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bonefall · 5 months

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post/734733274896809984/do-you-ever-worry-your-own-writing-might-come-off that makes sense. i was asking because i'm afraid of accidentally writing misogyny myself and i kind of admire what you do

Hmm... I wish I had better advice to give you on this front, but honestly, the only thing I can tell you is to consider the perspective of your female characters.

Women are people. They have thoughts and feelings of their own, so like... just let them have their own arcs. A lot of the worst misogyny in WC comes from the way that the writers just don't care about their girls (or, in the case of tall shadow, actually get undermined and forced to rewrite entire chapters), so they're not curious about their lives, or WHY they feel the way they do or what they want, or any direction for their character arcs.

Turtle Tail as an example. She'll often just end up feeling whatever Gray Wing's plot demands. She's gotta leave when Storm dumps him to make him feel lonely. She shows up again to love him in the next book. Lets her best friend Bumble get dragged back to Tom the Wifebeater, but is sad enough about her death to be "unreasonably angry" with Clear Sky, and then calms down and accept Gray Wing is right all along.

And then she dies, so he can have his very own fridge wife.

In this way, Turtle Tail's just being used to tell Gray Wing's story. They're not interested in why she would turn on Bumble, or god forbid any lingering negative feelings for how she didn't help her, or even resentment towards Clear Sky for killing her or Gray Wing for jumping to his defense. She isn't really going through her own character arc.

She does have personality traits of her own, don't misunderstand my criticism, but as a character she revolves around Gray Wing.

So, zoom out every now and then, and just ask yourself; "Whose story is being told by what I wrote? Do my female characters have goals, wants, and agency, or are they just supporting men? How do their choices impact the narrative?"

But that's already kinda assuming that you already have characters like Turtle Tail who DO have personalities and potential of their own. Here's some super simple and practical advice that helped me;

Tally the genders in your cast. How many are boys, how many are girls, how many are others?

And take stock of how many of those characters are just in the supporting cast, and compare that to the amount you have in the main cast.

If you have a significant imbalance, ESPECIALLY in the main cast, fire the Woman Beam.

It's a really simple trick to just write a male character, and then change its gender while keeping it the same. I promise women are really not fundamentally different from men lmao. You can consider how your in-universe gender roles affect them later, if you'd like, but when you're just starting to wean yourself off a "boy bias" this trick works like a charm.

Also you're not allowed to change the body type of any girl you Woman Beam because I said so. PLEASE allow your girls to have muscles, or be fat, or be old, or have lots of scars. Do NOT do what a cowardly Triple A studio does, where the women all have the same cute or sexy face and curvy body while they're standing next to dwarves, robots, and a gorilla.

Or this shit,

If you do this I will GET you. If you're ever possessed by the dark urge, you will see my face appear in the clouds like Mufasa himself to guide you away from the path of evil.

Anyway, you get better at just making characters girls to begin with as time goes on and you practice it. It's really not as big of a deal as your brain might think it is.

Take a legitimate interest in female characters and try not to disproportionately hit them with parental/romance plots as opposed to the male cast, and you'll be fine. Don't think of them as "SPECIAL WOMEN CHARACTERS" just make a character and then let her be a girl, occasionally checking your tally and doing some critical thinking about their use in the story.

(Also remember I'm not a professional or anything, I'm just trying to give advice)

#I wish I had more succinct and practical advice to give you besides the woman beam trick #Honestly I just kinda feel it out because I like telling stories about girls #I made it fun for myself by clapping and cheering and whooping and hollering whenever a girl does something #because it's not fun to write like a monk in a monastery #With the spectre of Brother Smockbimble looming over your shoulder telling you to Write Perfectly Every Time #Characters aren't real people. You can just fix it if you happen to fuck up or do better next time with what you learned.#Making mistakes is just part of acquiring skill #and writing is an art just like painting or drawing.#So don't make a fun OC project into homework! You should be enjoying making your own art! Express yourself!#Please understand that when I'm ripping into the series I'm being so harsh because it's bestselling corporate media #Read by HUNDREDS of thousands of kids worldwide #Raking in millions of dollars a year. Written by a TEAM of professionals.#So I have higher expectations of it than of a fandom rando on the internet. Or even a self-published author who's just One Guy.#Hence why I'm infinitely more charitable to Ratha than I am to Battle Cats #bones gives advice

