#also i'm fine with them as standalone characters | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

Visit Blog

Explore Tumblr blogs with no restrictions, modern design and the best experience.

Fun Fact

The KCSC sent more than 20K requests to delete posts related to prostitution and porn to Tumblr from January to June 2017.

#also i'm fine with them as standalone characters

tbgkaru-woh · 3 months

Note

hi! i was just wondering what it is specifically that you dislike about wangxian? i'm kind of intrigued, because while i get how someone could find them boring, i've never really considered anything about their dynamic (and as you mentioned in response to a previous anon, their confession scene) particularly off putting. no pressure to answer this, and this is in no way hate towards you i'm just genuinely curious <3 (i love your art by the way it's gorgeous)

Thank you for the compliment! ♥ This is gonna get ranty so I will hide it below read more as not everyone has to deal with reading this, so proceed with caution :'D

Wangxian is the weakest WWX dynamic. On god, even if I'm not fond of Yanli, they have very loving relationship where they are protective of each other and gentle with each other in a harsh world. I don't ship WWX/JC but their story and complicated love of someone you grow up with and care for deeply but clash constantly with is more interesting than anything wangxian ever had. Nie Huaisang and Wei Wuxian clicked together so naturally, they are chaotic and are similiarly not too interested in being up to rules. Jin Zixuan and WWX had a potential of going from enemies to partners in crime, to become family and have each other's backs but JZX was cut short and WWX never really cared afterwards either. WWX with the wens took time to build up but his YLLZ farmer era was one of the best WWX's in the story. Damn, even Lan Xichen who's always amused with WWX's temperament and secretly has a drink with wwx and is altogether looser with the rules while still being lawful matches with him way more than LWJ where there's... nothing. They were smashed together for convenience and we were suppossed to just go with it cause they are the two main characters. LWJ feels like he was just made so WWX has a "hot stoic top" to fuck him and the rest of the characters are actually build with the story and therefore feel more natural

Wangxian don't feel like they are in love, not in the way the fans make them out to be into some romantic picture perfect angsty deserved lovestory. LWJ's personal space is constantly disrespected, he's punished constantly for WWX's mistakes, he constantly needs to be the one to adjust to how WWX is instead of the other way around and after all that, LWJ doesn't really /know/ WWX so his attraction feels very idealized. WWX is the bad boy that goes against the rules and LWJ wishes he could be that (or with that) but it's almost a childish infatuation from their Gusu days that never evolved into something more mature. And WWX? I can't see how he'd like LWJ as anything more than in a physical sense. Even their obnoxious "Back then I wanted to sleep with you" confession scene is purely physical. He doesn't really know LWJ or respects him, LWJ is just a familiar face in a world that is against WWX and he's a hot body that likes him. LWJ is an easy score in a way, he's a safe option. And it'd be SO interesting if they went into that, but instead it's played like the only true love (dont forget, they are meant to be as the ONLY gay pairing in MDZS which I find insane when everyone else has more chemistry and in the end gets shat on so wangxian can fuck in a bush. I mean, LWJ leaves LXC to be depressed and alone after everything LXC stands for and did? Fucking ridiculous.)

It tries to "subvert" tropes but ends up being more stereotypical than anything. WWX was almost meant as this jock-y rebellious hotshot but instead we got a quirky twink, early 2000s shonen protagonist and every yaoi's Uke I've been seeing since like 2008. Are they suppossed to be different because the "stoic white-coded" one is not the bottom? Is the bar this low? If anything, this ornament top is the most usual top, let's be real, LWJ barely has personality or growth or focus, he's there to fuck WWX.

This is a petty reason but MXTX's "wangxian is the only gay couple" everyone else being implied straight as if to highlight just how real their love is that they are gay in time period where it's frowned upon, even though Yi City and 3zun combinations had more chemistry than anyone is. Annoying. And so is the "Don't ship them with anyone else and don't switch their dynamics" that fuels some of the most obnoxious people in the fandom to go after fanwork creators that do/like things differently.

All in all Wangxian is THE face of danmei, they are the most known even outside of danmei circles and they are extremely mediocry written for that. I mean, fuck, you put straight couple in their place and I guarantee no one would like it, it has the depth of a high school hormone-riddled couple who have different classes and "only" get to see each other during breaks and make out during lunch with others at the table, idk it's so fucking annoying to me when I know there were better options, when WWX had so many interesting dynamics that got shat on in favor of bland ass ship and I'm tired of having to like it/tolerate it just because it's gay.

Thank you for coming to my ted talk, this was extremely healing 🤣

#hcs #hc #this is of course my subjective perception of it #i just can't believe this is the most popular couple #if it was less so or not the main one i wouldnt even mind them #also i'm fine with them as standalone characters #just not together.#i will still make them together as a scenery to MY ships cause it makes it feel more canon #but i definitely dont go out of my way to interact with that ship #which is fine #there's more than enough of it y'all dont need me

85 notes · View notes

lackadaisycats · 2 months

Note

Hello, this is the perosn who runs the “Lackaroses” blog (You can look at the pinned post on that blog and you can see that if links to this one)

I just wanted to say that it makes my day whenever you like or re-blog one of my posts! Your work inspires me so much and I’m so happy that people enjoy my fan work!

I also wanted to ask if you’re okay with me using some of your patreon art, someone brought it up and I wanted to make sure it doesn’t upset you. To be clear, I don’t straight up get the images off your patreon, I find them off other websites like Pinterest and google.

Hello! Likewise, it's always lovely to see your boards pop up in my feed, and I'm glad to see others are enjoying them too! It's a little difficult to give a blanket 'yes' to posting things found on Pinterest and Google, since sometimes people will yoink things from the Patreon and post them around before I've made them public. If it's a mini-comic that looks unfamiliar, a tutorial, or a full character sheet that wasn't from the pilot, or animation that wasn't from the pilot, please don't, as that's more likely to be a Patron-only thing. If it's just a standalone drawing or painting of a canon Lackadaisy character, though, it's fine to use it.

#lackadaisy #lackadaisycats #art #mood boards #stim boards

241 notes · View notes

snapscube · 6 months

Note

So you mentioned the Amazing Spider-man movies, what are your thoughts on them? For me; I was pleasantly surprised by 1 AND 2. Like 2 is bad, real bad, but the jokes were legit, Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone are just...an amazing on screen couple and until the transformation Harry is a really fun villain....just sucks that most of the movie is exposition about peoples relationships to one another or experiments done mostly off screen.

TASM1 is perfectly serviceable as a standalone project and was definitely not the worst jumping off point, but it struggles to really properly understand Spider-Man/Peter as a personality. Peter absolutely doesn't have to be a goody two-shoes loser, all of the best adaptations of Peter imo can have some serious attitude and grit to their persona, but TASM1 kinda over-corrects on the Tobey Maguire "shy nerd" angle by making Spidey a bit too much of a dick. I remember the movie getting a lot of praise for finally making Spider-Man funny and quippy, praise I similarly gave at the time, but it really... doesn't do that nearly as much as ppl gave it credit for??? There's like ONE scene where Spider-Man is kinda jokey with someone he suspects to be Ben's killer, but that scene kinda stinks because he's not quipping as much as he's like actively cruel lmao. Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone had great chemistry though and you can tell Marc Webb knew his stuff when it came to directing that kind of romantic tension, seeing as how his previous project was 500 Days of Summer. All-in-all, it's a Fine movie but it's not a fantastic adaptation of the things I personally like about Spider-Man.

TASM2 is so much more intriguing to me to watch and to talk about. It's genuinely baffling how that movie ended up like it did, but in a way that almost anyone could have predicted. That movie STINKS. It's really really bad. But it also has kind of the opposite problem to TASM1 in that... TASM1 is a good movie that doesn't properly showcase the character of Spider-Man, whereas TASM2 is a garbage movie that features some of the best live action Spider-Man scenes/setpieces we had seen and would ever see to this day. It's sincerely tragic how many great INDIVIDUAL MOMENTS are in that movie, and how loosely connected they are by some monumentally stupid studio meddling. That movie has everything going in its favor with Andrew Garfield in the lead, the best live action Spider-Man suit to this day, the most thrilling and well rendered swinging sequences put to film, and the occasional glimpse of a true Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man that is down on the ground connecting with and watching over not just the city itself but the people within it. There's a montage in the middle of the movie that features Spider-Man on his daily patrol and he comes across as just so PRESENT and on the same level as the people he protects, meanwhile in the audio track you hear newscasters and interviews fiercely debating whether or not what he does is actually worthwhile. And that shit HITS. But unfortunately that kind of stuff is still too rare and it far overshadowed by Sony desperately trying to make a Spidey Cinematic Universe without earning it. Ultimately they had all of the pieces to make a truly definitive adaptation of Spidey that I feel like almost anyone could get behind, but they just... couldn't. Even Spider-Man PS4, commonly lauded as one of the most definitive Spidey stories of all time, uses SO MUCH of the same DNA of the Amazing Spider-Man films, but the difference is that it had the space to be only exactly what it needed to be. Nothing more, nothing less. Anyway I could talk more about this for sure but I'm looking at the length of this write-up and wincing already LOL.

328 notes · View notes

iguessmyfishisgay · 3 months

Text

Okay here's a little updated post about my thoughts on Chester and Norris vs Jon and Martin.

They're absolutely connected in some way. There's plenty of reason to think so. Getting the "some of him" statement (case? is that what they're called now?) after the tragedy of Jon and Martin not knowing how much of Jon would be left if they banished the entities? That's too obvious to ignore. And the glitchy names in the credits too is a good reason to think it's Jon and Martin's voices, not just Jonny and Alex's.

But I think we're forgetting that Protocol can be listened to standalone from TMA. Any connections between the voices in the computer and other characters are not going to be a big thing, lest it become confusing for new listeners. So perhaps they're a version of jmart, but I don't think they're *our* jmart, similarly to the parallels between Alice and Tim. Come on, an office flirt who copes with jokes and has a younger brother they absolutely adore? Yeah Alice and Tim parallels are going *hard*

If the third voice is Jonah we won't know for a while because it's not Ben voicing it, so it won't be Elias's voice.

