#it’s okay to head canon characters as aro ace
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i like being silly on my account but i saw a post that really annoyed me today
people who only identify as asexual, can still have romantic attraction towards other people.
people who only identify as aromantic, can still have sexual attraction towards other people.
someone can be aroace. but some people are only the aro or ace. they mean different things and they’re both valid whether you identify as only one, or the other, or both.
#allosexual people never make an aroace headcanon again#they don’t mean the same thing#but they can overlap#it’s okay to head canon characters as aro ace#but know what they actually mean#we are real people#asexual#aromantic#asexuality#aromanticism#aroace#aroace artist#asexual artist#arospec#aspec
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Just because a character is aro/ace does not mean they can't form close bonds, or have romantic partners, or have sex.
Aro/ace is an identification, but it's also a spectrum.
Aromantic is an identity and spectrum. Some aromantic people feel no romance and have no desire for the intimacy that comes with romantic relationships. Other aromantic people may feel the desire for the intimacy that romance brings, but have never felt romantic feelings, or they have, but they can't distinguish between platonic feelings and romantic feelings. Some aromantic people may only feel romance once they've formed a close bond with another person. Some aromantic people, like myself, have not really felt romance but has a desire to and hopes that, one day, they can find someone, who is patient and loving and willing, to help them figure it out. And some aromantic people fluctuate, from feeling romance to not feeling it, at all.
Asexuality is an identity and spectrum. Some asexual people are touch averse and have no desire for sexual activites, alone or with others. Other asexual people may feel the desire for sexual activities but have no attraction to another person. Some asexual people are attracted to someone but just don't care for sex. Some asexual people do feel attraction and is okay with having sex with another person but they have no desire to be touched by their partner. Some asexual people may fluctuate, from feeling attraction to not feeling any. And some asexual people only feel attraction once they've formed a close bond with that person.
There are so many more identities within the aro/ace spectrum but these are just a few, and just because someone is aromantic, does not mean they're asexual and vice versa. Sometimes, someone is both aromantic and asexual but that does not invalidate them or their experiences.
So, you can headcanon whatever you like about a canonically aro/ace character, but PLEASE do not erase their aro/ace identity all together.
I would like to clarify that this post is not specifically about zolu, and I have no problem with people going against popular headcanons, it just got me thinking about aro/ace erasuer, which as an aro/ace person, truly effects me and I just, hate to see it. I would also like to add, I understand Luffy isn't canonically aro/ace, it's a popular headcanon, it just reminded me of my feelings on aro/ace erasure. If you look at my profile, this post has been in my head for a little while. Sorry for any misconceptions. /Gen
#aromantic#asexual#lesbian#nonbinary#queer#headcanon#this was inspired by#zolu#and the#one piece#fandom#but it stands for all#aro/ace#characters
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Alastor ideal type in partner headcanons? I've been thinking about this and your one of the few writers I see that write alastor as close to canonly possible as can be and I really appreciate that in your writing so I knew I'd get a pretty close and accurate answer on this😭 hopefully you can get to this when it's okay for you but when you do thank you so much!!❤️
Aw, thank you, I’m so flattered!
Now, we know Alastor is for sure in the ace spectrum in canon and potentially on the aro spectrum as well and as someone who is on both of those, I have thoughts.
I think that Alastor would fall under the aegosexual category and be slightly sexually repulsed. He’s not completely thrown off by the idea of sex but I don’t feel like he would be very comfortable viewing himself in a sexual light and even others.
As someone who relates to Alastor on several levels, I feel like he would have a similar view to sex as I do. Kind of the opposite of projection here because I do think it makes sense for his character. Where it’s less about the act of getting yourself or someone off and not even about pleasure but about the ability to cause a reaction from someone that not everyone can cause. That will obviously play into any sex life you may have and thus you’d have to be okay with him not viewing you sexually even within a sexual context and more like a test subject.
Then his possible aromantic orientation. Whoever would be with him would have to be okay with him saying the words “I love you” and not being able to describe what that means. Once again, less projection and more if I feel like this thing about me also fits him. The lines between romantic and platonic in society are so rigid and the things he feels fluctuate. He knows he loves you differently than say Niffty, Rosie, or Charlie but it wouldn’t necessarily be romantic, more so bordering on it, if that makes since. Again, hard to describe.
Now in terms of a partner, some absolute musts:
Must be willing to cause chaos.
Must test his limits/challenge him occasionally.
Must have a similar moral code to his own.
Must be able to find entertainment outside of modern technology.
Must be alright with not knowing everything about him.
Some preferences:
Enjoy jazz.
Knows how to dance or be willing to learn.
Join him in hunts/killings.
Be strong headed.
Have traditional manners.
I think generally he would like someone who is very stubborn which will both provide him with entertainment and cause him to become his own. To be challenged in how to do things or how he sees things.
He’d need someone who would be willing to indulge and encourage his behavior. But perhaps due to that stubbornness be able to also reel him in.
Alastor has been described several times I believe as having a moral code to his killings. Obviously this will be a strong moral code as it tells him who to kill. This is not something he would budge on and if you do not agree with his moral code you can say goodbye to being romantic with him.
Being able to find entertainment outside modern technology isn’t as hard as some people believe. Whatever happened between him and Vox was at least the final nail in the coffin for him about modern technology and it would not be allowed in any of his spaces or when he’s trying to be intimate with you in any form being emotionally or physically.
He will not tell you everything. Some things (like his emotions towards you) he cannot describe. Other things (like his deal) he will refuse to elaborate on if you even know at all. The same is true for you. He knows when to not push. He’s good at reading people but he also trusts you to come to him if you need help and he expects you to return the sentiment.
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Okay, so I wanted to discuss the situation with Alastor, his canonical sexuality, and fans.
I have seen the two sides alot.
So one side ships Al with numerous characters and sees this as casual fun.
And the other thinks this is disrespectful cause he is ace, or Aroace.
(I believe that he is Aroace. His va said so, his character has shown no interest in romance, and Viv may have confirmed it at some point)
Now, I am sex repulsed ace and I'm aro. And I have strong opinions. Alastor is my favorite character in Hazbin Hotel, he is also the FIRST confirmed ace character I've seen. (This doesn't include subtly implied characters) Because Al is the first and I care for him he is very important to me.
My opinion is really mixed because on one side it's; yeah, it is a fandom, and fandoms ship. It's what they do. Its also kind a rude to judge someone for their favorite pairings and stuff, in my opinion.
On the other side though I'm hurt. I am a queer person with basically no rep. And I hadn't realized how upset I was by this until I saw discourse over this character. I had FORGOTTEN that it was possible to have confirmed canonical ace characters. I had gotten so used to that just being a head cannon. And not only just an ace character but also an Aroace character. And not just that but a seemingly non sex favorable ace character. I would even argue he is sex repulsed.
My real problem with all this is:
Yes, I KNOW ace characters can have sex. But do you know who else can? Literally every single allosexual character. I KNOW aros can date. But you know who else can? Everyone else. The appeal of ACTUALLY having characters with the same sexuality as me is that they would be like me. Cause I and other aces like me never, ever get stories like that. So many times in media I would be enjoying a character who had shown NO interest in sex/romance and would suddenly be partnered up with another just for the heck of it. This has happened SO many times it's not even funny. It's incredibly frustrating.
So, the point I'm trying to make is that; YES, there are aces who have sex. HOWEVER, a large number of us do not. And it's like everyone forgets that. Your not writing Alastor having sex with Angel cause your showing the vast spectrum of asexuality. Your most likely writing it cause it's sex between two hot characters. It's simply maddening.
(One thing I wanted to say was, despite the fact that Al is ace i don't think it's bad to find him attractive. He is very pleasing to look at so I understand allos finding him hot. However I'm not sure where I stand with people sexualizing him. I think I'm leaning towards, 'please don't do it'.)
Now, the worst thing though is when I'm looking for content to enjoy. When I found out Al was canonically ace I was so happy and excited. I'm pretty sure this situation wouldn't make me nearly as frustrated if it weren't for the overwhelming amount of sexual content for Al. Some would be fine. I could just scroll past it if this were the case. But it is not. Content for Al is MOSTLY sexual. That's why I don't believe people when they keep saying they aren't invalidating aces because almost every time I go looking for a fic I have to scroll for HOURS just to find few non ship fics.
I can't even use the Asexual Alastor tag because all that does is bring me to a bunch of fics where the author is like 'he's ace trust me,' then proceeds to write smut.
Why can't I even use a tag made for aces without being drowned in smut. It's so frustrating! Like I'm getting to a point where I wish the authors would stop using the tag and openly admit they made him not ace for the story. Like I know your trying to not throw away his canonical sexuality but I mean at this point I think it'd be better if you did. And if someone is going to write sex favorable ace Al then please leave it to the aces. I trust us to at least weave it into his character instead of stating it and acting like it's there when it's not.
So basically: I don't mind if you ship him, just don't say he's ace or Aroace if your neither of those in ship/smut content. I'm sick of trying to find content that isn't sex/romance in Aroace tags!
I don't want to judge people for liking a ship. But I'm really tired.
ON A DIFFERENT NOTE, I would love to see content with Al and Lucifer. Like them hating each other to like frenemies. It would be so funny.
Anyone have any platonic content with Al and the rest of the cast???
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Tumblr kept breaking when I tried to reply to the ask about this since the post is too long, so answering this here finally:
A non-comprehensive list of misc things I’d change in HoO, since apparently people wanted me to elaborate further (Re: [This post]). Semi-off the top of my head since I don’t feel like re-reading all of HoO with notations right now. Also this will be followed up by a Things I Would Change About TOA post as well at some point, since that was also requested and kept breaking, but my brain is exhausted from getting this post set up so that will wait. I will link it [here] when I complete it.
Going under a read-more cause it’s very long. Literally Tumblr crashed like three times while I was trying to answer the original ask:
As said before (and what is a given):
1. Goes without saying - fix all the distasteful offensive character descriptions/traits. Similarly, fix the whole "these characters inexplicably look down upon their cultures" cause that's stupid and it's really annoying every time one of the Argo 2 crew brings up something about their cultures only to immediately go "but THAT'S SILLY and WEIRD."
2. Remove Calypso from the active plot, rather than the current canon retconning that doesn’t work saying that she was never actually released from Ogygia like she was supposed to be. There's no excuse for why she wasn't, unless it's supposed to be the gods sent Leo to release her to fulfill that promise, but that's not really implied to be the case at all. There's no excuse for the Olympians to just go back on their promise, since Hephaestus is established to visit Calypso regularly and basically is her only friend. It isn’t the type of thing he’d let be overlooked given all the characterization we know about Hephaestus, and given they are explicitly friends it can’t be that Olympus just “forgot” either. Also Calypso doesn't actually add anything to the plot of HoO or TOA besides serving as a love interest for Leo (not even a motive, just a love interest that "fixes him,” because he already has motive in saving Jason from being the hero of the prophecy and helping save the Argo 2 crew/camp/etc from Gaea etc etc. Leo's romance arc completely derails the established depressive spiral/destructive character arc that's been set up for him and it basically ruins Leo's entire character. He's a tragic character! Let him be tragic until he's done being tragic and then the end of BoO and TOA can be him starting his recovery arc! (I have some thoughts for how Calypso could work removed from HoO but an active character in TOA but that’ll be for the TOA post.)
