingly suspicious about these Writer Notes. Yes, they're about sharing and talking and craft, but I'm also aware it's at least in part about not wanting to let go. I have to get over that. I'll be surprised if I do Writer Notes like this for any future project.

So yeah. That was a journey.

Re: Page of blackness. Would I go back and not do it? Of course. I think it's a neat idea, and fun. It's the emotional mess that is me that I worry about.

NOTHING TO BE SCARED OF is a lift from Adam Ant's ‘Prince Charming’ (whose video take on Cinderella is actually 100% a WicDiv origin sequence, which makes me think of the edited Disney Cinderella gif with the exploding head. Cinderella is very WicDiv.

Anyway – a lift from ‘Prince Charming’, but perverted and turned very literal. Minerva is evidently afraid of a literal nothing.

16-17

As I said last time, I decided to concentrate on Baph's confession (and Laura's reveal) last issue, so I had moved a bunch of plot beats from there to here. I knew I had 18 pages, so more space to work. I obviously played with the idea of doing the Cassandra arrest this issue, but realised I could do the reveal from Baph's text at the end of last issue, to give an actual minor cliffhanger. As such, this means that we have to explain what happened here. How to do that?

Well, obviously we could do it with just Baph and Persephone chatting, but that seems like dead pages. I had the idea of doing it from the outside, to move the focus away from the pantheon out into the world. We don't get many moments of perspective any more (though I suspect they'll come back hard in the last arc) so this was useful.

It's also another example of particularly pointed glaring at fan behaviour. There is a lot of casual cruelty here.

The scene they describe is literally Cassandra's Cassandra moment. We see a little footage of this next issue.

I originally wanted this sequence to be at Elephant & Castle, as its curling mess of tunnels struck me as a good pace for such a confrontation. There's no escalators though, which creates a few limits, and I realised it'd likely be better to return to Highbury & Islington.

You'll also note the other thing this sequence does – which is orientate the reader with the layout of the station. When Morrigan and Baphomet actually fight, they go the opposite direction to where these two walk. It's a fairly common action film trick – travel through the setting so you know where stuff is, and then blow it up.

I love the pinky purple shirt here. Nice call, Matt. If I wore colours, you could dress me.

18-19

This issue, despite the space, is cut really tight. I look at this and wonder if I'd have cut it a different way to get more pages to use later.

Back to the Underground, limited backgrounds, handy when you're heading towards a visual showcase like the last half of the issue, both in terms of workload, and also to create a dark visual which is then exploded.

"Can everyone stop dying? It's getting really fucking depressing" has been in the Baph dialogue file ever since issue 1, I think. "How to get ahead in show business" was one of the titles I played with for the end of issue 33's interstitial, but went with Talking Heads. Clearly, it's a very Baph line.

The Fancy Pager, as seen back in Imperial Phase II when Dio gave it him.

It's good to see these two talking. It's very strong moves by Jamie, with lots of tiny nods. The "why I like him" sequence is very human.

20-21

This is one I feel I could have cut to a page if I really wanted to, but when Minerva is only lightly in play this issue, giving her more screen time seemed worthwhile. Space = Meaning remember. Plus it means showing more of the heads as well. See what I mean? I could have cut it, sure, but I know why I didn't.

Like the lighting here as well. Matt does great stuff.

I'll say this – Minerva has been a delight to write this arc. I mean, horrible as well. I'm amazed at her casual villainy, and how she turns a scene. I realised early in the arc this is basically me flexing the Kid Loki muscles, in a different kind of workout.

Another text-based scene. I'm thinking about how we use text messages so much in this book. Hmm.

The last expression with the needle is golden.

22-23-24

And the gears start turning on this awful machine.

Second panel is a little like the "Morrigan merges from behind shot from issue 5 and issue 12". I'd have made it a 1:1 copy of it, but it's a space-jealous approach.

Persephone removed, leaving us with Baphomet and Morrigan.