I'd also like to put forward the idea that maybe this universe doesn't have the entities as we think of them? Clearly these cases have been happening well before Chester and Norris showed up, which is presumably when the fears would have been pushed to this reality if that's what happened. What this could mean exactly I'm not sure. Maybe they're even more amalgamous than before, lines blurred more than the previous fears or maybe no lines at all. The filing system seems to reflect that fact, imo. There's so many different ways you can categorize things, it's basically futile. Gwen and Alice's argument over Zombies or Reanimation is a perfect example. Zombies WOULD have been fine. Because zombies are just reanimated dead people. Maybe the verbage of "reanimation; partial" is more specific, but zombies is by no means incorrect.

I totally started rambling on a completely unrelated topic but yeah, here's my thoughts for ya.

#sorry if none of this made sense #i wrote it over the course of two days and i havent had caffeine this morning yet #the magnus protocol #the magnus pod #the magnus protocol spoilers #the magnus protocol theory #tmagp #tmagp vague #tmagp spoilers #the magnus archives #tma #tma spoilers #tmagp chester #tmagp norris

97 notes · View notes

jhilsara · 2 months

Text

I Can See You

Pt. 1/ Pt. 2/ Pt. 3/ Pt. 4/ Pt. 5/pt. 6/Pt. 7/Pt. 8/Pt. 9/ Pt. 10/

Pt. 11/ Pt.12/Pt.13/Pt. 14/Pt.15/Pt.16/Pt.17/END

Mariana Jimenez-Watson or MJ works in a normal pub living life paycheck to paycheck. Nothing exciting happens to her except the occasional drunk getting thrown out. She's 24 working away and finds a wrench thrown into her very boring life. His name is Hobie and she thinks maybe, a little excitement isn't awful. In fact she might start to crave some change for once.

Small moments of Hobie meeting his world's MJ. AKA I made an MJ variant and I think she's neat.

Characters are completely aged up and this takes place after what will happen in beyond the spiderverse. I just made a little MJ variant and I think she's neat. I've been writing standalone scenes of her life after meeting Hobie and my friends really liked it so I thought I'd polish it up a little and post it. Nothing serious just some silly fun. (also I'm sorry I'm just not a y/n person, I just want to make characters who are developed and can have their own distinct personalities.) My MJ may not be for everyone but I hope you give her a shot.

Can also be read on Ao3 X

Chapter 1

She’s wiping off the counter and looking over at the small dodgy stage the pub has in the corner. She’s surprised the thing hasn’t collapsed in on itself. It has a couple of the instruments set up already for the band tonight. She feels someone bump her hip and she looks over to see her coworker raising a brow at her.

“Why don’t you wrap up early? You’re meeting your friends, right?” Andy asks her smiling.

MJ shrugs, “It ends in like fifteen and the band doesn’t start for another twenty. It’s fine, I don’t even think they've walked in yet.”

“Go on, grab a good spot at the front. I got it back here.” Andy encourages.

MJ rolls her eyes and keeps cleaning, “No seriously. I don’t even know who this band is. My friends want to see them. I’ll wrap it up in ten and look for them. I need to change out of these clothes anyway.”

“Whatever, you know half of the girls in here are already buzzin’. They’ve been drinking for the past hour looking for a shot of courage.” Andy says laughing.

MJ nudges her letting some giggles out too, “Stop, Andy! Leave them alone, they’re barely old enough to get in. They just want to see some hot musicians.”

“Who’s gonna tell them that most of the musicians are indeed, not hot, when they do small pub shows like us?” Andy says starting to pop open a beer for a customer.

“Oh, come off it, apparently this band does everything and anything. Good too, at least my friends say.” MJ says handing Andy another beer for the same group.

“You better clock out, you’ll miss your window to not be trapped back here.” Andy tells her looking at the clock.

“Oh shit, thanks!” MJ quickly dodges around the bar to get to the back so she can grab her bag and change.

She rushes into the bathroom and quickly changes into something a little cuter than her pub shirt and black slacks.

She pulls her rosy pink slip dress out and easily slides it on. Shoving her other clothes into her backpack. She adjusts her necklaces and looks into the mirror, checking to make sure her hair’s still passible. She adjusts the twin buns but just shrugs a minute later. It’s a punk show it doesn’t matter if she looks nice. She checks to make sure nothings on her and makes her way back out.

She throws her bag back where her other belongings are and wades through a decent sized crowd. She can’t find her friends but does make her way to the front. She checks her phone and sees that her friends had texted and canceled coming last minute. She groans in irritation, and turns to try and leave but the crowd has gotten thicker and she’s stuck. She’s jostled into someone who grabs her waist and she whips her head around smacking the hands.

“Hands off!” she growls looking up at the man. He throws his hands up but his grin is slimey. MJ keeps her glare.

“You bumped into me sweetie.” He chuckles.

She rolls her eyes, “Doesn’t mean you get handsy with me.” She mutters turning back to the stage.

She sees her coworker Lars come out to push the crowd back, she feels a little better knowing she has an easy escape if she needs to. He settles in the corner of the stage, watching the crowd. Within a few seconds the band comes out and she settles a bit. She might as well enjoy the show.

She feels someone sidle up to her side, pressing into her, and she turns her head to see the same man from before smiling at her.

“Back up. I don’t play this game.” She hisses out shoving him off of her.

“C’mon, not a big deal, it’s a massive crowd in here. It’s tight is all.” He says slurring his words.

MJ puffs her cheeks in irritation and points her finger into his chest, “Do not fucking touch me again.” She flashes her eyes over to Lars and he nods his head, acknowledging her.

The guy takes a step back but is still looking at her in a predatory way that makes her skin crawl. She turns to the stage to try and pay attention to the band.

The music’s loud, booming, and it has her moshing with a small group near the front. She’s having a blast for the first few songs, then she feels it.

The guy that’s next to her starts to grab her bum. She turns around and slaps the guy across the face, “I said to not fucking touch me!” She shouts at him. The music’s too loud, the lights are in her eyes, and her bodies hot with rage and adrenaline. She turns to try and spot Lars but the man grabs her by the arm tightly, pulling her closer.

“C’mon I know a slag like you when I see one,” He starts to say, mouth too close to her face so she can smell how intoxicated he is.

She reels back her free arm, hand curled into a fist, but before she can deck the drunk someone else does.

She sees combat boots fly by and her eyes widen as she sees the guitarist drop kick the guy who’s grabbing her.

Her jaw falls open in shock as the man lands perfectly fine in front of her. His guitar strapped to his back is all she sees as he stands between her and the man he just sent to the floor. She for the first time in a while, is stunned speechless.

“Mate, I don’t know who raised ya, but we don’t touch people without consent at my shows.” The guitarist says, voice deep and his face hard as he glares at the man on the ground.

The man tries to crawl off the ground, the crowd around them parting to see what’s happening.

“She’s with me man! What’s your problem?” the man tries to defend pointing at her.

Her anger continues to boil and she opens her mouth to defend herself but the guitarist responds first.

He nudges his head back to her and gives a bitter laugh, “Ya need a better lie cause she’s with me.” He tells him.

She shuts her mouth, looking at him like he’s mad for only a second. She most certainly is not with him but she sure as hell will act like it. She doesn’t want to spend the rest of the night with some creep touching her.

Her eyes flash to the other guy who’s face pales, “Sorry, sorry!” He throws his hands up in defense laughing, “Didn’t know she was yours!”

The guitarist shakes his head and crosses his arms tsking at the man. “Wooooooooow,” he drags out exaggeratedly. “She doesn’t belong to anyone.” He says, and gives a small chuckle.

The other guy is looking at him, a little in fear, as he tries to laugh along with him. The guitarist quickly stops chuckling and throws a quick but hard punch to the creep’s face.

“Apologize to her.” The guitarist demands voice harsh and cold.

The man’s holding his bruising cheek, looking at her eyes filled with fear, “M’sorry alright! I won’t touch you again I swear!” he shouts rushing through his words.

The guitarists steps forward getting closer to the guy at eye level, “For the record, it shouldn’t take me lying about us being a couple for ya to respect her.”

The second he steps back MJ sees Lars come through and grabs the guy dragging him off. He tries to fight against Lars but that man is bigger than most and he works in security for a reason.

“You alright?” The guitarist asks his voice much softer, turning around to face her.

She’s stunned for a moment and just nods her head, “Uh yeah, yeah, thanks.” She says shocked.

“No problem.” He grins and jumps back on the stage.

She’s a little floored at what just happened but she looks around her and the crowd has closed in again, looking back up at the stage.

“Sorry for the delay there, but a not so friendly reminder, don’t act like a prick and touch people without consent ya? You will not be escorted out without a black eye.” One of the other band members says addressing the crowd.

The crowd roars with cheering as they start up another song, MJ really can only laugh and just rolls with it. The whole time making intensely too much eye contact with the tall guitarist whose wicks frame his face as he vibes with the music.

By the time the shows over, she’s able to wiggle herself out with the help of Lars. A lot of the crowd stays, still high off the show.

“Great save back there Lars, maybe we should hire that guy when people get handsy with the staff.” She jokes smacking his chest.

“Piss off MJ, I was gonna throw him out after you clocked him but, well, I didn’t have to.” He laughs holding the door to the back open.

“Night Lars, seriously though, thanks for taking the guy out.” She laughs going to grab her backpack and head back home.

He shakes his head at her and steps back helping to pack up the band’s equipment.

“Oi! Hey,” The guitarist from before comes up to Lars, “Is that girl here? The one who had that prick touch her? I wanted to talk to her.” He says.

Lars looks over him curiously raising a brow, “Oh, no she left. She works here if you wanted to try to find her.” He offers casually.

“No, no, just wanted to know she’s okay.” The guitarist replies shoving his hands in his vest pockets.

“Oh, I promise she’s fine, takes a lot more than that to shake her.” Lars chuckles. “She gave me a warning look and I was ready to grab him when he put his hands on her.”

“Good, good.” The guitarist nods in approval. He starts to walk back towards his band, who’s packing up the last of their stuff.

