I fucking love pretty much every version of the “celebrity x Just Some Guy™” trope that there is for Steddie, but in honor of having a totally reasonable amount of wine I’m going to tell you about the version I’m currently thinking about all the time, one of my dumbest yet also funniest AU concepts: modern!AU with streamers Steve & Robin and Hardcore Fan™ Eddie who writes reader-insert fic about Steve.

Steve and Robin, aka EvenStevens and BirdBox_ on Twitch (“My name is spelled with a P-H, Robin, that’s such a stupid name.” “No, it’s actually even better this way! You don’t want to just use your real government name for something like this, and you would just make your username ‘SteveHarrington01′ or something equally uninspired-”) frequently stream together and have a shared YouTube channel. They got popular doing reaction videos that quickly devolve into the pair of them bickering on camera, and since the internet just loves the ‘snarky woman and her emotional support himbo’ dynamic, they got very big, very quick. Plus, it certainly doesn’t hurt that they had the combined might of Dustin and Erica to help them bend the algorithm to their whims.

While most people recognize their platonic-with-a-capital-P soulmatism, there are still some that are convinced they’re secretly dating - they can’t decide if it’s hilarious or absolutely maddening that every time they try to disprove the rumors, they somehow get stronger. Robin doesn’t feel comfortable coming out to the internet yet, and without that trump card some people just can’t understand why they’re not dating.

...there are other sections of their fandom, however, that absolutely do believe they’re not dating. Mainly because they’d rather be dating Steve or Robin (or both!) themselves, and write all the reader-insert fanfiction you could ever possibly need about it. Robin is largely ambivalent to the concept of fanfiction being written about herself as long as they’re not writing smut, since at least that way they’re not insisting she’s dating Steve.

Steve on the other hand finds it absolutely hilarious how despite how much he’s changed, he’s back to being the heartthrob he used to be in high school - and, he’ll be honest, he thrives on the attention. He’s given everyone the green light to write whatever they want - dared them to make it raunchier, even - to the point where it’s a running joke that Steve will read your reader-insert fanfiction about him unless you tag it with some form of ‘Steve don’t look’. He even used the prevalence of fic about himself to come out on stream.

(Steve’s in the middle of re-organizing his flower field in Animal Crossing when he’s interrupted by a donation. “Hey Steve, really sorry to tell you this but people are writing porn about you... and they’re making it gay. Like writing about you getting fucked by a dude. Just wanted you to know so you can say something about it.”

Steve stops dead, his screen freezing on his open inventory. “Hey, uh, why the fuck would I have a problem about a fictional version of me bottoming? Or- wait, do I seriously give off homophobic vibes? I’m literally bisexual. Hey Dustin, can you ban that guy please? Christ, the nerve of some people. If that’s how you feel about people being gay, or about people writing things that I’ve already said I have no problem with, you can leave this stream right now because I don’t want you here.“)

Many people lost their minds after that stream, one of them being popular tumblr blog whorefireclub.

Eddie didn’t plan on starting a tumblr blog for self-insert fanfiction about a twitch streamer. Really he didn’t, and every time he thinks about it in terms that plain he kind of dies a little on the inside. It’s really all Gareth’s fault, for getting fed up with Eddie’s dumb parasocial crush on a streamer and daring him to just “get it out of his system already”. So, using a bare-bones anonymous tumblr and many, many beers as his cover story, Eddie posted some of the most quickly written and unedited pieces of writing he’s ever produced in his life.

Except he wrote it with an AMAB reader character - and for those of you unfamiliar with the reader-insert sphere, that’s like fucking hen’s teeth. People are pretty good at making things gender neutral at least in their descriptions, and sometimes the anatomy is vague enough that it’s ambiguous, but the majority is written with AFAB genitalia for the reader character.

Eddie’s little drunken post blows up, and at first, he’s never regretted a life choice more.

After thinking about it, and seeing just how many people left comments with their reblogs or came into his askbox directly to thank him for giving them the representation they wanted, he starts to feel a bit better about the whole thing. In fact, it kind of tickles his “protector of the outcasts” instincts; there are people who can’t enjoy the content they want to because it doesn’t gel with their anatomy or gender identity. Eddie could, hypothetically, if he wanted to be absolutely insane about this one hot streamer guy, help fix that problem somewhat.