From now on is an odd one. It's what I can only think of as a set-piece. A series of beats we've been chewing over and moving around and talking about forever. The road is set in issue three. In anything like this, it's complicated. When I talk about WicDiv becoming messier as it heads into its final year, it's things like this.

Want to talk about structure? I don't normally do this, but it strikes me as a useful focus.

As far as I can see, the rest of the issue is primarily wrestling with three main plot threads, to different degrees. There's more, but I think they're the main ones.

Firstly, and probably least, is Baphomet. It's a little early to explicitly name his hamartia, but throughout Baphomet's failings are primarily responses to his feelings around death, and as a sub-set to that, his relationship to violence. He's killed accidentally. We've seen him try to kill repeatedly. Is Baphomet actually capable of cold-blooded murder?

Secondly, there's Morrigan. I think Dionysus nailed Morrigan back in Imperial Phase. Dio wants the best for people. Morrigan thinks she knows what's best for people. When people do not skew to her narrative, she turns frustrated, angry and uses increasingly immoral and abusive tactics to make people obey her. People make her so angry, because if only they would play their part, and do exactly what she says, it'd be better for everyone. She sees herself as the good person who knows what makes people happy. In the most basic terms, she's a control freak who has a story she wants everyone to conform to.

Thirdly, there's Baphomet and Morrigan's relationship. Which is more complicated than I could put into a paragraph, but is mainly about the two lines of their bullshit intersecting. It can be compelling. At a distance, it looks like a gothic romance. That's what Morrigan thinks it is. That's what Morrigan needs it to be. She's the heroine. Baph's the hero. He just keeps on fucking up his lines. Morrigan does not understand or agree that her relationship is abusive, and does not understand that she's using Baph as a narcissistic prop to satisfy her own needs.

While it's important for all of them, I think only one of these three threads climaxes here.

Anyway – this sets up. We slow down, and Baphomet actually realises what's happening. Baphomet, on some level, believes he deserves his treatment, as much as he chafes and pulls away. When he sees what Morrigan is capable of doing to someone else, he gets a moment of clarity.

Badb, the symbol of all of Morrigan's frustrations when her self-image is questioned, arrives.

God, Page 24, depresses me. It's such a stark page by Jamie and Matt. Everything slows down. Big panels. Big expressions.

25-30

When we originally conceived this, I thought it may be actually the whole issue, and do this, juxtaposed with a whole look at their relationship. In the end, I didn't have space, and likely didn't like it either. It'd have ended up juxtaposing more violence with sex, which I find distasteful and cheap.

Instead, it's written in a Marvel Method structure. I write the fight sequence and the flashbacks in parallel – there's a suggested solution to it, which Jamie went another direction on. I think it was basically a column on the right.

The original draft had more panels, and went on further in the flashback to the morning after. We then played with doing more periods – I had a version where it'd run through the entire length of Baph and Morri's relationship (I even put the whole thing in a document). But, as I was writing that, I realised the best solution was to just crop to the initial meeting in a shitty university club.

Yes, there was dialogue to this exchange. I may find a home for it before the end of WicDiv.

I mean – that's something odd about writing. For something like this, you generate so much stuff to even find what's going to go on the page. Fraction was talking about this in the latest Image+, in terms of the stuff that doesn't go on the page. Chrissy occasionally talks about comic writing having a lot to do with poetry, in terms of being about intensifying meaning into as small a space as possible.

Jamie and Matt do astounding things in this sequence. It's a fight sequence, and in genre comics, fight sequences take the place that songs do in musicals. Jamie chooses his moments, and Matt finds a way to navigate between the dancing timelines. Things like the third panel on 25, with the uncanny greens of Morrigan and Baph's red bisecting the panel says a lot. The divisions between the two in Jamie's art is also fascinating.

Christ – the mess of people in the first panel, and what happens to bodies when they get in the way.

I had a draft where Baph making this a nod to Sandman more explicit, but cut it.