He keeps the name of the pub in the back of his head with the image of a pink girl with maroon colored hair.

Two weeks pass and MJ’s behind her bar working on a few drinks when she sees a seemingly familiar face plop a seat.

She gives the person their drink and turns to address the new face, when she’s met with a familiar voice. “Hey stranger.” The guitarist from before greets cheekily leaning into the bar top.

She beams at him, “Hey! Lars told me you were asking around for me after the show. Sorry I didn’t stay.”

He just shrugs nonchalantly, “No biggie, just wanted to know you were fine is all.”

She gives a soft laugh shaking her head, “Trust, I’m good. I was gonna clock him and let Lars handle him but…” She trails off giving him a pointed look, “You handled it just fine.” She teases.

“Oof, I woulda loved to see ya give him a mean right hook though.” He chuckles.

She shakes her head in disbelief, “Maybe next time.” She smiles softly.

“Oh? Already planning the next time we’ll hit someone who’s being a sexist prick?” he smirks leaning closer to her on the bar top.

She gives him a genuine laugh, loud and it shakes her body. “Absolutely.”

A beat of silence passes between them before she decides its time to do her job, “So, what can I get ya?”

“Your name preferably.” He replies easily flashing her a smile.

Genuine surprise flashes across her face and then a hot flush across her cheeks.

“Depends,” She fires back, teasingly. He raises a brow at her.

“I’m MJ to most people, especially the ones I’ve just met.” She says easily. Grabbing a clean glass.

Something lights up in his eyes for a split second, like he’s found something he’s been looking for.

“I like that, what’s it short for?” He presses.

“Mmmm, I don’t know, you are asking for my government name and I don’t even have your first name.” She says playfully tilting her head.

“Hobie, Hobie Brown.” He says without giving it a second thought.

She bites her lip, hesitating, but caves under his warm eyes. She feels a pull towards this man, and maybe she’s just projecting because he stuck his neck out for her, but she feels pulled to him none the less.

“Mariana Jimenez-Watson.” She gives him.

He grins so big it could almost split his face, “I like Mariana.” He tells her softly.

Her face warms up again and she turns to fill the glass with water. “Let’s settle for MJ alright?” she says.

“Alright.” He murmurs.

#my art #spider man: across the spider verse #hobie brown x oc #hobie brown x reader #hobie brown #across the spiderverse #spiderman atsv #atsv hobie #MJ Watson #spiderman fanfiction #spider punk #spiderpunk

78 notes · View notes

utilitycaster · 1 year

Note

What ACOC fanon are people getting so upset over?

Come traveler. Let me tell you a tale. For I, too, was unaware of it until they went absolutely bugfuck all over Twitter. But if you don't want the whole long-winded epic: people shipped Belizabeth Brassica and Saint Citrina and while there has been no evidence indicating this will or not be confirmed or even mentioned they FREAKED OUT about how Matt would OBVIOUSLY destroy the "widespread" fanon (it is not widespread), specifically implying he'd do so in a bigoted way. Then some D20 guests noticed because the people saying this are not like, unknown fanartists (in fact one implied they had been asked to create art for the season but forgot to check their DMs) and were like "this is entitled and stupid and needlessly cruel to Matt, who is like, a guy we personally know and generally like." The people then, rather than saying "my B" and taking this to the DMs like a normal person who wants to talk shit, repeatedly doubled down. As of a few hours ago they were accusing Jasmine Bhullar of subtweeting them when she was in fact merely promoting an entirely unrelated show, it's sparked both a heartfelt discussion about how Matt's discussion of body dysmorphia has helped people and a conversation about how there's toxicity in all fandoms but the D20 community refuses to even acknowledge it; and also I think they've burned their chances of ever doing fan art for an actual play of any size in LA, Chicago, New York, London, or the centroid that represents an equidistant point from all the McElroys which is, I believe, hilariously for Amnesty fans, in the Monongahela National Forest.

Anyway POV we're around a campfire, I'm drinking something lightly alcoholic, and you wish to hear of The Drama At Length:

Do you remember Belizabeth Brassica, aka Broccoli Pope loosely based in appearance on Queen Elizabeth I (technically renaissance rather than high medieval but like...people constantly mix those up in D&D so it's fine)?

Great. Now do you remember the Rocks Sisters? Not the twins played by Siobhan and Emily; Amethar's four older sisters who died in the Ravening War, before the story started: Rococoa, Lazuli, Citrina, and Sapphria. Rococoa was a general; Lazuli an archmage (and Caramelinda's wife before she died; Caramelinda then married Amethar because while Lazuli had been a love match, this was a beneficial marriage for political purposes); Citrina a devotee of The Bulb; and Sapphria a spy and diplomat. They get talked about a lot, for sure, but their presence in the story is to be absent and to haunt the narrative.

Anyway the fanon is that Citrina and Belizabeth were in a relationship. In canon, I believe all we know is that both were devotees of the bulb; that Citrina held positions that might be considered heretical by some (she was a passionate believer in love matches and supported Amethar's marriage to a commoner in the Dairy Isles) and that Belizabeth ordered that she be killed.

Here's where this gets fun. So ACOC aired pretty much exactly three years ago, and while I think it's considered by many to be a high point in D20's oeuvre, a lot of fans have, you know, kept up with D20 on the whole and not dwelt on it in depth. But a small group of people have been consistently focused on this ship between an NPC who is vitally important to the narrative but shows up in fewer than a third of the total episodes; and a character dead before the story ever started. Which, I need to stress, is fine; the joy of headcanons is playing in the empty spaces.

Flash forward to 2023: a creative director who was generally opposed to revisiting past campaign settings and preferred standalone has just amicably parted ways. Neverafter has gotten mixed reviews (I have to see the last 8 episodes; this is anecdotal but some of the editing choices, plus the both dense yet meandering plot, brought the momentum of a truly fantastic TPK and resolution early on to a shuddering halt), and really nothing but A Court of Fey and Flowers has truly stuck for some time. The fandom has been clamoring for Fantasy High Junior Year for quite some time to no avail. The switch to 10-episode sidequests from 6 episode sidequests has met lukewarm reception. In short: D20 could use something flashy to revitalize their next sidequest. Enter: Matt Mercer as DM.

Now, a lot of D20 fans who are not part of the (significant) overlap with CR fans hate Matt Mercer. This is in part because a lot of people who got Big Mad about ships in Campaign 2 went to D20 and proceeded to badmouth Critical Role, a show they happily watched and made art for until roughly episode 107-ish of Campaign 2, proclaiming it homophobic (wrong two women kissed); racist (one of the women who kissed is a dark-skinned woman played by a white woman, which would have still been true if she kissed the other woman but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯); and probably problematic in other ways. To be clear I am not saying Critical Role is above criticism, and it has made its missteps, but like, the fact that these complaints showed up conveniently only when a ship didn't happen and mostly from like, white teenagers who proceeded to simultaneously call the cast transphobic and deliberately get their names wrong means this is not the criticism that is valid and worth considering, as is the fact that technically Matt had nothing to do with the ship not happening, but they've realized being an asshole to Marisha about her character's romantic choices will rightfully get you flayed alive. Also some D20 fans just hate Critical Role in the way that if you live in Boston you're supposed to hate New York and vice versa but if you say "why? what if I just want the baseball boys to have a good time together?" no one can answer.

Anyway here's a diagram to illustrate the group I'm talking about; they're the green dot:

So: a couple of them decided a smart thing to do on Twitter in front of God and everybody was to say that they were worried Matt would contradict this "widely established" fanlore because he is not plugged into the ACOC fandom. They then proceeded to specifically (jokingly, but like, in a shitty way, still where everyone could see it) say that Matt would probably introduce Belizabeth as being married to her husband because she is 100% straight.

Now there's a bunch of problems here, and people pointed them out. Namely:

This is a weird thing to assume Matt would do, ie, automatically make an arbitrary NPC definitely straight, even if you're joking about it; like, he has a pretty decent track record for making NPCs of varying genders and sexualities, especially by C2 and C3.

This is not even widely established fanlore; this is a tiny group of fans of ACOC. See below for more on that.

Even if it were widely established fanlore, it's unlikely Brennan would know either.

Even if it were widely established fanlore and Matt or Brennan were aware of it, they are under no obligation to adhere to fanlore, because it's fanlore, not the established canon of A Crown of Candy. This does not make fanlore bad! It just means that creators are allowed to ignore it in the same way that fan creators are allowed to ignore canon; this is a two-way street.

Therefore, because this is fanlore, even if Matt did say "here is Belizabeth and her husband, and she has only ever been involved with men" this would not be homophobic because the character's sexuality has never been established and straight is one of the possible sexualities she could have. Obviously if he went super hard on her straightness that could get weird but that's a fucking bonkers stretch.

When people pointed it out, this group and a few other people who just fucking hate Matt kept dismissing them as CR fans. Then it caught the attention of various D20 guest cast members or people in the broader TTRPG scene, who have pointed out that like...the actual play and TTRPG industry is a place where basically everyone in a particular region knows everyone else and they are all good friends and this is shitty. The D20 fans mad that Matt is DM-ing The Ravening War kept doubling down and started making outright ad-hominem attacks on Matt (notably his appearance and dress which is like, shitty and irrelevant to this fanon thing anyway even before you consider the body dysmorphia) and whining that because they've made some charity fanzines, a thing people have been doing since the dawn of Star Trek TOS, they deserve...something. People rightfully called them out as 1. entitled brats and 2. needlessly cruel. They keep whining that CR fans are dogpiling them when in fact like, the entire TTRPG community including, as far as I can tell, the D20 community who overlaps with CR fandom and even the D20 community that does not but is neutral on CR, is like "you suck, you started it, this fandom is not exempted from typical fandom toxicity, and you will look back on this in 5 years and vomit from embarrassment."

Anyway this is all kind of tiresome, but also pretty funny because literally I'm expecting a bunch of fanartists who are immensely high on their own farts to be 100% blacklisted from ever receiving a commission from like, any Actual Play of note and also a lot of fans; there's an outpouring of support for Matt that far outstrips what there would have been without a handful of idiots starting shit; and also the season is fully filmed anyway so if this ship was confirmed noncanon, it happened a few months ago anyway and there's nothing anyone can do.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, pretty much all these losers are still 100% going to watch The Ravening War anyway so like, this has all amounted to a net positive for everyone but them.