A couple of months later and he’s become “the guy who writes inclusive reader-insert fic”. While a fair amount of his work is gender-ambiguous, both in anatomy and in avoiding gendered language, more than half is written for anyone who finds themselves underrepresented in the usual reader-insert scene; anyone AMAB, AFAB people who can’t do female language, he’s even written a few oneshots with intersex reader characters. He did research for it and everything. It’s certainly not how he planned for this to work out, but it’s actually kind of... nice. He’d written a lot of fanfiction in his youth, mainly about Lord of the Rings and Star Trek, and while this isn’t how he’d imagined returning to the hobby it’s actually really fun. (It’s making his celebrity crush on Steve a million times worse, of course, but he’s in denial about that so it’s totally fine.)

He’s a little shit, so his blog header has - underneath his personal details - a PSA that reads “Steve, don’t look at this unless you have the balls to shout me out on stream ;)”. Eddie thinks he’s absolutely hilarious.

Right up until he wakes up to find his following has exploded overnight, and upon checking his DMs from his mutuals realizes that - oh shit - that bastard actually did it and talked about his blog on stream.

And Steve said he liked it. Steve likes the porn that Eddie wrote about him. Jesus H. Christ, Eddie is so unfathomably fucked.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

if this were to exist as a fic it would be told through social media posts/DMs. one of those fics that uses unconventional (i.e. non-prose) formatting, you know the ones. the concept actually came from the fact I fucking LOVE fics like that, I’m a slut for any of that House of Leaves-type shit. one time I read a fic that consisted of 8 short stories and each one had a HTML puzzle you had to solve to be able to read it, e.g. one you had to highlight because the text was in white, another you needed to hover your mouse over to make it scroll through the text - I can’t remember the rest but it was SO COOL.

(or, to put this another way, I read homestuck at a formative age and it forever changed how I feel about formatting stories.)

hey saw ur comment on the man city fix it fic ab Jamie’s fathers death & was wondering what u disliked ab the Jamie’s mum and Simon part? not judging or anything im just curious!!

yeaaaaaaah so! from what ive seen at least this is a not particularly common opinion which is fine, im aware i have some particular biases and priorities and whatnot in this area, but it just… i didnt like that stuff at all. it really put me off actually, for a couple reasons. i'll get into why, but i know a lot of people like Really Loved that stuff and especially his mom - and it also gets a little down on season 3 and the writing team as a whole at some points lmao - so i'll put it under a cut.

(this got. very long. im so sorry.)

it basically boils down to a couple things: 1. what they presented us with doesn't hold water if poked literally at all in any direction, 2. it made me feel a little uncomfortable given the way everything else in jamie's arc played out, and 3. if they were going to do something like this, they needed WAY more time and narrative space to execute it well in general and specifically for ME to execute it in a way that didn't leave a bad taste in my mouth.

there are a few things that i generally dread when you have a character who's presented to have some serious trauma related to their family and specifically to an abusive parent, and one of those things is the sudden inclusion of another parent in there who is just. everything is totally fine and normal and happy and not at all complicated with them! it always makes me feel weird and bad when that happens, especially when there is no explanation provided for how that like. fits in with the abuse we know they experienced as well. that is a matter of personal preference, and i can own that. i just don't like it, and it makes me feel weird and uneasy. and that's part of it here, but what's also part of it is that i think that - my personal feelings about this type of character choice overall aside - they did not execute it well given the story they'd already presented us with, the way they used these new characters, and how much time they spent on it.

the image they presented of jamie's mom and stepdad is like… very simple and positive and shiny and uncomplicated. it's just good. they just love and support him and are a positive and affectionate active presence. and that might seem like an unfair characterization of it because we saw very little and we know very little of what their relationship is actually like - we don't know what might be complicated, what might be messy, how often they talk, etc - but that’s honestly part of my issue here. we were given a sliver of a glimpse into jamie's mom and his relationship with her and his stepdad when jamie as a character is someone who is hugely defined by his family history and the baggage and trauma and danger associated with it. if they were going to do this, they needed to spend way more time on it. they needed to introduce her earlier, do something to make it jive with what we were already presented about her: some vague mentions, half of which were in past tense, and all of which seemed to imply very strongly that if she were alive (which there was a lot of confusion about!) then they were likely to some degree estranged, because it seemed pretty clear with the 'i don't know if she would be [proud] lately' bit that he literally did not know what she thought of him in recent years. and like. it seems like i'm nitpicking, but again, this is a character who has been so strongly based in and defined by his family and the like. past and current danger and trauma associated with it.

