#i had never made fanart before i started posting here two years ago and i was terrified. but people were so nice and without those comments
Text
Taku and Madarame: To Heal and To Hurt
Before we get to anything, please know that I am not reading anyone for filth here. Everything I wrote for this meta is based on what the visual novel showed us and what I have observed from the visual novel, but it’s still difficult to talk about anything involving a certain character without it sounding like I’m bashing them.
Now, to start, I want to show you all this fanart (source here), which I find fascinating.
(Note: I highly recommend that you check out the rest of this artist’s work. Plenty of great TakuTowa fanart for all lovers of the pairing.)
I am promoting the fanart above because it effectively shows how Taku and Madarame are effective foils of each other. I already made a similar post before about Taku also serving as a good foil to another character (Sakaki). This post is going to be like that one, but this one is explained in greater detail; though both posts have the same goal: to compare and contrast.
Of course, be warned of the following:
Before you read any further, there will be spoilers, and I mean plenty of them, so I advise you not to read this if you haven’t completed the visual novel and want to complete it whilst blind.
What you will see under the “Read More” will be long, and I mean really long and possibly incomprehensible with all my rambling, so brace yourselves.
Every narration from the game is rephrased so that it reads in third-person, which is how it’s supposed to read in the original version. This is done to help with maintaining objectivity as I explain and point out things.
If you want to read this in a different platform, the meta is also available for reading on Google docs.
How Long They’ve Known Towa
To start with something simple: out of Towa’s four love interests, Taku and Madarame are the only ones who personally knew Towa for a long time. Sure, Rei may technically count as well since he knew Towa since middle school, but he and Towa never interacted until they were already full-fledged adults. Towa didn’t even realize that he and Rei attended the same school until Rei pointed it out in his route.
Taku knew Towa since he was a child, since he was assigned as Towa’s physician. As such, he was the one who would patch up Towa’s wounds or check on him when he falls ill (both of which are thanks to Maya’s “loving” care). After Maya’s death, although Taku is not legally assigned as Towa’s guardian, he still helped look after Towa for the longest time, which they both acknowledge.
Towa and Madarame were also joined at the hip when Towa was in his teenage years and was still an active member of the Takasato-gumi. The two were basically friends with benefits, though the ‘friends’ part in the term is questionable. They often slept together because they gave each other the violence and pleasure the other wanted, and they often hung out (with Kaga) but that’s about it.
In the common route, in what seems like a simple scene where people are having lunch at Yanagawa Café, we are already given an idea of what kind of relationship Towa has with both Taku and Madarame at present.
Relationship with Towa
(as established by the beginning of the common route)
Taku is the very first love interest to show up. How is he introduced? Fussing over Towa and getting exasperated with him, while also subtly showing concern for him. They also occasionally hang out together outside work hours, which establishes that they’re on friendly terms. Even then, there’s the kind of distance between them where while they get along, they’re not so close that they share all their secrets.
Towa would never know the real Taku, nor would Taku ever know the real Towa. Even though they had known each other for years, it didn’t mean they understood everything about each other.
As for Madarame, as far as Towa knows, the man died years ago. If Madarame’s route isn’t taken, Towa will keep thinking that, especially since he no longer has any positive feelings for Madarame and would prefer to forget about him entirely. We don’t know why yet, since until after his route is unlocked, Madarame remains shrouded in mystery. Nevertheless, Towa’s disdain for him is made clear.
As it happened, Towa knew the person they were gossiping about. A lot about him, in fact. […] But Towa would rather not remember him, and thus avoided thinking about his name or his face.
Conflict with Toono
Until Fujieda’s route proved otherwise, the fact that Toono actively plays the role of the villain in both Taku and Madarame’s routes baited us all into thinking that he’s the only one who’s really out to give the cast trouble, and it’s not hard to see why.
Taku owes Toono a great debt because it’s only due to the latter’s financial assistance (even though it was provided to Taku with an ulterior motive) that Taku was able to become a doctor. Even though he despises Toono and hates doing the jobs assigned to him by the Takasato-gumi because it goes against his morals, the fact that Toono aided him is something he cannot deny. Of course, Toono takes advantage of this, and even deliberately adds fuel to the fire by getting Towa involved when he notices that Taku is getting increasingly reluctant to make the drugs that Toono wants to distribute around Shinkoumi. This is what sets up the conflict and the main plot for Taku’s route.
This aside, Toono is also the reason why Kaga died and why Towa lost his right eye, even though in the latter case, the bullet was meant for Madarame. Even then, Madarame still got wounded, yet the entire night was chaotic enough for the Takasato-gumi to give up on looking for his corpse and just claim that Madarame was dead. Madarame may deny that he’s out for revenge, but this is contradicted by him saying that “[Kaga] didn’t have to die.” This means that Madarame is out to settle the score with the syndicate, especially with Toono, and the climax of Madarame’s route even covers his blood debt finally being repaid.
Another obvious point of comparison is how they deal with Toono. Both are given the opportunity to point a gun right at Toono and end him then and there. Both wouldn’t have hesitated to pull the trigger. Except that while Madarame - dead-set in his revenge - aims straight for the heart, Taku changes his aim at the last minute. Not because he hesitated, but because he - in his words - refuses to play by the other’s games and stoop down to man’s level for another second.
This alone shows how Taku and Madarame are fundamentally different people.
Personality (Indetermination vs. Certainty)
How different Taku and Madarame are is reflected in both how they’re introduced and what the player learns about them in full by the end of their respective routes. And in both cases, they’re always like yin and yang.
At the start of the game, Taku is established as someone who looks out for Towa’s well-being. While he’s exasperated with some of Towa’s tendencies (like being late for work and preferring to ingest nicotine and alcohol over actual food and water), he never tries to outright interfere…. unless you play his route, where his protectiveness starts to really rear its head, which puts him and Towa at odds with each other.
As you progress further into Taku’s story, both you and Towa realize that Taku is far more fractured than he appears, and this can be traced to his mother’s death, something Taku has been beating himself up for to this very day. What doesn’t help as of late is his debt to Toono, which starts to actively threaten his day-to-day life; and it even gets Towa endangered due to the latter’s association with Taku.
It’s then that as Towa tries to figure out what’s going on in Taku’s mind, he starts to realize the man’s greatest flaw. What is that? Taku always wavers, no matter the kind of decision and no matter who it involves, be it something about himself or about someone else. Because he always fears the worst-case scenario and is never sure whether he’s truly doing the right thing. More often than not, he’s not even certain of his own intentions. This has something to do with the guilt he harbors towards his mother’s demise. He fears that even if he does everything, it won’t be enough, and that holds him back. Even after he finally makes his resolve about his situation with Toono, he hasn’t completely gotten rid of his flaw in the drama CD, and Towa has to force him to make up his mind once and for all after confronting him about how he’s at it again.
From what is heard of Madarame, almost everyone just talks about how freakishly strong he is or how he’s supposed to be dead. While we can only guess what kind of person he may be (at the time), those conversations alone are enough to tell us that he carries a very imposing presence.
Once we finally see him, you realize that - besides the part where he supposedly died - everything else the others say about him aren’t an exaggeration. The man really is imposing, and his strength may as well be inhuman. He possesses an indomitable will and is the kind of person who will do what he wants to do, wherever and whenever he wants, and however he wants.
And remember the title of his chapter: Immutable. Never yielding, never changing– which is Madarame’s character in a nutshell. How can he be like this? Because Madarame doesn’t have any mental or emotional issues. There’s no deep-seated scar that Towa has to find, and this is reflected in the Interrogation since Madarame is the only one where the opposite approach has to be taken to get the good ending.
Taku and Rei are able to grow and heal if the right choices are made, and while Fujieda never gets subjected to an Interrogation since he’s able to resolve his issues by himself, he undergoes a development nevertheless and still reflects on himself. But as Towa observes, Madarame has never changed since years ago, and even at the end of the route, he’s still the same person that we saw him as from the start. He had not changed, and he never will change; hence why immutability is rooted into his very being.
Violence (Avoidance vs. Gratification)
Taku is a doctor and he pursued such a profession because he wants to save lives, as compensation for the life he wanted to save most yet was ultimately unable to. Naturally, he regards both life and death with grave seriousness and never regards it in a flippant manner, which makes him worry often for Towa, who couldn’t care less what happens to him.
On the other hand, Madarame may as well be violence incarnate—he lives and breathes to fight and carries a lust for blood. If he faces an obstacle, he’ll metaphorically and literally punch his way through said obstacle. And to him, life and death is nothing more than a game, a gamble, and he finds more fun in the challenge than in the outcome.
Now as for how this affects their approach with Towa…
Taku never does much to protest Towa’s stints whenever the latter pursues his artistic hobbies, but it doesn’t mean he likes seeing Towa either hurting himself or getting himself hurt, and he does make his displeasure known every once in a while by commenting on Towa’s wounds. Towa even remembers one time from some years ago, when Taku was absolutely furious after seeing Towa at the brink of death when an encounter with a potential model went awry.
Not to mention, there’s the way Taku treats Towa during sex. No matter what, Taku refuses to give Towa the rough treatment. At most, he will kiss and caress Towa’s scars, but no more than that. He even tells Towa that he knows his masochism is no more than a means to castigate himself. As such, Taku refuses to indulge in that, because he wants Towa to know that he’s worthy of being loved and cherished in a healthy way and that he can still feel pleasure through gentle and affectionate touches.
On the other hand, Madarame wants Towa to embrace the violence inside him and to live for violence, whether Towa inflicts it or receives it. He doesn’t mind Towa’s masochism and even seeks to indulge in it and to even amplify it, if possible. Though one can only wonder if Madarame ever saw the connection between Towa’s penchant for self-harm and the trauma of his childhood, the latter of which he’s hinted to be aware of to some degree, especially since he noticed Towa’s disdain for complete silence.
It also goes without saying that Madarame is the love interest who engages in the roughest and most violent sex with Towa. When Towa was still kept in chains as the other’s captive, Madarame showed his special brand of affection by making Towa bruise and bleed, and even after they properly rekindle their relationship later on, they still enjoy roughing each other up as part of their foreplay.
Unconditional Love vs. Conditional Love
Since he knows enough about what Towa’s childhood was really like, Taku also knows why Towa is the way he is. He knows why Towa indulges in self-destructive habits and why he’s almost completely apathetic to the motions of life. Taku doesn’t like it and the only reason he doesn’t protest too much is because he’s held back by the fear that he may end up accidentally giving away the truth, so he plays it safe by protesting on occasion but never actively trying to interfere (except when he’s certain that Towa may get himself killed).
Even then, in the event that he falls for Towa, all the negatives that he has observed from Towa doesn’t prevent him from having feelings for the other man. In spite of how flawed Towa is, Taku loves him all the same, especially since he understands why Towa is like that. Of course, he wants to help Towa heal (as much as he can at least) and grow out of his love for pain. But this aside, plus the fairly understandable request for Towa to stop sleeping with other men, Taku accepts Towa the way he is now and never asks Towa to conform to an image he has of him. This makes his love qualify more as an unconditional one.
As unorthodox as it is, Madarame’s love for Towa is sincere nonetheless. After all, for the longest time, he thought Towa died the same night Kaga did, and it’s hinted that this did affect Madarame to a degree, especially when he took a close look at Towa’s missing eye. Part of the reason Madarame even came back to Shinkoumi was to reunite with Towa. Madarame may like to make sardonic statements, but it’s obvious when he’s being upfront about his thoughts and feelings without the usual barb. When he tells Towa that he’s all he needs and asks him to not leave again, he meant it.
That being said, he’ll only reach out to Towa if he sees a chance that Towa can return to being the person Madarame last remembered him being. If Madarame thinks that Towa is, in his own words, “too far gone”, he won’t bother anymore and will leave Towa alone. This is why his love still counts as the conditional kind of love. He only loves the Towa that he once knew, but not the Towa that he sees now– which is ironic since Madarame is supposed to be a man who focuses only on the present, not the past.
Towa’s Visage
The only thing that really changes with Towa’s appearance in Rei and Fujieda’s good endings is his attire. On the other hand, in Taku and Madarame's good endings, Towa doesn’t undergo only a wardrobe switch; even the color of his hair changes as well.
Taku’s default appearance has his hair being mostly black in color, though the edges still have traces of the blonde dye that he would put on when he was still a teenager.
In Taku’s Euphoria ending, Towa grows out his hair such that it goes way past his shoulders. The blonde streaks are gone and his hair color is now a full raven black. This represents how his mental state has (even if not completely) gotten better, with his appearance being reminiscent of his younger and more innocent self. He even casts aside his black attire for a white shirt and a blue cardigan, which encapsulates how he’s become more at peace and put-together, and is now able to find contentment with the simple things. While he’s still the same person overall, he no longer seeks out violence nor does he want or need it just to feel something.
Towa also grows out his hair in Madarame’s Euphoria ending, but here, his hair is now blonde once more. Besides that, he also wears a hoodie with a design that makes it obvious to anyone who sees him that he’s feisty and rebellious, there are also the bandages on his lower torso. This reflects how he has become his younger and hotblooded self once more, with his propensity for violence now more active than passive. But since he’s no longer bound to Shinkoumi and his memories in it, he has remodeled both his identity and his love for pain, and he has become someone who always seeks to feel excitement and the rush and thrill of a fight or a beating.
Towa’s Past, and What They Know
Taku knows plenty of sordid details about Towa’s past, but just to be clear, he doesn’t know everything. He has no idea that Sakaki is complicit in Maya’s dastardly plans. Sure, he gets wary whenever Towa gets involved with the Takasato-gumi, but his suspicions are always focused on Toono, in particular. If he even had an inkling about Sakaki, a lot of things would have turned out differently.
If one pays attention to the dialogue in his route, Taku only found out the truth about what Maya was doing to Towa after the “accident” where Maya fell down the stairs. We don’t know how he found out, but it is important to remember that it’s only then that Taku discovered what Towa had actually gone through, and it’s exactly because Taku knows how horrifying Towa’s childhood was, that he does everything he can to keep it hidden from Towa.
If he gets caught in the lie, the most he can do is keep Towa from finding out more. Where Fujieda holds the key that allows Towa to finally unlock the doors where his memories stay hidden and repressed, it’s Taku who tries to keep every other key away from notice and from reach.
While he accuses Taku of being dishonest and secretive, Madarame is the pot calling the kettle black. As revealed in Fujieda’s route, Madarame also knows a lot about Towa’s past, and knows enough that he can even pinpoint to Towa where Euphoria was, so it’s safe to assume that he also knows what happened to Towa during his time in that wretched mansion.
However, what’s interesting with Madarame is that in his own route, he doesn’t tell Towa what he knows; but in Fujieda’s route, he gives Towa a hint.
We already know why Taku opted to not tell Towa anything, On the other hand, we’re left to guess why Madarame changes his gears from saying nothing to dropping some clues. It’s at least obvious that he didn’t do it out of altruism, so that makes it highly likely that he either withdraws or reveals the truth only because he felt he had something to gain from it.
Now, this is just my speculation, but I think he did either with the same goal in mind: to distress Towa in such a way that it will drive a wedge between him and the others. I’ll expound on this later on in another topic.
Taku and Madarame, Mei and Maya
Because I was apprehensive about saying or even analyzing any more about Madarame due to the thought that I might end up coming across as if I’m dragging him, it took until buzzin_buzzard’s tweet for me to fully acknowledge the similarities that could be found between Madarame and Maya, of all people. I summed it up in TV Tropes, but I’ll go into more detail for this meta.
I made a meta from before where I briefly likened Taku to Mei, since they’re both the only figures from Towa’s childhood who showed him kindness and made him feel safe, even if only for a short while. The key difference between Taku and Mei was that Mei knew exactly what Towa was going through (since she was in a similar situation herself) whereas Taku had no idea what was happening at the time. Nevertheless, they were the only two people who were not out to harm Towa, because everyone else hurt him, whether it was intentional or whether it was because they were coerced into the act (i.e. Ikuina and Asakura).