#answered #Anonymous #long post #i'm just...not maintagging this and if you need to filter it do what you have to

216 notes · View notes

pinkyjulien · 6 months

Text

🟨 Appearance Creator Mod Infos Dump

With the release of ACM (Appearance Creator Mod) I wanted to dump some information that might be useful, especially for non-modders that want to play around with it!

(I had no involvement with the making of this mod at all, nor I have any tie with AMM development, just throwing my two cents as a regular user, player and modder)

You'll find some How To, Tutos and other useful heads-up under read more, if you plan on using this mod as a modding tool (sketching up outfits ideas before modding them as custom appearance for your blorbo for example) or simply want to play blorbo dress up!

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

First, You might want to get familiar with these suffix, as you will need to identify what part of a character's outfit you wanna swap

▶ Garments Components Names

h0 - Character's head mesh he - Eyes mesh heb - Eyebrows mesh ht - Teeth mesh hx - Head's details meshes (pimples, makeup...) hh - Hair mesh t0 - Character's Body mesh t1 - Torso Inner Garment (T-shirt, Tank top...) t2 - Torso Outer Garment (Vest, Jacket, Hood...) a0 - Character's Arms mesh (Cyberarms...) l1 - Legs Garment (Pants...) s1 - Feet Garment (Shoes, Socks...) i1 - Accessory / Item Garment (Cyberware, Belt, Necklace...)

▶ Garments Rigs Names

ma - Man Average mb - Man Big mc - Man Child mf - Man Fat mm - Man Massive wa - Woman Average waf - Woman Average Fat

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

⚠ It's important to note that Garments are NOT automatically refited to the character! You can use a WA garment on a Male NPC but it won't magically fit his shape

⚠ Johnny and Kerry, despite using the MA rig, both have a thinner bodies and most of the garment will float and appear larger on them

⚠ A lot of Garments have their own RIGs and physics, and might T-pose / break upon being swapped on your NPC of choice! For this reason, Hair with physics will automatically break as well

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

AMC is a standalone window in game, and not included in AMM main window!

After spawning a NPC, the AMC window should fill up with the spawned entity's garment components (and yes it can get crowded really quick, especially on smaller monitors and resolution)

Yes, It also works on NPVs and NPC+! 🔥

Everything on these windows can be overwhelming especially if you're not familiar with modding, so I'll throw a little example here using Scorpion

First I want to get rid of his hood and vest, without using AMM's custom appearance, using only ACM

In the list, I look for his Vest and his Hood component

We can easily turn them invisible by clicking the "Toggle" button Make sure to also disable any decals, stickers, and additional component (his vest also has a decal component, see in the screenshot)

The little icon next to a component's name indicate it has been edited in some way

I'll now switch his tank top for something else

Click on "Select From List" next to the "Mesh Path" of the desired component (in Scorpion's case, t1_060_ma_tank__corset) Open up the "Torso" list, and you'll be able to click on any of the listed t1 and t2 garments!

⚠ As mentioned above, garments doesn't magically refits on characters; Scorpion use the Man Average body and rig, anything that isn't a "ma" garment won't fit him correctly!

⚠ Another thing to be aware of is that a lot of garments's might break around the collar area! However if you plan on using this same mesh in an outfit, don't let that scare you, as it's easily fixable in blender

Export your desired mesh and look for the "NeckCollar_JNT" bone and simply rename it to "Neck" (blender will put some numbers next to it but that's fine, ignore that)

I'm going to switch to Valentin here to showcase how to deal with potential clipping 🤏 Since Valentin's body is customized, bit chubbier, he always needs refiting

Let's say you swapped your character's top for something else but part of his torso clips out

To put my boys titas away, I'll look for his body component (t0)

Click on "Chunk Mask" to open the garment's submeshes list

Garment's meshes are broken down in multiple submeshes that can be easily chunkmasked (disabled) at will to deal with clipping! This is why NPC usually don't even have a full body mesh when taking off their clothes, they are chunkmasked to avoid clipping :D

I will disable the Submesh 1 by unchecking the "1" box

Don't be afraid to click on multiple box and see what gets chunkmasked on different meshes! You won't break anything 👌

aaand for now that's about all I can think of that might be confusing for users- tho if you have question don't hesitate to ask on this post, to reblog or to come into DMs!

#cyberpunk 2077 #Appearance Menu Mod #Appearance Creator Mod #CP77 Tutorial #Tutorial #long post

62 notes · View notes

asexualbookbird · 10 months

Text

Goodbye June! I'm six books ahead of my arbitrary reading goal! I also bought I think as much as I read whoops. I also did a lot, art wise, and turns out Project DIVA has a display tap mode and I'm kicking ass at that game. I can complete extreme mode songs! Even managed to not fail out of an extra extreme song! I am miserable, healthwise, but my hobbies have never been more productive.

Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim ⭐⭐⭐⭐Fun! Exciting! Well done! Wanted more! Excited that there was a second one! Adorable love interest! Deffo recommend!

Wake the Bones by Elizabeth Kilcoyne ⭐⭐Fine? I guess? I expected something like House With Good Bones but it was mostly forgettable and too focused on romance.

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman ⭐⭐⭐⭐Delightful! Actually glad I waited so long, because I don't think I would have appreciated it ten years ago

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke ⭐⭐⭐⭐ I spent the whole time trying to figure everything out and had a wonderful time about it

The Dragon's Promise by Elizabeth Lim⭐⭐⭐Disappointing, characters I loved before were annoying here, the dragons were Mean and not the focus at all, still enjoyable in it's own right but Crimson Cranes could have been a beautiful standalone

The Keeper of the Night by Kylie Lee Baker DNF Sad I didn't enjoy this, I was looking forward to it, but it just. Was not good. Seraphina dealt with similar themes and executed it better (I didn't know they dealt with similar themes, but it was kind of fun to compare!) Most notable complaint was wordlbuilding said the reapers could hear a whisper across a noisy room and then Ren was eavesdropping on them, and talking, in an airvent above them and no one noticed lol

I'm such a mood reader, but I think I'm going to try to put together a stack of books I want to read this month and do my best to stick to it! It might make me get through my shelves quicker. Somehow, the floor stacks keep multiplying. Send help, I'm being buried.

July I'm definitely finishing my Name of the Wind reread, even though I missed book club, and I'd like to get through a stack of graphic novels I got for my birthday! Other than that, who knows! Lets go!

#bookbird babbles #reading wrap up #june wrap up #monthly wrap up #books #booklr #did i work on this while finishing the dragons promise?#the world may never know #one day i will figure out how to duplicate animation cells in CSP #today is not that day lmao #i didn't think keeper of the night deserved a spot in the gif tbh #i read like 20% of it #i really was looking forward to it too :(

56 notes · View notes

jonathan-samuel-smith · 7 months

Note

Do you plan to continue the dragon Jon and Bard Dami?

Why did something happen in Damian past to him only wants peace now ? I assume this because his family is knights and everyone is just allowing him to be a bard I can stop thinking that this boy has already seen too much on both sides

Did the girls tell the king about the bloodthirsty dragon?

Or will Damian's family find out?

I honestly really want to but I don't want to commit to it so I tried to leave it off at a good stopping place! I think the au is really fun and I'm thinking I might write more standalone stories in this continuity. I wanna recover from covid before starting or working on any long fics, just in case I get worse and die and leave everybody in suspense lol. I don't expect that to happen I just have anxiety disorder.

Those are very good questions! I think definitely something has to be done to free these dragons. And I want to catch up with Lois and Clark, are they human and dragon or both dragons? I haven't figured that out yet.

I want to give Damian a happier story where he actually gets to choose peace instead of participating in his father's intense war on crime. And in dragon age, bards are sort of assassins in addition to merrymakers, so I think he might be more classically trained than you'd expect. I don't think it's quite so bad as what he went through in canon, though.

I did have a thought, batman would think every character in dragon age is a bad person for killing lol. You can't just give people brain damage to get them out of the way, Bruce, that's still unethical. Not talking about Gotham wars but that also applies.

I think it would be really fun to go backwards in the timeline and show how Jon and Damian met and became friends and why Damian trusts him. I can do that as a one shot.

I want more Kathy and Maya, I want them to have their main character moment. So I want most of the actual plot of changing the world to be up to them. But Damian and Jon could still introduce them to helpful allies and provide support!

Oh imagine one day Kon just kidnaps Tim to add him to his horde and Damian's worried about his missing brother and Jon just mentions offhandedly that his brother just found his human who acts just like Damian's brother. And Damian goes "HE DID WHAT?" Jon does not see the problem, Damian is crying like "he's so stupid why do I have to keep explaining that kidnapping is bad". And Kon is like, a disaster himbo with an empty horde cause he was born yesterday and he brings Tim along to collect stuff and Tim's like "hold on a second. This is just a dumb ass mf guy. Regular dude. What??" And he reasons with him and gets to go home. But Kon tries to come with him like "sweet cave. Nice horde. I'm glad I picked you to be my human, this is sweet." Tim is like "??? Get out??? They'll kill you???" Kon is like "nah it's fine you can hide me I'll be quiet. Got any grub?"

#timkon #kontim #damijon #jondami #ask answered #anon ask #damian wayne #jonathan samuel kent #damian al ghul wayne #jon kent #super sons #supersons

33 notes · View notes

carnal-lnstinct · 5 months

Text

Fic Author Self Rec

I know me and the moots have been delivering some beautiful writing since this first went around so we're bringing it back before the end of the year! Post 5 of your favorite fics you've written and share a little about it ♥♥♥

Tagging: @yeowangies @actuallysaiyan @dreadsuitsamus @beneathstarryskies @emmacornell @missnebulaa @vegeta-bananabluish + anyone else who writes and sees this please share and talk about your favorite things you have written

My five favorites from my own fics(of this year):

— Gogeta Soulmates Valentine

Plot-wise, this was definitely in the top three of my favorite vday requests and I really enjoyed writing the soulmate concept. Gogeta is still one of those characters that doesn't come as easy to me to write but when I get it, I get it! And he's always softer than what I intend for which I love.