especially given how little time or attention was given to everything else with his family, it was just way too late in the game to introduce these characters and be able to do them and their relationship with the existing characters justice. like you’ve already got a complicated story you’re skipping most of and not giving its due do you really need to add more really complicated stuff in there. and then just go actually it's not complicated don't worry about it :) like. that just doesn't work for me.

so that's where i'm at like, not only do i inherently dislike this sort of element introduced with this type of character, which is a me problem, i also think the story they presented in that episode with his mom and simon just flat out didn't make sense and they did not have the time to make it make sense even if they'd tried, which they didn't. like... if things are just fine and normal and easy with them and she’s just great and loving and supportive it’s like i. So What Happened, Then.

it makes his entire arc make less sense. if she's just Been Here what happened? why did he need to be reminded that not EVERYONE in his life was out to get him? why did keeley have to tell him to stop battling everyone that was just trying to help him? why is he so isolated and adrift at the beginning of season two? why did she never attend a single match? why did we never see him text or call or mention her in a contemporary way? like there COULD be answers to those things that make sense with what they presented, but we didn't get any of those answers and those are big questions to me given they comprise like... all of jamie's character arc lmao. at the end of the day, throwing in the stuff with his mom feels... really disrespectful to the story they wrote with him (that they already fell down on the job with) to just throw that in there with no consideration or attention paid to how it fits with or impacts anything already established.

i truly don't think that every question needs to be answered in a story. i am not saying that. i'm not saying someone needed to turn to the audience and go here's the logistic details of exactly how and when everything that happened with jamie and his parents happened. but there are some serious issues with like, telling a coherent story, and utilizing the extremely limited narrative space that a secondary character in an ensemble show can be afforded. (especially when in season three it really felt like they were already racing through characters and plot lines and backstory stuff like the goal was to just drop info just to Have It and then never address or do anything with it at all.) why did they do that, is what i keep going back to. you're telling a story with very limited space and a lot of characters. so what was the reason for that stuff to be there? so that someone could lay the 'yea he was a dick but he made you into this person! you're so strong now!' foundation for ted telling jamie to forgive his dad and 'disappointed teacher face' him into saying 'thank you' after the 'fuck you'? or was it just fanservice that you didn't think needed to fit with the rest of the story narratively or thematically? because that's where i keep going back to as well.

it just... and this is the bitchier, more spiteful part of me saying this, the part that was PROFOUNDLY let down by the way they handled the aspects of jamie's arc to do with his family and with the abuse he suffered, but it feels like an attempt to use happy sparkly fanservice-y funny and feel-good scenes with his adorable mom and sweet stepdad to like. pull way back on the rest of his whole situation with his family like see no he’s fine! isn’t it great how funny and adorable his mom is! isnt his stepdad fun! everything is fine actually things with his dad are just ~complicated because james drinks :) (and then all he needs to do about that is grow up and forgive, he's just a melodramatic mama's boy, the pain is his fault and he'll be fine once he Forgives, and rehab fixes everything). i don't have some kind of conspiracy that this was their actual reasoning but that's how it hit to me - whoops we don't actually want to deal with the abuse so we're gonna sweep it way under the couch and look! see! here's his cute fun mom isn't she great! (He's Fine Don't Worry About It, His Family Is Actually Sooooo Supportive!)

but yeah that's the bitchy and unfair part of me so. that's not really my main point.