Both also helped throw a wrench in Maya’s plans. Mei told Towa that he had to get away from his mother. Their attempt to escape may have ultimately failed, but that event still left an impact on him because that small taste of freedom allowed him to realize what could be waiting for him beyond the opulent halls of the mansion, and especially because of what he would eventually find out with regards to what Maya did to Mei in retaliation. When Towa learned exactly why Mei died, he summoned the will to defy Maya for the very first (and only) time, and it led to what would eventually be Maya’s demise.
However, just because she died doesn’t mean she’s gone, not with her final order to Sakaki. Unfortunately for both the mastermind and the adjutant, the trauma of the incident stripped Towa of his memories, which waylays their plans. And Taku (unwittingly) makes sure it stays that way by never letting Towa remember his childhood and letting him live in ignorant bliss. Of course, it’s not all good; the damaging trauma of Towa’s childhood had already left his mark, resulting in his hedonistic and masochistic tendencies. Still, without the recollection of his childhood, Maya’s plan is left at an impasse, and it will stay that way in Taku, Rei and Madarame’s routes.
Now, this is the part that I was afraid of talking about the most, but if you take a moment to think about it, Madarame and Maya mirror each other to some degree. Madarame is so physically strong that nothing and no one can beat him, but that’s why he gets bored so easily. Maya was a master manipulator and can control anyone she set her sights on, but deep down, she felt isolated and her psychopathy did nothing to sate her loneliness.
This is where Towa/Haruto steps in.
As Madarame states outright in his route, he feels that only Towa can give him the exhilaration he wants yet can’t find with anything and anyone else, and that only Towa can understand his bloodlust and his love for pain.
You are the only person in the world who I consider my match. You want what I want. You feel what I feel. With you, I'll never be bored. And you feel the same way, don’t you?
With Maya, there is the very fact that she wanted Towa to follow in her footsteps both literally and figuratively. One likely reason is that this is also her way of ensuring that her legacy will go on. Another possible explanation is that Maya believed if there was one other person who acts and thinks the way she did, life won’t be so forlorn anymore.
In her last recorded message: I asked Sakaki to fulfill one last request for me. I asked him to help you find true happiness in my place, and to make sure that you’d become my successor.
Madarame isn’t the most expressive kind of person, but it doesn’t automatically mean he’s as emotionally stunted as Maya was. He just has a very good rein on his emotions, and even if he’s very unconventional about it, his love for Towa (even if it’s only to a certain kind of Towa) is sincere. Maya - even if she could perfectly emulate both affection and tenderness - felt that she could never love, yet believed that she loved Towa as best (worst) as she could. Her brain is undoubtedly wired wrong (and really, really wrong), but her admission is also undoubtedly a genuine one.
And they both express their love in the only way they knew how: violence. Madarame inflicts it directly by making Towa bruise and bleed whether it’s consensual, nonconsensual, or a bit of both, whereas Maya does it indirectly, letting her clients have their way with Towa, regardless of what they would do to her son. They both think that it’s because Towa/Haruto enjoys it and that it makes him look even more beautiful. Of course, we know that Towa finding arousal in the rough treatment that Madarame gives him reflects how he made himself love pain as a subconscious coping mechanism for all the torture he suffered at Maya’s hands. In Fujieda’s words:
By accepting the trauma others would inflict on you, you desperately cling to the last shreds of your personal autonomy. Cutting yourself was a self-destructive impulse— a punishment for being worthless.
With this, there is the main reason why Taku and Madarame are bound to always be at odds with each other whenever Towa is involved. The reasons are, in essence, similar to the reasons which explain how Mei and Maya contrast each other, especially with regards to Towa.
In Towa’s childhood, Mei was the light in Towa’s life, where Maya was the darkness. Mei was a symbol of purity, hope and innocence, and Maya was essentially corruption in human form, luring and poisoning everyone around her. Because of this, Maya saw Mei as a “toxic influence” in Towa’s life and had her killed. This is hugely ironic since it’s obvious who the real toxic influence is, but anyhow…
Similarly, though it never escalates to murder (if only because Madarame is someone who prefers to beat up someone instead of killing them outright), Madarame still kidnapped Taku, held him hostage, and also threatened him. And if you remember, there is a brief moment in Madarame’s route where he questions why Towa feels the need to cover his eye with a patch, and one should keep in mind that it’s Taku who takes care of Towa’s injuries. This scene alone already sums up their opposing viewpoints to both Towa and to violence. In this case, it’s easy to put Taku in Mei’s position, and Madarame in Maya’s.
This consequently shows the difference in how they’d react if - in a route where neither is the chosen love interest - Towa figures out his past with someone else’s assistance, and what kind of person he could become once he learned enough.
Reaction to Towa’s Growth (in Fujieda’s Route)
Madarame’s presence in Fujieda’s route is very brief, but a lot could be drawn from it nonetheless. Just like in his own route, he holds Taku hostage to draw out Towa. However, the circumstances and the venue are different from before.
Instead of the back of the clinic, they now meet at the outskirts of the Deathmatch Area. Instead of being forced to meet with Madarame in private to ensure Taku’s safety, the entire gang has gathered, all wide awake and conscious with varying awareness of what’s going on. And instead of Madarame telling Towa that Taku is lying to him, Madarame points Towa to his mother’s mansion.
This all culminates in Fujieda and Madarame exchanging blows, and right as the latter is about to land a crippling hit, Towa intervenes halfway to take a hit for Fujieda… which immediately ends the fight since Madarame loses interest then and there.
Why? Let’s recall how the entire scene was narrated.
As Fujieda doubled over, Madarame began to launch another attack.
“Madarame!” Towa rushed over and jumped in between them.
Madarame’s fist grazed Towa’s head as the latter hit the ground, landing on his stomach.
Taku dashed over to Towa’s side. Meanwhile, Rei slowly pushed himself up while gritting his teeth in pain. Fujieda frowned at Towa, then turned his head and glared at Madarame.
However, Madarame seemed to have lost all interest. His arms hung limply at his sides. His self-assured grin was gone, replaced by a pair of cold eyes that stared down at Towa.
“I never knew that you were such a drag.” (Note: Based on the context and the tone that was used, the original JP text of the line「･･････つまらないことをするな、お前」 could also translate to “I never thought you would do something so absurd,” since the word ‘tsumaranai’ can be used to describe something that’s either boring, trivial or foolish.)
Enduring the pain, Towa glared back up at Madarame as he continued kneeling on the ground.
Contrast this to Towa’s reaction in Madarame’s route after he gets confirmation that Taku is keeping secrets from him, just like Madarame warned. This lands the final nail in the coffin for Towa’s belief that he can never return to his old life, which leads him to do this:
Rei, “You’re heading towards the Deathmatch Area! You hate Deathmatches, right? So why are you going there? …To see Madarame?”
Towa remained silent, causing Rei’s brow to furrow deeply. Towa glanced at them, then turned and started walking.
Rei, “Don’t do this, Towa! Why?! Why are you going to him? Don’t go!
Taku, “Towa!”
Towa could hear their anguished screams. But as he kept walking, their voices faded into the distance. Their desperation could no longer reach him.
Towa had realized who he truly was, and he was not the kind of person who belonged with them.
He belonged somewhere else.
So back to our original question: why did Madarame suddenly lose interest in the fight? Why did he suddenly decide to not bother with Towa anymore? Because to him, seeing Towa rush in and defend someone else is a sign that Towa had changed too much for his own liking. Sure, Towa showed some spunk in that act, but it was not the kind of spunk he wanted.
Not only that, but the act also indicated that by that point, even the threat of learning more about his past won’t sever any bonds that Towa shares with the other three (Taku, Rei and Fujieda). In other words, Towa will continue to have attachments to his home, or at least some of the people in it. No chance of burning bridges for good and leaving with him. And so, Madarame exits the scene.
Madarame – much like a ghost – completely fades away from Towa’s life. After he’s informed by Kotarou about what the man is up to next after ambushing the Takasato-gumi, Towa doesn’t bother thinking about him for another second.
And now, let’s talk about Taku. For almost the entire first half of Fujieda’s route, Taku was obstructive and unhelpful because he also feared that Towa would change. But in his case, “change” means the possibility that Towa could never recover from learning the truth—which does happen and nearly ends in the worst-case scenario. Taku had nothing to gain from keeping anything, yet he was willing to risk earning Towa’s anger and resentment by staying silent even as Towa attacked him, chewed him out, and pressed him for answers. And Towa has a very good reason to be pissed at Taku, even if you can see things from the older man’s point of view.
However, it should be made clear that while Taku’s actions were questionable, they were never once done out of malice or selfishness, which is saying something compared to say, Sakaki. Towa even comes to understand this, which is shown in two instances. One is in this dialogue from when Taku and Rei got patched up after their scuffle with Madarame.
“....Towa?” Taku mumbled. “Are you mad at me?”
Towa looked at him in silence. “Why would I be mad at you?”
“For hiding [the truth] from you.”
“But you only did it because you thought it was for the best, right?”
The other instance is the update in Taku’s entry (from the codex):
I’m sure Taku had his reasons
When Towa manages to conquer his trauma in the good ending, Taku expresses relief and is even proud of Towa for it, acknowledging that Towa has truly matured and changed for the better with a smile on his face. In turn, Towa expresses his appreciation towards Taku, and it’s clear by then that their relationship has completely mended.
Taku: All this time, I was scared of you getting hurt. So instead, I figured you were better off not knowing anything at all. But you were stronger than that. You remembered your past, overcame it, and then you came back. It's clear to me now... You just aren't the same little kid you used to be.
Towa: Well, obviously. But I couldn't have done it alone... Turns out, there is value in connecting with people. I just could never see it.
Taku: What do you mean?
Towa: What I mean is... I wouldn't be standing here today without every single person in my life.
Taku: … I’m amazed you just said that. Now I can see for myself– you’ve actually overcome it. I can’t describe how relieved I am.
With this, in contrast to Madarame, Taku remains an important figure in Towa’s life. In Volume 4 of the AfterStory drama CD, Towa takes the initiative to thank Fujieda for getting Taku exonerated and released early. In another scene, Taku confides to Fujieda about everything that happened before capping off by saying that he trusts Fujieda to look after Towa. Even when the story takes another path such that their relationship remains platonic, it nevertheless is a deep and important one for them both.
Closing Remarks
Now that I think about it, the only reason the Taku vs. Sakaki meta is a bit shorter than I expected is because I had to make it fit into Twitter’s format. Had it occurred to me back then to just upload it all on Google Docs, I would have gone all out with comparing those two (note to revamp that meta later on, R.I.P. me).
I admit that I’m biased towards Taku because he’s just one fascinating character all around, combined with the fact that he can serve as a foil or a mirror character two at least three other people who are connected to Towa’s past for a multitude of reasons– which fortifies my opinion that Taku would also make for an excellent “true” love interest besides Fujieda.
At the same time, it’s also fun to try and analyze Madarame even if, at the end of the day, many things about him remain an enigma despite the fact that everything about him is supposed to be already on the surface. And without a translation of his AfterStory drama CD, a lot of things about him will remain a myth for me.
Once again, if it sounds like I was insulting Madarame in this meta, I was not. Either way, sorry in advance and please don’t kill me. ^^;
160 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hi! I'm wondering why you chose to share a blog, as two people. Which of you uses it more often? Do you tend to post different things?
this is a great question with a long answer! also tumblr deleted my first answer to this because it's a shit. also this is all lilac speaking
so way back years ago aru wrote a silly little crack fic. i was immensly entertained by this and was like you should post it online. so i made an ao3 acc called watery_meln_baller bc "our fics are so bad they make you want to water melon ball your eyes out". we used to have a whole taglline about using the kudos as a dislike button it was great. over time aru wroye a few more crack fics and i would post them for aru.
then i decided to take a crack (ha) at writing crack fic and was nervous about it, and since th waterymelonballer acc was for crack fics i just uploaded it on there instead of making my own. i had never written fic before and then it blew up and i was like oh damn. im famous. and then i started getting FANART for the fic and people were like do you have a tumblr so i can tag you?? and i was like okay. time to make a tumblr! i did not excpect to actually use it for anything besides being a place where i could post updates and behind the scenes stuff for fanfics
after identity fraud i went back to barely using the account. around the same time aru got into like, danny phantom n shit and then they started using the account a bunch. and began posting podfics, and non-crack fics. so aru used the tumblr for a while, and then they abandoded around the same time i started getting into toh and writing WAB. then i took over the account, started posting shit, and now i've been using it conistsently ever since! oops, sorry aru. ive got a whole circle of mutuals its a great time we are all buddies. aru will pop on here and post occasionally its great. tthere was a bit of time where we weren't talking as much bc of life but now we're back to regular texting and being buddies. but tbh if i had to share a tumblr account with anyone, aru would be the best :]
i do have a seperate art accoutn i made a while back. i want to use it more but. ah. im lazy and forget to use it regualry so i just post fanart on it once in a blue moon. its here if u wanna check it out
#lilac post#here's some waterymelonballer lore#we really should have sepereate accounts but unfortunately its a bit late for that#ive made by own art blog and a pseud on ao3 but still :/#apologies for answering this months later LMAO im going through my ask box#ask#anon
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
Reddie Vs Byler
Okay I am once again here with a take that may not be that popular but I think it's worth a conversation. If you have a different opinion please feel free to comment on this post or inbox me.
So I've said this before but I'll say it again: I have been in the It fandom since the beginning of it, Sept 2017, and I crossed into the St fandom later that year but didn't start actively posting about it until about a year ago.
Point is I've seen some shit.
I've compared these two fandoms before and their behaviors but I want to specifically talk about Reddie and Byler, two ships that are the biggest in their respective fandoms. (I know Byler's spot for the number one ship may be rivaled by ships like St Steddie but they're still up there in popularity.)
Reddie in the It fandom has been big since the beginning, and only grew bigger (maybe 'exploded' is a better term) after the 2019 movie. You can see why it's popular, it features two of the most loved characters in the fandom, the dynamics are fun, and it inspires great fanart/fics. Look, I've never been the biggest Reddie shipper but I can recognize this as fact.
Let's talk about the shippers real quick. There are a lot of Reddie shippers that are great but the ship is not without people that cause discourse- especially in the early days of the It fandom. I think any big ship has these people, it comes with the territory of being a 'big' ship.
Back in the early days of the It fandom, when the fandom was more alive, there were Reddie shippers who didn't like Kaspbrough or Stozier and would make that known. Those ships are the two that would rival Reddie the most so it makes sense those ships weren't liked by some of them. Also Kaspbrough which features Bill and again, some, Reddie shippers did not like Bill but that's another conversation.
But here's the thing: even if Reddie had a few of those...problematic shippers, the overall ship space of it was relatively safe. There has never been shipping discourse in the It fandom like how it is in the St fandom. Here's a post I made on why that probably is a while back, but to some it up; it's just widely accepted that all the Losers love each other and every ship is valid and because of that there's never been a lot 'anti certain ship' rhetoric.
Now onto Byler. There is so much anti ship rhetoric and a lot shipping discourse but to say it's all the Byler shipper's fault would be frankly ridiculous. Shipping discourse and the Stranger Things fandom walk hand in hand at the this point, despite how much I wish that wasn't the case.
No matter what you ship in the St fandom, there are going to be people who hate you for it and focus all their energy on talking shit about the ship and trying to bully down shippers of it. I truly don't understand these people because why focus on being a dick and tearing people down for shipping a ship you don't like instead of focusing on the ship you do like? I don't get it, why be a jerk?
Yes there are Byler shippers like this but the same can said for every ship in St fandom. You can't really point a finger at a ship and call all it's shippers bad because it's a moot point. Also to look at couple bad seeds and then call the whole demographic 'bad' it's so...dumb and wrong.
But the point of this post is to compare Byler and Reddie. I can't really talk about the shipping discourse around just Byler because I would have to talk about it around every ship in the St fandom and how it all connects and intertwines...that's just another post in itself.