— Bedtime Story

**JJK SPOILERS** I honestly ain't been the same since Toji's second death and what it reveals about him. First death? Well okay you died doing what you loved sweetie time to rest. Second death? Please sedate me I have not known a singular day of peace! 😭😭 But I needed a Toji fic that wasn't him just blowing out backs. So I just wrote him being a dad and husband, happy, existing in the same space at the same time as his wife and child while she tells a bedtime story to Megumi that becomes about them AND THEY ALL LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER. Wishing everybody but the Zenin clan and Mahito a very peaceful rest of the year.

— All My Soul Within Me, Burning.

Wrote this mostly for the Halloween season and Fn-f movie, also I weirdly had just noticed at the time majority of Gero's androids have the same blue eyes and wanted to do something with that. This is probably one of maybe two fics I wrote this year without any pairings or romance. With this AU, I toyed around with the idea of an angry spirit (a la fn-f lore style) being trapped inside his own body from his violent death, only now his body is this "bio-android prototype" shell and he represents Android 16 instead of canon 16. After Bulma fixes him, the spirit starts to regain some of his memory and fights against Gero's android programming. I wanted to continue this but of course SOTS took priority and now I think it's fine as a standalone one-shot for its little twist ♥

— Royal Pains

Praise to the only threesome I wrote this year! Virgin!Vegeta plot has to be the highlight of the year though, I love how involved everyone was with this concept and the many fics that were born from it. ♥♥♥♥ Consider this one a fave more for what the prompt inspired from a few of my favorite fic writers than what I wrote, but I'm always proud anytime I get to write a flustered Vegeta. It's the only way I know how to write him.

— Back At The Garden

Obviously ss4 Goku is in my faves. He is my king 😭♥ This one is just a plot bunny that got stuck in my head until I wrote it down. One thing about my TWYSILY fics, they're probably gonna get sequels nobody asked for and this is always a safe space for SS4. ♥

#didn't get to write too much this year #but really proud with what I could do ♥

20 notes · View notes

anneapocalypse · 1 year

Text

Too Many Thoughts About Sera: A Love Letter

This post was originally part of a big long write-up I did after my first complete playthrough of Inquisition a few years ago and posted on dreamwidth and later here. It has been slightly edited to stand on its own here, but it's mostly the same. I thought it might be worth it post it as a standalone, so here is a slightly less analytical and more feelingsy post about Why I Love Sera So Much.

I understand not everyone likes Sera and that's completely okay but I am going to request that you refrain from outright dumping on her or making personal attacks on her writer on this post.

If you're interested in my more recent efforts at an in-depth analysis of Sera's character and background, you can check out my Sera Series.

Knowing my affinity for difficult, complicated, "unlikable" female characters, I was probably doomed from the start. But the truth is I did not go into this knowing I would love Sera. I just wanted to get to know her, regardless of how I ended up feeling about her. So I romanced her with my mage Trevelyan, the first Inquisitor I actually finished.

And at the end of that journey... yeah, I love Sera. I love her a lot.

So let's talk about Sera. As a character, as a companion, and as a love interest, because in this playthrough I got to experience her as all three.

And disclaimer up front that I know Sera is a controversial character in the fandom and there are a variety of reasons for that, so if you don't like Sera, that's fine. Some of this may read as an impassioned defense of her, and it kind of is, but it's not a manifesto; it's mostly that I have a lot of thoughts and feelings I'm excited to share.

Sera is a city elf orphaned young and raised as the ward of a human noblewoman, Lady Emmald, an upbringing which has left her with both a troubled relationship to elven identity, and a deep hatred of the nobility. We get only a brief glimpse into Sera's childhood with Lady Emmald, as she does not like to talk about it, but we can gather that the memories that have stuck with her are not good ones, most notably the "pride cookies" story that Sera will share with the Inquisitor at a high enough level of friendship. Lady Emmald would buy cookies from a local baker and pass them off as homemade, unwilling to admit she wasn't good at baking. To keep Sera from finding out, Emmald told her the baker hated elves so that she would never go there. She led Sera to believe she was hated and to hate in return, all to protect her own pride. To this day, cookies bring up bad memories for Sera.

World of Thedas Volume 2 suggests that Sera may have inherited Lady Emmald's estate when her guardian died of illness sometime before the Blight, but rejected her inheritance, wanting nothing more to do with that life. I don't believe this ever comes up in the game, however.

As an adult, Sera is a member of the Friends of Red Jenny, a loose network of common people who collaborate across Thedas to benefit one another's interests and offer some degree of protection from or revenge for the abuses of nobles where they can. Sera's Red Jenny affiliation is a nice bit of continuity from previous games which I like a lot. The Friends of Red Jenny are first mentioned in a cryptic little side quest in Origins wherein the Warden delivers a small painted box to a location in Denerim on the instructions of a note looted from a body after an ambush, for the reward of a few gold coins. In Dragon Age II, Hawke can clear the streets of bandits and undesirables at night and return to "A Friend" in the Hanged Man for rewards; at the end of that quest line, "A Friend" is revealed to be a Friend of Red Jenny. And now in Inquisition, we have a Red Jenny companion, who brings her network of Friends and unorthodox methods to the Inquisition. (It's also suggested in the war table operation "Red Jenny and the Tantervale Charade" that Hawke's cousin Charade Amell is a Jenny operating out of Tantervale in the Free Marches, which would explain a lot about Charade's roundabout ploys to get Gamlen's attention!)

I think it's safe to say that Sera's personal identity is most strongly rooted in a kind of class consciousness; she identifies first as what she would call a "little person," a commoner.

And it's worth noting that Sera doesn't respect social climbers any more than she respects the existing nobility, which comes out a lot in her banter and in her responses to various quests. She disapproves, for example, if in "Noble Deeds, Noble Hearts" the Inquisitor gives proof of Fairbanks' noble heritage to Clara; she approves if you respect Fairbanks' wishes to keep his parentage a secret and live as a commoner. In "Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts," she disapproves of reconciling Celene and Briala, but approves of any outcome that involves blackmail (either against Gaspard or against all three parties).

I think there's an interesting contrast to be had, too, between Sera and Vivienne, both of whom are characters I like and find quite interesting. And despite what you might think if you take their conversations at face value, I think their relationship is quite a bit more complicated than Vivienne being more privileged than Sera and looking down on her. Vivienne dresses, talks, and behaves like a noble, yes—but she's not a noble. Vivienne was born to Rivaini merchants and raised in the Circle of Magi, where she rose to First Enchanter of Montsimmard and then Enchanter to the Imperial Court of Orlais—a position that according to Leliana was once "little more than Court Jester" until Vivienne herself worked to make the appointment a position of respect. Sera is elven and common-born yet inherited a noble fortune; while she probably would never have held a title in Ferelden, she could have had greater financial resources at her disposal, had she not rejected them. It's easy to forget, but both Sera and Vivienne have come from fairly humble origins, and both of them have been presented with some unique opportunities given those origins.

Vivienne holds considerable influence in Orlais for a mage, but we should not forget that she has had to work for every scrap of it. Vivienne's manner, the way she approaches every situation with confidence and poise and her head held high, is just how one survives in Orlais. If you're not looking down at someone, you're looking up at them, and if you're looking up you're under someone's boot. On the one hand I don't love the way Vivienne treats Sera, especially a romanced Sera; on the other hand I must admit that "It's nothing personal, darling. I am demonstrably better than most" is an absolutely sick burn and I did laugh. (These days, I am frequently more amused by companion acrimony than I probably should be; I think somewhere around DA2 I just gave up on being bothered when companions don't like each other and instead embraced the comedy gold that often comes with it.)

There's a delightful little bit of party banter where Blackwall (who shares much of Sera's distaste for the nobility) needles Vivienne a bit about how she must miss being away from the luxuries of Val Royeaux. To this, Vivienne breezily responds, "I miss them. I do not require them. But please, continue to imagine me a pampered lady, if it makes you feel superior."

I am reminded here of the ongoing tension between Solas and Sera that comes out frequently in their party banter. At one point Solas will remark that it is a shame she was "denied an elven life," and Sera fires back, "Ooh! You think the only reason I'm not elfy is because I had no choice? Poor me, right?" At multiple points Solas will offer opinions on Red Jenny. When he asks Sera, "Do you wish to disrupt the nobility, secure a title? Or change the political structure entirely?" Sera responds with dismay, "None of it! I don't want any of that!"

Set these next to each other and they show us how Sera and Vivienne are alike and how they are different. Vivienne has worked hard to achieve upward mobility, and the reward for her success is that everyone assumes she is too privileged to know anything else. Sera has deliberately rejected upward mobility (as well as "elfiness") in favor of class solidarity, and is rewarded by people assuming that she is too stupid and ignorant to have chosen anything else.

Sera and Vivienne do not like one another, and probably never would, and Vivienne especially doesn't approve of the Inquisitor romancing Sera and makes that known (I'm sure the reverse would also be true if Vivienne were romanceable, which she isn't, because the world isn't fair). Both of their identities and worldviews are rooted in a certain understanding of power and power structures, but they approach those structures completely differently. Vivienne is a climber, believing it worthwhile to try and reach the top. Sera despises climbers, preferring to stay on the ground and fire arrows upward. And yet as different as they are, they have both made very deliberate choices with regard to their social status, and both will in their own way call out the assumptions other people make about them.

I think the biggest question that arises with Sera is, if she thinks the nobility is so terrible, then why isn't she trying to actively change the existing power structure? This is certainly Solas's confusion, as expressed in this conversation:

Solas: I do not understand you, Sera. You have no end goal for your organization. Sera: Nobles get rattled, and people get payback. I play in the middle. Solas: Why not go all the way? You see injustice, and you have organized a group to fight it. Don’t you want to replace it with something better? Sera: What, just lop off the top? What’s that do, except make a new top to frig it all up? Solas: I…forgive me. You are right. You are fine as you are.