In the flashback sequence, Cam saying something and Morrigan wincing, and me not needing to say that clearly Cam is making a crap joke is pleasing. It obviously is Jamie, but it also speaks to the characters. You know exactly how the first flirtation would go.

Jamie asked me "Does the fight have to be on an escalator?" and I basically said no, but... escalators are liminal spaces between the underworld and the surface world. They just seem loaded. And just as importantly, it's a place I just haven't seen nearly as much action as I'd like in genre comics. It's a space that many city people cross daily, and so will be familiar with, and so will perhaps think about as they go about. Jamie got it. Thanks, Jamie.

Morrigan as crow-beast is horrible.

Various people have asked what the notes are. It's ‘Welcome To The Black Parade’. I think I wrote ‘I'm Not Okay (I Promise)’ in the script. I think Jamie did it as you can get the notes right with ‘Black Parade’, which is a good call. The ‘I'm not okay’ was a callback to issue seven, but MCR generally is good.

Top of page 28 is another one for Matt – just how he works the long horizontal space.

End of Page 29 – Baphomet has his moment. He could end this now. And he finds he can't.

I don't know about you, but – for all his posture – I don't think Baphomet can kill anyone, and certainly not Morrigan. You can compare and contrast with Baal, if you wish. They're very much the bookends of certain forms of performed masculinity.

I wrote this as an impaling kind of move – but due to the panel shape, you can't show that, and capture the expression simultaneously. Instead, Jamie frames it as a swing, which does the same job.

30 – Baphomet may not be able to, but Morrigan certainly can.

This is horrible too, though Matt's colouring makes it a little more distancing. I suspect if I did have an extra page, I'd have used it here, to both make Baph's death clearer, and spend more space on Morrigan's realisation of what she's done.

This works, but I suspect for the trade I may change this interstitial to Baphomet. Baphomet's symbol is a skull here, but a little more stressing would likely help.

Title here is an early Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds single.

32-34

Persephone's captions are back – the stumble through an underworld path to find them made me think of the scene in issue seven, so the howl of the Morrigan, then comedy, now something else, is nodded to.

I love how Jamie and Matt have moved the mood from supernatural to hard disaster movie realism instantly. This is a tonal snap. The bodies, the people lying down. This is really horrible.

I suspect "Tragedy gives ‘clusterfuck’ ideas above its station" is one of my harder nods towards intent.

And back to Marian, the heroine of her gothic novel, confronted with undeniable evidence that she's a murdering monster who absolutely was driven by her own selfish desires. She denies it anyway, finding a way to persuade herself it's not true.

No, she's the hero. She's going to bring Baphomet back at the cost of her own life. That must prove she's the good person, right?

Morrigan is continuing her abuse the only way she can, while preserving her all-important idea that she was the good person.

So, of the three stories I mention, the one which climaxes is Morrigan's solo plot. She rode her own story off the edge of a cliff rather than face the reality of what she has done. The other two, and the other ones, carry on, especially Baph and Morri's relationship. Baph has to live with this.

When I was first explaining this to C, it had the desired effect. I then talked about my actual concern with it – that Marian's too convincing. Some people will take it as a "She loved him really" beat, and could then be taken as Abusers Love Their Victims Really. C got it, but noted, it's just too good to not do. I agree. I think it's one of the best scenes in WicDiv, and I had to hit it as hard as we could, and then go on to deal with the aftermath of it.

See you next issue.

#WicDiv #the wicked and the divine #writer notes

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pctrparkrs-blog · 6 years

Text

griefstruck

a/n: hello hello this is my first fic for peter parker whomst i would die for!!! i wrote the first draft for this at midnight on a school night the day after i got spoiled for infinity war and uhh i cried pretty much the whole time. it’s depressing & i promise i will write happier things after i get this out of my system!!!! also i listened to strawberries & cigarettes while writing this, it didn’t really inspire it or anything it just really reminds me of peter for some reason

warnings: INFINITY WAR SPOILERS!!!!! that’s all i think

words: ~1.9k

When all is said and done, Tony just wants to go home. He wants to go because you’re still there, in New York, waiting for them all to return.