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tamelee · 1 year

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Just wanted to share with you a preview of something I'm working on ;-; because this is my very first real (?) Manga panel and it's a lil Naruto 🧡 🔆

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wrylu · 2 months

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idk why i'm so moody these days but i find my despair funny

aka my average day as of now

#1. impulsive silly thoughts #2. STOP FORGETTING TO EAT!!!!!!!!!!!!1 please :3 (note for myself me myself and i)#3. i get sad 🥱#4. tired #(tumblr deleted half of my tags. isnt that nice though you wont have to listen to my essay of vents nobody wanted to hear that)#vent art #wrylu #lu's canvas #negative thoughts below :) have some flowers 💐#sometimes i feel like i should get up more and spend time with my family i miss how it used to be #but you know what i suck and im practically glued to my chair and im lazy like if i was one of the 7 deadly sins i would be sloth #im surprised im not dead yet #this is purely for myself to speak my poor mind #no i actually hate this #i wanna die #i wish i was dead #not really #but still #i wish time just stopped so i can re evaluate my life #and whoa damn dysphoria makes an appearance ever #i wish i had a schlong (funny)#this is awful #sometimes i feel manipulative like i switch my emotions and personalities so hard #am i manipulating you guys??#i feel like im being sad for attention #ugh i hate that the internet is my comfort #thats bad isnt it #i feel like an attention seeker #why am i even writing this 🥱🥱#i cant wait to fall asleep forever

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derpinette · 22 days

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SPERG YOUR HEART OUT

#EVERYONE #NOW !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!#& FOREVER #i love it when my friends &/or mutuals post about their interest & Passions i will like your posts but really i Loved them.#i deleted some tags because they might be interpreted as weird(er than usual) but 0_0 i am ♯Passionate about ♯Passion (for fashion - Bratz)#still kind of feel like a worthless human being but i secured another hangout in like a week so yayyy ^_^#I GET TO BOTHER SOMEONE TOO NOW i just wish people did that to me too why am i like always the one raving #literally have to beg my friend to give me updates on her things even if i normally hate it even i go out of my way to look for things #for us to discuss -_- GIRL please i am for real not just faking for politeness who do you think i am I WANT TO KNOW #so effin excited OMG i have like so much to say & the greatest thing is that this girl has no knowledge at all about my Thing #so i can explain from the very beginning You literally have no idea how much i practiced the conversation in my head #ever since she told me & she said she wanted me to go on & talk about it more i have been Devising My Plan #OMG YAYYYY ^_^_^_^_^_^ AIMU SO HEPI AAARRRGHHHHHGSJDJSHSJDHSHSG #& OFC i had to plug it in the first time i met her in person i just could not help myself there was an NF on that day & i told her i wanted #to catch it i had to go in the end for a different reason & BTW it was such a whiplash the show itself was so fun but the winner... 0_0 NO.#next i will ask her about berserk & maybe even read it so we can talk about it because she really likes it #i dropped it when i was 14 because the laptop i was using to read it was complete crap Just like mine is RN #like a section of my keyboard is completely dead T_T so i have to use the on-screen one...

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saltycactusss · 1 year

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they r so gnc af

#i like this show...a normal amount...😄#cuphead brainrot (real)#wish kd had more screen timeee #this show tickles my brain sm so glad i watched it during my break off school #i don't really like how i drew the devil in this style #might have to practice drawing him differently next time #cuphead #king dice #the devil #henchman #fanart

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goldkirk · 4 months

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question: have any of you personally seen a dietician (not looking for experiences with nutritionists, only dieticians), and did you find it helpful or useful, and if you did see a dietician and you ALSO have seen a GI doctor, how did the experience compare for you in terms of helpfulness + how much you felt listened to and helped?