If Leo still ends up on Ogygia, then have it be clear that Calypso's already left and the island is abandoned (which imo is WAY more narratively compelling for readers of the first series, because you already know the context of the island, but for readers who don't have that context it leads to this being an interesting mystery - who was Calypso? What was this island and why do all the signs/notes left by her imply she wasn't always alone but usually was and was desperate to leave?) and Leo has to collect the scraps left behind to build an escape for himself while he goes through a fun identity crisis. At some point maybe Hephaestus shows up and Leo gets an interaction with his dad that probably does not help his identity crisis and then he goes back to the Argo 2 to have a further identity crisis about how the rest of the crew got along in his absence (a good identity crisis or a bad identity crisis? depends on how they did without him! you decide! I personally like "they managed okay" and Leo feels Really Horrible About That Cause It Feels To Him Like They Don't Need Him. I like Leo's tragic arc, okay? It's compelling.) Iirc Leo’s also the only member of the Seven who doesn’t get to have some kind of direct conversation with their godly parent, at least in-person, so yknow. It’d be nice to have. Also if you want Aro/ace Leo Valdez this is the perfect spot to put it while he's having his identity crisis on Kiss Kiss Fall In Love Island, or when he gets back.
3. Jason's stab wound in BoO is not healed by the Power Of Friendship, and instead they use the Physician's Cure for that so it doesn't feel like they're literally deus ex machina-ing their way to cheating death like 3 times in the same book. It makes more sense to use Potion Of Don't Die on Wound Of Excruciatingly Painfully Slowly Killing You instead of Whoops You're Already Dead, Just Get Better. Ctrl+Z That Real Quick.
Given they already used the Physician’s Cure on Jason, Leo doesn’t die/get revived at the end of BoO. Instead he just almost dies, probably lands in CHB’s woods somewhere, and is found and patched up with the series ending on him being on the mend and starting on the path to healing and getting help for his Numerous Issues that he was putting off for The Entire Series. Which parallels nicely to Nico basically having the same thing (overexerting his powers to near death, ends series getting medical treatment/being on the mend and the indication that he’s moving on to a happier period of his life). Again, grand happy ending rather than aggravating fake-out.
Further notes:
- Heavily tweak Ella's character cause I get what Rick was going for, but the execution is… not awesome! Please, there's already so much ableism in HoO just. hmm. We can do better.
- Jason and Piper break up in HoO, probably around MoA when they start seeing Percy and Annabeth interacting and after they’ve had time to hang out with each other and realize their arranged relationship is Kind Of Fucked Up, Actually. (Probably something something them having gotten to spend time actually getting to know each other between TLH and MOA while they’re both at camp.) They have no problems with each other specifically and do genuinely like each other, but it just gets really awkward given all the memory manipulation and being set up as a "picture perfect couple" - emphasizing stuff like them both being children of really famous movie stars in their universe, or Jason as a son of Jupiter/Jove (an "all-father" type god) [and Juno - mother figure goddess and goddess of marriage]/"son of Rome" and Piper as a daughter of Aphrodite (goddess of love, also Aphrodite/Venus indirectly is associated as a sort of "mother of Rome" due to Aeneas). They just feel like they have too many expectations being put on their relationship and even though they do both like each other it feels too forced for them, but they’re comfortable staying just friends. This just gives way more opportunity for low-stakes character conflict among the Argo II crew outside of Monster Of The Week Chapter so things don’t feel unreasonably busy and chaotic and we actually get some consistent development. Just a nice mini-arc to follow in the downtime. Also while we’re here, more directly establish Piper’s bisexuality earlier on. If she’s already having an arc where she’s contemplating her romantic life, throw in a couple of nods to like “Piper thinking about her old childhood crush on Shel, the kid of a family friend she’d see when her and her dad visited Oklahoma” or something. Literally anything just to establish some kind of set-up to her getting a girlfriend later. Just for consistency’s sake.
- Bunkernine has a very good post about wishing the Argo II didn't have the magic plates from CHB, which I agree with in concept. Like I was just saying, MoA through BoO lacks a lot of little moments where we get to really focus in on the characters, probably in part because Rick was struggling to juggle so many parties given this was his first foray into writing a major cast that size. We can definitely cut out a lot of the random unnecessary fights and dramatic moments that don't really do anything for the plot and instead replace them with little moments of casual life on the Argo II - the scenes like those that do exist in HoO are some of HoO's most memorable moments to me! And they'd help a lot with how the characters never felt fully and properly fleshed-out. Let them exist as a cohesive group without two-to-three of them being absent at any given time! I don't think we necessarily have to remove the magic plates entirely because they do solve a fundamental problem ("where are these kids getting food?") but like, there is nothing stopping them from still cooking and just using the plates to get ingredients! Let these kids bake or something! Even just for fun! Though also I have personal headcanons about the Argo II crew's cooking skills and I really like the concept of like, during HoH or something at like 3am everybody hears something and they all suspiciously shuffle into the mess hall. And it’s just half-dead Nico standing there in his PJs making food for himself because Dammit They're IN VENICE and he’s FROM VENICE and they DON’T HAVE TIME TO STOP AT HIS OLD FAVORITE RESTAURANTS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT STILL EXIST and he Hasn't Had A Proper Meal In Weeks so By The Gods He Will Make His Mom's Old Recipes At 3am before he keels over from this quest. He just stares at everybody and goes "What are you all looking at. go away." and the rest of the crew just shuffles away awkwardly and leaves him to it. (Is Nico’s 3am meal actually good? Who knows. It is left a mystery.)
- Tweak the god characterizations. Remove the "gods splitting" thing and maybe play more with different aspects of gods/verisons of gods across history/city-states/etc presenting themselves instead. The Roman gods are not wholly equivilent to the Greek gods and it's actually really interesting from a historical perspective, and I think there's a lot you could do with that but instead it gets flatted in HoO which is sad to me. Just generally though, with the god characterizations, like. [uncomfortable pagan noises]. Which is almost impressive because it is difficult to write the Greco-Roman pantheons poorly since a good portion of them are basically just very complicated metaphors turned into personifications and characters. So they work fine for narrative purposes when applied accordingly, and yet! and yet!! Rick managed it! He managed to really bungle it in HoO and TOA. Because instead of leaning into the aspects of metaphors and dynamic characters he just fell into 2D tropes, gimmicks, and stereotypes. Off the top of my head the only deities written Okay in HoO is like. Hades/Pluto and Thanatos. (even Chiron in TOA is extremely lackluster, it's sad.) In the first series it ranges from “okay” to “actually really interesting” so it’s sad to see that drop-off and I would like it to be fixed.
Some potential examples for this: Play with the historical ties combo of like, Athena, Minerva, Enyo, Bellona, and etc! Annabeth and Reyna parallels! if the first 2 books are about the trios, let MoA be about Annabeth and Reyna and both their connections to Athena(/Bellona). Let Reyna be a second half in the Athena prophecy! It'd be cool and fit with her thematically and would set-up the whole Getting-Blessed-By-Athena thing later in BoO and make that scene feel so much cooler!
- Also retcon the whole "Hestia appears as an 8 year old for no reason" thing. And maybe also Artemis only appearing as a teen, because while Artemis has a mythological excuse, Hestia doesn't, so it just feels weird and at worst comes off as a little aphobic (depicting a character who explicitly is uninterested in relationships/romantic love as a child despite them being an immortal god with no basis for appearing as a child or even being comparatively young to other gods) with how it relates to aphobic tropes about disinterest in romance being "childish".
- Remove the "no children of Minerva" thing. Also maybe emphasize the aro/ace vibes there cause Athena being implied to be the only ace character in the entire series who a.) isn't literally a child/teen nor appears as one, and/or b.) hasn't had an unfortunate relationship that makes them disinterested in romance, but also at the same time being the only one out of herself/Hestia/Artemis to have relationships of some sort (having kids, implied to possibly be romantic but unclear) issss bad! actually! Bad tropes, don't like that. (Again aphobic tropes of disinterest in romance being “childish” and something that can be grown out of, or a result of trauma. Also it feels weird that the only a-spec characters in the series are all women. Can we have a male a-spec character please.) Just let Athena be aro/ace and vibing and occasionally having brain children cause she can do what she wants and everyone is aware of this and chill with it (And being a-spec doesn’t mean she’d be disinterested in having kids). Also maybe make her feel less cold cause "a-spec character is cold and loveless" is also an aphobic trope that PJO!Athena falls into, actually.
- Speaking of aphobic tropes, fix the Hunters! Please. Please just redo the Hunters of Artemis entirely. Holy cow. I wrote up an entire alternate oath/rules set for the Hunt because it's just so weird and poorly done. There were male Hunters of Artemis in Greek Mythology! Multiple! And most of them were chill! The "swearing off all romance" thing is also questionable, because depending on what versions of myths you’re looking at it’s potentially implied the Hunters had romantic relationships among themselves. And in Greek Mythology all the Hunters were definitely not all pre-teens. And it feels especially bad that the only adult Hunters we ever see are explicitly ex-Hunters who are heavily implied to be not ace and definitely aren't aro and are also implied to have "grown out of" being disinterested in romance. (That gagging noise you hear is me being sick of how many aphobic tropes the Hunters are juggling).
The version of the Hunters i have written up is, and I quote (from my notes): "Hunters can be any age, species, and gender identity (so long as they are comfortable enough being occasionally referred to as “Huntresses,” “Sisters,” “Maidens,” and etc). Relationships between Hunters are allowed so long as it will not endanger/distract from the Hunt or endanger any other Huntresses. Having a child is not allowed within the Hunt and any Huntresses who wish to do so must leave (purely because having a pregnant person/young child on the Hunt is dangerous, and safety is the number one priority - especially as Artemis is a protector of youth and goddess of childbirth. Once they turn like, 12 they can join, that’s fine. Everyone knows middle schoolers are the optimal combination of bloodthirstiness and ability to wield a weapon)." Also, just as like, a side-thing, I wanna see a clear-sighted mortal Huntress, because we're told thats a thing but we never see them. Closest we get is like ancient semi-immortals and Technical Nymphs, or other Huntresses who are of unspecified mortal/demigod status.
- Similar deal - fix the Amazons. they're… better but still a little wonky.