Or at least, he hopes you are.

Because he hadn’t truly considered a possibility in which Thanos hurt you, not in the same way he’d considered a possibility in which Thanos hurt anyone else.

Everyone else, though, that was another thing he hadn’t seen coming.

He sat, legs crossed like a preschooler, his head in his arms, for what felt like years. He knows it wasn’t actually years, but it felt like it. He hadn’t thought of much beyond Peter’s terrified sobs when he realized what was going to happen to him. After he saw Strange and Quill and everyone else disintegrate into nothing but dust, and felt death reaching for him. Wondering why it had saved him for last. Abstractedly, Tony wonders if it hurt him very much. It didn’t seem like it. It seemed mostly like fear.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Tony has never been a religious man, but he finds himself praying when they land back in New York. Praying for Peter, for May, for all those he’s lost over the years. For you. In case you’re gone too, but also in case you’re not. You’re not related to him by blood, but you may as well be, and he can’t remember how he met your parents, but it doesn’t matter. He took you in after their tragic deaths, and you were his responsibility from then on. He thinks about how terrible it was to see the fear in Peter’s eyes, the hopelessness in his voice as he apologized for something that wasn’t his fault, and he thinks about how much worse it will be to walk into his apartment and see you reduced to a pile of ashes. He wasn’t able to protect Peter, but he could at least comfort him in his last moments; if you aren’t there when he walks in, he won’t have been able to do even that. At least Pepper will have been there.

Another barely stifled cry. If Pepper is gone too, after all this…

There is an overwhelming sense of horror as Tony opens the door. It feels like he’s the star of a horror movie, about to enter the room and find the bodies of his dead friends, the murderer still hiding in the closet somewhere, waiting to kill him too.

Thankfully, you’re still there. You seem cheery (after fifteen years living with someone, he can just tell), and the air in the room is light. Pepper must still be here too. For a minute Tony feels himself relax in the comfort of his own home, but then realization sets in and suddenly his day goes from awful to so much worse, because you’re standing there with your back turned to him and you don’t know yet. You haven’t seen what isn’t there yet. Or rather, who isn’t there.

The coward inside of him tells him to turn around. He needs time to himself right now, to properly grieve, to figure things out, to apologize to Peter’s aunt May, before he does this. But the rest of him, the noble part of him, knows he can’t do that. It would take too long and you had to know. He coughs slightly and you turn around.

Your day had been about as normal as it could have been: just school and back home, a few stops to pick up food on the way home. Pepper was the only one there when you got back to the apartment, which in itself wasn’t unusual; Tony was rarely in the apartment at 4 in the afternoon on a weekday. There was always work to do at the company, or with the governments of the world, or with the Avengers (or what was left of them).

Of course, Pepper’s news that a giant, donut-shaped spaceship and a couple sinister-looking aliens had landed in New York was objectively not normal. But they left New York quickly, taking Tony (and Peter, according to a text from Ned) with them, so life returned to normal just as quickly.

But the realization that half the world’s population was disintegrating for no apparent reason was even less normal than the aliens.

So obviously, you & Pepper locked yourselves in her room and buried yourselves under the covers, hoping that at least if you were going to die by crumbling into dust, you could do it in the comfort of a bed, with your family. But after about ten minutes of that, you got bored, and you figured that whatever freak incidence was occurring all over the world would come for you if it came for you, so you might as well go get a snack.

Which is how you happened to be in the kitchen, your back facing Tony Stark as he came into the room. He coughs. You turn around.

What you take in immediately is that he looks absolutely destroyed. Both physically and mentally. There are cuts on his face, hands, and arms; a few are still bleeding. He has a deep red spot on his face that you know will be a dark blue-black bruise by the end of the day tomorrow. He’s bent over, holding his side. But none of that looks like it’s paining him. No, it’s his eyes. They’re void of tears, but they look hazy, unfocused. He looks haunted.

And he’s alone.