#i'm trying to figure out which doctor appointments I want to bother making and spending money about for potentially no return on investment #and right now i'm trying to figure out if I'd get way more practical help from a dietician or if I need to suck it up and find a #not-elderly not-male not-dismissive GI doctor first and THEN see a dietician #although I cannot afford a bunch of tests #so like???#trying to figure out if a dietician would be more helpful overall with me not HAVING any GI diagnoses or eating disorders #and just really struggling with food in both sensory ways and unpredictable digestion ways that don't correlate with food allergies #god i sometimes wish i had food allergies so i could have some predictability #but yeah. i'm leaning towards dietician but figured i should crowdsource experiences #since I know a lot of you have health issues you've also been trying to manage for years and probably have good advice #if it helps i'm also in a major city now and have a decent-but-not-great health insurance plan so I'm good on those two fronts #to do #health #I know a dietician can't diagnose anything but I'd love help figuring out how to get maximum nutrition even when i can barely eat anything #or when my body decides to start getting sick from or (tw emetophobia) puking up fiber or fatty foods #which thankfully isn't often #now that I do cannabis daily in microdosing I have so much less pain and bloating and nausea #but when it hits it HITS #and the last time I tried going without cannabis for a couple days and then eating a fiber muffin I was sick six times in one morning #and didn't get my normal eating ability back until dinnertime #luckily that's not normal for me #but my issues bounce up and down so much #and I lose weight so fast whenever my appetite goes from 'barely ever there' to 'negatively nonexistent'#and I had like. two months last year where I think i reached my body's natural healthy set weight #and i needed so much food but it felt so good energy wise and temperature wise #and i'd like to STAY THERE FFS #and I feel like a dietician would be helpful for making meal options for good #*good and hard and nuclear alert level eating difficulty times #anyway. crowdsourcing. yay!

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kuwdora · 9 months

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I always have thoughts about book-to-media adaptations running in the back of my mind these days since it’s part and parcel of our fannish landscape. There’s just so much that goes into translating something from book to a visual medium. And then the adaptation fails in some small and/or large way and it ends up being a disappointment. (I think there’s also a lot to be said about adaptations that are more Successful than not and what success means in an adaptation…but I think that deserves its own post.)

I’m often considering a person’s entry point to adaptations, whether it’s through the media or the original source, and how that plays into people’s reactions about failures of adaptations or—like, what each person is wanting to get out of the adaptation if they know the original source material. And what they’re happy with when they’ve just discovered it through the adaptation.

Just gonna ramble a little bit about my own experience with being a book-to-adaptation person. I think even when writing and production circumstances are the most ideal, it’s still fucking hard as hell to adapt complicated narratives to the screen. Still. I’m not immune to heartbreak about seeing something play out badly because I had been so attached to the original book material.

When I was a little girl I picked up a fantasy book featuring a little girl protagonist. This main character was living in a foster situation, had dead parents, and a wishy-washy background she didn’t know much about. She was a little bit of a ruffian and kind of defied everybody and everything because she had a very strong sense of self and moral code. She is, of course, a child of prophecy and has a lot in store for her.

Over the course of the first book she ends up embroiled in some social and political intrigue and ends up going on a grand adventure. She meets an outcast who is is hated by humans but they use his services anyway because he’s good at his job. He ends up becoming her protector and guardian and would do anything for her.

She eventually crossed paths with a world-traveling misfit with who brought levity and a heart of gold to every scene. She also ended up meeting a very old, very beautiful witch also fell in love with this child and would move heaven and earth to protect her and help her survive and thrive.

The whole series deals with a lot of complex issues of the moral and social variety, and there’s a running theme about how men and institutions headed by men wield their power and try to impose their vision of the world on everyone. Particularly on women.

The little girl also eventually found out that her dad isn’t actually dead like she was told. The dad is alive and well and he’s asshole, also a bad guy. But he has the MOST CHARISMA EVER, holy fuck.

I ate these books up as a kid and reread them over and over and my brain and heart totally grew around them. I admired the protagonist and her sharp wit and mouthiness and determination. Her resiliency and perseverance to do what she knew would be right and just. As I got older and I reread the books and absorbed the more complex issues about personhood and agency. I thought more about how you can resist a bad situation or person when the world/person is trying to change you to fit their ideal. (That part was particularly important to me when I was young). But also the themes of good and evil, etc. I started seeing the politics and then understanding it more with every reread over the years when I started reading more history, more politics. It had always been there in the books but I could finally SEE it. It felt like a revelation.