- Some slight tweaks to the Cupid Scene - Nico still has a confrontation with Cupid cause that is a very compelling scene that works well for Nico's character and informs a lot about him (and serves a purpose in a very meta way - not so much for the plot but reflecting something the first series did occasionally which was a kind of showing an example of a situation, usually a negative situation that either mirrors or directly references a type of situation a kid may find themself in, and explains and shows sympathy for the character being hurt in that situation. Which is notable because the demographic for the series is young middle schoolers and particularly neurodivergent kids, who are probably approaching a lot of new social situations or may struggle with empathy. It acts as an introduction to “unfortunately this is a bad thing that happens sometimes, and it hurts people, which is why you should be nice to this kid. Look at beloved character. Here’s an elaboration on why they’re hurt so you can understand.” So for the purposes of that, the scene of Nico getting outed would likely remain, but it would still keep the very overt “WOW THIS SUCKS, THIS IS A BAD SITUATION.” stuff) Most of the tweaks are just slight adjustments to minor prelude dialogue and/or setting, like. Jason does not forget that being gay is a thing for a second. And etc. But Nico having a very literal metaphorical conflict about grappling with how he views the concept of love by LITERALLY GETTING KICKED AROUND BY THE GOD OF LOVE is actually kinda badass from a narrative analysis perspective. This is exactly what i meant in the previous bullet points about the gods in a lot of myths and classical stories playing the roles of personifications of metaphors and that being used well. Admittedly I'm 50/50 on tweaking Cupid's general attitude in the scene itself, because a more hostile Cupid lends itself better to the meta use of the scene as described before but a more sympathetic-to-Nico Cupid who is nonetheless still kicking the shit out of him is interesting from a metaphor standpoint (something something Nico overcoming internalized homophobia but in the very literal form of it’s the god that literally presides over protecting gay love [yes that is an actual thing Eros/Cupid is the god of] beating him up).
- Remove Reyna's “prophecy” entirely. It's stupid and pointless and doesn’t make sense with her character at all. Just say she's ace. There is not a single scene in any of the series that ever indicates that Reyna believes that she can only be happy if she’s in a relationship and that’s some kind of internal struggle she needs to overcome. The closest we ever get is Reyna being upset that her best friend disappeared and when he returns she finds out he had forgotten about her completely. Which does not apply to the “prophecy” at all. We just don’t need it.
- Absence of "a character" can work! Jason's lack of personality and backstory can work but it works best if it's absence is felt and properly explored. This works best if we get more information about Camp Jupiter from SoN and from the other Roman characters, especially Reyna (and maybe even Nico referencing his trips there!) because that inherently informs us about what Jason's life was like there. Have other characters note things about Jason and highlight the fact that this is absent from Jason's own POV! He's lost that part of his life! It was taken from him! That's such an interesting dynamic to have and explore! But we don't get any of that!
Side-note: Part of the problem with Jason's amnesia is that it feels so awkward especially compared to Percy's amnesia because we already know what Percy can't remember. We have the context that informs his character, even though he can't remember it, so that absence is felt and it feels really compelling! Also, Percy is unfamiliar with Camp Jupiter, and we're unfamiliar with Camp Jupiter, so it feels new and interesting (even though we don't actually get much about it so we never actually form any real attachment to it and that's a problem later on in every subsequent scene when we're supposed to care about what happens to Camp Jupiter but we. don't). The reason it doesn't work for Jason is because we don't know what's absent and we already know CHB. Jason also already knows about demigods and stuff, so if you're a new reader starting at HoO it just doesn't work. Because Jason already knows everything and we're being led from his POV primarily for that portion of TLH, and even Piper and Leo's backstories both heavily include being pushed around by Gaea/and or Hera/Juno, so if you aren't familiar with the universe you're just being hurried along and it ends up feeling weak. At least with Percy even if you don't know the contexts of his backstory, we can feel the implications of other characters referencing things about him extremely often, so you feel the weight of his memories being gone, and he doesn't know about the roman gods and you, the reader, aren't expected to know much if anything about it either. We don’t get the full demigod debriefing (but that's also the second book) but we at least get a Camp Jupiter debriefing. The first two books are a bit messy in those specific regards with setting up the camps for the series, and we don’t really see the camps much for the rest of HoO (except for CHB, of course).
This is personally why I stand by that if we ever get a roman series it should be a three-part series from Reyna's POV, because leading with Jason is basically like trying to lead PJatO with Annabeth - a demigod raised in camp and surrounded by the knowledge of this stuff their entire life. It doesn't work as a character who's acting as an introduction to this world for the reader. There's no real clean way to work that out for HoO unfortunately, since literally all our protagonists are given established pasts involving knowledge of Greco-Roman mythology being real and half of them are either already at camp or have been to a different camp. I'd say best solution would probably actually be leading from Piper for TLH and tweak her character set-up slightly in that she Does Not Know What's Going On At All re: Gaea and the Giants. She just knows Something Happened To Her Dad and she's the POV we follow into TLH, because that mirrors Percy in beginning of TLT well (with Sally being kidnapped)! It's a fun call-back for the old readers and a good lead-in for the new readers.
- Fix Nico backstory inconsistencies caused by Rick almost making his birthday in March and confusing himself over it. He's 12 in TLO, 13 in HoO. He was born January 28th, 1929, and got put in the Lotus Hotel and Casino in 1939 (If you wanna be cute, we can specifically say May 1st, 1939, to reference the musical). Hazel is one month older than him chronologically and one year older than him post-revival. Something something also smooth out the inconsistencies about Nico being raised in Italy and how Maria met Hades and stuff. Fill in the rest as you will.
- I do stand by that the entire PJO timeline is not one-to-one with the real world. That's always been a thing with the series. We're basically condensing everything from ~1998 to ~2020 into an 18 year timeline. We don't need to be exact with things. Don't get too bogged down with it.
- Make the whole "injuries caused by celestial bronze/imperial gold for demigods makes their souls self-destruct" thing specifically relating to cursed weapons/materials or feature some more volatile abomination combo weapons like Backbiter (with Backbiter being described as unstable due to being both celestial bronze and mortal steel). (Ex.: the spear used to stab Jason in BoO is just cursed, and maybe Octavian's catapult plan is a "well i put a bunch of mortal steel and imperial gold in a pot and melted them together a bit and now it really wants to explode so im gonna just chuck the entire thing and hope it kills everyone lots and lots <3" which is tbh significantly more dastardly and fucked-up, which makes Octavian a bit more compelling). Having it just be a plain trait of celestial bronze/imperial gold doesn’t make any sense and is only referenced like twice in HoO and never again in basically the entire three series. Again: consistency.
- Make a more prominent reference to the whole "btw there are retired adult Romans just living wherever but they're legally required to help any campers who request aid" thing, cause you could totally do something really fun and cool with that but idk what.
- PICK A THEME! First series theme was family! Second series theme is….. we don’t know! It felt like maybe a theme was intended at some point but we lost it. Forging a new life for one’s self/choosing your own path/etc could be a good theme, or something similar. or found family. or both. We’ve got a bunch of characters absolutely ripe for “I didn’t think i’d get this far and now I have to like, actually consider what i want to do in life. huh” arcs! (Frank! Leo! Hazel! Jason! Percy! Nico!) Do something with that!
- Lean more into the characters having aspects inspired by myths, or legends being mirrored in plot points: 7 against Thebes, the Argonauts, etc etc etc. The first series leaning into it heavily worked really well! More of that! HoO and TOA suffer a lot from lack of mythological basis to lean their plots on, despite there being plenty to work from. It instead just kind of messily mashes random misc myths (haha, alliteration) together into a very incoherent plot. Annabeth is known to be explicitly based off Atalanta, Percy is mostly based off Perseus and Theseus, Leo has loose connections based off of Demophon of Eleusis and possibly also his brother Triptolemus, etc etc. There’s stuff to work with! Poke around at the mythological figures of the original Argo and maybe match them up a bit (though most of the Argonaut myths were used in Sea of Monsters, so focus more on the figures/archetypes rather than just exact myths of what they did. For more plot-things, maybe consider Seven Against Thebes, though admittedly the plot of that is just Kinda Depressing.)
- Slightly related to that - lean into Piper presumably mirroring Orpheus! Or even if she isn’t supposed to, let her do that, because it fits with her thematically SUPER well. Her charmspeak is OP and that needs to be appreciated. In canon she brings Jason back from the brink of death in TLH and just straight up gives Festus a soul/free will/sentience. Let her go Orpheus-mode on everybody. You can even tie that in with the half-hearted snake theme that Rick tried to throw in there that didn’t work at all. We can make this work, just lean into it. It’ll be fun.
- Remove scene of Nico confessing to Percy at end of BoO. it’s just. random and feels sudden and OOC. Give Nico time. You could maybe replace it by having him come out to Reyna on his own terms while they’re on their quest discussing their adventures thus far and them having a very sweet little emotional moment rather than it being a weird out-of-place afterthought comical scene.
- Remove Bob and Damacus. They’re just half-literal dues ex machinas for Percabeth in Tartarus that don’t make sense. It feels extremely cheap and doesn’t fit with the established mythos of either figure (and Bob feels extra awkward without the context of knowing Sword of Hades). If they do run into a figure who helps them out in Tartarus, Arke could possibly be a good option - especially since in SoN Percy meets Iris. There’s a lot potentially you could do there with Percy mistaking her for her twin and stuff like that. If we want a figure to more-so take the role that Bob fills (Nico encouraging an immortal to be sympathetic to Percy and thus indirectly helping him later) that role could be filled by Nyx instead of making her a minor antagonist - imply Nico encountered Nyx in Tartarus or something and she took pity on him as someone who also understands the dark, and he told her about Percy and so Nyx is willing to help Percabeth escape. Plus imagine how COOL a Nyx & her children vs Tartarus/Titans/Giants fight would be. That’d be a significantly more memorable scene than the Tartarus fight scenes we did get. (“Why would Nyx help though?” One of Nyx’s kids is LITERALLY a goddess of friendship [Philotes], we have excuses.)
- On a similar note, this is more of a TSATS thing, but for goodness’ sake STOP THROWING CHARACTERS INTO TARTARUS. You’re overusing it! It only works when we use it sparingly! In fact, just in general Tartarus works better the less we see of it! Nico going through Tartarus once in SoN-MoA, yes, that works! Especially since we have almost no idea what happened to him down there, just that it was Terrifying and Horrible and he Barely Survived. Not going into much detail means we get more out of it. The only exception to that really was when Percy realized that Nico saw Tartarus as it truly was the entire time, because that’s one hell (ha) of a punch to the gut in terms of added information! Percabeth falling into Tartarus in MoA? Eh, fine, sure, because we’ve established that Nico (who is implied to be more resilient to that environment on virtue of being a child of Hades) talked about his experiences down there so they know what to expect and how to survive. Though it does kind of just feel like Rick went “Oh wait hey I can use this to make angst!” and then overused the hell out of it. It feels way weaker in general in HoH because of how much detail we get, because Tartarus has been built up so much until that point that literally anything we get will feel lackluster in comparison, especially with how it kind of feels like Percabeth just. breezed through it with little more difficulty than they’d usually face on their quests. Solangelo jumping into Tartarus in TSATS is honestly just a blatant “Oh boy we can make Solangelo into Percabeth 2!” and it doesn’t work at all because NICO HAS ALREADY BEEN TO TARTARUS.
The only way you could make Nico going into Tartarus two times work is if he fell into Tartarus a second time to replace Percabeth falling down there. Because we’ve established he knows what it’s like down there, he survived it once, and he is actively sparing someone else he cares about from suffering his same fate. And then he can return once again even closer to death and A Little Fucked Up and it turns into a rule of threes where we know “Oh, Nico can’t go back to Tartarus again because if he does he’ll Lose Himself Completely” which is way more interesting than romance angst for the sake of romance angst. Especially since again, we don’t see it, it’s all only implied. Also it then also turns Tartarus into even more of a “Nico is probably the only demigod who could ever even hope to survive Tartarus” which keeps Tartarus as an ominous thing. Percabeth falling into Tartarus lessens that by a lot because it implies that it doesn’t matter that Nico is a child of Hades; that had absolutely no bearing on his ability to survive down there. TL;DR: Stop throwing characters into Tartarus. Either throw Nico in twice in a row and no Percabeth or Nico and Percabeth once only and never touch it again.