This, I think, gets at some of Sera's core beliefs about power and why she prefers to act from below rather than trying to get to the top. Sera views structural power as inherently corrupting. Anyone who makes it to the top is going to frig it up.

That's what being at the top means.

We might call it a failure of imagination on Sera's part that she doesn't seem to be able to consider the possibility of creating a different kind of power structure, only replacing who's at the top. And, well, fair enough. But consider even in our own world, with a variety of governing structures on display for us, the challenge of imagining something completely new and then envisioning a realistic path to it. (And if you've got that all figured out, let me know!)

Sera is class-conscious, Sera identifies and organizes around class-consciousness, but she is not a revolutionary. We might criticize that about her, but why lay that burden on her, specifically, when the Inquisition is packed to the gills with people who have far more structural power than Sera? This setting is full of injustices, but it is worth questioning why the burden of righting them should be laid on this character, specifically, when she is already dedicated to helping other "little people" in smaller and less risky ways.

Once the Inquisitor gets friendly with Sera, they can ask her more about herself, about where she's from. In this conversation she'll talk about the Red Jennies in Denerim where she grew up, and she'll mention that some other Jennies were "a lot more serious about being serious" and that it got some of them killed—a reminder that Sera's "little people" have plenty to lose. And Sera really hates anyone who gets less powerful people hurt and killed for their own ends. I think this is really at the heart of both her visceral hatred for nobles and her passion for Red Jenny, and this becomes really clear during the "The Verchiel March," when Sera will get more and more upset if the Inquisitor keeps talking to Lord Harmond and appears amenable to working with him. She never set out intending to kill the Verchiel nobles, only rattle them a little, but after Harmond murders an unwitting informant in front of her? She's furious. She wants him dead. And if the Inquisitor is willing to work with him, that makes the Inquisitor someone who can't be trusted.

So let's talk about Sera's relationship to elven identity. There's no question that it's a complicated one; one of the first things she says to an elf Inquisitor (which at the time of writing I'm currently playing) is an offhanded "Hope you're not too elfy." You don't get an approval hit for saying she's "different for an elf," but she will respond to the effect that she doesn't appreciate assumptions being made about her based on her being an elf, which doesn't seem unreasonable, honestly. I've seen Sera's attitude framed as self-hatred but I do feel like it's a bit more complicated than that; has she struggled with self-hatred in her life, yes, absolutely--the cookie story makes that very clear. But I think that to simply say Sera hates herself for being an elf is an oversimplification in the same way as saying Vivienne hates herself for being a mage. Sera definitely has some insecurities, and I think Vivienne needles her accurately when she remarks that Sera actually cares a great deal what people think of her. At this point in her life, however, I don't feel like she hates being an elf so much as she hates when all people (elves and otherwise) see in her is their own presumptions about what elves are or should be, and not who she is.

Elven identity is a complicated thing in this universe, and tensions between city elves and Dalish elves is certainly nothing new. Dalish elves largely view themselves as the sole keepers of elven culture, calling city elves "flat ears" and in some cases barely regarding them as elves, and yet I would argue that alienage culture is also elven culture. Though they are not referenced as a group in-game, we also see plenty of examples of what we might call "country elves"—elves who live on farms and in villages in more rural areas, some of whom still maintain a bit of the ancient language and a belief in the ancient gods. (The elf family you meet in Lothering comes to mind, as well as various NPCs around the Hinterlands.) Even among elven servants, which could be regarded as a sort of sub-class in itself, there seems to be a kind of subtle understanding and solidarity, based on Briala's point of view in The Masked Empire. All of these are elven culture.

Sera is on the extreme end of not identifying with elven culture generally, but I want to draw a distinction between Dalish culture (which might be called a kind of Elvhen reconstructionism) and elven culture generally. Sera is not fond of the Dalish, but I'm also not sure how much contact with Dalish elves she's actually had, considering that she's lived most of her life in major cities. So I have to wonder if her particular irritation with the Dalish comes from interactions with actual Dalish elves, or from their general reputation. I'm not saying the Dalish wouldn't be rude to Sera; many of them definitely would. I'm just not sure if her feelings about them come from direct experience with the Dalish or from other elves generally.

Because Sera does feel alienated by elven culture generally, and if you listen to to her ambient dialogue and banter throughout the game, if you take her on quests and listen to the things she says, it becomes really obvious that being told she's the wrong kind of elf is a particularly sharp pain point for Sera and has left her with a lot of anger and resentment. I don't know from whom exactly this has come, because she never goes into details, but it's obviously something she's heard a lot.

I had Sera with me for most of Jaws of Hakkon on this playthrough, and she has some really interesting dialogue for Finn, a young Avvar man who is in danger of being disowned because due to a disabling injury, he is unable to complete the ritual hunt for his late father's funeral rites. "Wait, so he does this or he's the wrong kind of elf?" Sera snaps, like that's something she's been told repeatedly. She clearly feels a powerful compassion and solidarity for Finn, insisting the Inquisitor give the gifts of the hunt to Finn himself so that he can keep his father's name: "We help him. Not asking. Do it." Upon doing so, Sera remarks to Finn, "Say what they want, and you can belong. But maybe when you figure that threatening you was shit, come look for a Jenny." She wants him to have the option to stay with his community, but also for him to know he has somewhere to go should he choose to leave. I really love that. To me, this is Sera at her best, reaching out in solidarity and compassion to help someone outcast, offering them a place to belong.

Sera certainly has her less-sympathetic moments too. Her absolute glee over the revelations from the Temple of Mythal is honestly not cute. I have sympathy for where Sera's coming from on elfy things, but she's really spiteful about it in this case: "The Dalish. Are going. To shit themselves!" She'll get angry at a human Inquisitor (as she did at mine, who was in a romance with her) just for trying to be respectful of what they saw in the temple and not outright denouncing all of elven tradition as rubbish. "You're not even an elf! Why are you being so damned elfy?" There are several ways to resolve this fight, and it certainly wasn't a relationship ender with a human Inquisitor. (I can't speak to elf Inquisitors since I haven't romanced her with one yet.) I certainly don't think it's out of character for Sera, but it definitely exposes some of her pettiness and insecurity. If she were fully secure in who she is, elfy or not, she wouldn't need "elfy elves" discredited to validate her.

But Sera's a flawed character, and that's not a bad thing. I think she does show some growth in subtle ways, too—if an elf Inquisitor befriends her, her journal will include the line: "Book. Read elfy stuff for her (scratched out)." She's trying! In Trespasser her journal entries express concern about whether the Inquisitor is "all right with the elfy stuff" and wanting to be there for them and help if they aren't. A big step forward from the Temple of Mythal!

I also enjoy the way Sera actually comes around to certain people you wouldn't expect her to like, or at least respects them. Of Josephine, Sera remarks that "She's as good at humbling her kind as I am, just with less mess. Knows her business, if you have to have it." And there's this beautiful banter with Dorian:

Sera: So you’re fat with it, right? Dorian: Me? Are you referring to…? Sera: Do you sleep on silk while gold shits down all over you? Are you rich? Dorian: I left all that behind. Although I do miss the gold-shitting from time to time. Sera: You really left it, huh? Knew you weren’t all bad.

I talked quite a bit about Vivienne above, so let's talk about how other characters interact with Sera.

After a successful march through Verchiel, Cullen notes at the war table, "Potential future gains may be impressive. Do not tell Sera I said so."

Why not?

This quest is Sera's first chance to prove her value and the value of her organization to the Inquisition—and she's proven it. (Yes, things go a bit sideways later, but that hasn't actually happened yet, and she continues to bring information and quests to the Inquisition after that setback if allowed to stay.) So, that Cullen doesn't want to acknowledge her value after she's demonstrated it? Well, that sucks a little! We sure wouldn't want to let one of our allies know she's valuable to us. All because he doesn't like her personally—and because she's not important enough to be worth showing respect. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, honestly, and illuminates a certain feeling I have about the Inquisition generally.

Let's review the backgrounds of the rest of the Inquisition's inner circle, shall we?

Cullen Rutherford, Knight-Captain turned Commander, respected enough to gain the trust of Leliana and Cassandra which is not nothing. Leliana, experienced bard, used to mingling with nobles, friend of the Hero of Ferelden, Left Hand of the Divine. Josephine Montilyet, noble-born, Ambassador. Cassandra Pentaghast, Nevarran royalty, Seeker of Truth promoted to Right Hand of the Divine at a remarkably young age. Dorian Pavus, Tevinter nobility, albeit estranged from his family, still influential enough to be apprenticed to a magister. Varric Tethras, born to a powerful dwarven Merchant Guild family, popular author, friend of the Champion of Kirkwall. Vivienne, Enchanter to the Imperial Court, mistress to the Duke of Ghislain (which in the Orlesian court is considered a respectable enough position to be declared openly). The Iron Bull, Qunari Ben-Hassrath, commander of the Bull's Chargers. Solas, the Dread Wolf of elven legend and though currently known only as an elven apostate, quite vocal about his authority on elven history and his dismay over Sera's everything.

Compare all of those Very Important People to: Blackwall, (not) Grey Warden, traitor, murderer, and liar. Cole, spirit, lost soul. Sera, commoner, elf, Red Jenny.

At the end of the day, you can spin it any number of ways and it's generally in-character for most of them so this isn't a writing complaint, but people look down on Sera. Most of your advisors and companions are either noble-born, used to mingling with nobility, or otherwise Someone Important. Even Blackwall, the closest to Sera in terms of class (and you can tell by how well they get along in party banter), spends most of the game pretending to be Somebody that he isn't. Cole's whole personal conflict is a crisis of identity and fear of his own nature. Sera is low class, crass, broad, common—and an elf to boot. And she doesn't try to hide any of that. She is who she is.

And her commonness is her value. She sees things in a way that people like Cullen and Josephine and Cassandra cannot. She has a perspective most of the Inner Circle doesn't. She is valuable because she is nobody. The founders of the Inquisition make plenty of noise about "restoring order" and you get a lot of dialogue about how the Inquisitor gives hope to "the people" and how important they are to "the people." Well, Sera is the goddamn people. Not to say that she represents all commoners, but if the Inquisition has contempt for the manner and perspective of someone like Sera, they are going to have that same kind of contempt for many of the very people they claim to be protecting, when they actually meet them face to face.