The only reason I brought it up in the first place was to highlight the shipping discourses with Byler vs how it is with Reddie. Moving on.
There is one huge difference with the Reddie and Byler and that's Reddie is canon. Keep in mind it's only firmly canon in the movie canon, but canon is canon.
Byler on the other hand has yet to become canon. It feels like the natural progression of Will and Mike's story arc depending on how they handle it but at the end of the day, we simply don't know what will happen with the 'canon' of this ship.
You could equate Reddie's 'boom' of shippers after the 2019 movie because it became canon. Who's to say the same won't happen with Byler after season 5? If it becomes canon?
Another thing- Reddie shippers for the most part didn't expect the ship to become canon, it just didn't seem like a thing that would happen honestly. That being said they also didn't care if it didn't become canon, that wouldn't take away from the enjoyment of the ship for them. There wasn't a ton of concrete 'canon' build up to it, just speculation and theories that paid off when Reddie surprisingly became canon. When you look at Byler, there is some 'canon' buildup for it so it's not unreasonable for people to think it can happen. Reddie happened didn't it?
But let's take 'canon' out the equation real quick because I want to get to the point that started the idea of this post in my head.
Unlike Byler, Reddie has never had a real ship it was pitted against. It didn't come from a fandom where ship vs ship was common unlike Byler. I mentioned Stozier and Kaspbrough and the few bad seeds of the Reddie shippers but even with that it still didn't really happen. Probably because *romantic* Stozier and Kaspbrough were only popular in fanon and not canon.
Byler shippers do have a heavy ship they're pitted against, which honestly is a fandom issue, and that's where so much of the discourse comes from. They have justifications for wanting their ship to be canon and sometimes they have to beg to be heard.
On the other hand, the 'bad seeds' of the Byler shippers are much more numerous than they ever where with Reddie shippers and they contribute a just as much as any other St ship's 'bad seeds' to the shipping discourse and the reason for that is simple. Byler has a bigger mainstream audience, it's a so much bigger than Reddie even when Reddie was in its hayday. Logically, the more people who ship a ship, the more bad seeds there's going to be.
Okay I'm done, I ended up rambling a lot and I'm sorry. Thank you if you actually read this.
#i just had too many thoughts#and I started to lose track of them I'm sorry whoops#pfffff#one day I'm going to write an essay on shipper's behavior in the St fandom#it's interesting how viscerally hateful the shippers can become#i just sit back and watch with my little ships#also the st fandom's relationship with “canon” is....it's certainly something#sam talks#reddie#byler#will byers#mike wheeler#richie tozier#eddie kaspbrack#it 2017#it 2019#stranger things#stranger things 4
26 notes
·
View notes
Text
The Journey of Wan Premise+Masterpost
Almost 2 years have passed since Wan became the first avatar. In that time, the spirits were guided back home in the spirit world, Wan closed the spirit portals, and the lion turtles retired as guardians of mankind. Since then, humans have been free to roam the earth again without fear of the spirits, but new troubles arise when humans wage war with eachother, hunt hybrid animals, and abuse the elemental powers bestowed upon them. As the first human to have power of all four elements as well as the world on his shoulders, Wan does whatever it takes to restore balance to the world.
Main Cast: Wan, Mula, Raava, OCs
Pairings: OCxOC, Wan/OC
~~~~
4 books/seasons with 15-20 chapters each:
Book One: Light
chapter 1 (under construction)
chapter 2 (completed?)
chapter 3 (TBA)
~~~
Q&A/FAQ:
How long has this project existed?
I started this project 2015-2016, after the release of the "Beginnings" episodes of LOK, which basically started from me creating OCs that existed 10,000 years ago, for no other reason than for the fun of it. I made friends with a shared interest in ATLA/LOK/Beginnings whom also created ocs for Wan's time period and their own takes on the lore behind the spirits and we collaborated with eachother. I had started the first two chapters of book one, that can be found on deviant art and wattpad (plus a few written prompts that featured ocs and wan's relationship with Raava) but with the newer updates, will also be posted here and archive of our own. After writing and publishing the second chapter, I began to focus on other priorities in my life, as I was taking classes in junior college, dealt with deaths in the family, and got caught up in other fandoms.
I never lost interest in this project, ocs and concepts that had yet to be fully fleshed out, however, they were always in the back of my mind and I would occasionally draw my Wan/oc ship, but not much further. Now with the release of the Kyoshi and Yangchen novels, comics and shows/movie announcements, I started to feel more compelled to revisit and commit to seeing this project through, even if friends I once collaborated with moved on or lost interest. I am taking this as an opportunity to redesign ocs or do some rewrites of old prompts and make any needed adjustments to the plot/characters/etc.
Are you doing this project alone?
As it stands, it appears so, but this is on me due to my own inactivity.
How many books are there going to be?
It has always been four: Light, Renewal, War, Legacy
Each with a varying number of chapters, but ideally the goal is 20 max. per book/"season"
Are you open to collaborate/form a writing team?
It is a possibility. As of now, I would like to reconnect with former peers and see if they would like to revisit this story or not, and seek consent on use of their ocs before moving any further.
Can I submit fanart to this blog?
Fanart is absolutely encouraged and welcome, once I have some art of my own and OC designs up of course. If you like what you see, then you are most welcome to draw and submit fanart.
Where can I find the story?
You can find it on:
deviant art: the-journey-of-wan and wonderpepperboops
wattpad: zhervey06
archive of our own: thejourneyofwan1006 (currently has short story prompts)
You can also find my inspiration board on Pinterest!
~
Thank you for your time!
(last update: August 23, 2023)
#legend of korra#avatar the last airbender#avatar chronicles#avatar wan#raava#vaatu#beginnings#fanfiction#beginnings ocs#avatar wan x oc#waava#rise of kyoshi#dawn of yangchen#first avatar wan#text post#questions and answers
14 notes
·
View notes
Text
Final Words for Beetlejuice: The Musical
In times like these, we have no words, we have only each other.
By the time I post this, the final performance for Beetlejuice: The Musical would either be wrapping up or has already concluded. I decided I wanted to write a few words here. This isn't a review or anything like that, just me rambling about this show that changed my life.
The first musical I've ever seen was Hamilton, and to put it kindly there were much better ways I could've wasted two hours. It convinced me that musical theater wasn't anything good at all, a mentality I've carried around for 6 years. Then, a little show titled The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals came around, and became the first musical I ever enjoyed. Despite this. I viewed it as the exception, not the rule. Later I would watch The SpongeBob Musical, and I enjoyed it as well, but I was still not convinced that musical theater was anything special.
That is, until a friend introduced me to Beetlejuice.
Though I was reluctant, I gave it a shot.
That was one of the best decisions I've ever made.
Throughout those two hours, I laughed, I cried, I was floored by what was unfolding in front of me.
It didn't take long for me to decide this was my favorite piece of fictional media ever.
I became obsessed, drawing fanart, listening to the soundtrack, even writing a whole script for a film adaptation and a sequel. Beetlejuice was something special. There was only one problem:
The musical closed over a year and half before I watched it.
I wanted to watch this show live, but couldn't.
That is, until that fateful day in September (I think) when they announced the show would be brought back to life at the Marquis Theater in April.
At that moment, I knew I had to go watch it.
As the months passed and passed, I saved up my money, but something always came up, and I was never able to go.
In October, they announced that Beetlejuice would once again close on January 8th, tonight. At that point, I was done delaying my trip. After over a year of being obsessed with this musical that changed my life, I purchased plane tickets to New York and two tickets to watch the January 6th performance.
Those three months of waiting felt like an eternity. It was reported that Alex Brightman had gotten a concussion, and would likely not be able to perform for the rest of the duration of the show, which was devastating, but I was more than willing to watch any of fhe understudies (all of whom are very talented performers), as long as I got to watch the show at all.
At long last, the day came. To my shock and delight, hours before the performance it was announced that Alex Brightman would return starting with that night's performance. It seemed I would see Alex perform after all.
The performance was two days ago as of the writing and posting of this message. It was one of the happiest moments of my entire life. Throughout those two hours, I laughed, I cried, I was floored by what was unfolding in front of me all over again. It was an absolutely magical experience finally having the opportunity to see this story I love in person.
As of the time I'm writing this, Beetlejuice should probably be in Act 2 of their final performance, and before they close for good I just want to give my thanks to this absolute wonder of a show.
To Scott Brown and Anthony King, for taking the basis of the movie and crafting something unique, and in my opinion, superior to its inspiration.
To Eddie Perfect, for not giving up when it seemed like Beetlejuice was just another flop in his resume, and for bringing us so many fantastic songs that will be remembered by everyone forever.
To the fans, for proving that this show was so much more than what it was seen as, for being one of the most amazing fanbases I've ever had the honor of being a part of, for proving that this show deserved a second chance.
To Alex Timbers, for bringing this show to life, for spending 9 whole years crafting the perfect show, tweaking and editing things so that this show could reach it's true potential.
To Kerry Butler, Rob McClure, David Josefsberg, Leslie Kritzer, and Adam Dannheriser, for bringing the Maitlands and the Deetzes to life, from transforming words on a page to living people (despite the fact that half of them are dead) that so many people could fall in love with.
To the remaining cast and crew, for putting your all into this show and making sure audiences are entertained day after day (-O).
To Sophia Anne Caruso, Presley Ryan, and Elizabeth Teeter, for portraying a character most strange and unusual, that so many people, myself included, could relate to, who helped many people feel seen and understood, for showing us all that there is always a reason to keep going.
To the man, the myth, the legend, Alex Brightman, for breathing life into a literal dead person. You are a star, an irreplaceable legend, and you will always be Betelgeuse to me.
This is not the end of Beetlejuice's story. With the ongoing National Tour and the possiblity of licensing in the works, the tale of Beetlejuice is far from over. This may be an ending, but Beetlejuice will forever live on. The show may be dead, but this is just the area where Betelgeuse thrives. And if there's something that Beetlejuice proves, is that even something is dead, it's never truly gone.
Thank you, Beetlejuice: The Musical, for changing my life. Goodbye, I'll miss you dearly, and you will live on forever.
He may he gone, but he's never far away.
All you gotta do
is say his name.
-Jo Pinedo
6 notes
·
View notes
Text
I posted 1,194 times in 2022
12 posts created (1%)
1,182 posts reblogged (99%)
Blogs I reblogged the most:
@carryingthebanner
@mysandwichranaway
@cold-butter-warm-toast
@hotcocoandmarshmallows
@shippingcannons
I tagged 554 of my posts in 2022
#newsies - 144 posts
#jack kelly - 52 posts
#newsies shitpost - 38 posts
#davey jacobs - 34 posts
#percy jackson - 26 posts
#lord of the rings - 22 posts
#important - 22 posts
#newsies fanart - 21 posts
#fansies - 21 posts
#tumblr culture - 19 posts
Longest Tag: 138 characters
#i’m currently in a room with 11 other people who are presumably asleep and will be for another hour and a half so i can’t listen to it now
My Top Posts in 2022:
#5
This is a tumblr hug, or a tumblr high five, or a tumblr sitting in the same room together, pass it on to your ten favorite followers or mutuals <3
AYYYYYY THANK YOU BESTIE! Right back at you! I saw your other ask too, you're so sweet <3
1 note - Posted August 10, 2022
#4
crash
2 notes - Posted April 1, 2022
#3
Ok now I'm curious to see which newsie you associate ME with
Okay so I went to look through your blog and the very first thing I saw screaming lady and cat meme and so my brain instantly said Race but then then the very first couple posts were about how nice it is when someone's open about how much they care about you and giving someone the bigger or better part of something you're sharing because you love them and so I'm gonna say you're Jojo.
I've always seen him as a bit of a jokester and always trying to make people laugh, but he's also the sweetest guy ever and one of the first people to know if someone is having a bad day. Basically, I think you're really cool!
2 notes - Posted February 22, 2022
#2
for the newsies association, either kath or finch!
Ooooo interesting! I am very honored that I remind you of our queen, her majesty Katherine Pulitzer Plumber! And Finch is cool too, I never would have thought about that! We stan our bird man
2 notes - Posted February 21, 2022
My #1 post of 2022
Sprace Royal Wedding AU (Let me know if anyone has an idea for a good title!)
@gendistic42 Here is your fic for @newsiesgiftexchange! I absolutely LOVED your prompt! This was my first time writing an au, so I hope you like it. It's also important to note that this fic isn't finished yet because it is going to become my first ever series! Updates will probably be sporadic, but shall be made with love so hopefully that counts lol I'm so glad I got to be a part of this! Without further ado, here is the first part of *Inset Title Here That I Will Come Up With Later!* I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it!
Spot was pissed. He'd always known that one day he was going to have to marry someone who was chosen for him, someone that he wouldn't have much time to get to know, and given his track record, likely someone he wouldn't even like. All the same, to find out that Denton had chosen someone without even talking to him first made him angry.
Denton had been his father's advisor before he died. He'd practically raised Spot and while it was safe to say he was one of the only people Spot actually loved, they two didn't always get along very well. Denton wanted to make sure that Spot would be ready to rule when the time came. Seeing as how his father had died years ago, he would be crowned king as soon as he turned 18, leaving him with far less time to prepare than most had. Spot had watched Denton rule as the Lord Protector, learning all he could from him, until he effectively took over at 16. It was a hard life and while Spot often wished it had been passed to someone else, he wanted the best for his people and wasn't willing to risk turning over his kingdom to someone who didn't care about it as much as he did.
Spot's inevitable marriage was one of the most common debates between the him and Denton. It always started the same way. Denton would ask if Spot had thought any more about one suitor or another, Spot would get defensive over all the other things he had been working on lately till Denton pointed out that Spot was using that as an excuse to avoid thinking about it. Spot would get angry, Denton would yell back and they'd fight till Spot inevitably stormed from the room to lock himself away in his office for hours on end. They always made up quickly, they couldn't afford not to, and they both understood the other's position. The last argument had ended with Spot telling Denton to just find someone for him so that he didn't have to think about it anymore.
Sitting in his office, Spot now regretted telling Denton to decide without him. Spot realized that while he trusted Denton to try not to doom him to a miserable life, he had given up what little choice he'd had in finding someone to marry. Knowing Denton, it was likely someone serious, stoic, and far to boring for Spot's taste. Someone who could help him run his kingdom well, but probably not someone he would want to spend his life with.
Most of the reason why Spot loathed the idea of an arranged or political marriage, though he would never be caught dead admitting it, was that he wanted to have a chance to actually fall in love with someone. He wanted the chance to admire them from across the hall, for his friend's to tease him whenever his crush walked in the room. He wanted to ask them on a date and go to the movies or watch the stars together talking about everything and nothing. He wanted to hold their hand and watch their face light up when they talked about their passions. He wanted to make pancakes on a Sunday morning while his partner cooed over their kid in the living room. He wanted so many things that he'd never get the chance for.
Spot jumped as his phone vibrated next to him. Looking down he saw the name lighting up the screen. Of course Davey would be calling him. Spot had known Davey Jacobs for as long as he could remember. The Jacobs family had always been granted nobility back when Spot's grandmother had been queen for their ongoing efforts to align the monarchy with the needs and feelings of the people. Ever since the family had been both politicly active and well loved by most of the nation. Because of their close relations with the royal family, Davey, Sarah, and Spot had practically grown up with each other. Spot wasn't always sure if Les knew that he was technically his future king, but Spot didn't care for Les to ever see him as anything other than his older brother's stressed out friend.
He huffed and ran a hand down his face before declining the call and going back to the document he had been trying to distract himself with earlier. Not five seconds later his phone lit up again. Groaning he declined the call again, unlocking his phone and typing out a text before the young politician could call him another time. Just as he was about to send it, that damned picture of a smiling, gap toothed 8 year old Davey took over his screen again.
"Davey what the fuck do you want?"
"Wow, Denton said it was bad but I didn't expect that," Davey's languid and amused voice gave away that Spot's reaction was exactly what he had expected.