- More heavily set up Percy’s emotions/mood/etc being influenced by water around him. If we keep most of Percabeth in Tartaurs, then this would really make the Achlys scene pack a bigger punch. Up until HoH everything is “oh how quirky” but the minute Percy’s surrounded by the rivers of the underworld and the acid/poision you get hit with the “oh shit” realization that Percy Is About To Get SCARY.
- Maybe have Annabeth keep her blindness from Tartarus, or trade Jason having glasses to her having glasses as a result of that, since vision is actually an aspect of Athena so it kind of fits her more, thematically-speaking.
- Change the judo flip percabeth scene in MoA to Annabeth picking Percy up and spinning him around in a hug/swinging him into a dip cause that’s cuter, makes more sense given Percy’s PTSD, and still highlights Annabeth being very strong and showing off in front of the Romans while they’re still being lovey-dovey.
But also, related to that, you could potentially make a sub-arc for Percabeth throughout HoO (so that they actually have like. some type of character development that fits them rather than them feeling stagnant the entire time) about Annabeth learning she doesn’t know as much about Percy as she thought (learning about Gabe [since as far as we know she actually doesn't know much if anything about that!], seeing his behavior change with different types of water, etc) kicked off by the judo flip scene, and possibly vice versa (Percy learning more about Annabeth’s time spent traveling with Thalia and Luke, growing up at CHB, her relationship with Athena and other campers at CHB, etc) so they gain a deeper understanding of one another. If Percy keeps his curse of Achilles, that could also factor in (contrasting Percy’s “perfect” image [relationship, near-immortality] against Annabeth realizing she doesn’t know as much about Percy as she thought [could also parallel that dynamic to Jaspiper, which opens opportunities for Annabeth/Piper and Jason/Percy bonding] [Or Annabeth/Jason and Piper/Percy bonding! I want more Annabeth/Jason and Piper/Percy parallels so bad. They’re almost there but we never get them. Please.]/ the Argo II crew learning about Percy’s past) with Percy being more prone to seek out conflict or solve problems with violence due to the Curse of Achilles and eventually recognizing that [possibly after Tartarus] and it scaring him just as much as it frightens Annabeth. Maybe at that point Percy tries to make some sort of deal to rid himself of the curse.)
- Maybe also explicitly parallel Percy getting the curse of Achilles with Nico’s help to Poseidon giving his lover Caeneus iron skin. There’s no really smooth way to do it, but maybe even just a during Nico’s pov him going “I heard about this myth once and got an idea. It didn’t work.” Just for that added through-line of connecting the series and further establishing “yeah, no, Nico’s been gay this whole time. this isn’t a new thing. we aren’t pulling this from thin air.”
- Give Piper a different weapon than the knife from the beginning cause she stops using it eventually anyways. Also just... no cornucopia. That part is just stupid and there’s no point for it. If we have to keep it as a plot object, give it to someone else - Nico could work because then there’s actually at least a valid relation there regarding his godly parent (yes, Pluto sometimes has cornucopia associations). Also Nico having a cornucopia would be kinda funny in a subversion of expectations thing. Maybe even have Nico go on a little exposition-y rant complaining about Hades/Pluto versus Plutus (the Greek god of plenty/wealth, later merged with Pluto).
- Similarly, either remove Diocletian’s scepter (if we have multiple characters who can boss around skeletons, why do we need an entire separate extra object whose sole purpose is to let them boss around skeletons?) or let Nico keep it but it loses its abilities, so it’s literally just “well now he has a cool bashing stick for bashing things.” Or let him use it as a cane to highlight him being disabled!
- As I slightly touched upon in a previous bullet point, give Piper more connections to her dad’s community in Oklahoma - where’s all her family friends? Tristan is a major pop culture figure in the Riordanverse, so it’d make sense that people from the community he grew up in would like. know him? But all we ever hear about is Piper’s Grandpa Tom. Even though apparently Piper is already good enough friends with Shel presumably before Piper moves to Oklahoma that the two start dating soon afterwards. Heck, again, have Piper reference Shel specifically. Just at any point. For any reason. Just to establish that she knows people her own age that exist outside of CHB.
Similarly, flesh out the background Romans in Camp Jupiter more in SoN and possibly also BoO, particularly the ones Jason references by name but we never see anything of, besides at most maybe more background references. Highlight them either through the SoN trio interacting with more characters while at camp (and we’re left to glean specific details of Jason’s past through others, which would make Jason more compelling and how these details are absent from himself but present to those around him, playing into his memory loss more) and possibly also through Reyna (and maybe Nico)’s POV(s) in BoO. (And maybe if we get a Reyna POV in MoA, then there as well).
- Let Reyna use magic! We establish that she studied under Circe and then never see anything come of that other than referencing her Tragic Backstory™. It could be a fun point for Reyna and Hazel to bond over, even!
- Remove the random “Hunters of Artemis death fodder” scene with Orion in BoO. There’s no reason for that. It’s just kinda dumb and feels bad given it’s basically just “We’re gonna kill a bunch of nondescript allegedly a-spec coded characters now for no reason. <3” like ???. That served no purpose. It just felt weird.
- Also just as a like, logistics thing - change the route Team Statue takes in BoO from the huge jump over the Atlantic into Peurto Rico into them traveling up into like the UK, then over to Iceland and Greenland and then Canada and down the east coast rather than the huge jump and up the east coast. The smaller jumps make more sense given the entire POINT of their quest taking as long as it does is that Nico can’t make extremely large shadow-travel jumps at that time. Plus if they’re traveling south then they could pass through Maine and we could maybe cameo Nico’s old school and that’d be fun. The pit-stop in Puerto Rico doesn’t really give us much that we couldn’t have just gotten from Reyna explaining it anyways. If they pause in Maine that can be where Nico and Reyna have a heart-to-heart about their tragic backstories and past experiences with horrible ghosts that they had to exorcise.
- If Team Statue travels a northern route we can make jokes about Nico learning specifically 1930s British English before he moved to America. The gang goes to London and Coach proceeds to incessantly make fun of Nico for not only using British slang, but using OUTDATED British slang (which is made weirder given he doesn’t have a British accent).
- Also extremely tiny detail but a specific acknowledgement that Piper was helping out Nico once they got back to the ship when Nico’s getting rescued from the jar. Since Piper just kind of drags him off-screen. Just any kind of follow-up to that. Like Nico doing his classic “You were vaguely nice to me. I would now Die For You.” Just them having basically any kind of interaction or acknowledgement of that scene, mostly cause I think it’s funny.
- Let Annabeth keep her laptop, and get rid of the sphere of Archimedes cause it just feels kinds pointless and random? We don’t really have any emotional connection to Annabeth’s laptop (and her hat gets replaced in Demigods & Magicians anyways) so her losing it doesn’t really feel impactful at all. Maybe have Leo use Annabeth’s laptop while she’s in Tartarus and that acts as the point of guilt for him rather than weird random curse stuff with a random new introduced object. Instead of “oh no fortune cookie thing or whatever” it’s him feeling guilty he saved Annabeth’s laptop but couldn’t help Annabeth herself. Especially since Leo would also have his Ogygia identity crisis in the same book so he can feel extra bad about himself for a bit, to lead up to his role in BoO nicely (sometimes a character negatively spiraling is more narratively compelling than them having positive development for the majority of the series and that’s okay! Let him be tragic but again he gets a happy ending and an implication post-BoO that he’ll begin a road of healing/recovery surrounded by loved ones. It works out.) AND there could be a very sweet moment once Annabeth gets back from Tartarus and Leo gives her the laptop back and it’s a huge relief to her that one of her prized possessions was in safe hands while she was gone and that she has it back when she thought she might have lost it.
- Further highlight Jason’s whole Greek/Roman/etc identity crisis. Bonus points if we go further into acknowledging Jupiter/Zeus’s epithets and roles and Jason having some epiphany that the Romans look to him with the expectations of Jupiter/Juno as king and queen of the gods making him some kind of perfect leader, but he’s not that at all. He’s the son of Jove and Juno, father and mother of the gods. He doesn’t want to be a general or praetor or anything like that, he wants to spend time with his friends and family at a summer camp where they’re safe. He wants to regain the childhood he lost being raised as a perfect soldier and get the chance to go to school and learn about his long-lost family and do cheesy summer camp activities. He is a wolf but he is not a creature built for the hunt - he is part of a pack.
- Touched upon it briefly in a previous bullet point but Curse of Achilles can stay/go, does not particularly matter to me either way. I do think it’d be funny though if Percy does keep the Curse of Achilles that he also randomly gets the Nemean Lion’s pelt back. Initially maybe as like a gift from Hera/Juno to help him cover his Achilles’ Heel while he’s running around with no memory just as insurance so he doesn’t die (with bonus points of the Romans being introduced to Percy either wearing the stupidest looking coat ever or wearing just a straight up bullet-proof lion’s pelt, which would even further solidify his “Are We Sure This Guy Isn’t A God In Disguise” vibes). But then later on into the series it’s just kind of part of his outfit or maybe even a running gag. The praetors have their magic bullet-proof cloaks, Percy has a very silly looking bullet-proof fur coat that is sometimes a whole lion.
- Keep Hazel’s blackouts. There’s not really a reason for them to disappear altogether for her? They’re somewhat tied to her powers and are a consequence of her coming back from the dead, which also helps keep the concept running in the series that death is a consequence that can’t just be easily evaded, even while we’re operating with the Doors of Death being open. That way future deaths in the series don’t feel like they could be as easily negated/avoided. Also, Hazel is disabled! This is a disability of hers! Why are we somehow magically getting rid of it without even an explanation as to why? Heck, if we’re getting rid of Piper’s knife, Hazel’s dreams when she has her blackouts could be used to supplement the dagger’s insight into the future, since we’ve already established that Hazel gets prophetic dreams sometimes anyways. Also fun thematic matching for the Death Sibs with them both having disabilities and random ways to glean the future (Hazel’s blackouts, Nico talking to ghosts). Her blackouts would probably improve slightly over the course of the series but never fully disappear, and it ends up mostly a thing of she can tell when they’re about to occur and prepare quickly for that or let someone know before she passes out.
- Get rid of Frank’s curse in SoN instead of waiting until The Tyrant’s Tomb. If we’re going to get rid of it eventually anyways, do it during the big scene of him freeing Thanatos. Let him have his cool big moment of embracing his destiny and that breaking the curse the first time he does it rather than him doing it twice but it only breaking the curse the second time? Also if the curse is broken earlier on then Frank’s entire arc gets to be about him realizing he has a life to live, since in SoN a major part of his character is that he’s not afraid of death because he’s used to the idea that his curse could kill him at any point. He’s actually pretty reckless for the beginning of HoO because of that. If he realizes that he no longer is at risk of dying at any given moment because he thought about candles too hard, then that opens the opportunity of him having a whole existential crisis about what he actually wants to do with his life and him looking to the future for once.