Sera's crassness and prankster tendencies come across as disrespectful, but it's worth asking why exactly everyone else is deserving of her unconditional, unearned respect when they show none to her. Just because they're Very Important People of higher social standing? Is that not an assumption worth interrogating? I think it is, and I think Sera's very presence in the Inquisition invites us to examine assumptions about class and status and respect that might otherwise go unexamined in a story like this. And if you've read my Masked Empire essay, you know that I am 100% here for storytelling in this universe that dismantles the fantasy trope of the benevolent nobility.

It's no mystery why the companion Sera gets along with best is Blackwall, and they have some great friendly banter. I think she might even get along fine with Cole if she didn't know he was a spirit, and if he didn't constantly say out loud really on-the-nose things about people's hidden pain, because that's the stuff about him that freaks her out. If he was just a weird dude who wanted to help people and went about it in some strange ways, I think she'd be cool with him.

I gained a lot of sympathy for Sera over the course of the game and romancing her, but frankly nothing gained me more sympathy for her than seeing how shitty other characters are to her. Sera's used to being treated like dirt, but she's also not going to curtsy and thank you for the pleasure. Fart noises, indeed.

But that's not actually a complaint about the game. Like I said, I think the unexamined disdain for someone like Sera is pretty in-character for most of our Very Important Companions. And I like all of those characters a whole lot, so I'm definitely not trying to slam any characters to uplift Sera. It's good for characters to have flaws. Sera has them. Every companion has them. That's good writing.

Where I do have some complaints is in the ways in which the Inquisitor is able to talk to Sera—or rather, the ways they're not.

For many of the dialogue options with Sera, even the most positive response kind of implies that you're just tolerating her or humoring her. Even when you're trying to role-play as aggressively positive toward Sera as possible, the Inquisitor as written and voiced comes off as confused by her and by Red Jenny. Of course that will make sense for some characters, but the total dearth of a "Sounds rad, count me in" option when Sera tells you about her organization is a source of continual frustration to me. Why, exactly, don't I have the option to say I think Red Jenny is awesome? Why is that not a thing my character can think? Of course I should have the option to say otherwise, but why I assume I won't get it and will need it explained to me over and over?

The concept of the Friends of Red Jenny is not that hard to understand. People with little power banding together to exercise a bit more collectively should not be stupid or baffling. It especially should not be baffling to a mage or a surface dwarf or a Vashoth qunari. It also shouldn't be that confusing that they're working together to achieve small goals and desires without looking to start a large-scale revolution that would likely just get a lot of them killed. It's not complicated, but the game seems to expect you to view it with, at best, confusion, and at worst, contempt. It starts to feel like you're expected to either dislike her or at the very least not "get" her, and that rubs me the wrong way not just because I do like her, but because it feels railroady. I should have the option to vibe with Sera right from the start if I want to.

(For the record, I'm pretty sure the reason this happened is because the Inquisitor was originally conceived and written as a human from a noble family. Basically everything that's annoying about the Inquisitor's dialogue with Sera makes so much more sense if you look at it from that perspective, and it's also not the fault of her writer. Mark Darrah has talked about this more recently, and the Bioware team never actually wanted to have a human-only Inquisitor but had to start out that way because EA wanted the game to ship in 2013; it was a whole thing.)

Where you do get the option, it's fun to vibe with Sera. It's real fun. She has some excellent friendship content that is not unique to the romance. There's the pranks sequence, wherein Sera wants to play a few tricks on the Inquisition's advisors. I can see how this could be off-putting to some people (I don't like practical jokes in real life) but I can appreciate Sera's stated reasons for doing it: to humanize these Very Important People to their underlings and as such, to improve morale. In that way, it reminds me of the Iron Bull taking the Inquisitor to mingle with the rank and file disguised as one of them, to hear their perspectives and give names and faces to the people depending on their leader. It's also really nice for breaking up the Everything Is Super Serious tone of the Inquisition as an organization and injecting some fun into it. Again, Sera just brings an energy and perspective to the Inquisition that no one else does. Then there's the roof talk about the cookies, after which you have the option to go spend some "friendly roof time" with Sera whenever you like. For a reluctant Inquisitor, I think Sera can offer a much-needed escape from the gravity of their work, and I certainly found her becoming that for my Inquisitor Eleanor.

I find Sera's little window alcove in the tavern so charming. I also love the idea that she just claimed this space and told everyone to piss off. Maryden might have had a thing for Sera, if the song is any indication, so maybe she went to bat for her. Either way, Sera has her own little space and collection of curiosities.

The codex entry you can read nearby features a note from Quartermaster Morris questioning whether it's a good use of Inquisition resources to give her a cabinet. A cabinet. She doesn't even have a private room with a bed, but how dare she ask for one wooden bookcase for her stuff. Again, it's everyone treating Sera like a waste of space, like she doesn't deserve even one nice thing, while Skyhold's "visiting dignitaries" have their every whim catered to.

And let's talk about stuff. Let's talk about Sera's collection of things, a collection for a girl who's been reminded her whole life of all the things she doesn't deserve. A collection of the few things a girl considers important or interesting after she rejected the inheritance left her by her abusive foster mother. Parts of Sera's catalog are very funny! I will always laugh at "Goblet. Fancy cup. Cup. Shit goblet." But I also find something very touching about Sera's little collection of things, and what she writes about them, especially with a romance active, as she gradually adds things that remind her of the Inquisitor she loves. I could write pages just talking about how much I love Sera's journaling but some bits I especially love:

Silk. Bolts, not arrow-bolts. Soft! Make something!

Use silk for her! Underpants (scratched out). Tit thing (scratched out). Scarf (scratched out).

Silk is stupid. Get book to sew better. (scratched out).

Silk comes out of a worm's arse! Yuck!

That book she reads. Why's it good? Soooo long (scratched out).

Stupid book. Didn't cry.

Book. Learn Human stuff for her (scratched out). Every book is human stuff.

Sera's gift quest, "A Woman Who Wants for Nothing," is delightful and made me so glad I chose this romance. In it, Sera mentions that she got the Inquisitor a hat. Well, actually, what she says is, "Listen! I got you a hat, but it's ugly, so I drew Coryhe-whatzit's face on it, and stuffed it with apples. Everyone's hitting it with sticks! I really hope you like it!" and then runs away giggling. The Inquisitor, charmingly, takes this SUPER SERIOUSLY and decides she needs to get Sera a gift in return. She then asks everyone in the Inner Circle for gift ideas, with the responses ranging from supportive befuddlement to outright annoyance, with Solas and Vivienne both giving approval drops and Vivienne sarcastically replying, "Just shave something rude into your privates, dear. She won't get the redundancy." (If you entertain this suggestion, you get a hilarious bonus cutscene later.)

But when the Inquisitor returns to Sera to confess that she asked everyone for advice but couldn't figure out a proper gift, Sera replies, "Wait wait wait. You went to everyone and said I was your lover? Right to their faces?" She doubles over laughing before adding, "Best gift ever."

It's a funny scene, and a funny quest, but at the core of it is the fact that the best gift Sera could receive is someone who accepts her, who isn't ashamed of her—someone who's proud to claim her and love her for who she is.

Usually, the expression that a person "wants for nothing" means that they already have everything they could possibly want, but for Sera it takes on a different meaning. Sera, probably the least wealthy member of the Inner Circle, with her rejected inheritance and her little collection of things—Sera for whom the greatest gift is not another thing for her shelf, but simply acceptance.

In Trespasser, Sera has a new journal codex, "Sera's Past and Now Things" and it's even more of a delight, with such notes as "Back to the Winter Palace? Never good. Pack bees." It also features Sera's worries about the Inquisitor's mark, which is slowly killing them, with increasing distress for a romanced Sera and such heartrending bits as:

It isn't... (scratched out).

I will... (scratched out).

We have to... (scratched out).

(The book is scuffed, as though thrown against a wall. This page also has what look to be tear stains.)

I have arrows. They leave and things die.

I get to keep something.

Why don't I get to... (scratched out).

Make her happy. I will keep that she was happy.

I also found it really touching that her love being there makes the Fade okay for Sera, and helps her face something she's afraid of.

If you can look beneath the surface with Sera, I think her friendship and especially her romance is really moving, and taking the time in-game to get to know her is extremely rewarding in the end.

The Inquisitor and Sera can get married at the Winter Palace during Trespasser. Inky can wear her terrible dress uniform and Sera wears an ugly dress and shouts "That's our bells, nobbers! We frigging win!" from the balcony. It's perfect.

I love Sera, I'm so glad I really got to know her, I'm so glad I decided to play her romance. This one's a keeper.

#sera #sera dragon age #dragon age sera #dragon age inquisition #blunders of thedas

83 notes · View notes

sinswithpleasure · 10 days

Note

hai sins :hugg:

kariselle super duper hot, im actually jealous how u were able to set that up so well and casually, makes me think abt how I do my own worldbuilding like maybe in Minecraft terms turning down my render distance(?????) to just the characters and less to the environment

sisterly bonding also cool, named reader is something id love to try out. I haven't done threesome yet and I will be taking notes :DDDD in particular im interested in how you wrote in such a way that didn't take long, I didn't think abt it a lot before I started but after I did I've been avoiding threesome bc I felt they had to be long like 5k+ and have all the moving parts when you could just,,, do that which is awesome

tuesdays with you again named reader and this time fem, it's another thing I have an aversion to bc im not well into the intricacies of the female experience but reading eunbi I had to stop and think if it really really warranted that much special attention. the cut was also perfect tho that wasn't too hard to do in hindsight, just makes me wonder abt how I do my own cuts since im kinda insecure that I do them so often sakfjflshshdkf

this maybe wasn't the sort of feedback u were looking for lmao sorry but ily sins go to sleep :DDDD

hi box!!

okay let's dissect this part by part.