(i also gotta say everything about that sequence with jamie and company at his mom's house feels like... tissue paper thin and very fucking weird from both a narrative and a logistical point of view. the stuff with the actual people of his mom and stepdad aside, what the hell was up with his room? what was that poster of keeley doing there. when did that go up. how old was he when he put it there. yeah she's older than him by a fair bit but not THAT much older. and if he was putting it up as like, a teenager or something, why is the rest of that room decorated for a seven year old. parents preserve their kids rooms like shrines this is true but the idea of a like, jamie in his mid/late teens or whatever putting that poster of keeley up but also sleeping in a little kid's bed still is like... did you think about this at all. it really does not seem like you did. At All. it just goes to my spiteful fringe theory about that whole sequence which is “oh this is pure 100% gratuitous backpatting fanservice that nobody actually thought about in any real way whatsoever”)

sorry this got so long but i have a lot of thoughts on this and they get kicked up every time i see posts gushing about how much people loved georgie or those scenes or whatnot like everyone is of course entitled to their opinion and i don't hold it against anyone! but that stuff hit way different for me and just added insult to injury in an episode that generally seemed to handle jamie and his situation in a way i found cringeworthy and weird at best and offensive and victim blaming at worst.

Ah ok! I think that's fair. I guess I was thinking there's always improvements I could make when writing them, and awkwardly worded my last ask

Hopefully a better question: What are some interesting things about the Master and Jo's relationship/dynamic that fandom often overlooks?

No worries! I just didn't want to try to dictate what other people should be doing. Even in your case, the most important piece of advice I can recommend is deciding how you see the characters and what you want to say about them.

For me, probably the thing that interests me most is the role the Master plays in showcasing Jo's character development and the fact that he doesn't underestimate her intelligence or competence, unlike the other characters around her. We see her grow more confident throughout their interactions, going from being afraid of him to trading barbs and learning to resist his hypnosis, and she's perhaps the only companion to even grow a little fond of him, at least based on the way she acts at the beginning of The Sea Devils. It's a very unique relationship among all the Master/companion dynamics. I also don't think there's another human that the Master not just likes but actually respects to some degree.

my assumption is that despite everything, you do not have a solid idea of every detail and pinpoint on the FNAF timeline. That part of canon is silly putty to manipulate and hurt Bill with more :3

I'd say I have a vaaague idea i tend to stick to (Fredbears opens in the 70s, Everyone kicks it in 2023, Timeline is: 2, 1(+4), SL, 3, FFPS, UCN(+World), then Security Breach in the 2030s). Bill being hurt is generally his own fault though I don't do that to him, he's just a jackass.

I was thinking about growing old with bakugo and it somehow evolved into thinking of him getting all sad grumpy old guy when u die first and now I'm depressed kms

Aw, Oji Bakugo🥺 always out in the garden watering his plants or yelling at the neighborhood kids (who he secretly loves) for bothering him with questions about being a hero. I really love the dynamic of like, one grumpy grandparent and one really sweet one, so I’m also gonna say that’s you and him in how you’re the one always handing out the onigiri and mochi you (both) made for the kiddies.

This is definitely super depressing though LOL, but let’s pretend you are him are/were both helllllllllllaaaaaa old so things seem a little more natural that way. Plus, you have your own kids + grandkids or even Kiri, Deku’s and everyone else’s, too, there taking care of him now that (when) you’re gone.

Calling him Grampy (or something) and asking him to teach them how to cook, or fix something, or even how to make the bed in that way you always liked… I think he’ll be okay🥺

…even if all his “jokes” consist of lamenting about the fact that no one is you:

“Oji! Oji!!! Guess what?”

“You brought my wife back from the dead?”

“Uh, no…? I got a—”

“Then I don’t care.”

“…”

“I’m just kidding, kid. Tell me that again.”

LMAOOO LIKE LITERALLY EVERYONE YELLS AT HIM FOR THAT😩😩😩

totally random person here asking you why why is dream state... by lucy dacus is on your nancy wheeler playlist

heyyy totally random anon!! thanks for asking me to open this can of worms :)

so, overall, this song has this really deep, mournful vibe that I think is at its core very Nancy Wheeler coded. there's this sense of loss of kinship and innocence that's very losing barb-esque, if you know what I meannow, lyrically, some lines that jump out to me as Nancy Wheeler core are;

a) "You catch me when I'm falling / Sometimes, I wish you wouldn't / I can't tell if I'm learning" because we see Nancy become somewhat isolated after the loss of Barb and feeling like she can't really rely on or let others in, especially in s4 when her relationship with Jonathan is strained. Nancy has not only oldest daughter syndrome but is also the final girl, so she's got a lot of complex struggles about feeling like she is the only one in a situation who can do things but also she is constantly doing then wrong