Spot gritted his teeth a took a deep breath before he responded.
"Jacobs, I swear, you'd better have something real important to say."
"Dude you just got engaged and you don't even know who it is. You literally told your dad to choose someone for you."
Only a handful of people knew that Spot would often refer to Denton as his dad. Given that his actually father had been the king and was now dead, it would have been considered disrespectful of him to refer to anyone else as his father, even though the former king had never had much of a hand in raising Spot in the first place.
"Yes, which is why you had better say something interesting in the next five seconds or I'm hanging up, I've got work I was doing before you called!"
"Uh huh, because you were definitely focused on that and not on your future husband," Spot could hear Davey rolling his eyes through the phone.
After a moment of silence, Davey huffed slightly before speaking again.
"Look Spot, how about I come over tonight. I don't want you stewing around your office and don't say you're working, we both know you aren't gonna get anything done like this. Let's just watch a movie, maybe sleep out on the balcony and talk. You need some time to process this."
Spot sighed before answering. "Ya know what Dave, you pick out the movie and I'll cover snacks."
"I'll be there in 20 minutes."
Spot laughed, "You'd better, Jacobs."
20 notes - Posted January 1, 2022
Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →
#tumblr2022#year in review#my 2022 tumblr year in review#your tumblr year in review#I love how I hardly posted anything at all whoops#Okay but I’ve been thinking about the sprace royal wedding au thing lately how are we feeling about that one boys? Should I revisit it?#Also the bestie being my top reblogged#Celeste my beloved
6 notes
·
View notes
Note
YOU HAVE PETS?? YOU HAVE PLANTS??? I MUST SEE PICTURES!!! Tell me about them tell tell, and then show me some of your art and maybe your wips and then tell me a little bit about yourself
This is probably gonna get long, so full post under the cut (hopefully):
I have a kitty! I found her a few months ago and kept her. Her name's June and she's constantly bouncing between being the sweetest and the most troublemaking kid in existence <3 we had cats at home before, but she's first cat that's mine, so im figuring everything out, but i love her so much ;w; she's my baby
And when it comes to plants, i used to have a lot of them! I had to give most of them out to family members when i took June in, because i learnt they were toxic, but some of the plants that i still have are these:
I have two orchids, two yuccas, two silver inch plants, one fern and a few plants that i can never remember names of ^^' the pohotos show my smaller yucca, the other one is around 6 years old and is taller than me already :3
Sadly i don't have many wips, i have been pretty artblocked whole 2022 and this year im very slowly getting myself to draw again but! I'm taking part in a collab so even tho i havent started drawing yet, there will be art "soon"-ish
When it comes to me, I'm actually mainly OC artist! Of course i've always drawn fanart from time to time, but most of my brainpower goes to rotating my own characters around.
My main characters include Charlie (left) and her bestie Ivy (right). They haven't really gotten a story and for the most part were just getting into hijincks, but i've been slowly cooking a world and a story for them and my other characters to take part in :3
And my all-time favorite oc is Anne:
Who's a prissy princess with malfunctioning moral compass. I love her a lot, i made her when i was 15 and she's one of my oldest characters
I hit photos limit so i'll just write second part or sth and link it here lol :>
BOOM
1 note
·
View note
Text
I posted 171 times in 2022
75 posts created (44%)
96 posts reblogged (56%)
Blogs I reblogged the most:
@sockythedog
@miss-galaxy-turtle
@diamond-night
@angelsaxis
@cgbk10
I tagged 128 of my posts in 2022
Only 25% of my posts had no tags
#musashden - 56 posts
#digital art - 36 posts
#my art - 27 posts
#fanart - 22 posts
#encanto - 19 posts
#art - 17 posts
#drawing - 16 posts
#comics - 14 posts
#red - 12 posts
#wip - 11 posts
Longest Tag: 93 characters
#he can't make eye contact because now he's in love with will and that scares and confuses him
My Top Posts in 2022:
#5
Nataniel Lago
Okay... so something happened while I was coloring this. That bottom right sketch of the two of them - I cut it off at a weird angle and when I colored it it looked like Nat was missing the bottom part of his right arm and... I went with it. I have never made a character that is an amputee. Anyone who knows me knows I love doing research and writing new things - especially when I feel like I’ve fallen into a rut. So here we are!
Meet Nataniel, a 17 hunter that lives in a forgotten part of the Encanto. So far away from Casita Madrigal that it’s literally a mile away and partly over grown. He is the leader of a group of orphans that range in age. He and Camilo meet by chance while they are rebuilding Casita. Camilo is instantly curious as to why he has never seen Nataniel before and proceeds to... well, stalk him until Nataniel notices him and Mirabel not being stealthy.
Because I just decided to make him an amputee I have not come up with how he lost his arm but since he’s a hunter I’m gonna go ahead and say it was a hunting accident. One that has not detered him from hunting. He still takes care of all the kids in his part of town and he often refuses help. So he’s a bit bullheaded and determined to prove that he can do things on his own.
Camilo knows how capable he is but he also makes it his mission to spoil Nat with kisses and cheek squishes... aren’t they cute? I just love them already:
See the full post
23 notes - Posted February 3, 2022
#4
Morning Glories
I had to start the year off right. Had to get a sexy man out before the end of the month. I was torn on who to draw until I realized I was wearing one of my favorite shirts. A shirt I have had for over 20 years because that's how long I have loved Future Trunks. Purple is my favorite color. It explains why certain characters resonate with me - like Trunks here. I saw a post on twitter that said he got his father's looks and his mother's color. Don't tell anyone but I used to think Vegeta was handsome but then when Trunks came along I was like DAYUM - blood runs hot in that family.
Future Trunks was that first tragic/sexy character that lit up my teenage brain and honestly he's got it goin' on. What's funny is that I'm not nearly as in love with present day Trunks. And the version of him from DBSuper is just... meh. Go fig. It's definitely the purple hair. If this gets enough likes I'll turn him into a print
Future Trunks belongs to Toei/Akira Toriyama
33 notes - Posted January 17, 2022
#3
Treasure Planet: Platinum
Treasure Planet turns 20 this year. 20! I can hardly believe this movie came out 20 years ago. I still love it. I still love Jim even tho I'm no longer a broody teen like him. I remember going to see it in theaters - this movie resonated with a small fandom back when it came out. Those who loved it REALLY loved it. It wasn't until years later when they started showing it on Toon Disney that the fandom got way bigger. And who wouldn't love Jim - he's voiced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt who is honestly the perfect pick for the character. I love how they combined two totally different styles to make him emo + surfer. The ending of his movie had endless potential but Disney never did anything else with it. Their loss - I'll take him if they don't want him.
Since it's been twenty years Jim would be about 35 years old here. I imagine even tho he went to the academy and became a professional spacer he still builds his own surfers and in his downtime you can find him stuntin' in the ethereum - trailing comets. I was gonna give him facial hair but it refused to look right. Still iffy on his tattoos. If I think of something better I'll update it. Likewise when I make the speedpaint video.
Catch some of the light coming off my man 💫
34 notes - Posted June 28, 2022
#2
Just something I did to brush off the rust. I haven’t really drawn anything in a month - with Dark Schneider being a rare exception - I need to practice a little before my drawings look any good after so long. So I decided to draw all the canon characters I’m currently writing fanfics about. It’s a lot lot LOT of slash going on here.
Most of these faces should look familiar - I decided to put them in order of age. I had a bit of a debate with myself over where Owen fit in. Technically the persona of ‘Owen Burnett’ has only existed for about ten years (as of 1995) but Puck is much older. His folklore dates back to about 1600′s so he’s only about 3,000 years old. Certainly not older than VHD. Canonically D is something like 10,000 years old (depending on who you ask)
I love that canonically Daken is older than Jackie Chan. The real Jackie Chan was born in 1954 where as Daken was born sometime during World War II making him older than Jackie Chan LOL Cartoon Jackie was supposed to be in his 30′s which in 2002 the real Jackie was.
The bottom row is just a bunch of jailbait cuties. Terry McGinnis is the oldest teenager clocking in at seventeen at the start of his series, though honestly he was one huge 17 year old. X-men Evolution Kurt Wagner I think starts out the series at 16. And then there’s the baby of the group: Camilo Madrigal who is 15 y/o in his movie. I age him up in most of my art of him and my oc Nat so I feel slightly less like an old creep but what ever.
I might draw the OC counterparts I created for them but for now... just this
36 notes - Posted October 5, 2022
My #1 post of 2022
See the full post
121 notes - Posted October 27, 2022
Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →
0 notes
Photo
I’m Looking Forward Now 💖Thank you and good bye
So, it’s been a little over a week since Steven Universe Future ended…
I’ve been hesitant to write this, honestly, but I’m tired of holding myself back from properly expressing myself in fear of appearing overly invested in the media I consume, even in private. Writing helps me organize my thoughts and feelings, and I feel like these thoughts in particular may resonate with many, so I want to share them. I want to talk about what Steven Universe has done for me personally, both as an artist, and as a person.
I’ve been around since the day the first episode of the original series aired. I actually remember when Steven Universe was just a logo on Wikipedia’s “List of Upcoming Cartoon Network Shows” list, back when I was a freshman in high school. It piqued my interest, but when commercials finally dropped for it, I thought it was going to be bad because of the way marketing handled introducing Steven as a likeable character. There was still something about it that made me want to give it a chance though, so I went online and watched the pilot before the first episode's release. I was hooked immediately. I knew I was going to love it, and I did. I fell so absolutely in love with Steven as a character, and the world that he and the gems lived in. I became obsessed. I was always so excited for new episodes to come out. Little did I know what else it would do for me as I went through my adolescence alongside it.
As the show progressed, it was evident that what I wanted out of a western animated childrens’ cartoon was finally coming into fruition: this show was becoming serialized. There was continuity, there was plot, there was character development-- it was getting deep. It was pushing the groundwork that Adventure Time laid out even further (thank you, Adventure Time).
I will give credit where credit is due: earlier western childrens’ cartoons I grew up with like Hey Arnold, and Rugrats, among others, also touched on heavy topics, but Steven Universe was able to take similar ideas (and even more complex ones, concerning mental health and relationships) and expand on them outside of contained episodes and/or short arcs. These themes, which were a part of the show’s overarching story, spanned across its entirety. Continuity was rampant.
What did this mean? It meant kids cartoons didn’t have to be silly and fun all the time and characters weren’t just actors playing a part in 11-minute skits. Steven and the gems would remember things that happened to them, and it affected them and how they would function and play a part in their story. This was a huge deal to me as a teenager. I always wanted the cartoons I grew up with featuring kid characters to feel more. In my own work, I often felt discouraged when combining a fun, cutesy western art style with themes as dark or layered as anime would cover. I always thought it had to be one or the other because an audience wouldn’t take a combination of the two seriously enough, based on discussions I had with classmates, friends, and online analysis I read at the time. Steven Universe proved to me otherwise. This show was opening the door for future cartoons exploring in-depth, adult concepts. I felt so seen as a kid, and was inspired to stick with what I love doing.
I was actually very worried about the show’s survival. It was in fact immensely underrated and the fandom was miniscule. Then in 2014, JailBreak dropped, and it’s popularity exploded. Part of it was because of the complex plot and the themes it was covering like I mentioned, but also because of its representation.
I remember when fandom theorized that Garnet was a fusion due to grand, tragic reasons. Turns out, she’s simply a metaphor for a very loving w|w relationship. This was huge. I cannot stress how important it is that we continue to normalize healthy canon queer relationships in childens’ media, and Steven Universe finally was the first to do that proper. Introducing these themes offers the chance for a kid to sit there and ask themselves, “Why is this demonized by so many people?” I asked myself exactly that. Ruby and Sapphire were my cartoon LGBT rep. They were the first LGBT couple I ever ecstatically drew fanart of. I was dealing with a lot of internalized homophobia at the time, and they showed me that I was allowed to love women and feel normal about it. The process of overcoming this was a long one, but they played a part in my very first steps into becoming comfortable with my sexuality. I could go on and on about it’s representation in general-- how it breaks the mold when it comes to showcasing a diverse set of characters in design, in casting, and in breaking gender roles. It’s focus on love and empathy. Steven himself is a big boy, but he's the protagonist, and the show never once makes fun of his weight, or any other bigger characters for that matter. It wasn’t hard to see why the fandom had grown so large.
Fandom was always a joy for me. It was a hobby I picked up when I was in middle school, like many of us here did. I would always cater my experience to fun, and fun only. I only started getting more deeply involved in SU’s fandom when I had just turned into an adult. During the summer of 2016, between my first and second year of college, I drew for the show almost every day non-stop when the Summer of Steven event was going on and posted them online. This was a form of practice for me in order to become not just more comfortable with experimenting with my art, but also to meet new artists, make new friends, and learn to interact with strangers without fear. I dealt with a ton of anxiety when I was in high school. When I was a senior applying to art school for animation, I decided I was going to overcome that anxiety. I made plans to take baby steps to improve myself over the course of my 4 years of college. Joining the fandom, while unforeseen, was definitely a part of that process. I started feeling more confident in sharing my ideas, even if they were fan-made. I fell in love with storyboarding after that summer, when I took my first storyboarding class, and genuinely felt like I was actually getting somewhere with all of this. I remember finally coming to a point in my classes where I could pitch and not feel hopelessly insecure about it. I was opening up more to my friends and peers.
But this process, unfortunately, came to a screeching halt.
My life completely, utterly crumbled under me in the Fall of 2017 due to a series of blows in my personal life that happened in the span of just a couple weeks. My mental health and sense of identity were completely destroyed. All of that confidence I had worked for-- completely ruined. I was alone. I nearly died. My stay at college was extended to 4 and half years, instead of the 4 I had intended. I lost my love for animation-- making it, and watching it. I could no longer watch Steven Universe with the same love I had for it beforehand. It’s a terrible thing, trying to give your attention to something you don’t love anymore, and wanting so desperately to love again. I dropped so many things I loved in my life, including the fandom.
Healing was a long and complicated road. I continued to watch the show all the way up until Change Your Mind aired in the beginning of 2019, and while I still felt empty, that was definitely a turning point for me with it’s encapsulation of self-love. I was hoping James Baxter would get to work on Steven Universe since he guest-animated on Adventure Time, and it was incredible seeing that wish actually come true. The movie came out and while I enjoyed it and thought highly of it, I was still having issues letting myself genuinely love things again, old and new. It was especially difficult because cartoons were my solace as a kid, when things got rough at home. I remember feeling sad because the show ended, and not getting the chance to love it again like I used to while it was still going.
By the time Steven Universe Future was announced, I was finally coming around. I was genuinely starting to feel excitement for art and animation again. I wasn’t expecting there to be a whole new epilogue series, but happily ever after, there we were! Prickly Pear aired, and the implications it left in terms of where the story was going did it. I was finally ready to let myself take the dive back into fandom in January of this year. My art blew up, something I wasn’t expecting considering my 2-year hiatus. Following this, I was invited into a discord server containing some of the biggest writers, artists, editors, and analysts in the fandom. I had no idea there were so many talented people in the fandom, some already with degrees, some getting their degrees-- creating stuff for it on the side just for fun. The amount of passion and productivity level here is insane, and so is the amount of discussion that has come out of it.
I didn’t realize it at first, but it was actually helping me gain back the courage to share ideas. I lost my confidence in pitching while I was taking the time to heal, and graduating meant there would no longer be a classroom setting I could practice in. This group helped immensely.
I have made so many friends through this wonderful series, and I have so many fond memories talking to like-minded creatives, getting feedback and a myriad of sources for inspiration, as well as all of the memes and jokes and weekly theorizations that came about as we all waited on the edges of our seats for episodes to air. I needed this so badly, I needed to get back in touch with my roots, when I would go absolutely hog-wild over a cartoon I loved with people who loved it as much I did. Future has been a blessing for me in this way. I graduated feeling like I was back at square-one, but now I feel like I’m on my way again.