Bonus opportunity for this - maybe Frank actually gets fire powers as a result of his curse breaking. Ares/Mars has an association with fire so it would fit for him as a son of Mars. Plus, then we could also have an even more overt dynamic of Frank and Leo acting as each other’s parallels and foils and the two of them slowly growing more used to one another and actually becoming close friends. Lots of bonding over getting used to their fire powers and overcoming their mutual fears of fire and probably also solidarity in having lost their moms. Just - the boys are bonding! The boys are bonding. Fire boys hours.
- Related to Frank’s curse, give Hazel and Frank parallel narratives of them realizing they have a future ahead of them (Hazel re: getting a second chance at life and Frank re: realizing he’s no longer at risk of spontaneously combusting) and them grappling with trying to figure out what they want to do with their lives and how they want to live them after everything is said and done. And also being motivated for once to make it out the other side in one piece because they’re determined to not waste the opportunity they’ve been given. The two of them coming to terms with realizing they have a future if they can make it through this (which is also a fun contrast to Leo and Nico actively almost sacrificing their own lives for others and having essentially an opposite character arc for the majority of the series).
- Especially while Frank (and Hazel) are having these arcs, going back to the idea of Leo getting stuck on Ogygia alone for a bit - very strongly contrasting the arcs of Frank’s mental health improving over the series while Leo’s is very steadily decreasing (until BoO at which point again the series ends with Leo getting help and beginning to improve/heal).
- Also further emphasizing Leo and Nico’s parallels throughout HoO. They’re both autistic on top of the usual adhd/dyslexia and have issues with social interactions and care a lot about Hazel and are having a majorly bad time throughout the entire quest and are pretty depressed, etc etc etc. Again, parallel narratives at the end of BoO with them healing and things looking up for them - I think I’ve mentioned that like four times now you get the idea.
- Make Frank ADHD/dyslexic. There is literally no reason for him not to be and him being the outlier for being neurotypical feels weird and doesn’t fit with the literal entire worldbuilding we have for demigods. If it’s part of “demigod instincts” or whatever then Frank should be ADHD/dyslexic! And it’s not even a “the Romans aren’t ADHD/dyslexic” because we’re explicitly told they are! They are specifically also ADHD and dyslexic! So why isn’t Frank? There’s no reason. It annoys me.
- The Frank/Hazel/Leo “love triangle” can stay but it’s significantly more one-sided. Frank is mostly just intimidated by Leo for multiple reasons (mostly fire-related reasons) and Leo is mutually intimidated by Frank (because Frank is bigger than him and Leo is scared of everyone, really, but especially people who are bigger than him, because they could beat him up. Which is basically everyone). Hazel is not romantically interested in Leo and Leo is not romantically interested in her, though they are very close and do have a very confusing time trying to figure out the whole Sammy situation. Frank still misinterprets this as Hazel and Leo being romantic. Leo does not realize Frank is misinterpreting that as them being romantic and think Frank just hates him for the general reasons that Leo has found people usually hate him for no reason over. Leo wants nothing to do with that situation though. Eventually they all sort it out and become a very strong trio.
- Again as I briefly touched upon before, maybe give Reyna a protagonist role in MOA if not an outright POV. Probably an outright POV, with the main POVs of the book being her and Annabeth. Again, themes of historical associations between Athena and Bellona and playing with that, alongside making Reyna more of a prominent player earlier on in the series and letting us see more of the Romans. Use this opportunity to heavily parallel her with Annabeth (and also highlight her parallels with Percy, and Annabeth’s parallels with Jason).
- Really I just want more Annabeth/Jason and Percy/Reyna parallels. There’s so much you can do there. The blond(e) gifted kid/smart aleck raised at camp and their best friend, the former newbie raised with a difficult home life. Percy and Reyna both have dogs (Mrs. O’Leary / Aurum and Argentium) and pegasi (Blackjack and Skippy). And a sibling they don’t see often (Tyson / Hylla). You could have notes about Jason and Thalia and Annabeth and the dynamics within that and how those internally parallel each other. Or more about when Reyna encountered Percy and Annabeth while on Circe’s Island. Really anything more about Reyna’s time on Circe’s Island. Heck maybe you could parallel that to Percy’s difficult time in school, since Circe’s whole thing was that she was training the sorceresses living there, so that’s kind of like a school environment. Paralleling first quests between Reyna and Jason with the events of the first series with Percy and Annabeth. Etc. etc. etc.
- We are taking BoO and just. Throwing it out the window, really. We don’t have time to unpack all of that. Just start mostly from scratch, same extremely rough overarching elements are there.
- Also actually just. Rework the whole main prophecy too while we’re at it. It kinda sucks. It’s just kind of a weak prophecy. “To storm or fire the world will fall” or whatever; we can do better. I don’t have the brain power to write a better prophecy right now but just [see my recent post] for notes about what I think makes for a good prophecy in the series and why the main HoO one is kinda lame.
Footnotes:
Again, I will be following this up with part 2 electric boogaloo: Things I Would Change About TOA* (*That I can say without spoiling Deadangelos too much) at some point and I will link that when I make it. If you made it this far, gold star.
#pjo#percy jackson#riordanverse#hoo#heroes of olympus#leo valdez#frank zhang#jason grace#piper mclean#Hazel Levesque#reyna ramirez-arellano#annabeth chase#nico di angelo#toa spoilers#toa#trials of apollo#(< for that one bit about Frank)#and maybe also the bit with Shel I guess#tsats#the sun and the star#(< for that one bit about tartarus)#bunkernine#< mentioned briefly. good post.#analysis#meta#< i suppose#long post //#< not an exaggeration. my apologies for those of you who click on that read more#ask to tag#i dont even want to think about how to tag this further
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Boop
📚 ⇢ what's the last thing you wrote down in your notes app?
Added some lines to a poem of mine; it was late at night but I hope this makes sense:
when you go the extra mile on the road less traveled
kinda makes it silly how the path we took unraveled
but if it's what it takes for me to get back next to you
i hope you know the extra mile's the path I'd take for you
🍬 ⇢ post an unpopular opinion about a popular fandom character
Y'all really wanna know? Okay, fine. The hunters of Artemis from Percy Jackson are NOT a "flock of lesbians." Trials of Apollo makes it very clear that ALL romantic relations are forbidden for them, and that INCLUDES dating other women, including each other. Why can't we call them a pack of aces or quiver of aros instead?
🧩 ⇢ what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?
Smut, nsfw content, mischaracterization, and also? a ship that isn't tagged that i don't like showing up anyways.
🍄 ⇢ share a head canon for one of your favorite ships or pairings
I like to think August and Belle (my pet rarepair from Once Upon a Time) like to talk to each other in literary references, and have an unspoken competition to make more references the other person doesn't get than the other one does, and they keep a running tally.
Writers Truth & Dare Ask Game
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THE "fanon is so much better then canon" REBLOG TAGS. WOULD U BE OKAY SHARING UR SASHA CHARACTERIZATION THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS THAT MADE ME SO EXCITED TO SEE..... . no worries if u'd prefer not to though or wouldn't be sure how to articulate all of that!!! im like that sometimes when there are just So many character thoughts so no worries either way :-]]] have a cozy day or nightttt btw
oh my goodness yes absolutely i would be okay sharing. Sasha's my girl!! i love her!!! and i will not stand for fanon's slander of my beloved.
a while back i made a post about the list i have of Various Sasha Observations from the episodes she appears in (tbh i still need to add stuff from MAG 039 to it...), but what's always struck me is just how full of character and life she is, even appearing in as few episodes as she did. she's curious, clever, snarky, pedantic, reckless, and cares for her friends so much. basically the opposite of the "braincell holder" archetype she's been assigned!! she faces monsters head-on twice to protect her friends, she learned about Martin's CV through her own snooping and kept that information to herself so he could keep his job, she seems really easy to talk to (in MAG 024, she manages to coax an amused tone out of Jon, who's in full prickly-boss-mode at this point in the series), and she's also just as clueless about archiving as the rest of the characters (see: the stapler incident. standard staples rust, i believe what she should have been doing to keep the loose statements together was putting them into individual folders? i'm not an archivist. but the idea Sasha would have been better at archiving is not true. she would have absolutely been a better Archivist though. in Jonah's eyes, at least. she's got Jon's lack of self-preservation and double the curiosity).
also just...as an arospec person i love projecting on her, honestly. aromantic!Sasha is a headcanon very dear to my heart; i'm particularly fond of queerplatonic interpretations of her and Tim's relationship. i'm also very fond of queerplatonic jonsasha! which is even harder to find!! i just love the ace/aro solidarity they could have. i've got fic WIPs that feature both those relationships in more spotlighted roles than they usually get, if only i could finish them...alas, i'm a notoriously slow writer. they'll get done eventually, i promise 😅
oh my GOD i almost forgot to mention just how often the other characters bring her up after her death!!! see, like, another thing about fanon is how often Sasha is sidelined, even when she's still alive, but Jon pauses for a heavy moment after Knowing she was killed by the Not!Them, and Martin repeatedly asks about her and her safety after "she" (the Not!Them) disappears, and Tim's downward spiral is accelerated by having lost another person dear to him to the Stranger. and even after her death, she's important to them. when Peter asks Jon "where are your friends, Archivist?" in 159, his first answer is "Tim and Sasha are dead," when his closest friend at the time is Daisy. this isn't even important to her characterization per se, but it's important to me that you know that she was so important to them. she was their friend!!! even though she was forgotten she was remembered as a friend!!!!!
...but uh, yeah. that's my thoughts, lol. Sasha James is the light of my life and fanon absolutely dropped the ball on her. fanon tends to drop the ball on most things but Sasha especially. God i love her so much. it's like my personal mission to get the fandom to care about her as much as i do.
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I reread my own fic A Light That Never Goes Out last night and remembered that I actually have notes for it so here y’all go, I’m dumping them here! 🌈
Ch 1
okay so here we go, here’s me explaining the candle thing again
To the newer folks who might not know, when you meet Ephemera in khx (browser chi), he asks you to get a candle from the Moogle because the Moogle wouldn’t let him get one. You’re more successful than he is, and throughout the quests where you’re traveling in the sewers with him, you go ahead and clear out the Heartless while he holds the candle so the flame doesn’t go out. The sewers visibly look darker too, until you both reach the end
You can watch it here
Ch 2
It always bugged me that the union leaders never got to fully grieve Ava or any of the other foretellers on screen. As far as they know, they perished in the war, they’re gone. So I wanted to let Ephemera have a moment to miss her, as one of her friends and someone who liked being around her
I also think that out of anything that happened during the war, it would’ve been really poignant if Player remembered their interaction with Ava. Of course, that’s part of their pain that was meant to be erased via union cross, but I imply that in this fic, Ephemera has gradually been helping them sift through the memories rather than completely suppressing them. Slowly re-exposing them to the memories so they don’t have a total breakdown.