A dozen or so years later it turns out someone was going to going to adapt these books! It was much discussed and heavily anticipated. These were well-known, beloved fantasy books from the 90s. Amazing characters and great scenes! Fascinating themes.

God I remember being so excited when I heard about the adaptation. And then I got to see it. It was the most confusing and disappointing experiences of my life. What I ended up seeing was pretty. Great costumes, CGI. Amazing actors! But everything that made the books interesting and magical and profound had been watered down, elided over the moral complexities. Or it outright changed things that would have fundamentally shifted the events of the rest of the books and make the adaptation even MORE incomprehensible.

I’m talking about the 2007 film adaptation of The Golden Compass from Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials. A lot of this probably sounds familiar to my Witcher mutuals, right?

Anyway.

The film had so many boycotts by the Catholic Church and other churchy groups in the United States for its depiction of institutionalized religion in Lyra’s world. So on the studio-side they made so many changes and demands that fucked the movie. So much doesn’t make sense or is just pales in comparison to what was actually originally intended.

After the film’s flop even more articles and reviews came out talking about Tom Stoppard’s original draft of the film and the director’s first take on the screenplay. Vulture read both versions and it's really illuminating what they discovered. The film was indeed supposed to be significantly longer but the studio wasn’t having it because they wanted kids to go and see this film and 2+ film wasn’t gonna be it.

Like. The studio was really hoping for another Harry Potter franchise and were treating this book-to-film more like a YA fantasy type of thing. When in reality someone wrote a sanded down version of the story for the screenplay that left me and a whole bunch of other people fucking jaded as hell. Because damn. Way to miss the fucking mark on an amazing fantasy series. 10000% missed it. I’ve blacked out most of the actual film from memory because I just could not believe it. The disappointment. The heartache of not doing the story justice.

But yeah…just… someone really thought The Golden Compass was gonna be a huge fantasy action/adventure hit because there were really cool talking animals.

It’s so fucking hilarious to me in retrospect. When you realize these books are Phillip Pullman’s AU fanfic/fix-it of Paradise Lost where Lucifer gets to have his revenge on the kingdom of heaven, there was noooo way that original film was going to even begin to set up a 3 or 4 film franchise. Nooo way.

The first book ends with an absolutely heartbreaking and horrific scene that is the catalyst for Lyra and what motivates her for the next 1500 pages of the series. I was there opening weekend in that theater for The Golden Compass. I have never been more confused in my LIFE while watching a film because they ended the film like 5 chapters before the end of the book. They lopped it off and made the first film a very strange Cliffhanger for a sequel that would absolutely never get made. I was flabbergasted.

The disappointment. The confusion. The despair. I was fucking depressed about it for a good long time. I had been so excited and been brimming with anticipation because I loved the books so much and I wanted it to be good and then what I got was….absolute garbage. To me. I mean maybe if I had been a little girl watching the film for the first time it would have been better. But as an adult who had spent the better part of my life immersed in Lyra’s character arc… I just. Could not feel more betrayed.

I can’t even be that upset anymore because I’ve had enough time to grieve and leave it behind. Then somehow the universe came together and HBO let Jack Thorne and company re-do the books as a series. It is a much more faithful adaptation. I’m too close to the book source to know if people who don’t read the books will get the same kind of experience out of seeing the show play through Lyra and Will’s experiences in the show.

The final season of His Dark Materials was also probably the most philosophical and abstract season of fantasy television I’ve seen. I fucking loved it. I don’t think it was perfect, but it was really enjoyable and did more to soothe my soul than I thought possible. It’s not a show for everyone—and I’m still not sure how it got made because HBO the last few years had been going through some changes. Maybe I’m very sentimental and forgiving, I don’t know. The narrative pacing was a bit weird to me in places and some of the dialogue was hit or miss but overall, I could not have gotten a better time from it.

That experience with the film a has made me much more intentional about managing my expectations of how I approach media adaptations.