It’s 2020 and while I’m doing great right now, I am honestly still recovering from the total exhaustion that followed after graduating a few months ago, and finally leaving the campus where my life fell apart behind. Needless to say, watching Future was like looking into a mirror. Watching one of my favorite characters of all time-- one that grew up with me-- go through so many of the same things I went through not too long ago was absolutely insane to watch unfold. It’s such an important thing too, to show a character go through the process of breaking down over trauma and all the nasty things that come with it, and to have them go on the road to healing. Steven got that therapy. He wasn’t blamed. The gems were called out. The finale was everything I could have ever hoped for. The catharsis I experienced watching it was out of this world.
As I continue my own healing journey, I will always look up to the storyboard artists, revisionists, and designers that I have been following over these past 7 years, as well as the new ones introduced in Future. It's been such a joy watching these artists release their promo art for episodes, talk about their experiences working on the show, and post the work they've done for it alongside episodes airing.
Thank you Rebecca Sugar, the Crewniverse, and the fans, for making this such a truly wonderful and unique experience. Thank you for reminding me that I am, and always will be, an artist, a cartoonist, and a fan. Thank you, my followers, for the overwhelmingly positive response to my artwork. I have had so much fun interacting and discussing the show with you all again over these past few months. Steven Universe and it’s fandom will always have a special place in my heart, and it will always be a classic that I will return to for comfort and inspiration for decades to come. I am sad that the cartoon renaissance is over, but so many doors have been opened thanks to this show. I am so, so excited to see what this show will inspire in the future, and I hope one day I get the opportunity to be a part of that.
Goodbye Steven, thank you for everything. I wish you healing, and I wish Rebecca and the team a well-deserved rest. ♥️
-Cynthia D.
#steven universe#steven universe future#steven universe future finale#steven quartz universe#the future#i am my monster#good bye steven universe#thank you steven universe#crystal gems#garnet#amethyst#pearl#bismuth#lapis#peridot#greg universe#connie maheswaran#lion#su#suf#su future#art#artists on tumblr#illustration#tears#lineless
5K notes
·
View notes
Note
Hiiiiii, I rly like your writing X3 I was wondering if you’d answer this question: What is your interpretation of what SEGA is doing with SonAmy as of right now? Seems like it’s becoming more and more canon. I know you’ve done similar question before, but could you maybe just answer this for 2021? Thanks!💖💙
No problem! And thank you, lovely Anon~<3 I love writing for the feels~ But also for the accuracy to be as close as possible if I can manage it! First of all, they’ve always been canon? Maybe not ‘in-world dating’ canon but canon in the sense that they are a official SEGA advertised couple since the get-go.
Amy was created to literally be in the slot of ‘Sonic’s Girlfriend’ where she had feelings for Sonic and always a fun mystery as to decipher Sonic’s subtle ‘returned caring’ for her.
As for 2021 we are so FREAKIN’ HAPPY to hear that SEGA is FINALLY marketing the two and VISUALLY SEEING the sales of their ‘couple shirts’ and the like make some profit. Furthermore, we have long-time fans and professionals in the careers within SEGA also vocalizing that they don’t mind the couple and even support it. With less emphasis on the ‘fandom fanatics’ of the raging past and more so on the fantastic marketability and popularity the couple brings to SEGA’s exposing their main IP, it’s become almost common ground to expect more and more people liking romantic and suggested romantic couples in all ranging medias.
We need also mention the alarming rate of the worrisome numbers in Japan recently. Conducted studies have shown that most of Japan’s population is elderly, and in the very near future (About 5 years or so) a good chuck of Japan’s population will die. This means the Japanese Government is promoting more and more companies within both entertainment, advertising, etc. to be more ‘promoting family’ in their media. Japan needs more babies! And guess what?
Mario Odyssey comes out with a completely ‘Wedding themed’ video game.
Dramatic romantic underlying's in Zelda’s new game.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake’s focus on romantic underlying’s along with Cloud willingly saying (English version) “Do I have any say in this?” As though to fight the idea that romance can’t happen and-
Kingdom Hearts 3′s romantic underlying that literally has a song (Japanese) talking about rings and getting married called “Chikai” or also ‘Oath’ that in English is rewritten to a romantic song about going deeper into love called “Don’t Think Twice” but literally has the two ‘making their fates intertwined’ in a symbol of ‘romantic intentions’ such as marriage or even just fidelity in a relationship.
So? How does all this influence the latest Sonamy supersonic boom we’ve seen in the media recently?
Although Sonic is his own character, he’s also only 15 (But as many of you have seen in Anime, Japanese ages of appropriateness are different then our own cultures and societies) we see faint glimpses. In the mostly American-made Sonic Boom t.v series, the comedic moments of Sonic and Amy are very much to a genre of American audiences and how we view ‘funny love’ should normally be marketed as. (I don’t always agree with what they say, but that’s how they’re trained and believe the ‘trends’ go... so ... can’t argue with professionals? Eh? -I personally think they’re outdated *cough cough*)
Sonic is not one to express feelings in overly dramatic ways which is common place in American television and media, but he’s also got a ‘boy’s heart’ which means we won’t see a lot of things from him BESIDES ‘romantic underlyings’ that are probably going to be initiated and themed mostly and primarily in Amy Rose’s character (If at all shown or expressed.)
For these reasons, I believe SEGA is just hopping on the bandwagon and doing what they’re told, while also following the latest trends that the other big fellow companies are making a significant profit on. I know we wish and want SEGA to be ‘special’ in how they think, but they really are just a company that is trying to survive and outlast the competition.
It’s sad to think that way, especially when SEGA used to be so creative and always influencing the next best thing but that was YEARS ago and they’ve learned to tread water since then...
(Goku being a grandfather emphasizes family in this particular scene where they take his granddaughter before a big tournament fight to a fair/festival. We see Goku with his family too, or at least, a successful son with his wife and daughter, spending time with his Father-In-Law, and the like.)
We see it in Dragon Ball emphasizing family, we see it in more romance-themed animes (and those that have only recently done romance, when they--for the longest part--never indulged in such things before or previously) and we now see more japanese games and media centralized around that.
What does that mean for Sonamy? Hopefully good things! Because if you buy the merch, they’ll produce more content. It’s a basic ‘supply and demand’ formula. If the demand (meaning how much you spend and want Sonic and Amy couple merch) goes up, then they have to supply to keep their business afloat. If they don’t they sink, but that DOES NOT MEAN TO BE AGRESSIVE. It means just support when they do something you like, and positively, kindly mention what you liked and wish to see more of if the future allows. No one reads aggressive writing unless, they too--wish to be aggressive back.
SEGA’s had issues with aggressiveness before, please let them see that couples in the sonic world won’t have a negative impact on their branding with irrational and bad-media frenzies. (Now, after saying this, I know people will start to do just that, don’t feed fire with fire, just let the fire burn till it has nothing left to consume, and carry on happily posting fanart or fanstories of what you love. Ignore to extinguish, which is what SEGA will do to Sonic shipping fans if we don’t act somewhat reasonably, okay?)
My predictions are such: 1. Amy’s crush will sadly lessen in impact and become more of a novelty, something that is treasured when moments arise to reveal her crush on Sonic, which in my opinion, is not her personality, but due to the heavy influence of women’s portrayal (Especially in America) being overemphasized and not done well, this is how they will try and combat it... (No one does this right and you shouldn’t base a characters solely on political reasonings...) 2. Sonic will have moments of caring for Amy or doing something sweet that can and probably will be interpreted as ‘a couple moment’ but he’ll remain mostly about other things, and the ‘underlying romance’ will have to come through Amy Rose’s character. 3. SEGA will loosen some rules after seeing more and more of the productivity and trend associated with marketing romance, and to keep up with demand and growing times, will finally let small moments emerge between the two, but the fandom will not be satisficed since we will now be desensitized to overly avert demure and oblivious stereotropes that will date their characters. and won’t allow them to proceed smoothly into the new area of customers and audiences.
Children are becoming extremely observant and aware. They are clever, and they always have been. It’s time to market to Children and Young Adults, not babies.
My ways to avoid this, predictions 1: New employees will surface that will start to get a name and reputation in the Sonic Fandom, along with youtube and internet stars who will influence certain marketing schemes (as is starting to appear now, and I feel will be just like ‘star marketing’ or ‘influencers’ that will be popularized in fandoms that companies will slightly make use of.) that will encourage new ideas and bring about a sudden ‘boom’ not expected. (Especially after the lull of the pandemic, I feel there will be an abundance of things happening in the upcoming years... but nothing right now, unfortunately, but at least they’re forced to focus on working on things instead of just releasing to keep up with other companies.)--In other words, they will incorporate new blood with the old, and they will lead Sonic’s IP into a ton of nostalgia and new beginnings that will actually stick and become Sonic’s new brand identity. (This will resonate with fans old and new, but still be a fresh leap into the future for the franchise and fandom.) 2. Sonic’s negative popularity will start to decrease, leading and paving the way for fame and possible adjustments such as more romantic themes to keep up with trends and Japanese Government demands (especially when the population starts to wither and it becomes an emergency situation to start encouraging family ties). Other than sonamy or romantic things, I believe new characters will pop up to ‘test the waters’ and see if we like romance intertwined adventures. 3. Villains will become more sentimental and caring, less comedically, they will be redeemable entities so that the company can market them more. This can also lead into funny romances that help other romances develop and have more meaning. (In other words, they’ll dig into their vault of familiar and new faces, go off the trend of ‘redeeming the villain’ and have more heart-to-heart moments that may inspire more canonical couples... especially if a newer villain were to have a crush that ended up helping two canon characters get together and leave the audience sympathizing more with the villain. This is an actual trend starting where Villains have more character and roles other than just being evil and staying that way till death. I suspect this will be popularized in American and possibly foreign media as time goes on.)
(I actually have a lot of the sonamy shirts lol But here’s an example of the villain actually helping the canon couple have more ‘romantic underlying’ moments together <3)
Those are my current predictions, though I admit that some don’t sound all that hopeful. But hey! All my hopeful and positive predictions have already come true XD Sonamy is being marketed, the new media (Sonic Boom at the time) had subtle but more forward comedic hinting (that I don’t feel went all that well? But eh, that’s just me!), and SEGA continues to try and reface Sonic which his brand doesn’t need. I believe they will still try and rebrand Sonic continually until something sticks for them that they like. Sonamy may go through many iterations, as they are still hesitant with it, and we see that by only marketing their ‘younger selves’ as in Classic Sonamy, and are too ‘shy and uncertain’ if backlash would happen if they advertised a more mature-looking Sonic and Amy marketing. Again, I don’t know if they’ll fully grow out of this, so I predict they won’t.
(I have this one but in black <3 <3 <3)
That’s it for now! My positive last comments would be the more we buy/purchase Sonamy merch, the more we’ll start seeing it in their media and entertainment products. Until then, do your best and write, draw, and review -kindly- to keep those articles of enchantment alive with the sweet sound of--”When will Sonic and Amy finally have a love song AMV moment for us?” lol
#cutegirlmayra ask#ask cutegirlmayra#sonamy#sonic the hedgehog#sega#amy rose#cutegirlmayra#sonic ask#ask sonic#sonamy ask#ask sonamy#sonicxamy#sega marketing#anime#video games#japan#sonamy predictions
86 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hey, how do you and other Krexie shippers work around the age gap? I mean, I ship Krexie and have my own headcanons, but I'm curious to see what others have done.
I feel like I answered this before several months ago, but I don’t feel like finding that post so I’ll answer again. The full answer to your question is a short essay (and that’s without including the footnotes) so I’m gonna put it under a cut. This is based upon my own experience in the fandom, and the krexie circles I frequent are the ones on FFN, AO3, and of course, here on tumblr. Abuse and grooming (in the context of real people) will be talked about below the cut.
TL;DR I’ve seen three main ways of dealing with the age gap: ignoring it, aging Krel up, and aging Douxie down.
Ignore It
This one actually encompasses two different methods. The first of the two is to treat one or both of the boys’ ages as nebulous, with the maturity level of “teenager” and nothing more explicit since Douxie is about nine centuries old and Akiridion royals live for centuries Krel’s exact age is unknown. In this case, the age of one or both of the boys won’t be mentioned aside from being hundereds of years old. In addition, at least on Douxie’s end, this is somewhat canon. Fun fact: Douxie never calls himself a college student, and neither does Archie. Likewise, neither of them call Douxie 19. That was Steve, who deserved far better of a character arc than just to be the idiot that he is in Wizards. However, even though he deserved better Steve is not a reliable source of information on Douxie’s age, but Douxie and Archie are. In Wizards, the only information Douxie and Archie give on Douxie’s age is that he’s about nine centuries old.[1]
The other method of ignoring the ages is to treat Douxie as a 19-year-old (ignoring the immortality) and Krel as a 16-year-old, and to mention one or both of their ages. Their ages are ignored due to one or both of the following reasons: for one, in real life a three year gap between teenagers doesn’t automatically mean the older person is a predator. It’s something to be cautious about, and the younger person really needs to have people they can trust since if the relationship does turn toxic they would have less power and thus be in more danger (usually, though it is possible for the younger person to be more dangerous to the older one), but that doesn’t automatically mean something bad will happen. The other reason to ignore the boys’ ages is because honestly? If someone needs non-canon ships to tell them which relationships are healthy and which ones are dangerous, then their parents/guardians and teachers have failed them. Fanfic authors, fanartists, and other people creating/consuming fanworks on the internet are not responsible for educating random people on the internet. In fact, they and their content are not responsible for if a random person is abused, even if the abuser uses fanworks to groom the victim. It’s the fault of the abuser for being abusive.[2]
Out of these two methods, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen more using the former method of ignoring than the age gap than the latter.
Age Krel Up
This, again, has two different methods. The more common method is to have Krel (and the other Arcadia Oaks High students) age naturally, until they’re at an age that the fanwork creator is more comfortable with having krexie at. These types of fanworks take place years after the events of Wizards. The other method is to create an au where Krel (and likely the other Arcadia Oaks High students) were already the age the fanwork creator is more comfortable with when Douxie and Krel first met. I, personally, have created a lot of content for the first method, and I’ve seen other people use this method as well. My fake marriage au utilizes the latter method, and this method would also work for au’s where Douxie and Krel are both adults when they meet but the au does not follow canon.
Age Douxie Down
This one also has a basis in canon, though I haven’t seen any other krexie shipper use this method of dealing with the age gap. I, personally, use this whenever I want to make krexie content that’s compliant with Trollhunters and 3Below but also do not want to deal wit backwards time travel because I hate backwards time travel. However, someone should write an au where Douxie and Krel are human high schoolers whose biggest problem is being gay for the guy attending your rival school.
Now, while Douxie and Archie gave Douxie the vague age of about 900 years old and Steve made the assumption that Douxie was a 19-year-old college student, Trollhunters actually went out of its way to show that Douxie was a high school student.
In season two episode 10, Mary reveals that she was dating a student from Arcadia Oaks Academy, and Eli remarked that that was their rival school. I was in high school when Trollhunters was airing, and let me tell you: high schools do not have rivalries with colleges. Arcadia Oaks Academy would have to be a high school, or maybe a k-12 or 6-12. However, it’s far more likely that Arcadia Oaks Academy is a high school with the same age range of students as Arcadia Oaks High. In season three episode 1, Mary excitedly tells Claire that a student from Arcadia Oaks Academy is at Arcadia Oaks High. This student is Douxie, and unless I’m remembering wrong he also mentions attending the Academy. Unless Mary knew all along that Douxie was a wizard and was trying to give him a cover story for why he was hanging out at Arcadia Oaks High only for this information about Mary to be cut from Wizards due to time constraints, there is absolutely no reason for Mary to lie about Douxie’s age to Claire. The fact that Douxie was considered to be a high schooler by most of the fandom (some people had been on the train of “he’s a centuries old adult” for a long time) is why the krexie fanworks created pre-Wizards are all treating Douxie like a high schooler. (Yes, people shipped krexie (or at least consumed/produced fanworks for the ship) before Wizards came out. I have my fic on AO3/FFN and other people’s comments to prove it, as well as some fanart saved to my blog. Sadly, some of the people are now antis, and one them has now harassed at least one krexie shipper.)