And he’s gripping his hands so tightly you’re worried the bones might break. It would be almost comical if you didn’t feel cold dread creeping slowly through your body.

“Tony…?” You ask, slowly, quietly.

He exhales. Loudly. As if the weight of the world is on his shoulders.

“Where is everyone?” The room is so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Your mind wanders for a moment; it’s never been this quiet in this room, you don’t think. The look on Tony’s face reminds you that this is a serious matter.

“Y/N… They’re gone.”

For a split second it’s so absurd that you want to laugh. Obviously, you weren’t expecting the return of the original Avengers, even though the alien attack of the day appeared to be a big deal. You haven’t seen Steve, Natasha, Sam, or Bucky in years; with Bruce and Thor it’s been even longer. And Peter usually went back to his apartment after missions, although not without a text. You weren’t sure why you felt so let down.

“They’re gone, Y/N.” Tony repeats suddenly; you hadn’t even realized you’d been speaking out loud. His tone is the same as before, but his voice cracks on your name. You look up at him, just as he lets his arms drop to his sides.

Everything is so, so quiet.

You can barely breathe, your mind is racing so fast. You sit down on the floor and cross your legs; Tony sits down beside you and takes your hands.

Everything starts to click.

“Where is he.” It’s not a question and both of you know it. “Tony, where is Peter?”

Tony closes his eyes, his face contorted in pain. You already know the answer; he knows you know too. It’s been all over the news for the past twelve hours, ever since people began turning into dust. And here’s Tony, without his starry-eyed student, looking completely and utterly destroyed. Unable to say more than a few words.

You know the answer, but you don’t believe it. You want to hear it from Tony.

“Tony, please.”

“Y/N, just try to breathe,” he says. You’re hyperventilating, another thing you hadn’t noticed. His voice is thick with emotion.

“No, I don’t believe it,” you shake your head, backing away from him even as he comes closer to you. Your eyes start to burn as you try to blink back tears. Tears mean it’s true, and it’s not true. “I don’t believe you.”

“You should.”

And that’s it. The scream leaves your body involuntarily; you feel strangely out of body as it happens, as if you’re only watching yourself, not actually there. Your knees buckle – you would have fallen had Tony not caught you as you collapse. Footsteps get louder; Pepper must be coming into the room.

“What happened? What happened?” You sob almost incomprehensibly, struggling to break free of his grasp.

“Thanos,” Tony murmurs. “He snapped his fingers and all of the sudden, half the world’s population starts to crumble.”

“That’s not good enough,” you wail, struggling back just far enough to hit him. You know you shouldn’t, but the reasonable part of your brain is not in control right now. He flinches, more from the words than your fists, but it doesn’t stop you. You beat on his chest again and again, and he lets you, until your arms weaken and you slip from his grip and flop to the floor.

Some truly disconnected part of Tony’s brain thinks it was funny, you flopping like a fish to the ground, but it’s overwhelmed by the thought that just a few short hours ago Peter was hugging him with a death grip, pleading with him. Sobbing about how he didn’t want to go. Like the child that he was.

“H-how could you do this,” your breathing is ragged as you stare up at him. “How could you let him come with you. He’s just a kid.”

“I didn’t -“ he starts, but cuts himself off after seeing your face. “It could have happened to him down here too.” That isn’t much better; Tony knows it’s a cheap excuse as soon as the words leave his mouth.

“You don’t know that,” you whisper. You don’t hear his response; you feel as if you’re underwater. You can hear indistinct mumbles as Pepper talks to Tony, and after a few seconds, he pushes something across the floor to you.

“Th-that’s what’s left.” He says slowly. “I took what I could.” A heartbeat passes and neither of you respond. “It’s not… Peter.”

You can’t help it. A sob escapes your lips as you reach for the box, pulling it close to your chest. You squeeze your eyes shut, as tightly as you can, and pray that in a few seconds you’ll hear Tony and Pepper’s footsteps leaving the kitchen.