As someone very close to Ephemera, it just feels more right and fair to him that Player gets these important memories back. It’s his sign of trust
Ch 3
It’s the shortest chapter, but still one I really like
It’s important to me that you know just how smitten Ephemera is with Player, and also how great of a friend Skuld is
She plays a wingman role in this fic, basically the one who encourages these two oblivious pining dorks to get together and helps when they need a third opinion
Ch 4
As I said in the notes, this is an expanded/updated version of an ask prompt which you can read here
The most important change to me was Ephemera asking to kiss them first rather than going in all gung ho. It feels more in character for him. Plus we love consent in this household!
Ch 5
I miss khux’s avatar boards…but not buying them!! 😜
The black and white tuxedo Player tries on was foreshadowing for Ephemera struggling to choose between a black and white tuxedo in ch 9
I also just really love Ephemera in red boots. It’s like…a Thing for me now. This will not be the last you hear of it
Now’s a good spot to mention that Ephemera’s absolutely relentless when it comes to being flirty. Not in the “whoa he‘s got rizz” way, but more in the “wow this guy’s a massive cheese ball” way. He’s been like this in my head since 2016 (I blame Kam. Love you Kam!!)
Ch 6
This was written with the intent of Player being somewhere on the ace/aro spectrum (one of the meanings for the chapter being called Purple is a reference to the colour purple on the ace flag). I didn’t really elaborate on it or even mention it because honestly, I’m not ace and I wasn’t sure if I was portraying it accurately enough for it to be a prominent point
What I wanted the focus to be on was simply that Ephemera would love them, no matter what they feel or don’t feel. This applies to chapter 10 too, where he’s very understanding of whatever their opinion on having kids is
Ch 7
The jokes about the barter system is actually from a bunch of skulmerayer mini prompts I tried to write but ultimately couldn’t figure out or even fit in anywhere else
Eph and Player should’ve been able to hang out in Candy Kingdom together like they did in Cy-Bug Sector…..I stand by this
They both have a severe case of the sillies, amplified when they’re around each other
Ch 8
I think Ephemera gets bad dreams too, especially after the war. He often dreams about how hurt Player got, or worse, not being able to save them at all. And now he has bad dreams of the canon universe, where he lost everything, including Player
But this is a different timeline, where the two of them, and Skuld, were all able to escape the data world and meet up with the other leaders again to plan their next move in a new world
Ch 9
In this alternate timeline, all the union leaders continue their work together in Scala ad Caelum at the main tower. Honestly, I didn’t really think of how this would happen, but just imagine some kind of override where they’re able to create a new world at the expense of losing Daybreak Town forever. That part sadly stays the same
Skuld tells Ephemera, “You’ll be alright on your own.” It’s a callback to what he told her before leaving her party.
I like listening to Chikai (orchestra), starting it right before Ephemera pulls out the wayfinder :)
LISTEN I just think gifting a wayfinder can also be a romantic gesture. The sokai fans get this. It can be a big romantic gesture in place of giving someone a ring. It’s cute and made by your partner’s own hands, doesn’t get in the way of gripping a keyblade properly, and always lets you find each other again no matter where your travels take you across the worlds. Its pretty! It’s unique! It’s cute!!!
Ch 10
This is a 10 year timeskip, they’re all in their mid to late 20s now
Ephemera and Player have settled down in Destiny Islands, but take trips to stay in Scala for a few months at a time to relieve the others of their leader duties (and later to teach at the academy). So essentially they live both in Scala’s tower, and in their own home on the islands throughout the year
I feel like in this universe, Blaine would settle down first. Him having a kid on the way ended up giving Ephemera a bit of baby fever, which can often be what happens amongst friends and family around the same age
I have a headcanon ingrained in my head that Eph was raised by two moms who owned a library, so he’s always been surrounded by books growing up
I intentionally kept it vague whether or not he and Player would conceive or adopt children mainly because of Player’s ambiguity and also cause I could easily see them doing a mix of both
(I also headcanon the two of them being a t4t couple so there’s a lot of ways the having kids conversation can be interpreted anyway :D)
but basically, they both end up being parents in canon, so why not make them be parents together? 😊
In conclusion: I love them your honor. Thank you for reading!!!
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Random Midnight Museum thought: Maybe it's just because I'm ace, but TBH I've never needed any romance (straight, gay, or otherwise) to have any 'physical' confirmation onscreen or on-page for it to still obviously be canon romance. For example, I've read so many of those old plot-heavy light-BL mangas where the leads not only never had a bed scene but some never even kissed, yet they were obviously still life partners in-story, and that was plenty fine enough for me. Or even elements like romances (of any persuasion) in some other plot-heavy stuff where, say, one character ends up sacrificing themself for the other a short while after mutually confessing or something, like okay sure they may have never gotten a chance to consummate the relationship or whatnot, but they were obviously still in love, and would obviously have been partners, you know? So to me all of that still counts as romance. I mean, don't get me wrong, I also do still enjoy seeing characters in fiction getting good and kissed/etc. (if they want to) just as much as the next person, haha. I'm just saying that if Museum does continue to go the no-kissing/etc.-onscreen route all the way through the ending, that wouldn't necessarily mean that the characters aren't still canon romantic partners in-story (and not just in all of our head-canons, which I fully admit I've been deep in right from the start right along with you, and am never gonna let die no matter what the narrative ends up saying, haha). Anyway. TL;DR: Maybe I'm just old and remember the time when high-heat (or really ANY heat) content wasn't as prevalent as we have now (plus, you know: ace), but like, just because there's no kissing/sexual stuff onscreen doesn't necessarily mean they're not still an actual couple? IDK, I just felt like adding that to all the discourse I've been seeing about this show in general, haha. 🤷♀️
Okay, as another ace (and, for that matter, mostly aro) person... this is an interesting ask that also goes a lot into how queer relationships are shown and characterized and what makes a relationship a life partner/romantic relationship and what that means and there are so many more qualified people to discuss this than me...
But I'm watching Midnight Musem and I watch a lot of BL and I have my own little subset of knowledge so let's try this... And if I fuck up, I'm doing my best.
The main issue here boils down to is... what makes a romance and what are looking for in a romance?
Like, when I talk about not expecting anything queer in Midnight Museum I am calling back to the days of my youth when any queerness in a mainstream show was in your imagination. I am calling back to the days when I called myself a slasher and I wrote all kinds of queer relationships into stories that were never, ever going to do that.
And that is what I expect from Midnight Museum.
But what I see here is a high correlation in your ask between high heat and confirmed romance and those are two very separate and very different issues that cannot be addressed in the same breath.
I have zero high heat thoughts about Midnight Museum. Even if they do make it queer and even if they do have romance it will not be high heat. It will be, most likely, a confession and a maybe maybe maybe kiss. Maybe. And that if it's confirmed queer in the show which I am very much not saying is going to happen.
And putting 'confirmed queer romance' and 'high heat' on the same level of importance is... something I'm not comfortable with, honestly.
When I say that I think KhathaDome isn't going to be canon or happen in the show, I don't mean 'they're not gonna fuck but the show will say they're in a relationship'. I mean 'the show is never going to mention or imply them to be in any form of romantic relationship'.
Yes, in the past, I have read and watched and enjoyed and loved many queer ships that were not canonically queer. No hesitation. I still do. I am planning to enjoy Midnight Museum, after all!
But your ask seems to imply that just the idea of them living together is enough to imply a relationship and that's just... not true, honestly. If the show implies they share a bed on the regular despite not needing to and live together and share a life or has a love confession? That'd be a confirmed queer relationship and then Midnight Museum would have given us the relationship as something that happened in the show, canonically.
I am struggling with this because, as someone who doesn't care about high heat at all and mostly ignores it even in shows I enjoy, I still find the idea that queer relationships can be just sort of vaguely implied in 2023 and still be considered enough.
If Midnight Museum gets to the same level of queer that Good Omens, I will be ecstatic. Because no, queerness is not 'just' about sex or making out or high heat. But it is about being queer and being in a relationship.
But I don't expect that here. At all. I expect the show to go on its merry way teasing us with hints of something but making sure that it always stays friendship in the show because that's what they're doing. Am I certain? No. Who knows? I don't know, I can't predict that stuff.
But the idea that the dichotomy is high heat versus low heat in this scenario is a false one. This about queer versus not queer and this is about a relationship versus a friendship. Implying a life partnership that they choose in each other is one thing and that would be welcome but that is not a guarantee and that is not what most of us are hoping for.
I do think that a kiss is important to many aspects of making a romantic relationship (I know @absolutebl holds to that strongly and I do agree with them) but I would be happy if this show even implied any kind of relationship...
Anyway.
This went on forever, I did my best to express this but what I'm really trying to say is that no one is implying that they're not going to be close and in each other's lives when we say it's not going to be a queer show, we're saying that the show itself is not going to embrace their relationship as a romantic one regardless of the heat level.
But I think the real answer is... no. It's not enough anymore to just vaguely imply that maybe they're in relationship but one that never involves kisses or saying the word or speaking of their love. It's not enough. The world is moving past that.
#midnight museum#thai drama#thai series#meta#deep meta about high heat#asked and answered#i dunno i did my best#but this feels off to me#i understand in a way what you're saying
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Okay so I have a theory with regards to the whole Tolya and Inej ship thing happening:
From what I've seen, it seems to me that people who do ship them are more focused on (and maybe have only seen) the show, and so right off the bat, there is a lack of knowledge of the backgrounds of the characters
For the people who have only read the SoC duology, if they don't like Kaz, Tolya seems like a great alternative. He is religious, kind, strong, and we love him. This of course misses the fact that he is also explicitly regarded as aro/ace in the books. And even people who see that later or who have read the books can say, well, maybe, as a human being, his feelings and/or his mind changed, as people aren't locked into a sexuality. Of course, 1) this would be a major loss of representation and 2) would be contradictive to everything we have seen so far with Tolya in the books before, after, and during this point in the story (but essentially nothing we have seen in the show)
And people who haven't read the duology have an additional limitation of the lack of external indicators of Inej's trauma. And I think part of that is the result of the show being a visual medium in which we don't get to be inside the characters' heads in the same way as a book and the fact that they were so squished for time in the second season. Which, obviously neither of those things are great, but at least we had Amita Suman who obviously understands Inej
So Inej's "I will have you without armor" seems a lot more like she is issuing an immediate ultimatum. And this is just my own opinion, but I feel like this is a lot of fans' reading on this scene, both in book and show. Personally, I take this scene as her asking him to try. To show that he is willing to try and be open to her, not just (or even) to take his gloves off
So with that "ultimatum" reading, it makes sense to ship her with someone who appears to be able to give her what she appears to want (even tho show Inej still flinches even when Jesper, who she views as a brother, hugs her, so she is not ready for an immediate intimate relationship, rather, she wants to be able to get there someday with Kaz)
In addition, the show didn't have/make time (especially in the second season) to demonstrate the friendship and intimate knowledge that Kaz and Inej have of each other. Most of that is demonstrated in the first season and feels very Kaz focused, e.g. their confrontation in his room in the Crow Club, her asking him if he got the right uniform size since he didn't last time, him always noticing where she is.