Personally, when I age Douxie down, I age him down to 17. Only 17. Not 17-plus-several-centuries-without-aging. In-universe he may try to call himself 1492 years old, but he’s really just 17. However, as I mentioned before, if I’m aging him down to 17 then I’m also completely ignoring the backwards time travel aspects of Wizards. And, by doing that, I end up really changing the lore of Wizards. If you would like more information for the timeline I use when I age Douxie down, please refer to this ask.
In Conclusion
Thank you for reading this. These footnotes aren’t nearly as on topic and are more of a ramble.
[1] Re: Douxie having a really vague age of nine centuries. If you take enough chemistry and physics (but in my experience especially chemistry) courses, you will have it drilled into your head that 900 years old could really be anywhere from 850 to 949 years old. So, while 919 is definitely possible in the age range given by the age of “about 900″, it’s really a give-or-take number. However, if we truly want to be accurate, then if we choose to have Trollhunters take place in the 2016-2017 school year, choose to have had the moppet been between 16 and 19 years old at the Battle of Killahead Bridge, and we consider that the late 12th century (aka the time period of Wizards... supposedly, considering that it is not historically accurate) to be the latter half of that century, then Douxie would have to be somewhere between 834 and 886 years old. If we want a 16-year-old moppet and for the 900 years to be an accurate case of rounding, then the Battle of Killahead Bridge would have needed to be in 1183 at the earliest, which is accurate for the description of late twelfth century. If Douxie were to really be 919 in 2017, then the Battle of Killahead Bridge would have needed to take place somewhere from 1114 to 1117, aka the early twelfth century.
[2] Re: the argument that fanwork creators are not responsible for if an abuser uses their content to groom a victim. When I was a kid, the big scare was that strangers would lure off innocent children with candy. We were told not to go anywhere with a stranger, even if they had candy (or puppies, kittens, etc.) I don’t know how many kids have been hurt by strangers promising candy, nor do I know if this is something kids are still being warned about, but I do know that there isn’t some campaign against candy companies for daring to sell candy that an abuser would use against kids. This is because, as horrible as children being hurt is, it’s not the fault of the candy companies. It’s the fault of the abuser. And likewise, it’s not the fault of a fanwork creator if someone else uses their content to harm others.
PS: A side note since we’re discussing ages. I’ve been in this fandom for years, specifically on tumblr, AO3, and FFN as well as one of the discords. It wasn’t until the krexie discourse started that I started seeing people start calling Krel 14. I had seen people call him 15-16 in the past, because the fandom wasn’t sure if he and Aja were twins or had a minimum of a 9-month gap (assuming, of course, that Akiridions reproduce like humans do). That being said, before the discourse I never saw anyone treat Krel (or Aja, for that matter) like he had a canonical age. 14, however, seems to be something that stemmed from the wiki. You know, the same fan-run wiki that claims that Nomura’s full name is Zelda Nomura even though nowhere in the shows, books, games, or graphic novels is she ever called by that name. Yeah, the Arcadia Oaks-Pedia is not a reputable source. I’m going to give the wiki editors the benefit of Hanlon’s razor and hope that they were just going “well, since Krel is Aja’s younger brother and we’re assuming she’s 15-16 years old like the rest of the protagonists he must be 14-15 years old” and it was only after that that antis took the idea of Krel being 14 as canon and then ran off with it to be cruel and cause chaos.
#answered ask#anonymous#krexie#tales of arcadia#trollhunters#3below#toawizards#krel tarron#hisirdoux casperan#fandom discourse#child abuse#abuse tw#grooming#if i wake up to people being dicks about this i will be so mad
49 notes
·
View notes
Text
The Last Phoenotopia Blog Update
(Date 2021 MAR 01)
I debated how to open this blog post, but perhaps the main crux of this blog post is the best place to start. The blog is being retired.
The purpose of this blog was to be a "development" blog for Phoenotopia, and well, Phoenotopia's development is done. I'll still be doing bug fixes and maintenance on the PC and Switch versions, and playstation and xbox ports are underway (by a publisher). But I'm not going to be making any more major changes to the game. At some point, you put the paintbrush down and say it's done. Blemishes and all.
Recent Events
The game launched on Steam last month, and like any launch, it was hectic. Bugs Galore. This is our first commercial PC launch, so it was a real baptism by fire. Unlike Switch's one configuration, the PC has multiple configurations and factors to account for. The game needed to be able to handle multiple control schemes, screen resolutions, refresh rates, and more! I had a 60Hz monitor going into launch and didn't know anything about Hz (I do now). There was a troublesome stutter that some players were sensitive to that my whole team didn't notice since our eyes compensated it away. There were a few times where in fixing something at one party's behest, it introduced problems for another party. A few times, due to disorganization, I unwittingly rolled back a fix that was meant to be applied. For some, the game couldn't play at all (really glad Steam allows refunds).
It was messy. It was tiring. I.AM.BEAT.
I think the worst of it is over... I'll still be around to do the last updates and bug fixes, but I'm ultimately ready for what's next.
SO what is next?
What isn't next... is Phoenotopia 2. As you may have heard down the grapevine, the game couldn't be what you call successful. No one's earned even minimum wage on it.
Maybe there's hope in the game's long tail. A year or two down the line... maybe. I won't hold my breath though. At some point in the past few months, I finished processing (or grieving) and it's time to move on.
The game has at least earned enough for us to continue our modest operations. As long as we don't expand the team, and we don't take another monster six-year dev cycle like what Phoenotopia took, we can continue. We'll have to be smarter and faster. Perhaps the most valuable thing we gained from all this is experience.
The Experience
It is a dev blog. Here are some of the lessons I've accumulated from this game's development.
- Have a good menu design. Menus aren't just that in-between fluff before you get to the good stuff. Menus are KEY. Your menus need to be robust, expandable, and *understandable* (to you, the developer). Because once the game's out, you will invariably be asked to add more options. And if your menu design is bad, every time you have to add a new menu option, it becomes a whole new pain all over again. Support mouse from the get-go, etc.
- Focus on features that people will actually care about. For instance, I've never seen anyone praise the camera's zoom feature. In practice, people try that feature a few times and then never use it again. But that feature was a constant consideration factor for every level. Run through it multiple times to make sure the level didn't break, think about which zoom levels made sense, resize rooms because they worked at one zoom level but not the other, and so on.
- Don't do boxes that you can move around. Other 2D platformers avoid movable boxes because they're a huge headache to program and they really complicate the game space. Enemies need to respond to boxes you throw in their path and either navigate around or attack it. When you're moving the box, you have to worry about constantly changing your collision size and reconciling when the box gets snagged on the environment. The boxes were also a constant source of bugs because people can manipulate them to soft-lock themselves and more.
- More focused script. Phoenotopia's 100,000+ word script was panned more for being bloated than it was praised for being lengthy. Long scripts take a long time to write and make the game more unwieldy, increasing the costs of translation and upkeep. Every update we're addressing some textual error or mistranslation. There are some highly renowned games (e.g. Hyper Light Drifter) that do without a script at all!
- Be flashy! A bat and a lightsaber take the same amount of work to program, but the lightsaber will draw a lot more attention and interest.
- Slopes, surprisingly! Six years ago when I started, Unity was ill-equipped for 2D games. If you used the physics that Unity provided you'd have a really floaty character that wouldn't adhere to the slope when going downhill. There were a hundred different tutorials saying different things (use forces, use move position, use translation, etc). You can get rectangular collisions done in a day, but to do slopes took weeks. Meanwhile, games can actually get by fine without slopes. Most people won't even notice. Did you know the Phoenotopia flash game didn't have slopes? Neither does Hollow Knight or Rogue Legacy. You can save yourself a lot of work by avoiding slopes.
(big entities look weird on slopes. Bad slope!)
I could write enough little knowledge nuggets like this to fill a book! But I'd rather just make the next game.
So… what IS next?
As mentioned previously, it's not Phoenotopia 2. Pirate and I are mostly just tossing some ideas back and forth right now. We'll go silent for a year (or two). Our next game's scope will be more modest in some ways, more ambitious in others. It will definitely be more smartly designed. (There will be a map!)
We'll announce it when it's ready for the public. It might be necessary for us to do a kickstarter. I've tried to avoid kickstarters having been burnt on quite a few myself and also because I worry that mismanaging a kickstarter would earn the ire of backers.
But I did keep this blog regularly updated for six years. So I've gained some confidence in my abilities to at least manage a kickstarter well.
Is it really the last Phoenotopia Blog update though?
Okay, not really. There is some news that I'll need to announce, and this blog is one of the game's main outreach channels. Here are the events that will cause me to update the blog:
Announcing the launch of the xbox/playstation ports when they're ready
If a physical edition of the game happens
If a new language is getting introduced into the game (Korean is a high possibility)
When we're ready to talk about our next game
If (BIG IF) we begin development on a Phoenotopia sequel. I do want to do a sequel one day if we have the means and the demand is there.
Those updates will be more on a "when they happen" basis, rather than me reporting in every couple months.
Fan Art
As always, I'm very happy to see fanart of Phoenotopia. Major thanks again to Pimez for collecting all the artwork from the corners of the internet! Since this is the "last" blogpost, Sir Pimez can finally take a rest from collecting the fanart :P
ÆV made a series of pictures that tell a story. A Pooki is humanely sheared of its wool to create a hat. The Pooki is unharmed. Nice! Gotta love Gail’s expressions.
Amagoo Mazeru makes a stunning landscape shot of a full moon and shooting stars. It’s a sharp and clear vector art. I like the faint glow of the moon and the fire and the subtle gradient in the night sky. Very skillfully done!
Hah hah. I got a chuckle out of this one. I imagine this is how Gail's enemies see her by the end of the game. CaESar made this image based on TerminalMontage's famous youtube videos. Nailed it!
CrownStar drew two pictures of Gail. I'm a big player of JRPGs, so the first shot instantly reminded me of Persona 4's art style. (Hmmm... Phoeonotopia as a JRPG... there’s potential there...) Next, Birdy is shown carried off after her defeat. I really like Birdy's expression here - she just seems mildly uncomfortable.
There's a bit of a story behind the first image. As Firanka shares it, she wasn't able to defeat the Big Eye monster at the end of the flash game, so she believed a tall tale that what awaited after was a 6 armed Kobold boss. Hilarious! The second is a rendition of the lonely Anuri elder. A rare subject. The loneliness is portrayed well here. I feel lonely just looking at it!
Koo_chop draws the clash between Gail and Katash at the top of the towers. I really like this interpretation of the game's art style. It’s faithful to the in-game graphics. And the lighting, from the glow of Gail's bat, to Katash's sword, and the lightning in the background... Amazing!
Lime Hazard shows Gail with a salute pose. Very appropriate for this occasion. I also like how there's a slight tilt in the angle that Gail is portrayed. Those dynamic angles are always hard to get right, and Lime Hazard pulled it off very skillfully. See you next mission!
Lyoung0J with a digital painting of Gail posed sitting on a rock. I like how it almost seems like she was caught in a candid moment - she’s smiling, but also feeling self-conscious. Cute! The art style really pops, and I like how Gail is sporting what I call the old anime style nose.
MyUesrNameIsSh*t with a sketch of Gail performing a skillful slingshot. I like how Gail is depicted with her tongue out in a mischievous manner, the way all mischievous people with slingshots do.
Niitsu Kentaro returns with a 2021 Happy New Year picture. That happened didn't it? A New Year... Gail's pose gave me a chuckle with how she seems to be waving the bat around as casually as one would wave hello. And "Phoenotopiyear"... Well said! One day we'll have our Phoenotopiyear...
Ochan Nu breaks all records with a stunning NINE pictures in one session :O
There's so many goodies here. My favorite would be the one with Gail staring intently at the screen - it's like she's looking directly at you. You almost feel uncomfortable.
Next, there's an Animal Crossing villager dressed as Gail and sporting her pink hair. It even looks like a house Gail would live in. Gail is a connoisseur of the arts and likes Mona Lisa. Yes :)
There are various comics of Gail pointing out Gail's weird food habits. A picture of Fran looking really cool, and even Gail rocking a bathing suit. (bathing suit image linked here in case NSFW). Wow!
Pimez didn't just collect the arts, he creates them as well! This one, which he aptly named 'The Year 175' is a depiction of when the dragons invaded the towers as told by an elderly Daean woman. Great pixeling skills! I got a good chuckle from the ice dragon leaving with its stuff slung over its shoulder.
Quo made a stunning picture of Gail playing the flute surrounded by the 5 musical notes and the Phoenix logo behind her. The theme seems to be "fire" and it works really well. Gail herself looks awesome depicted in her red suit - it's like she's leading a marching band!
Rai Asuha depicts Gail in the late game with her red suit, and night star bat, and holding a lamp. She looks ready for adventure! I really like the white outline here and Gail's poofy shoulders here - the art style feels reminiscent of Final Fantasy Tactics.
Seri also draws Gail bearing her late game equipment. Unique to Seri's drawing is how all of Gail's equipment is accessible from a pocket on her shirt. I also like how Gail is depicted with her lucky earrings - that accessory is often forgotten.
Treedude depicts Gail with a bat and wearing a funny smirk. She looks like she's ready to hurt someone!
Warotar returns with everyone's favorite Great Drake, Bubbles! It seems so happy to be featured!
I'm really grateful for all the fanart this game has received. From the bottom of my heart, thank you!
Closing Notes
Pirate drew a picture to mark the occasion. It shows Gail enjoying a hot chocolate with marshmallows and a pumpkin muffin. A rest well-earned...
Goodbye! Until next time!
95 notes
·
View notes
Text
coa one year later & self-reflection
(*drags out a creaky metal chair and plops down on it heavily*)
Hi. It’s me, ya boi skinny--
Wait, wrong one. Do over.
Hi, it’s me, Kat, and I’m not dead. Clearly. Today being one year anniversary of COA has kinda put me in a reflective mood, so I guess I decided to sit down and just...talk about some things, thoughts and feelings I’ve been bottling inside for a hot sec. Especially given how radio silent I have gone on here and people deserve a bit of perspective.
And before anyone starts worrying, it’s all good, and I’m still around and currently in good health for the most part.
So, let’s take it back to the start. Regardless of how dramatic it may sound, we need to go back a year for that.
By technicality alone, COA actually turned one year old on October 12th. That’s when the first part was posted. However, the reason I’m treating today as the aforementioned birthday is simple: I had no intention of this story ever being more than a short two-parter. I told this to the discord gang already but COA was only going to have two parts. V was going to die in Tokyo and the rest of the story follows glimpses of John throughout the movies and it’s her ghost that haunts him. Skipping ahead, it was going to have a bittersweet ending of John eventually dying, having completed his task, only to be greeted by V, Daisy and Helen in the afterlife. A peace of sorts. Then, I realised that, well, no. I have more to say on this world and intrigue about this placeholder character V kept growing.
November 1st happened and I made a very last minute call to continue COA but with the added pressure of doing it during NaNoWriMo 2019. And boy did I. Most of the story was figured out during that very intense month. I posted Part 2 on this day a year ago because I was so eager to share it. Perhaps, in retrospect, a bit too eager.
For those of you who may not know this, I work as a writer full time for my actual every day job. I’m the main writer for an original webcomic called In the Bleak Midwinter on Webtoon.com and have been for almost two years now. Getting what is essentially your dream job is amazing. I’m very lucky on that front but it also taught me stark realities of having your job and only hobby overlap. It’s a dangerous creative mix. Especially because I was not used to being constraint in what I create or the feeling like I have to please anyone else. Writing as a job is a whole other avenue of creative exhaustion. I love my job a lot and am very, very lucky to have it but it doesn’t change the fact that those initial stages made me fall back on COA a lot for creative freedom that I craved so desperately. To an unhealthy degree looking back on it now.