Where am I starting with an adaptation? What am I hoping to get out of this? Who is making it and what are the production constraints working against it? How do I manage my expectations if I know the original source and what do I want from the visual media and acting? Etc etc. Do I want to go and read the original if I don’t know it already because I want to see what changes they made?

I keep thinking about everything with The Witcher Netflix. It’s so fucking difficult to get anything made through studios and networks (especially now, but even then in the late 2000s)… And when you’re trying to appeal to the widest audience possible, you’re only going to get so far when you’ve left the rest of the source inspiration on the table. And didn’t bother to make up for the difference in what you left there.

We all know how depressing it is. The streaming model has fucked television over completely. The depreciation of writers rooms… we had 20 and 22 episodes, and then 15 and 12 episodes. Filler episodes with great character moments. Space to flesh out complex narratives with nuance. And now 8 episodes as a standard runtime. The lack decent amount of time for production (including pre and post) to actually set things up in a way that serves the media narrative.

It’s so hard to cater to everyone when you’re drawing from a book/comic book. Also harder to cater to your specific audience. But when you’re trying cater to enough people so you don’t get cancelled and keep going to try and tell the story you’re trying to tell, that’s fucking hard and shitty and I don’t begrudge them for that. Even though it sucks.

Even though I can hate it as much has I can understand it. Wish it was different. Even though it can be a fucking travesty of epic proportions because these writers/showrunners/directors don’t get the space to actually flesh out what they’re trying to do.

Even if people are writing a very different iteration of the story that I don’t like/want/agree with/understand/etc.

That doesn’t even go into the issue of when showrunners and directors don’t understand the characters they’re working with or make fundamental changes because of their own vision, production constraints, and everything else. You might see a lot of this going around again with Red, White, and Royal Blue and what the director had changed in his film adaptation. People are worked up into a froth for very valid reasons. It’s all exhausting but this is all nothing new. Still demoralizing when people so attached to the original material.

Anyway. That’s….just some thoughts that have been sitting with me for awhile. Could probably ramble more if I can get the brain cells together.

Fun fact: George RR Martin looked at the 2007 The Golden Compass film and said (paraphrasing here): “I am never, ever fucking EVER letting anyone make my books into a film. A television show is the way to go.”

Fun fact #2: James SA Corey (Daniel Abraham and Ty Frank) worked with GRRM extensively over the years and I think others have written more extensively about GRRM’s influence the way they wrote sprawling narratives with multiple POV characters. Anyway they developed a tabletop RPG that they eventually turned into novels that became The Expanse.

Which eventually got adapted to television. SyFy network was in a bidding war with Netflix for the show and out-bid Netflix. This was a show adaptation that did not hold your hand whatsoever. Fascinating, new, interesting. Faithful adaptation. Still got cancelled after two seasons. Even though both authors had become producers on the show and were learning more about production and writing teleplays from experienced sci-fi showrunners/producers/television writers.

Show was later picked up by Amazon to finish out the last few seasons. But I would bet my bottom dollar that both these authors watched how the Game of Thrones adaptations went and probably went “we’re not gonna let this happen to us.” And I think that’s reflected in the way they and their team were able to adapt the story faithfully with multiple huge and small changes specifically so it would work with the television medium.

#so rambly #next time I'll edit more #honestly this is still only like 30% of my feelings about His Dark Materials books #and only like 15% of my feelings about how The Witcher Netflix has been adapted #my crankiness about the way witcher netflix adaptation goes is so variable. i love. i hate. i'm confused and chill at the same time.#hurray for posting some rambly thoughts #and for years i've wished i had the brain and energy to write my like eight part essay about The Expanse adaptation #maybe this will spur me into writing about Lyra & Ciri & Teresa Duerte from The Expanse & how they're treated by the authors and narrative #my brain is soggy and worn down from capitalism but still always churning with thoughts #i need to practice being more pithy and editing but alas this is what i have right now #textpost #blogdora

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littlebluejaydraws · 1 year

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Buddy boy, you've got what they call sex appeal.