They murmur to each other as they leave you lying on the floor, curled up in the fetal position with the box next to you, your eyes closed. You must look almost peaceful like that, but of course you’re not. You’re thinking about how you’d seen Peter just the night before, just because he was in the area (or so he’d said) and he wanted to see you, and you’re thinking about all the late-night adventures to get ice cream, or Chinese food, or Cheetos from the bodega two blocks down. And you’re thinking of the first time he kissed you – one of those days when it’s finally starting to get warm and everyone is optimistic – which was cliche but the look on his face after made you feel like you could explode from happiness. You’re trying to ignore the box next you in favor of your happiest moments.

You’re trying to reconcile your memories of this beautiful boy with the fact that he no longer exists.

#fjadsklfjdsaklfj i have to post this now i've been staring at it so long i'm starting to hate it #peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #infinity war #infinity war spoilers #tom holland #spider man #my writing #pey.txt #feels kinda pretentious but it's FINE

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awed-frog · 6 years

Note

So, the cuestion about writing it's just... I love writing, I love reading, I love my ideas and I really believe they're good ideas, but I can't finish them and I really don't know why. I thought maybe it was bc I had to plan them better, or bc I had to let myself just write and see what happens in the moment; I thought maybe the problem it's that I should tell them in a different way (like for a comic that then I could draw) but nothing I do works and it really hurts

Hi there! Thanks for writing back! So, what you’re describing is really a common feeling - I think most writers or artists have felt this way and can recognize what you’re describing. I’m going to talk about my experience, and I hope you can find something that you can relate to and that can be helpful to you.

The tl;dr part is, I think there are many possible causes for not being able to finish a story. Here are a few of them:

you’re having technical problems

you’re too much of a perfectionist

you can’t put on paper what’s in your head

you’re having what I call ‘the Vermeer problem’

you have too many ideas for other stories and can’t focus

you’re experiencing a lack of support for your writing

you are bored with your own story

you’re afraid to finish the story

you can’t finish the story

you can’t tell these things apart

Let’s have a look at them, and remember - I’m talking about my experience here, so this might not apply to you at all. I’m just talking into the void hoping this will help you in some way.

1) This is the most common problem for someone who’s only just starting out. You know your beginning should capture the readers’ attention, but you don’t know how to make that happen. You know the ending should be spectacular and magically solve every issue, but you don’t know how to get there. Since we are rarely taught creative writing in school, this is completely normal, and there’s no easy way to get past it. Like for everything else, you’ll need a lot of practice, and maybe some kind of formal instruction (for instance, this is a good book, but there are many more). So, you know - do what works for you. Maybe join a writers’ club, or an online challenge. Read and reread books you like, and remember to read them ‘with the mind-set of a carpenter looking at trees,’ as Terry Pratchett put it. If you can, write every day - I find codas are a great way to practice, get better and get read (and if you’re comfortable to, you can ask your readers for pointers or criticism). Not being very good at writing is a big problem, but it’s also a problem you can solve.

2) Being a perfectionist is one of those things that often trips you up more than it helps you, and there are some areas of your life - relationships, foreign languages, writing - where you have to let go of it. If this is an issue for you, remember that everyone is crap when they start out (do you know the original lyrics to Beatles classic Yesterday? ew!) and maybe experiment with breathing exercises, with yoga, or try writing with a soundtrack to get out of your mind a little. So, really - I’m not saying perfectionism is bad, but save it for your baking efforts and last drafts - your first draft gets to be as crappy as it likes.