We really miss that perspective of Inej knowing Kaz, which is super unfortunate. The first chapter of SoC makes it so clear that these two spend a lot of time together (the way she mentally refers to him implies q sense of intimacy and knowledge, plus her and Kaz concocting 100 theories for how the ambassador was murdered, that would take a decent amount of time), not to mention later the description of her just hanging out in his room feeding crows. She chooses to be there.
There are so many intimate (and platonic) moments and feelings between these two that the show didn't even touch on (and a lot of book fans who don't like Kanej even miss these moments imo). And combined with the limiting knowledge of the other characters, it makes sense that some people think Inej should be with someone else like Tolya
Personally, I love the idea of them becoming good friends and I can understand, at least in part, the logical steps that are taken to see them as a ship. But the full knowledge of these characters obviously prevents that from aligning with canon
#kanej#six of crows#shadow and bone#shadow and bone s2#shadow and bone spoilers#inej ghafa#kaz brekker#of course people will ship whatever they want to#but this is just my analysis of why it's happening#not any justification or attack
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just so you know, i don't ship anybody in one piece, i only have two head canon (i don't know if this word has the plural so no s)
the first super big enormous super super head canon i have (i'm pretty sure that's real, at least, for now) is that luffy is aro/ace, has adhd and maybe is autistic (not completely sure about this last one)
my second head canon (still not super into that, but i think it's pretty clear like..) is that nami is lesbian. i mean, i don't even ship her with someone, but still she's lesbian for me
i know, some of you might not agree with me (and it's completely fine) but.. just think about oda style, most of his characters are parodies or stereotypes of a specific characteristic (like usopp, or iva and the girls in their island, even zoro and google maps, or sanji and so over), and if you think about it, nami is the personification of the stereotypes people had about lesbians (into money, likes to use men as they are object (of course not talking about her caring about her nakamas), are feminine but at the same time super strong.. just think at her punching luffy, zoro, sanji etc..)
okay i'm done, bye👩🎤👶
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(( Introduction Post ))
(( Hello ! I'm @cryptic-eccentric and this is my roleplay account for Dani from the show Danny Phantom. This blog will be treated as if it were her own blog. Anyone is free to interact regardless of what fandom their character is from or if they're an rp blog or not. This is just for fun so I'm not planning on sticking by a strict canon or anything. All OOC text will be denoted with double parenthesis.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Some of the content will involve some heavy/darker themes mostly due to the nature of the character. A more detailed list of potential triggers has been put under the read more of this post.
Further information under the read more:
Admin Info:
Hi my name is Silas, I’m a 24 year old autistic trans man who uses he/him pronouns exclusively. [ Here ] is the link to my main account. I have at least a decade of roleplay experience but I’ve been a little out of practice recently. I am very excited to make some new pals.
I also have a few ocs you can read about [ here ]. Feel free to dm me either on here or on my main if you want to discuss story line ideas or if you’d like my discord.
Tags:
#roleplay & #danny phantom rp - on (almost) every post
#poetry - for in character poems
#ooc - for out of character posts
#reblog - for non-original and not directly roleplay related posts
#kitty cats !! - appears with the reblog tag, on images/videos/gifs of cats
#fungi - for posts relating to mycology
#long posts - for extended roleplay threads
#star trek - for posts relating to star trek
#music - for posts relating to bands she likes
#asks - for answered asks
Partner Info:
-> inevitablefuturephantom plays Dan Phantom
-> therealvladmasters plays Vlad Masters
-> sam-manson-blog plays Sam Mason
-> danny-fenton-blog plays Danny Fenton
-> sp724 plays SIdney Poindexter
-> wes-weston-ghostly-blog plays Wes Weston
-> tucker-foley plays Tucker Foley
-> paulina-sanchez plays Paulina Sanchez
-> ghosth8er-valerie plays Valerie Gray
All accounts are tagged with the url, spaces replacing dashes when applicable.
Headcanons:
This version of Dani is currently 12 years old (~8 months chronologically), has been semi-recently adopted by the Fentons, is currently sharing Jazz’s room and is attending Casper Middle school as a 7th grader where she mostly has B’s, a couple of A’s, and one C. She is particularly fond of Jack.
She inherited some of Danny’s knowledge when she was cloned which has resulted in her being somewhat academically advanced in some topics but behind in others that Danny didn’t pay attention to.
Maddie and Jack were initially aware that Dani was “half ghost” but were lied to about why that was. They were told that Vlad Plasmius (the ghost, no relation to Vlad Masters) had conducted experiments on her against her will. Danny Phantom saved her and brought her to Jazz and Danny as her memories of her actual parents had been removed and he assumed the Fentons would be the best bet in helping her. They have been trying to find a way to permanently stabilize her. She has yet to tell Danny but she is considering revoking her ghost half so she can try to lead a normal life.
Vladco made a post claiming that their CEO, Vlad Masters, had made her in a lab. The Fentons are aware of this and, regretfully, so are all of her new classmates.
After reforming in D-Stabilized, the lenses in her eyes came back warped which caused her to develop astigmatism. She currently wears glasses. She generally wears boys clothes. She will eventually identify as aro-ace.
She loves The Beatles & The Talking Heads, mycology and mushroom identification, Earthbound, and Star Trek TNG.
She prefers to be called “Dani” but is okay with “Elle” in order to avoid confusion with Danny. She does not like being called "Danielle" much.
Boundaries:
Mostly any account can interact, this includes personal accounts, OCs and roleplay accounts from different fandoms. This is just for fun so no strict adherence to canon will be expected. The only exceptions are listed on my main blog’s pinned post.
I will not allow for any heavy angst/gore or romantic relationships involving Dani though. Also like, just don’t be rude I guess.
Content Warnings:
•Heavy discussion of mental/emotional health struggles (namely identity issues, self esteem, PTSD)
•Religious Imagery (sometimes appears in in character poetry)
•Mentions of Child Abuse (incl attempted murder)
•Mentions of bullying
•Mentions of homelessness
•Drugs and Alcohol (only during the Future!Dani Event where a 26 year old Dani came from the future)
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2 FICS IN ONE WEEKEND we’re so spoiled omg I!!!!!!! I LOVE THEM BOTH
Sick Diluc with Kaeya being on better terms with him as caregiver is so ;;-;; Kaeya immediately taking control of the situation!!! The way they know each other so well broke me a little and I’m so weak for characters getting sick, stopping, and then having to be sick again… multiple times… like my gosh he must have been so absolutely exhausted 😭
And!! The sick Xiao fic was absolutely precious!! I can’t emphasize enough how beautifully written it is, too, from a more technical standpoint, like. The pacing and everything is impeccable. And just!!! I adore their relationship. I have a personal head canon of Xiao being ace/aro, and having a QPR with Lumine (absolutely fine ofc if you or anyone else view it differently lol I know I’m in a minority here) which I mention just because. Reading your fic through that lens was so extremely comforting to me on a personal level. I can't even explain it but I just!!! Really really love the way you write them!!
All this to say - thank you for all your hard works and incredible fics you’re amazing!!! 💕💕💕
— Cas
(see you say that but I feel like *I* am spoiled bc y'all are amazing and no matter how unsure of a fic I walk out of it the screaming tells me what I need to know lol)
I wasn't Originally sure how I wanted their relationship to come across but I decided upon "better terms" partway through, and like it still worked even with a little bit of snark from Kaeya because siblings snipe at each other and Kaeya's got ammo to hold over Diluc for the rest of their Lives:tm:
And yes Diluc was SO exhausted. I really like playing with how well they know each other - have to know each other - and also how well Kaeya knows his way around the winery and such because like. Dude Kaeya's hangout only underscored how much Kaeya may not do this often but he knows Exactly what to do and what is going on. and its just. I love it so much...
Diluc needs a nap (and a break)
aslk;djflask;jdf okay actually I love your take on the Xiao and I'm glad it reads comfortably like that??? because?? I wasn't actually aiming for shippy and I think even if they were... kinda shippy I agree with Xiao as ace. Something in the QPP range suits well for what I was hoping for and im glad it works because I wasn't sure if I nailed the range I wanted right. Bc. I am also ace and and my partner is aro and tbh outside of our relationship (which works beautifully for us) I barely know how they Should work and obviously ours is weird bc we started out dating like, normally and learned a lot about ourselves and each other and- anyway. The trouble with dating someone aro for more than 10 years and being Super Ace is that I just. -shrug- what does this look like to anyone else I dont know and ive stopped knowing how to Tell, if I ever knew how.
Anyway! I'm glad They came out well. Even half out of his gourd xiao ended up way wordier than I anticipated but I kinda loved the way it all came out. I'll def have to write more of them. At some point. -glances at the list of things I have to write more-
This has been TMI responses from Aery!
(seriously tho thank you so much for your kind words you're amazing too <3)
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6, 9, 27, 30
6. Favorite title you used
It's a tough call so I'm picking two: first, I have to shout out the custard pie appreciation consortium, because if that lyric from "The Village Green Preservation Society" hadn't stuck in my head, that fic would not have happened. I was trying to figure out what would happen during Hal's visit to Ragnor Bella, just listening to music in my car when suddenly I thought, oh. Bake sale.
The other title I especially love is let him know its flood also. Sometimes when I pull lines from poems it really is just the one line that I love, but in this case, Kahlil Gibran's "On Friendship" is just so fitting for Jemis and Mr. Dart. (It has occurred to me that I could write more little fics about their friendship, pull more titles from the same source, and create a series of it. We'll see.)
9. Favorite pairing you wrote for this year?
Jemis and Mr. Dart have my whole heart. (They're also most of the romance I wrote this year.) It's funny, because in canon I am fully happy with their relationship remaining purely nonromantic, but in fic... yeah, all bets are off. Romantic, queerplatonic, general friendship - their relationship is my favorite no matter what form it takes, and probably always will be.
27. What do you listen to while writing?
This is going to sound wild, but it's usually nothing. Here and there I might be able to stick a handful of songs in a playlist and put it on repeat, but a lot of the time I find music distracting. I have lots of writing playlists! It's just that I usually listen to them in the car when I'm thinking about fic, and less when I'm doing the writing of fic. There are exceptions, but yeah, generally nothing.
30. Biggest surprise while writing this year?
Besides my shock that apparently I'm capable of writing this much fic??? It would have to be that I got over the hurdle of publishing e-rated fic. Which is funny now, because it's not even like I had an issue with the idea of it, and now that I've done it, I am just like... okay. This is not even remotely a Thing to me. All it really came down to was the fact that I write for a small fandom, and there were things I wanted to read that had not yet been written, and I had ideas. Therefore... here we are. Technically the only e-rated fic I've published so far is hello, my old heart, but I have a few more wips in the pipeline that include sex. And many more that don't! I am, at the end of the day, just an aro-ace guy whose goal as a writer is exploring the relationships of these characters I've imprinted on in as many ways as possible. Upping the rating a bit just gives me a few more options when it comes to doing that.
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rei mekaru (shocker i know)
we r ginger liker solidarity.... yuuki/yuki likers and rei likers need to come together and be allied...