Inspired by [this post] because I absolutely love this idea

ID: Full body digital drawing of Castiel and Crowley from Supernatural slow dancing in some sort of living room/office. They are standing facing each other with Cas to the left of the frame and Crowley to the right, side on to the viewer. There is a wide window behind them vaguely showing a moonlit garden. In front of the window is a couch with a side table to the left. On the right hand side is a dresser. Both the side table and the dresser have candles burning. The room is fairly dark, with light cast by the candles and some moonlight lining Cas and Crowley's heads. Cas has a halo shown as concentric rings centred on his head. End ID.

#cas #castiel #crowley #spn crowley #crowstiel #supernatural #spn #i like the idea of all the seemingly unrelated plot threads of season 6 being dramatically revealed to be all connected right at the end #however in practice it just doesnt really work and while i do like most of the moments in tmwwbk i kinda wish the angel civil war #and the cas and crowley stuff was spread out across the whole season #and i REALLY wish we had more time crowley's seduction of cas like i think it would be fun to see that build up and get like #more time with them working together before all the drama #i feel like spn often shows us the ends of things (like the whole deanlisa thing and the demondean and crowley stuff)#and i would really like to get to see this stuff before it all falls apart #i wanna buy into the relationship so i can feel the weight of the ending #i mean the demon dean stuff is also just. incredibly boring in execution and i like to imagine it would have been more fun if they #invested a little more time into it

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lulu2992 · 4 months

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Ask meme!

I was tagged by @glowwormsmith! Thank you :)

Rules: Spell out your URL using song titles that can describe your muse/OC/pairings, then tag as many people as there are letters in your URL!

My URL isn’t the best for this game because it simply consists of the same two letters twice (I didn’t take the numbers into account), but I still scoured my entire music library to find titles that worked! I chose my OC Taylor Rook, John Seed, and the couple they form in my heart because of course I did. There are four letters in my username so I’m tagging four people: @cassietrn, @laindtt, @simplegenius042, and @strafethesesinners (only if you feel like doing this, of course)!

(Not all the tracks I wanted have lyrics, so I did this a little differently than you did and wrote a little “story” instead):

In Hope County, Taylor really became a “Lurking Danger” [Yoko Shimomura - Final Fantasy XV] and had to walk along many “Unfamiliar Paths” [Cliff Martinez - Far Cry 4]. John kept telling her, “Let The Water Wash Away Your Sins” [Dan Romer - Far Cry 5], but she remained “Untouchable” [Niels Bye Nielsen - HITMAN 2]. As for the Baptist, deep down, he was just a “Lost Child” [Brian Tyler - Far Cry 3], but on the outside, the thing most people noticed and talked about was his “Unsettling Aura” [Yoko Shimomura - Final Fantasy XV]. I wish he had had time to “Learn To Let Go” [Kesha - Rainbow]*, but all he did in the game was try to be “Unstoppable” [Sia - This Is Acting]*. Their story didn’t end well, so in another world, one that only exists in my head, they decide to “Let It Go” [Demi Lovato - Frozen] and stop being “Under The Gun” [Motörhead - Kiss of Death] all the time because I just want them to sing “Love Me Forever” [Motörhead - 1916]* and “Underneath Your Clothes” [Shakira - Laundry Service]* to each other instead!

*actually for these the lyrics also work

#I honestly wish john had healed enough to be able to sing 'learn to let go'#I mean 'I think it’s time to practice what I preach: exorcise the demons inside me'? perfect!#and 'unstoppable' is about suffering inside but wearing a mask of strength and confidence #so basically john (mostly duncan)#and 'under the gun' can be him fantasizing about the deputy too I guess #taylor rook #john seed #john seed x deputy #anyway so it turns out not that many songs start with U #almost all the ones I have are here haha #ask meme #also since we’re talking about my url did you know it’s technically lulu-29-92 and not lulu-2992?#'twenty-nine - ninety-two' and not 'two thousand nine hundred ninety-two' or 'two - nine - nine - two'?#it’s even 'vingt-neuf - quatre-vingt-douze' since I’m french #yes to read 92 we say 'four-twenty-twelve' because we are very weird #the belgians and swiss are less weird they have other words that make more sense

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