b) "If you hadn't come over / I would be so much colder / I would be much less confused" both comphet Nancy realizing her feelings for Robin but also this line has jancy vibes of like all this shared trauma being the foundation of their messy relationship that's not really strongly built on anything else (not to shit on jancy or anything, that's just my take on where they are right now)

c) "Without you, I am surely the last of our kind / Without you, I am surely the last of my kind" this to me screams out in mourning for the parts of Nancy that died when Barb was dragged into the Upside Down, the girlhood she lost and the guilt and blame she carries on her shoulders for something horrific that happened to her that was totally not her fault

... yeah, a LOT of thought goes into my character playlists and Nancy is SO interesting to me, i hope any of this made sense

hi! i wanted to ask if you know anyone/anywhere that archived techno’s twitter account? my own inactive account was deleted a week or so ago, per the new rules, and thinking about the day his gets removed is really nervewracking.

i dont know of anyone specifically that has done that, but there are plenty of archives on the wayback machine. here's one from 2022 which includes the last tweet made on his account from technodad

that being said, i wouldnt worry too much about his account since his dad HAS logged into it. it's likely that someone will tell him about this new policy and he'll continue to log into it. if he doesn't though, it exists on the wayback at the very least. maybe you can save your own backup from there

I remember many back in the early 2000s

hating anime!Kagome for not taking anime!Inuyasha's shit, like she had to just accept whatever he threw at her as it was her job to be his trash bin or something...

Oh man I will probably write a longer rant about that one day because that's one of my biggest pet peeves in the fandom.

When it comes to Kagome some people (usually men) will take Kagome's use of slapstick comedy seriously and call it "abuse", right? They'll argue that she's a terrible person because "Imagine if this was real! You can't slam your boyfriend to the ground when he annoys you! That's domestic abuse!!" but these people never have the same complaints with what Inuyasha does?

The language that Inuyasha uses would also be wrong in real life. Yelling "shut up!" or using "temee" (rude form of "you") would be considered "verbal abuse" if this wasn't a cartoon. Funny how stuff that is exaggerated for comedy is only taken seriously when a female character does it, uh?

you think he wouldn't be into slapping his partner?

also sorry about ur gym :(

Spanking, yes. Bruising… if it’s part of whatever you’re doing, yes. But specifically slapping somewhere like your face… no.

I just think (and this is my own personal opinion, you’re welcome to disagree) that Bakugo is kinda weird when it comes to sex because he really believes deep in his heart that it’s meant to be gentle, intimate and sweet.

Like his sense of justice + wrong and right is just so… distinct and specific that he wouldn’t want to (nor feel comfortable) mixing something he considers harmful with something he considers “nice…” if that makes sense LOL.

(And no worries about the gym. Turns out my mom fell asleep too🤪)

this is what every butch+femme lesbian couple looks like. they should be at the club.

An accompanying M!A post to this ask game! All ask numbers are just suggestions!

Fyi: M!A is (iirc) a term used in askblogs where the askers make an event (see below) happen which wouldn't occur normally. Sometimes they have specific ask limits, sometimes it's up to the asker or the mun.

🫀: The muse gets a random injury every 2 asks for 10 asks. They can be of any severity as long as it doesn't directly kill them.

🫁: The muse gets a random symptom of illness (eg. Nausea, Dizziness, Fatigue) every 2 asks for 10 asks. They can be of any severity as long as it doesn't directly kill them.

🦷: The muse feels like everything is a particular texture for 10 asks (or mun's choice), which the asker decides. (This could be as simple as things feeling soft or rough, or something abstract like that they're covered in teeth.)

🕳️: The muse keeps getting startled by things that aren't there for [Mun's choice]. The muse may start to become paranoid that someone's watching them.

👁️: The muse starts to lose their grip on reality. They start seeing flickers of things that aren't there, they can't tell what time or day it is, and anything else the mun desires. The duration is also up to the mun.

🍄: The muse is unable to find anything to eat that isn't rotting or basically inedible. The asker decides the duration, and the muse gets hungrier as the M!A goes on.