But going back to November last year. NaNo time. I did it. Finished on the 24/25th I believe. A juicy final count of 52k+. All while maintaining a weekly update schedule for a fic that usually hit around 10k per update, if not more, even during those early days. Add writing an original story on top of that. Writing every day for hours on end (we are talking 10-12hr days) without any time for other hobbies or time for myself in general. I kept pushing and pushing and pushing. Losing weight and sleep in the process. I think the thing that convinced me that I should continue doing so is the fact that the outpour of support for COA ended up surpassing anything I ever expected or even dared to hope for. I’m not a huge numbers person but the outpour of love and just sheer investment in the story and characters blew me away. John Wick fandom is on the smaller side and has been going through downtime when I posted COA so my expectations were...well, small tbh. I like keeping expectations low to avoid any disappointments in general. But I’ve also always had an issue of being a massive 0 or 100 kind of person. If I love something, it consumes me. In this case, it brought me as much joy and freedom as much as it was steadily pushing me towards the ultimate crash.
That being said, I can’t thank you all enough for every comment, like, reblog and message and fanart. You’re the reason I got this far. With your support. It brightened some really dark days for me.
But.
To be frank, it’s never been about you guys. I never wrote or pushed because I felt like I had to appease anyone. That creative mindset is pure poison and I long since learned to let go of it. I kept pushing and kept working myself to the bone because I liked it. I liked how reading peoples’ responses made me feel. I liked the addictive nature of reading all the comments and theories after an update. I loved the idea of brightening peoples’ days and giving them something to cheer them up after what might have been a shitty day. Even if that was at expense of my own time/well being. But for a long time, it wasn’t. I love writing a lot but facts remain facts.
It was beyond unhealthy and burnout wasn’t a question of if but when and that when was approaching at neck-breaking speed.
So we come to the end of November. Part 4 has just come out. People were invested and I was invested alongside them. I was just finishing up Part 5 which (back then) was the biggest single chapter I’ve ever written and god I still recall my sheer dread because that was the beginning of Santino being established as a LI. Looking back on that now, it’s downright hilarious how worried I was about the reception of him and V together after John.
So honestly, I hit burnout at around Part 8. Because that’s the first time I recall struggling with writing a chapter. Part 8 came out on December 28th. I had a brief break for holidays. But my mistake was not taking longer back then. Because I continued writing with a barely healed burnout. Followed by almost a year of struggling and continuously creating through that state. It wasn’t like I eased off the pressure, either. Oh, no. The chapters grew in size, the world and the characters with it. AUs amassed quickly and while I adore every single one - again, I didn’t know how to pace myself well enough.
I’m spiteful though. The more the chapters struggled the more I pushed against the burnout. By the time Chicago arrived, however, I knew I was in trouble. I ended up writing 43k+ in a span of 2 months, I believe. And while to some it may not seem like a lot given the time frame, it’s a lot when you’re burnout to a crisp & writing an original story for work + deadlines. Which I was burned out and then some. Chicago was something I was looking forward to writing for months. I have built it up since Part 4. It was a long time coming. So while I’m still proud of it, I would be lying if I said that some scenes were not sacrificed for the sake of keeping to my invisible schedule that no one but me actually cared about. You guys have always been patient. I never felt pushed into anything. It’s always only ever been me doing the harm.
Chicago was the downwards spiral for me mentally. I felt like I was failing to live up to my own expectations. That people were drifting away from it. I was plagued by the thought that the story I poured so much into was falling apart and growing weaker. Which this has always been an issue with me: I am my own harshest critic. Always have been. In fact, I’m a downright mean little fucker when it comes to just tearing at myself. I know writing is for fun - and it is - but I still like the idea of being proud of my work which only made everything worse despite the love each update received.
This takes us to the beginning of June. Specifically, June the 2nd. Or, as I like to call it: Kat Makes Another Impulsive Decision but This One Actually Works Out For the Better. On this day, I created the COA Discord server. And damn, I’m not sure what exactly I was expecting when I did ngl. I did it for fun and as an escape more so than anything. But somehow it ended up being the best decision I made in a long while. I know some of you are reading this. So love you lots, dorks. It’s such a privilege to be able to call so many of you my friends even outside of COA now. That little community has given me some of the best memories from this year and helped me to crawl out of my own metaphorical pit I was stuck in. Mentally, I’m doing much better than I did beginning of this summer. Which could be summed up as a constant self-hatred cycle and a feeling of inadequacy.
That, however, does not mean my burnout magically disappeared. If anything Chapter 17 just put a nail in the coffin so to speak. 2020 has been a shitty year just across the board for obvious reasons I don’t need to go into here but that can only partially be attributed to my mental state. Chapter 17 was...exhaustive. To say the least. But I was determined to stick with my vision and not split it up. I was also starting to be a bit more forgiving towards myself in terms of how long I may take to write it thanks to guys on discord though the feeling of failure and worry never quite faded fully. I’m proud of Part 17. Truly. But that was also when I hit rock bottom creatively on COA. It drained me completely.
I tried writing Part 18 for weeks after, day in and day out, not getting past the first scene and hating every word I wrote. So I took a deep breath and stopped. Figured I let it marinate and wait instead of trying to piece one of the most crucial chapters in this story like some Frankenstein monster two sentences at the time.
So my solution was simple: give myself some distance from it and write other things. Get my spark back. Of course that’s always a good idea. Having multiple creative escapes is the best thing you can do for yourself creatively. There was just one tiny little problem.
I was still burned out. Still am. The problem went deeper than just being burned out over COA. I was burned out over writing itself.
Which is an issue for a person who only has writing as a creative outlet.
I don’t have any other way to express myself. So I was stuck in a runt, trying to write because it’s the only thing that makes me genuinely happy even when I really shouldn’t have. And let me tell you. It’s a shitty fucking feeling. My burnout worsened. I had a thousand ideas but every time I tried to get them down it felt forced, fragmented, and weak. Repetitive and dry. Now, this is also in part because English isn’t my native language, so my vocab is limited as a result, but I hit that sweet rock bottom in that regard, too.
So, I worked on V (but in her OC form Clara), Lucien and The Elites. All those characters have grown so much since you last read about them. I have multiple original projects planned down the line that will feature all of them existing in their own world, with their own stories and no longer constrained by JW canon.
Which, finally, takes us to the end of October and beginning of November 2020.
I was convinced that the best course of action was to do NaNo again but with an original story this time (involving V). Suffice to say, it took a grand total of maybe 5-6 days and hating every second of writing it while also feeling like this project I’m so passionate and excited to write (still am) is just...going down the toilet to be blunt, to realise I may have made the wrong call.
Still, the stubborn ass that I am, I pushed through. Convinced I can get into it if I just keep going. The realizations that I am sharing with you right now won’t have been possible if it hadn’t been for a rather curious turn of events about a week and a half ago.
I recently bought a gaming laptop, all in preparation for Cyberpunk 2077 dropping ofc. But, in the meantime, I kept recommending a game to a friend on the COA server. That game? Far Cry 5. (It’s a blast to play btw, just a side note.) And playing it brought back all the feelings of nostalgia from the days when I used to write for that fandom. So I revisited some old work. Checked the stuff I never published and that has been sitting ducks in my docs for months and hoo boy. Let me tell you it was a vibe check of the worst kind.
The stark difference in the prose and the ease with which it flowed was...startling. It made me remember why I love writing so much and how proud I used to be of what I wrote back in the day. Which is not to say I’m not proud now, but it was just such a sharp dip in quality it was impossible to ignore.
So I didn’t.
I paused NaNo, moving it to another month. I paused writing for everything but work, which with our season coming to an end I will also get a rest from soon, too. I kinda paused in general. For the first time in a while, I finally forced myself to switch off. Rest.
The reason why I haven’t been on here is simple: guilt and not having energy to be on here. I like making my blog a safe space for everyone. Similar to escape it has become for me. I couldn’t pretend I was fine when I wasn’t. I felt obliged to perform and being here became exhausting. I haven’t been checking my inbox. Haven’t done much of anything except occasionally dropping by and reblogging a random post so people know I’m alive.
And that’s that, folks. That’s where I am currently. Resting. Completely exhausted mentally but resting. Getting my energy back.
So where does that leave us, huh? If you read this far, dunno what to tell you. Thanks, I suppose. It’s still odd to think people actually care about my existence sometimes.
I know what you’re likely thinking, too. So does this mean COA is never gonna be finished? What is gonna happen to it? Are you abandoning it?
The answer: no. 17 out of 25 chapters and 250k+ in, I’m too far in not to give it a proper conclusion. Not because I owe it to anyone other than myself. I want this story to be a stepping stone for my future as a writer. I want to prove to myself that I can get this done and finish it. As of right now (as you can no doubt tell with how long it’s been since last update) it’s on a soft hiatus while I rest. This rest? Not sure how long it may last. Right now, my plan is till mid December at which point I will reevaluate. Ideally, I finish the year with an update. But my New Year’s resolution is to finish COA. That timeline has become a little more murky now but, again, ideally it’s within the first quarter of 2021. Will that happen? I don’t know. And I don’t want to make false promises, either.
All I’m saying is that it will be done. I’m just no longer sure how long, exactly, it may take me to reach that Epilogue. I don’t expect many people to stick around for however long it may take me, but if you do, thank you. Truly. I really and deeply mean that.
So what’s on the cards for this blog in the meantime? Well, CP77 is coming out in under a month (if it doesn’t get moved again lmao rip) and I expect that to be my soft return to posting my writing on here again. We will see where the muse takes me, if at all. Regardless though, I’m excited.
One doctorate thesis later, here we are at the end of this really long rambling session. I hope that this has given you some perspective on things going on behind the scenes. I spared you some of the gorier details but I think this post has been long overdue. I suppose I, myself, was just too unwilling to face these things despite knowing about them deep down for a while now. I’m too self-critical not to notice but acting on correcting this behavior has been a whole other matter clearly.
Thank you for reading this post, my writing in general, and supporting me. I’m not going anywhere. I’m still around. More is on the way in the future. I’ll be seeing you all real soon. And all my love to all of you.
Love,
- Kat.
125 notes
·
View notes
Text
i think so much of writing respectfully and inclusively is being aware of what you’re putting down on the page. what do i mean by this? what better author to focus on than sj///m, right? i’ll start with CCity on this, since it’s the one where it’s most obvious she’s trying so hard to fix her mistakes, but the problem always comes back to her fundamental misunderstanding of why and how her shit is problematic in the first place and what she must do to fix said problematic shit.
i’m sticking this under a cut bc, surprise surprise, i rambled 😌
take, for instance, Hunt: i think it’s pretty widely-accepted he’s coded as a MOC, (potentially an Asian-coded man) since he’s given “golden-brown skin” and “angular” eyes. sj//m was trying to be more inclusive by writing him in such a way that he shouldn’t be perceived as white, but what she failed to realize is two big things: 1) the fact he’s a slave of centuries who is constantly tortured, mutilated, and manipulated by his oppressors, and 2) the fact he lusts after and is demeaned by Bruce, a white girl. furthermore, Bruce constantly makes comments about how Hunt should fight back, shouldn’t allow himself to remain a slave, and taunts him into either disobeying Micah (the man he’s enslaved to) or killing for her. it’s made clear time and time again that Hunt doesn’t like that he’s an assassin for Micah, and yet there are so many instances of him wanting to kill or hurt someone for Bruce, which not only makes his characterization inconsistent, it plays into the problematic trope of the dark-skinned aggressor (a trope that sj///m seems to be particularly fond of, what with the Illyrians).
(on the topic of Hunt, a quick side-note: the idea of the “alphahole” that comes up again and again in CCity and that antis have critiqued up the wazoo (though not with the “alphahole” colloquialism until CCity came along, but i don’t think many antis actually use “alphahole” as anything but a joke when talking about her obvious love of the hypermasculine alpha male). sj///m is clearly trying to call out her past mistakes and work to rectify them going forward, but she completely fails bc she only succeeds at 1) mocking her readers, who are often fans of hers bc they like the alpha male douchebag sj///m is infamous for, and 2) making herself sound like an idiot when she calls out “alphahole” behavior while actively writing “alphaholes” and making them (possible) endgame love interests (i say possible bc it’s anyone’s guess if sj///m will actually subvert everyone and their mother’s expectations by making Hunt endgame). Hunt is an “alphahole,” even if he’s not quite as bad as riceman or rowboat and even if sj///m thinks she’s not actually writing an “alphahole”. with his aforementioned behavior toward anyone who’s mean to Bruce (aka wanting to kill them for her), he still falls under the “alphahole” category.
but i digress.)
another example of sj///m writing without being aware of what she’s actually putting on the page is her inclusion of queer rep. sj///m queerbaits quite a lot with Danika, thanks to lines she has involving Bruce and her relationship with Bruce, not to mention how many times others wonder if Bruce and Danika are “just” best friends and not actually lovers. we have Hunt wonder about it, after all, several times iirc. one that stands out the most is when he says that they have to be more than “just” best friends because Bruce doesn’t mourn Danika like someone mourns “just” their best friend, thus implying that Bruce is mourning Danika like a lover and/or spouse (bc obviously people can’t be torn to pieces over losing their best friend in a horrific attack, right?).
here’s some lines that have romantic connotations bc i am nothing if not a historian who likes citations:
page 38 of my ebook:
Danika just said it. “If he grabs his phone to check his messages before his dick’s barely out of you again, please have the self-respect to kick his balls across the room and come home to me.”
page 45 of my ebook:
But it was Danika’s added “Love you” as [Bruce] slipped out into the grimy hallway that made her hesitate with her hand on the knob.
It’d taken Danika a few years to save those words, and she still used them sparingly. Danika had initially hated it when [Bruce] said them to her—even when [Bruce] explained that she’d spent most of her life saying it, just in case it was the last time. In case she wouldn’t get to say goodbye to the people who mattered most. And it had taken one of their more fucked-up adventures[...]to get Danika to utter the words, but at least she now said them. Sometimes.
page 258 of my ebook (aka the line of Hunt’s i referenced above):
The silence pressed on [Hunt] enough that he asked, “Were you and Danika lovers?”
He’d been told two years ago that they weren’t, but friends didn’t mourn each other the way [Bruce] seemed to have so thoroughly shut down every part of herself. The way he had for Shahar.
[...]
Hunt turned in place as [Bruce] padded around the other end of the kitchen island, flinging open the enormous metal fridge to examine its meager contents. “No,” [Bruce] said, her voice flat and cold. “Danika and I weren’t like that.”
page 696 of my ebook:
[Bruce] swallowed, looking at the ground that was not earth, but the very base of Self, of the world. She whispered, “I’m scared.”
Danika grabbed her hand again. “That’s the point of it, [Bruce]. Of life. To live, to love, knowing that it might all vanish tomorrow. It makes everything that much more precious.” She took [Bruce’s] face in her hands and pressed their brows together.
page 700 of my ebook (and i was torn on including this one, but it’s from Danika, so i think i should):
Danika had whispered, “I love you,” before fading into nothing, her hand sliding from Bryce’s.
page 703 of my ebook (also torn on this, but it does sound a little queer, so):
But it wasn’t okay. Not even close. What had happened, what [Bruce had] done and revealed, the Horn in her body, all those people dead, Lehabah dead, and seeing Danika, Danika, Danika—
Her breathless words turned into pants, and then shuddering sobs.
also, not for nothing, but the fact Danika dies without an actual male love interest to make Her Straightness Obvious kinda also implies she’s queer, but *sips tea*
furthermore, there’s the way sj///m writes Fury and Juniper: we see the two women together in one scene, in which Juniper is fetishized and goes to sleep with some random guy. for the rest of the book, they never interact on-page and thus we are never given the chance to see their dynamic, which would provide crucial context clues to what their relationship really is by the time this exchange happens between Fury and Bruce on page 494 of my ebook:
“And yet you can still talk to Juniper?” Bryce’s throat closed up. “I wasn’t worth the risk to you?”