~*~
My identity hc for them
oh shit tumblr is auto formatting in bullet points thats fun. uhhh w/rei i pretty much like any combination of ace/aro spec + lesbian. 100% lesbian rei? aro lesbian rei? aroace rei? all epic all amazing. i started hc'ing this back in like.. vv early sdra days. and i think its just part of who i am now... i think she doesnt really experience much attraction in general and has a bit of a hard time labeling how she feels because. of her general emotional trauma. so tbh i can see her kinda rotating through labels? i think she keeps it very to her self tho. she doesn't like people assuming she's cishet but she also doesn't want to come out as straightn't, so she just snaps at people who try and drag her into convos about identity.
similarly i think she struggles with really.. going "wow this is so me this is exactly what i am" when it comes to gender identity. i think she's very.. "well im Definitely not a guy, and i dont think im anything else, so..." ie, she's more prone to defining herself by what she isn't than what she is. which is perfectly okay!!! i don't think she'd consider herself trans, but she may occasionally like the label genderqueer. (yes i know that trans people r anyone who's gender deviates from what they were told they should be, but while it is an umbrella term, people can decide if they like it for themselves a lot! and i don't think rei would really like any label other than "idk man its weird", which she likes to use on/off) again tho i dont think she's very into sharing that with people, at least as a teen.
Thoughts on their home life/family
im so curious what her time was like when she was all alone??? i think that's something thats fairly unexplored, is her time between her parents not being able to care for her, and her becoming self-sufficient. ultimately i dont have much to say here, i like how linuj handled her backstory, i just think it wouldve been cool to see more of it, not that there was any good place to write it in, but i love bonus modes and would like to see maybe how the dra survivors coped w/what they learned in the sixth trial in a bonus mode about how the kisa foundation became what it is now.
How i feel about their canonical writing/handling
mmm... tbh. i like rei, i think her growth from dra to sdra2 was handled well- she still feels like rei, while also serving her narrative role- ie. there's not much you can do when shawty gets exploded in the prologue and then has to play second fiddle to tsurugis viola of fucking evil. sadly, we can't do much with the kisa foundation and showing how rei and tsurugi have changed and have the pacing of the chapter still be intact, when we see rei, its mostly just her being voice of reason because someone has to give exposition on what the foundation knows while tsurugi has a meltdown. i think her development feels authentic and natural, if she maybe feels a biiit.. i dont know how to word it, but she almost feels a bit too calm? less snarky at points than i'd think she'd be, and than what i'd like to see. but again, we can explain that as being due to the role she has to play for the story.
ultimately, while not necessarily my cup of tea, i'm just not prone to latching onto characters like rei a whole lot! i def think she's handled well, oddly well for linuj in general, and v oddly well for a female character written by linuj. i like her, im just not brain rotted about her
The one thing i’d want to make canon about them
hmmmmm... im not gonna lie i can't really think of anything? after thinking about it while i typed up. essentially the whole rest of this post, i think it'd be cool if she and kabuya were friends after sdra2. yuuki is... .... ..........lets not talk about what hes up to, syobai and iroha are just a whole fucking mess. theyre a bit busy dealing with heads in boxes. and tsurugi is just sooo normal he's too normal really.
so i think they could meet and chat about how Fucking Insane the games were, in a way that other kg survivors wouldnt get, since they didnt have to deal with divine luck and what it does to people. also seeing as akane saved rei in dra and then. ya know. Soruko. i think that'd be a interesting convo for them to have, both kinda understanding more about akane taira. i think that'd be really neat!
My number one favorite ship for them
hm.... reikako by default of i dont think much about rei ships, and they have a significant amount of canon material. i do wonder though what their relationship was like pre-despair, it feels like a lot of the school life info we have is on utsuro or tsurugi? buuut yeah. also as kinda established i think rei is uncertain where she stands on attraction/her thoughts change a lot and. yeah. so this is less a romantic thing and moreso i want inside linujs brain so i can know what he thinks except he like. officially has stated he doesnt know shit abt sdra anymore which is SO UPSETTING
…Now everyone else i ship with them
i think rei/kizuna/kiyoka could be cute!!! also i kinda just like giving akane gfs, and i don't really think they'd be that compatible, but i think if they had a weird little queercoded friendship for like. the duration of one year during their stay at hpa, and it leaves akane feeling more confident and comfortable with herself as her own person, and leaves rei with a LOT of questions, while they also never really cross the line between friends and something more, that'd be cool and fun. just normal gals being pals things.
The thing i will NEVER ship
im so sorry. 2020 sdrainsta has made me incapable of terurei propaganda. i support people who ship it as a matter of fact im so glad we r now in a place where people can ship it or not ship it and everyone can just be fine and happy. but i dont think ill ever be able to see the vision.
a dynamic/relationship i wish was explored more (in canon, or in fandom)
i wish in sdra2 we saw more on the dynamic that grew between rei and mikako in dra. i think it'd be cool to see that discussed a bit more seeing how it was. mikakos in game memories that formed the basis for sora iirc.
thoughts on their design (appearance-wise)
mmm...... why the fuck did linuj use so much blue in the dra cast color palettes... i remember i had this dentist appointment that was really evil and like. literal hours longer than it was supposed to be, and to try and distract myself i went through the cast and counted who had blue in their design and who didnt. it took a long time because i was in so so so much pain but like. iirc its just mikako akane and yuki. and also mikako wears blue in ch4. so. THATS NOT RELEVANT THOUGH.
uhhhh. im not a huge fan of her outfit just because i dont like the skirt. her og design was a school uniform and i think it kinda shows and im not a huge fan of it? my brain keeps getting mixed up on the length of her skirt but yeah. its just so vibrant and pigmented and so is her hair and its like. the lower half of her fit just feels so high school uniform and i dont really like it. i think her hair is super cute in the bonus sketch (the just-woke-up one) on her character sheet tho.
i also don't really like her fit in sdra2. i think the labcoat is super nice (i like the ombre effect it looks good) and while its not too practical i dont hate the vest short skirt tights combo. but im not a fan of the color palette, its just so dark, so u have her bright hair and the bright coat, but the dark grey and black, in vertical stripes just kinda dominates it in my brain. and i don't really like it? i really dont like the grey with her hair.
she is very pretty. but im not a fan of the fits linuj puts her into
A music-related thought- a song that reminds me of them, or what their music taste is, etc
hmmm.. this is a very foreign concept to me but i dont think reis huge on music. i think for the most part she listens to songs she has memories associated with- she doesn't seem huge on the arts or. ya know. emotional connection? so i think while she wouldn't really vibe with anything particular of her own accord, listening to music which was playing when something emotional happened to her both improves the music, and also. helps her with being in touch with her emotions and letting herself feel. if that makes sense?
#dra#sdra2#rei mekaru#yomis ask meme#reikako#iroha nijiue#dont want to tag spam but i do want to be on the look out for tags people may have filtered
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Personal, ooc, but this ties to Gia also (really he's the whole culprit for it) and I'm just Excited over it so you'll get to hear it under the cut anyway. Long ramblings.
So I made Gia sometime in December of 2022, in-game, then started rping him with the ever wonderful captainqster like... Idk man, three or four days later.
Let me check actually.
Two days later, okay. We went fast I guess.
ANYWAY. Gia very, very quickly ate up all of my interest, creative energy and drive, not to mention within a few months he had fully become my main in the game, entirely usurping poor Saahe despite being canonically an NPC, whereas Saahe made a legitimately good WoL and I could really get into the story with him.
And yet, Gia. Gia became my everything, and the friends that have known me the longest were commenting that I really just related to him on a level I never have with any other character I've played.
I couldn't exactly deny that, seeing all the evidence.
Now, a bit of context. Saahe was my first and my original FFXIV character, and when making him my thought process was "okay, what's the most personally attractive character I can make in this character creator", which led to Saahe. I think he's hot, appearance wise! I'm very very ace, but you know, aesthetically.
Gia was made on a whim and with an entirely different goal in mind. My thought process behind his appearance was more "if I could be anything in this game, what would it be?"
You might be able to see where this is going based on that alone.
Of course then I went on to mod him to be more in line with the vision I had for him, which led to him getting that hourglass figure and nearly getting entirely, fully castrated before I refrained just enough to leave his dick in peace. It wasn't just to please me, it did have IC reasons, but put a pin on that preferring the look of a male with all external sexual organs removed still in the context of "if I could be anything, what would it be".
So there I am, doing all of this to Gia, while relating like all hell to Gia, while suffering from an intense case of body envy given to me by Gia. More background, then: I've always considered agender to be my preferred identity/closest descriptor to how I feel about gender and shit. Agender, aro, ace, a-everything essentially. However, my appearance has always been very in line with gender binary.
And while I've been indifferent to genders, I have not been indifferent to my own body parts and how against what I feel they go. I've always had dysphoria, but I've kinda just dealt with it, mostly probably assumed everyone's equally unhappy with their bodies. Joke's on me there.
But now there's been Gia and me being kinda... Forced to confront the fact he is so much what I would want to be, physically. He's wonderfully caught between traditionally male and female features, is also very indifferent to his gender, and loosely considers himself a male only for the ease of it because it was the sex he grew up into in puberty and has those sexual organs (sans what's been removed).
And all of that has made my dysphoria flare up like all hell!
So after things kinda came to a head and I spent one total day crying over how unhappy I was with my body, I started to actually look into straight up transitioning and how that works in my country. And it got me very... Excited? Hopeful kinda? Like maybe I could be happy with my body eventually?
After sleeping on that 'cause being super emotional and very upset is no state of mind to make big decisions in, I took a lil step and sent an email to a social worker of a gender diversity organization, explaining my situation and my concerns a bit and just this "idk who to talk to about this". It's hard to doubt my dysphoria and want to change things after living with it since puberty which wasn't exactly recently, but of course it's still a big thing to consider and not something I want to think on alone, while also not knowing how my nurse and doctor would react if I brought it up with them. Or my old therapist, for that matter; we had other things to discuss during my three years with her than my dysphoria that I'd sort of just resigned myself to at the time, and I made Gia shortly before my therapy ended so then there just was no time anymore.
I wasn't expecting a response to my email right away, but I actually got an email back the next day! In which the worker suggested an appointment to discuss my situation, my worries, and what might be the right next steps for me to take. So I scheduled one, and that will be in about two weeks.
So yeah everything is only just at the very beginning, but I haven't felt this... Optimistic? Hopeful? About my future? In a long time? Like atm, before discussing anything with a professional, I would kinda hope to have two surgeries to make myself look more androgynous. Change my name into something less gendered too, most likely. Other stuff is more in consideration, but those first two I've been dreaming off for a ridiculously long time without ever actually thinking that hey, maybe they'd be possible even, and I've never been very fond of my name. I'd need to get a diagnosis first obviously, and that'll inevitably take a while, and then everything else afterwards, but I've cracked the first door open kinda? So maybe? Maybe I can get there?
I don't need the gender on my legal papers to change, I don't care that much and legally you gotta be one or the other, I just don't want to look like one or the other. Let me have the same confusing aura Gia does.
I've also been laughing over how the reaction of everyone online who knows me to any extent has been just a resounding "and no one was surprised". Apparently my vibes and how I've talked have been just a lil like that for the longest time.
But yeah. Thank you Gia for this, you funny little bunny. And if you've read this far, thank you for the time and all the best!
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