3) This is a very common problem. When you do creative things, be it writing music or quilting, there’s often a great deal of anxiety and dissatisfaction in finally starting a project because the more your work, the less it looks the way you’d imagined it would. Sometimes I write something that’s supposed to be sad, or that was hilarious and sexy inside my head, and the I reread it and it’s just - flat. This happens to virtually everyone, but there’s something very important we need to remember: in the words of Jim Sollisch, “Writing is the art of figuring out what you know, not the process of recording what you already know”. Think about it like this: the inside of your head is a different country. Writing down a story is like finally getting to that city you’ve been wanting to visit for ages and ages - sure, you’ve seen all the IG pictures and you’ve planned your visit and you’ve fainted and drooled over museum websites and recipes of traditional dishes, but now you’re here, and it’s real, and it’s different. You’re here, and maybe it’s raining, and maybe that famous art gallery is closed on Sundays, and maybe that blueberry pie is way, way too sweet for your taste, but still - you’re here. Isn’t it wonderful? You can smell this city and walk down its street and discover small secret corners you never even knew existed and maybe fall in love with this one person you never ever thought you’d meet. So this, to me, is a necessary step to writing: to accept that daydreaming is good, that planning can be useful, but when the time comes, you have to let go of all of that and discover the reality of what your story is like.

4) I don’t know if you read Tracy Chevalier’s Girl with a Pearl Earring - it’s a favourite of mine, and I reread it a couple of times because I love how she writes UST, how understated and yet vibrantly present the feeling is. And anyway, towards the end of the book, the portrait is finished - this one, I mean -

- and everybody says Vermeer should finally sell it and start painting something else - only, Vermeer is not happy. He takes to spending hours in his studio - not painting, not working - just staring at the thing, because it’s beautiful and balanced and textbook perfect, but something is missing and he doesn’t know what (if you haven’t, please read the book and find out how he solves this, because it’s really beautiful). This is a feeling I often have when I read a first draft - everything that I wanted in there is in there, but something still feels - off. And here, I think, there’s no magic way of solving the problem - you can either ask a beta for help, and hope they see it, or you can keep working on it (and reading other stuff, and practicing, and getting better) until you see it yourself.

5) This is another familiar feeling: you start writing something and BAM, you’re distracted by something else. And here, you need to find out what kind of person you are, because some blessed people can work on two projects at once, and others just can’t. Me, I always fool myself and think, ‘I’ll just work on both things, a week has seven days, how hard can it be’ - but nope. Right now, for instance, I’ve got about thirty books of Roman history on my desk because there was this story screaming at me and deafening me and I really wanted to get it out of my head, but today I’m finally giving up and bringing all that stuff back to the library and accepting this is not going to happen - not right now. Not as long as I’m writing a different story and I’m in a completely different headspace. And if you’re the same way - just keep a folder, or a notebook, and fill it with these half ideas and pieces of dialogue and then put them out of your mind. One story at a time - that’s a good and reasonable goal. Because another problem of a beautiful and tantalizing scenario popping into your mind when you’re struggling to finish a chapter for something else is - that other thing is automatically going to look more appealing, because it’s not real, because it’s untested, because you haven’t ruined it yet. And that’s why you’re tempted to abandon that stupid thing you’ve got in your hands that’s not working and go pursue something else. But, again, that’s probably not the best idea. Sometimes you just need to see a story through, no matter what.

6) That said, it’s hard to finish a story when you’re keeping it to yourself. I used to be paranoid about sharing things, but fanfiction helped me to appreciate the importance of feedback. So even if you’re writing original fiction, it could be a good idea to give fanfiction a try - signing up for a bang could help you to stay motivated and focused (you’ll have a beta, and maybe an artist!), and writing codas will usually get you some attention, because many people will automatically look for codas and ‘missing scenes’ after the end of an episode. If you’re not interested in that, consider sharing your work with a friend, a teacher, or a writers’ group.

7) This is a tough one. Maybe you’re writing fanfiction and fall out of love with the show. Maybe you’re writing original fiction but you’re no longer interested in the story. It’s okay - not every story is meant to be. You’re allowed to give up (and you never know - there are writers who go back to their manuscripts ten years later, so I would advise against burning everything in a fit or rage). The trick here is giving up for the right reasons, so before you decide to walk away, look at your story again and ask yourself: what is it that’s not working? Could this get better with a new, exciting character? Should I drop this stale plot twist? Go with a different ending? If you can get your mojo back by shifting the pieces around, give it another try; but if the whole thing’s just a chore, and you simply lost interest, move on.