Kariselle exists because I work with characters, yes. I think the world around the characters can only be built when you have a grasp of what you want these two, three, four people to do with each other. It's the wrestling philosophy—I'm the booker of the show, and it's a sex show. I want the audience to see these two people fuck. These two really complement each other in some shape or form (character trait, like, for example, in To-Do List, Minju's naughty, and OC's corruptible and a bit of a pushover). Now, I have the complentary traits, and I can start selling the reason why they fuck: Is Minju exploring? Is she a known pervert? Is OC just a horndog? What does Minju want out of this? What does OC want out of this? Why do they have to fuck? I think this is an effective way to start a draft—knowing your characters first, and making a world around them.

For Sisterly Bonding, a threesome does not have to be complicated. You can actually just start with the sex scene, and sprinkle details in later. Writing does not have to be a linear process—this is something I need to learn myself too. You can absolutely just cut the story short, and sprinkle details of it into the smut instead. However, remember that Sisterly Bonding is Chapter 1 of a series, and not a standalone, so I do have wiggle room to spread my worldbuilding out, which results in what is posted.

For Tuesdays With You—I'm not familiar with that experience at all either. I'm absolutely shooting from the hip, but I've also tried to really make it as realistic as I can imagine or know through research. I'm pretty sure there's a girl out there who's read my work and went "this is bullshit" and left, but I don't think I'll ever know, unless they use this AMA to really tell me "haha ur shit" or something idk. I think I'm doing okay though, based on the comments on AO3.

Your cuts are fine, from what I remember. Don't worry about it.

:huggr:

Sex in the Box,

Sins.

#asks

10 notes · View notes

spopbang · 2 months

Text

Answering more questions!

Reminder:

Deadline for Writers is February 29th

Deadline for Artists is March 31st

As we get closer to the deadline for writers (which is Feburary 29th, 2024 so if you were waiting for the last second to sign up… now is your moment!), here's a round up of questions that have come up on this and other platforms.

❓ Does it have to be something new or can we just update an existing fic?

We answered this back in this post but it keeps coming up so we're just going to repeat: the point of this event is to make a burst of new content so only new fics are eligible.

That said, if you want to post a new, standalone installment of one of your existing AUs, that is fine!

❓ What happens if I'm assigned a fic to draw with a ship I hate or something that makes me uncomfortable?

Writers will specify their endgame ships and any content triggers when they submit their final check in.

Artists will be able to see these and also specify their shipping preferences or NOTPs when they submit their choices for fics to illustrate.

We'll make sure no one will have to work with any content that makes them uncomfortable!

❓ I was already a member of the SPOP Flex community so I'm already signed up for the Bang then, right?

No. While the SPOP Flex is hosting the event, the Big Bang has a separate database and you need to actually sign up so we know who is participating and get keep the balance of creators even. If you haven't signed up yet via the form, please do so, because if you're not on our list, you're not participating!

And if you don't remember if you signed up or not (I get it), DM us either here or on Discord and we'll double check for you.

❓ I signed up but forgot to grab the Discord link from the confirmation. How do I get it again?

The easiest way would be to reach out to the SPOP Flex team via their contact info listed here. But if you have trouble with that method, dm us and we'll try to help you out!

❓ Can I change what I'm writing?

Nothing is set in stone at this point so, even if you already submitted your first check in, you can change the title or what you are writing at anytime until the midpoint check-out.

❓ Are OCs allowed?

OCs are fine, so long as the main focus of your story is on the existing SPOP characters.

❓ Doesn't Discord allow AI to collect people's data?

The concern with that is with Discord's bot called Clyde which is not part of the server we are using for the Big Bang.

❓ I'm not going to be able to participate in the Big Bang but I would like to join the SPOP Flex community anyway. Is there a way to do that?

Yes! Any fandom creator is welcome to join that space and participate in future events. Just reach out to the mod team via the contact info here to see about joining!

OK, I think we got everything!

Any other questions? Our askbox is open!

This bang is gonna be BIG big and I'm really looking forward to the burst of content everyone we're going to have for everyone this May!

#spop #spop big bang #she ra #shera #fandom event #she ra and the princesses of power #big bang #dreamworks #netflix #questions

8 notes · View notes

sergeant-angels-trashcan · 4 months

Note

Hi! I'm interested in working through the Hatchet field stuff while I'm on break. Is there a recommended viewing order? Or can I jump in anywhere?

ahahaaaa i am SO SORRY I am just now seeing this. in my defense i caught covid about the time you sent this (and also infected my mom who does NOT do sick well) buttt if you're still looking,

tbh you can start anywhere, because while they're all related, they aren't connected--like you'll appreciate certain jokes and callbacks, but in that way I guess it's like an anthology.

Technically, the first musical is The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals. If you know someone who doesn't like musicals, they might actually like this one (PROMISE ME YOU'LL THINK ABOUT THE IMPLICATIONS) It's the first introduction to Hatchetfield and there are some recurring characters in the next musical, which is Black Friday. It is about Black Friday and consumerism and the amazing line "I've met god. he had nothing nice to say about you" BITCH OMG. The most recent musical is Nerdy Prudes Must Die, and honestly imo it has the least connections to the first two, so you could probably start with that one if you wanted--again, you'll appreciate some jokes more if you've seen the other two. It does also have more Lore, but I still think you'd be fine not knowing anything about it. I don't know that much about it and it was still good, because--

---there's a whole series of web-icals? Social Distance Musicals? Whatever, it's called Nightmare Time and they dive deeper into the lore of Hatchetfield and I've never managed to watch more than the opening number of the first one (it's a sound quality issue, i just need to watch it on a laptop or something) but look to be really cool and interesting and maybe deal with the same Hatchetfield? Because the Hatchetfield in each of the musicals is...not the same one. Or it is, but different timelines. Or different dimensions. Something. I think Nightmare Time does more into that.

Basically, you could watch them all as standalones, there's not really a plot that goes through all three of them, but characters and concepts that do.

But that's the order I'd do them in. From a theatre nerd standpoint, it's also really cool to see how they've evolved musically. Just technically with how they're putting numbers together and adding vocal layers. NPMD has a few songs that i would LOVE to see the sheet music for so I could try and figure out who is singing what. Honestly the best comparison I can make is "Wait For It" from Hamilton.

Anyway I hope you enjoy them!!! If you want to shout opinions at me i am here for that :)

#the guy who didn't like musicals #nerdy prudes must die #black friday musical #black friday was my favorite until npmd #a bully singing about he knows he's going to peak in high school? unparalleled #a song about imposter syndrome?#but then black friday has ;monsters and men' which is one of my favorite songs in a musical maybe ever #and also black friday which is heartrending #and tgwdlm has 'working boys' and 'america is great again' or w/e the actual title is #anyway i have feelings about the quality of these musicals #i think they are just as deep and musically complex as hamilton #i think they should be more well known than they are #i think they should be used in theatre classes in colleges #just the very nature of how they SHOULD be performed to achieve the end goal #is not something possible on broadway. just logistically #broadway isn't meant for epic theatre. epic the movement not the scale #'sarge are you saying any one of these musicals is better than wicked?' what of it #and i love wicked!#look starkid could do broadway but broadway couldn't do starkid #hatchetfield? more like hatchetFEELS

9 notes · View notes

explosionshark · 8 months

Note

Clarissa oxenfree for the character ask game? still love how you write her :]

General opinion/How much I care about them: she's like! My second favorite Oxenfree character! Right after Alex! I think a lot of this has to do with Avital Ash having an incredible voice and bringing a lot to the character but it's also bc her role in the narrative is so much juicier than the other NPCs. She's such a bitch to Alex, but you see a lot of warmth she shows to the people she cares about (Michael, Nona) and the duality there is so interesting. Plus she's so fucking haunted and she dies so gruesomely so many times and the ghosts want her soooooo bad and I think that's neat

A ship I love: I mean personally when it comes to the stuff I write it's Alex/Clarissa all the way. But I like her past relationship with Michael a lot too

A non-romantic relationship that I love: Clarissa/Nona friendship is sooooooo cute. They love each other! Clarissa salvaged Nona's birthday! They came out to this dumb fuckin island party together! Also I think Ren/Clarissa would have been fun to see more of - friend downgraded to creepy neighbor was a really fun line

The NOTP: uh idk. The only ppl I really see her shipped with ever are Alex, Michael and Nona and I'm basically fine with all of those?

My biggest headcanon about them: she is bi and she usually goes for bad boy/aloof types so Michael was an outlier for her.

An idea for a fanfiction I would like to write/read about them: (if I have none in my WIPs I'll make one up on the spot!) So there was this one longfic idea I really wanted to write for a while that was post-game Off The Island. Alex and Clarissa, having been the biggest targets of the ghosts are still dealing with aftereffects that the others aren't and they're basically hiding it from everyone. It manifests in different ways - Alex is possessed by the spirits of the Kanaloa victims. She slips into their memories, is influenced by their personalities, experiences hallucinations, etc.

Clarissa's haunting is bodily, trauma she suffered on the island echoing out across timelines. She wakes up with bruises, spits out bits of glass, you see her from the corner of your eye and her neck is fully broken, you blink and she's fine (ngl part of the point of this was just to give me an excuse to do a little bit of horror). Alex and Clarissa realize they're both dealing with a similar problem and team up to figure out how to help each other. They also have weird guilt ridden UST about it. Actually this last week I was going through some old WIPs and found part of this fic I think I could post as just a standalone so look out for that this weekend/early next week.

Something that makes me think of them: (a song, a character in another fandom, an animal, anything) "Some are Lakes" by Land of Talk is THE Clarissa/Alex song for me, it's just 100% vibeologically correct. But when it comes to thinking about Clarissa on her own I think she'd be a cold wave/dark wave type of girlie. Cold Cave, Tempers, Light Asylum, etc

#ty for giving me an excuse to talk about clarissa oxenfree! i love Clarissa Oxenfree!!!!#clarissa oxenfree #tee hee hee [twirls my hair]

15 notes · View notes

Last Seen Blogs

naneki-maid

💕

lokkesari

Untitled

seii-fantasy

Seijuun's fairytale

missplanetcroissant11

❥ 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐢𝐧

deniskhenry

Zeta project By Denis