Fury hissed, “Juniper and I have something that is none of your fucking business.” Bryce refrained from gaping. Juniper had never hinted, never suggested—“I could no sooner stop talking to her than I could rip out my own fucking heart, okay?”
“I get it, I get it,” Bryce said. She blew out a long breath. “Love trumps all.”
i’ve talked about this scene to death, but this is written in such a way that it can be read as “just” best friends or as two women in a romantic relationship, depending on the reader. the fact that Bruce “gapes” (which faerug also does to Mor, and which i talk about below) implies that being openly queer isn’t accepted in this world, that it’s not very likely you’ll see two women holding hands as they walk down the sidewalk or kiss at a romantic restaurant. it also implies that Bruce, no matter that she says about “love trumps all,” might not be as accepting as sj///m would like us to believe. maybe sj///m has never had a friend come out to her before, but if i came out to someone and they gaped at me (and i’ve come out to several people several times now, both about my sexuality and my gender, so i have some experience here), i don’t think i would be very happy with them/want to remain their friend.
on the note of queer rep in sj///m’s work, Mor is another fantastic example of trying to be inclusive through a response to criticism without sj///m being aware of what, exactly, she’s writing. Mor comes out because faerug all but forces her to by not shutting up what a good guy Azriel is and that Mor should just give him a chance. that right there is fucked on so many levels, not just because Mor is a lesbian, but bc she’s supposedly faerug’s friend. no one should ever force their friends to date someone they don’t want to (i’ve had this happen to me! i had to literally snap at my friend to get her to back off bc i wasn’t going to go to the dance with this one guy who ignored my every rejection and bought us tickets to winter formal, just bc he’s a nice guy and i might like him if i gave him a chance), but i don’t think sj///m could figure out how else to write Mor’s coming out scene, largely bc she has no fucking clue how disgusting the scene we’re given is. the problem with Mor being a lesbian is threefold: 1) she’s a woman who was tortured by her father and left to die bc she was no longer a virgin; 2) Azriel spends centuries lusting after a woman who makes it clear time and again that she does not reciprocate his feelings and yet he cannot take the fucking hint, so much so that sj///m has to now dangle Elain in front of him like a piece of meat to get him to let go of Mor; and 3) sj///m was obviously setting up Mor and Azriel to be an endgame couple in ac0maf, as evidenced both in canon and in her pinterest board:
even stans picked up on it, what with their vocal outrage over how Mor “led Azriel on” for centuries instead of just outing herself to a man she obviously does not feel safe around, and posts like these:
and fanart like this:
the tl;dr of this ramble is this: if you want to write inclusively and respectfully, you have to be 100% aware of everything you’re putting on the page. when people ask for advice on this kind of thing, my first comment is to always say they’re already on the right track bc they’re already thinking of this, rather than being unaware of problems bc a state of unawareness is where the problems begin to appear. Hafsah Faizal has talked about this before on her twitter (i wish i could find the tweet, but this is from eons ago), but if you write a character of color when you yourself are white, you have to be wholly conscious of how your white character talks to this character of color. if the character of color is constantly yelled at or ordered around or ignored by the white character, that’s a big problem. if you write a queer character when you yourself are straight, you have to be conscious of how your queer character comes out, is perceived by the reader, and is treated by the straight character. if the queer character comes out by comparing their bisexuality to forced prostitution, as is the case with Aedion and Lysandra in t0g, that’s a big problem.
the moment you share your work for public consumption, it no longer matters what your intentions are (something sj///m has a lot of trouble understanding, hence why she over-explains everything in her interviews and on tours, not to mention why she force-feeds us her opinion of her characters in canon so we’re forced to share the exact same outlook on them) bc all that matters is what you’ve put down on the page. your words, at that point, have no choice but to speak for themselves, and if they do any of the above, your work is going to come under warranted critique, and unless you learn from that critique and do more than half-assed jobs to write more inclusively and respectfully, you’ll run into the exact same problems that sj///m has with CCity.
#anti sjm#anti ccity#anti acotar#anti tog#long post#stans being stans#writing advice#writing tips#sorta
100 notes
·
View notes
Photo
Old School X is a project interviewing X-Files fanfic authors who were posting fic during the original run of the show. New interviews are posted every Tuesday.
Interview with Circe Invidiosa
Circe Invidiosa has 11 stories at Gossamer, but there are even more X-Files stories at her website. Some of my favs I’ve recced here before, like Make It Worse and Slap a Goatee On Me and Call Me Evil. She also made a bunch of X-Files collage art, including some cover art for fics (hers and others), which you probably saw if you were reading fic back when authors posted fics on their own websites where art could be shared. Big thanks to Circe Invidiosa for doing this interview.
Does it surprise you that people are still interested in reading your X-Files fanfics and others that were posted during the original run of the show (1993-2002)?
Well, it would surprise me if people did read my fic. As it happens, I don't hear much feedback from my fic these days. Probably because the bulk of it is on Gossamer and my own site rather than AO3. Also, I was never a BNA. I worked a lot behind the scenes – hosting other authors' sites and making fanart and dustjackets. I think that's what I'd be remembered for, if anything.
What do you think of when you think about your X-Files fandom experience?
I miss the collective excitement and discussions we had as groups. When you got in with a group in the XF fandom, you felt like you knew everybody there. Now the fandom feels a little faceless except for the people I still follow from my old groups.
Social media didn't really exist during the show's original run. How were you most involved with the X-Files online (atxc, message board, email mailing list, etc.)?
Most of my experience was on Yahoo Groups. I joined Scullyfic while it was still there and then E-muse when it became an e-mail list, which I'm still a part of. I was part of several Yahoo Groups (can't remember all of them now), where I'd post my fic, RealPlayer slideshows (remember those?!), and collages. I never really took part in discourse because I'm shy and don't think anyone cares about my opinions (still don't!). The e-mail address I used for those groups was purged a couple of years ago, so I've lost all those messages.
What did you take away from your experience with X-Files fic or with the fandom in general?
My take away is that fanfic made me a better writer, thanks to having some great betas, and it made me a better professional writer for it (my real-life work is writing but not fun writing) because I learned to take criticism.
I also used to make a lot of fanart, collages and dustjackets for fic mostly. My big take away from that was that I really got into graphics and I got super proficient at Photoshop, which helped my own artistic endeavours and photography. I didn't realize how much skill I had developed until I've had to help someone with their graphics or photo editing.
What was it that got you hooked on the X-Files as a show?
My mother was watching X-Files before I was and she was raving about it. I don't have a great relationship with my mom, but one thing she was usually right about was TV shows. It's where I got my love of Sci-Fi.
I think the first episode I watched was Ice, which definitely hooked me. As for when the shipping started, I remember we were watching Lazarus, and when Mulder was yelling at Lula (I had to look that up) about hurting the hostage Scully, my mom said, "Oh, he's so in love with her." And I was all, "What?! Pfff." But then I could not stop thinking about it. And then I thought about it way, way too much.
What got you involved with X-Files fanfic?
I was in my late 20s, and it was around the end of S7 and I kept thinking about what if these two dumb idiots actually talked one day. And I kept thinking about dialogue in my head about what they'd actually say. The internet was still in its infancy back then, but I'd seen fan sites here and there. So I decided to search around to see if other people were talking about it and thinking about it like I was. I was such a noob I'd never even heard of fanfic. Imagine my delight when I discovered it. I found a few stories and thought, 'Well, I can do that.' And I wrote up my first story, found a place to post it (wasn't Ephemeral the best?), got some kind feedback, found a really nice person (not sure she wants to be named since she used her real name in the fandom back in the day) who encouraged me a lot and directed me to all the e-mail lists and Yahoo Groups that I needed to be on, and then, Bob's your uncle, I wrote more and more.
What is your relationship like now to X-Files fandom?
Periphery. Most of my experience in any fandom is now on Tumblr because that's where my attention span is. Show me pretty pictures and funny stuff. I am old now and don't want to think hard.
Were you involved with any fandoms after the X-Files? If so, what was it like compared to X-Files?
Veronica Mars was my next fandom experience. A number of my XF friends got me hooked on VM. The VM fandom was a LOT younger compared to the XF fandom. When I joined the XF fandom, I was the kid compared to most of the other fans who were all goddesses and royalty in my eyes. But in the VM fandom, I was in my 30s and the rest of the fandom were all in their early 20s if not younger. It often showed, so I stayed out of discussions and just posted my fic once I started writing it. I took a new handle (invida) when I started writing VM fic. Just in case these kids felt like my writing sucked, I didn't want it getting back to the XF fandom that I’d branched out and failed spectacularly.
By then fandom experiences had moved over to LiveJournal. I never really got involved in the discourse or the fandom fights. I knew what people were saying and where the schisms were, but I was all about the fanfic and the pretty pictures. Most of my LJ friends just discussed the episodes and posted their fic and that was good with me.
What got me writing fic for VM was Anjou's brilliant VM fic Into the Blue. Seriously, if you love VM S1, read her fic. Just so beautiful.
VM was also where started writing a WIP, which was a wild trip. I wrote a much-loved WIP called Damn, Damn the Circumstance which people still ask me about finishing to this day. Someday…*wistful sighs*
Who are some of your favorite fictional characters? Why?
Scully. She was everything! Lapsed Catholic, degrees in science, skeptic, always trying to work within the rules but still not taking crap. Yeah, she was the best.
Veronica Mars was great until she wasn't. I have a lot of issues with her beyond S2. And don't even talk to me about S4. For me, S1 was the best, I enjoyed the movie, the books were okay, but nothing else happened after that. NOTHING.
And the first character I ever loved was Princess Leia. She was also everything to me growing up. I wanted to be her. I still do.
Do you ever still watch The X-Files or think about Mulder and Scully?
Now and then. Not as much as I used to. I sometimes have it on in the background when I'm doing other things. Back before the pandemic, my BFF and I would have get togethers where we would play Scrabble, eat a lot of candy, and binge several XF episodes. I miss doing that. Hopefully, we will get back to that soon.
Do you ever still read X-Files fic? Fic in another fandom?
I am not an active XF fanfic reader right now. I will read any stories my friends put out. Otherwise, I only occasionally read some I come across on Tumblr in my feed, but I am not seeking them out. I will beta for any XF author who asks me as well.
I am reading fic in other fandoms though – Endeavour, Broadchurch, Sherlock…huh, I'm just realizing that's a lot of British stuff. I have been really into British detective series for the last few years.
Do you have any favorite X-Files fanfic stories or authors?
I used to run an XF fic recommendation site called How Will It End usually with at least one other person (I went through at least 4 partners on that project because I'm a control freak). We'd compile our recs and then I'd post them on my site. We'd also feature authors we really liked and interview them. Not unlike these interviews!
I'm terrible at giving feedback/comments. So I solved that problem by making a rec site. That way I could tell authors I loved their fics by recommending them. I didn't have to comment, I'd just say, 'I'd like to rec your fic'. And then they'd get promotion. Win-win. Back in those days, the fandom would absolutely roast you for promoting your own fic, so to get on a rec site was a big deal. Not that I had a popular rec site or anything. But I think authors really enjoyed being asked.
All that to say I've liked a lot of fics. I can pull up the archives of HWIE and show you all the faves I liked. :)
What is your favorite of your own fics, X-Files and/or otherwise?
Back in the day, E-muse would hold Improv Challenges, where other members would give you a prompt that you had to include in your fic. I was always really proud of the stories I created from those challenges (No Earthly Means and Elephant in the Room if you want to read them).
I enjoyed writing Dead to Rights which is an XF/Dead Like Me crossover because I loved the challenge of writing a crossover. It was the first crossover I ever tried writing even though I only recently published it.
Otherwise, I like re-reading In a Graveyard, Importuning Life for Life, and Some By Virtue Fall. Of my more recent fic, I like Slap a Goatee on Me and Call Me Evil because the premise was ridiculous and I think it's funny as all get out.
Probably my favourite of my VM fic was Stay Outta Riverdale. Because: 1. The title is a Simpsons reference who doesn't love a Simpsons reference? And 2. I think I was hilarious throughout it.
Do you think you'll ever write another X-Files story? Or dust off and post an oldie that for whatever reason never made it online?
I'm always open to writing more fic (and, of course, I don't mean my WIPs…don't look at me like that). Lately, my only motivation has been from writing prompts on Tumblr. I haven't had anyone give me a prompt in over a year, so here we are. I have snippets of dialogue in journals and word documents that have never found their way into stories. I'd be happy to dust off any of those and shoehorn them into a new story.
Do you still write fic now? Or other creative work?
The last fanfic I wrote was a mini-fic over a year ago (with a prompt from Lilydale!). I've written a bit of original fiction but I haven't been able to finish it. Otherwise, I do have a number of real life hobbies which are where my creative outlets lie now.
Where do you get ideas for stories?
Lately, challenges and prompts. It used to be from wanting to see more from a scene. I really had a thing for fill-in-the-blanks or scene continuations. And sometimes my motivation is just plain old spite. :)
What's the story behind your pen name?
Circe Invidiosa is the title of a painting by John William Waterhouse. Love the colours and the absolute malice on the face of the subject. It felt like a good pen name – the envious witch. That's me!
I chose it when I posted my first XF fic (which I cringe to read now, ugh so terrible) without knowing there was already a Circe in the fandom. Whoops. I tried to go by the full Circe Invidiosa or Invidiosa as much as possible after realizing that (invidiosa is my url and my username on a lot of sites, etc.). Now I think that I've been around long enough that it doesn't matter as much but I still like it.
As I said, I took the name Invida for the VM fandom which is just a shortening of Invidiosa.
Do your friends and family know about your fic and, if so, what have been their reactions?
My significant other knows and that was quite a reveal (oh how awkward). However, the SO has been very supportive and has read all my stories since the reveal and sometimes betas them. The SO also wants us to collaborate on writing some original fiction but we haven't found a project that works for both of us creatively or timewise.
My BFF knows because I dragged her into the online fandom. We've known each other since we were 14, but our love of XF really solidified our bond in our 20s. She wrote some short but sweet fics under the penname Helen Quilley which I bullied her into posting, and we wrote Of Ladies Most Deject and Wretched together. She is mostly embarrassed that she wrote fanfic now but we still fangirl together.
No one else really knows other than fandom folks I've met in real life. And some friends know I've written 'short stories' but I don't elaborate. I work in a stodgy, uptight industry where anything fun or actually having a life is frowned upon.
Is there a place online (tumblr, twitter, AO3, etc.) where people can find you and/or your stories now?
Over the first lockdown, I got my shit together and got my fic site, invidiosa.com, up and running again. My site houses fic by Rain (now @doctorhelena on Tumblr and AO3), Helen Quilley, ML (who I miss so much), Folieadeux, Shelba, TLynn, Oracle, Piper Sargasso, Diehard, and me. And I made all their dustjackets (except Folie's). The site got hacked a few years back and it was so much work to get running again that I put it off for years and years. I still feel terrible that I did not get the site back up before ML passed away, especially when ML had asked me about it a few months before she passed.
Anyway, all my XF fic is here: circe.invidiosa.com. I have 3 of my newer XF stories on AO3. And my fic-LJ also has some of my stories. Some of the newer stories are on Tumblr but the tagging is so erratic that I'd have to list several tags before you'd find them all. I don't know why I haven't moved everything over to AO3. Probably laziness.
I'm @invidiosa on Tumblr. I'm still on E-muse. I'm still on LJ. I'm always reachable by e-mail (invidiosa at gmail).
Is there anything else you'd like to share with fans of X-Files fic?
Thanks for reading, writing, and commenting. It is always appreciated.
(Posted by Lilydale on January 5, 2021)
56 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
libra-cant-just-dance
Bigender Wanderlust Truther
csabaklement
CsaK
undeadnecromancer
Welcome Home
itburnslikeafire
Louder than God's revolver and twice as shiny
anarchomikeism
Anarchomikeism