8) Many of us have a problem with endings. Ending a story usually means leaving your characters behind, and close a period of your life. If you write longer stories, fics and novels are like songs - they’re usually tied to very specific moments, and in letting them go you also let a part of yourself go. Plus, there’s always a lot of pressure on getting the ending right, because that can make or break a story, and it’s often the moment when big things happen - maybe there’s a slowburn that’s getting real, and you’re afraid the long awaited kiss won’t measure up to the fireworks display you implicitly promised your readers. Or maybe someone’s dying, and you’re not ready to say goodbye. Or maybe the big plot twist you’ve been teasing forever and ever just seems childish now, and you’re not sure how to make it more impressive. Whatever the reason, endings are hard. But, again, don’t put too much pressure on yourself. A lot of things can change between your first and last draft, so you have some time there. If you’re writing fanfiction, your readers will appreciate to finally know what happens, and if you’re hoping to publish your manuscript, an editor will probably help you to shift things around and make them better. Plus, as difficult as it is to say goodbye to this world you know intimately well, there’s also a sense of relief in finishing anything that takes up so much of your time and soul. It feels good. So: breathe. Relax. Write.

9) A distinct problem is that you objectively can’t finish the story, or even get past the middle, or past two pages of heartbreaking dialogue, because you simply don’t know enough about that world yet. You have this great idea but you’d need to be an expert in microbiology, or cordon bleu cuisine, or deep space, to make it work. Or maybe you’re daydreaming about your very own Westeros, but your writing keeps getting interrupted by stupid, yet necessary details (how far away are these two cities? how fast can horses travel? what kind of swear words would a character with a made-up religion use?). If you’re devoted to your story, and determined to make it work, you’ll need to do research and plan and get answers to your questions before starting to write too extensively, because the wrong scientific detail can make your entire plot collapse. And the thing is, doing research is not always possible. Maybe you don’t have time right now, or access to the right resources (speaking of, there are some excellent blogs here on tumblr that will help you with making stuff more believable - a favourite of mine is @howtofightwrite). So, it’s painful, but there are some projects that need to be postponed, and others that will probably never happen at all.

10) Finally, a big problem is that sometimes it’s hard to tell these things apart. Are you bored with your story because you can’t write a certain scene, or is it just a boring story? Are you being a perfectionist, or is this chapter actually out of balance and weird? Is this ambitious story too much for your current skills and knowledge, or are you just giving up? There is no easy answer to these questions, which is why I think it’s important to not walk away too easily - maybe come back when you’re in a better mood, or change your writing soundtrack, or set up a fake interview with yourself explaining why you’re so happy your novel is now taught in every school in America. If you can’t write, try drawing. If you can’t draw, create a moodboard for your characters, or a fake Wikipedia entry for your imaginary country. Play around with your story. Switch POVs. Create walls. Write scenes you won’t necessarily include in your final draft - get your characters trapped in an elevator, have them fired, have them hurt someone, or reminisce on childhood memories, or trudge through a really bad day. Go through writing prompts or shower thoughts or creepy Wikipedia entries and write something about that. Try to truly be honest with yourself, day after day (maybe keep a diary?), so you can get better at understanding whether it’s time to power through or time to take a break.

Finally, I think that engaging in creative activities, whatever they may be, should be a way to make your life better, not worse. There are times when you’re just not inspired, times when you have zero ideas and zero wish to write or art or do anything, times when it’s actually better to focus on other things - your studies, your work, traveling, relationships - so that one day you’ll have something to write about. And that’s okay. Writing is like life - it’s messy, and it changes, and you change, and you just have to be patient with yourself and find a balance between loving the hell out of it and not take it too seriously. I hope this could help with getting you started, and I wish you all the best for your life and those stories crowding inside you, waiting to be told.

#ask #writing #writing tips #writing advice #writing is hard #and lonely #imo you're amazing for even trying it #pat yourself on the back #and be kind to yourself #you can do the thing #<3

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