🌑: Any problems to do with sleeping the muse may have are dialed up to 11. If the muse has trouble sleeping, they cannot sleep for the M!A's duration, and if they are usually tired, the muse can barely keep their eyes open for the M!A's duration.

🪰: The muse finds it hard to take care of themselves for 5 asks/asker's choice. They can forget hygienic but ultimately harmless things like forgetting to brush their teeth, but also may forget to take care of any injuries they have and forget to eat or sleep. The severity of this is up to the mun.

🍭: The muse is extremely persuadable for 10 asks. It's up to the mun whether they're just gullible or if it's to the point the muse can barely think for themselves for the duration of the M!A.

🧸: The muse can't find their comfort object for 5 asks and get more distressed every ask. If they do not have a comfort item, they get attached to their most frequently used object and can't find that.

❄️: The muse suddenly starts to feel cold for 10 asks, with them slowly getting colder as the M!A progresses. By the end they're freezing and looking for any way to get warmer. (This can also be reversed as an🌡️)

🗯️: The muse gets very jumpy at even the slightest loud noise, even to the point of tears for 5 asks.

how long have you been in the osc, and how has time changed your perception of object shows as a whole?

i've been here 10 years and as i (hopefully) have been getting 'better' at thinking critically about Art in general, folks like you and awseriously have made me appreciate object shows on a deeper level, at least the ones fully intended to be thought of on a deeper level

Ive Been Here Since 2016 So Around 6 or 7 Years. A Lot of My Changes in Perception Did Coincide With Me Just Growing Up and Being Able to Interface With Art Better, This is Why I Try Not to Be Too Annoyed at 14 Year Olds Mischaracterizing Their Faves Because if You Scroll Far Enough Back on My Own Blog You'll See Plenty of That.

My Major Perception Shift Though Kind of Coincided With Me Realizing That Nothing is Just Accidental In a Work and That Characters Don't Behave Independently. Being Able to Fully Perceive The Hand of the Creator Made a Lot of Object Show Analysis More Interesting for Me Because Now Its Not a Case of "This Character is Mean", Its a Case Of "Why Did the Creators Write the Character This Way and Why Does the Narrative Frame It As Such" Which is Useful When Engaging With All Art But Esp Independent Smaller Works Like Object Shows.

This is Just a General Rule for Me But Whenever I Engage With Art I Try to Give It the Respect It Deserves and Think About What I Do and Don't Like In it Because Thats What I Would Want From My Own Viewers

Miss you on here.. need some positive thoughts they are still together after all this London and new Taylor stuff

there is never anything they could do that would convince me harry and louis aren't wildly in love and good. cause even if other people are trying to convince us that they aren't, harry and louis themselves are the ones reminding us they're good. the stunts aren't the reason we believe in hl, hl are. like even the 28 clothing drop! the fucking 28 implications! and at the end of the day, if they weren't good, there'd be no reason to continue to try to push bullshit.

also thank you, i miss yall too. it's been a rough 6 months, but hopefully i can be around more soon.

What does the title mean??? Like. "Eisoptrophobia: is an unhealthy fear of mirrors(can be due to self-image issues/etc)." , so like.

Is one of them(Henry & Will) a mirror to the other??? Or like????? A reflection of sorts? (But now that I'm thinking more about it ,,,,, I can also expand to the Afton kids. Yk?? Like- not wanting to be a reflection of their father due to the cruel things he's done & stuff. Yeah)

Yesss :]]

It's called Eisoptrophobia as a reference to the UCN title music (which I love btw I like how it implies the animatronics are a reflection of Bill and the things he's done and that scares him). And the whole idea of the comic is that Bill and Henry are, ultimatly, the same. They share a world view and ambitions and experiences. Bill even becomes one with something Henry built and Henry is only still alive cus of Bill's remnant- they literally give each other life. They are each other's reflections.

In regards to the kids, yeh. Particularly Mikey DREADS becoming his dad even though they're also really similar. He even refuses to wear his glasses cus hid dad did. Lizzie swings really far in the other direction she's trying her damned hardest to reflect her dad back at him. Nate is tiny and small and dies for real in '83 so he doesn't really get to have any super developed feelings about this :[ rip

-