Queen <3

sex and hormone therapy and killing my abusers and doing hard drugs will fix me

Hi, I used to draw a lot but I've not drawn/created for a long time now, any tips to get back into it?

Or rather the whole thing about making art for yourself, I used to get a lot of attention for being good at art from other ppl and I'm not sure how to connect it back to myself again

I'm also contending with the Autism "It needs to be done in this way" and the ADHD "I can't focus for shit"

Also please don't worry if you don't know what to say, I'm just trying to get a variety of opinions to try and untangle my brain

Thank you in advance 💕

i think a good way to get back into creating *for yourself* whether its to come out of a dry spell or just to get back to creating things that you like, is what i call 'backtracking' (bearing in mind that my particular methods may only work for me! im lucky ive never struggled with focus when it comes to drawing things, but maybe some of these things will help as my main goal when drawing is to entertain myself!)

also before i move on this i think is valuable: you gotta draw things that you aren't gonna post sometimes. it's fun and fulfilling to make art for an audience, and wanting attention is not shameful (ITS HUMAN!) but also we live in panopticon times and i think its good to train your "i am alone doing something for myself and no one has to see it" muscles.

backtracking is a couple different things:

look back to when you were really young. what kinds of drawings were the most fun to do? what did you spend time on or get really into? for me, this was a few things! tracing cartoons, drawing up elaborate scenes of lots of little creatures doing a thing, and designing little characters as paper dolls and making their houses and little furniture and accessories and such to cut out and play with. also getting paint all over my hands (i still paint my whole hand whenever im done doing something with acrylics before i wash up! its stimming)! backtracking here is when you try to take those things and make use of them now. try to find that old joy and use it in a way that makes you happy today, even if it's something small or silly or embarrassing. it can really help you rediscover what parts of art make YOU happy!

if you're regularly drawing and in a slump, backtracking for me is stepping back and doing either more exercises and practising the things you feel like you already know how to draw (ie. studying angles of the face or pulling up imgs of rooms on pinterest to see how normal people arrange furniture etc.), or simplifying your drawings to a level that feels more relaxing and less stressful. (ie. chibis instead of more detailed characters etc.) i find i kind of fall back to chibis when i feel lost, and then sort of rebuild from there. its fun to let my style change as i grow!

ALSO! im telling your autism this for your adhd's sake (this is useful for anyone i think): if there is a part of art that you do not enjoy doing or find boring but you feel it is an important or necessary step in the process? the secret is it isnt! art is made up. if you hate lining, dont do it! if youre a digital artist and get caught up picking a brush every time because you feel like you need the perfect one? switch to mspaint for a bit to get the nerves out. it can be really freeing!

art is for having fun and fulfilling our need to create. the rules are all made up and not real. perfectionism is the little death that something something i forget. yeah

I read your thing about stridercest. I didn’t super like the ship (I’m more of a lalondecest girlie) but I respect the hell out of the textual analysis you did. Anyway do you have any good fic recommendations? I want to see what you see in it.

oh fuck yeah i love sharing ship stuff especially with ppl who dont usually go here and vice versa for me. its like hell yeah im digging in sand and its fun i love my sand and then i turn around and woah i had no idea there was even MORE sand just behind me ya dig? that might not have made any sense hahaha. its the joy of trading pokemon cards except with ships

but okay heres some of my current faves. bear in mind i read mostly M and E rated stuff but ive got a sprinklin of lower ratings in here too. im also gonna categorize this list by stridercest flavour. theres a lot so this turned out like ridiculously long

anyone else goin through this feel free to link yalls faves in the replies too cause im ravenous. especially if its haldirk. im constantly craving haldirk

guardiancest

doku line terminus & two steps away from the county line by lildogie these first cause theyre my ultra faves rn and i cant get enough of this au. set in the same universe but county line is the prequel. a/b/o verse with lotsa interesting political stuff and also interpersonal dynamics. dave & dirk are there too and are real cute. its also got mysterious time travelling. i really cant sell these two enough like i am not doin these justice

davedirk / dirkdave

if i woke up next to you by bumbly | G, ~2,700 words, complete. SUPER sweet relationship study, made me fuckin melt. this author has really good stuff for other ships too but mind the archive warnings

dont joke about hentai face broctopus transplants im eating cheese n onion pringles here by smrtnik | M, ~1k words, complete. this one made me fuckin melt its so tender. it truly feels like were peeking into their life together. also great title

Stasis State by Caeslin | T, ~3k words, complete. another really intimate feeling one. its so fuckin sweet. mind the tags for typical dirk suicide attempt but its not on screen its moreso the recovery and how dave is affected by it

“stupid fucking bullshit” ad nauseam by anon | T, 13.7k words, complete. REALLY GOOD AU. trans striders, fade to black sex scene. the boys are cute and you can feel how much theyre drawn to each other immediately. wish there was more of this

sometimes the bad guy wins by nutrimercenary | E, ~7.5k words, ongoing. wow. oh wow. ive been looking for a davedirk fic like this for a long time. PLEASE read the warnings and tags but its so fuckin good. a crossdimentional narrative tug-o-war between dave and ult dirk i fuckin love it

got it goin on by bumbly | E, 7.5k words, complete. dirk indulges daves mommy kink after prying it outta him. its cute and funny and sexy it made me smile. their dynamic is sooo sweet

helping hands by ghostlyAnarchist | E, 5.1k words, complete. THIS IS SO GOOD. its got trans man dave and is genuinely one of the hottest transmasc fics ive read so far and boy howdy ive read a lot. slight warning for dysphoria discussion but its not too bad its all just hot af a dick-sucking venn diagram by Elendraug | E, 10k words, complete. first off domestic af. very established relationship and you can tell. its so fuckin sweet. i looove this one. its like the best kind of silly realistic smut its one of my faves of all time

STILL WITH ME by egbert | E, 8k words, complete. dave and dirk strife and then fuck in the bathroom. holy shit this is hot. their want is like tangible in this one

brodave and a!brodirk

hardware by orphan_account | E, ~8k words, complete. dave gets some dick piercings and bro goes insane about them. hot as hell and also features bottom bro which is my fave. its got a couple uses of the r-slur but its also from 2011 so i take it w/ a grain of salt. 2011 and earlier fics are like internet artifacts (/pos)

but you better never pull it by hapaxlegomena | E, 5k words, complete. wow. WOW. sub top bro and dom bottom dave need i say more. this sub bro activates my cute aggression the power play is great mars & murrie's by orphan_account | E, 6.8k words, complete. a!brodirk, omorashi. super hot!!!! alpha dave is sooo embarrassed about his piss kink but dirk wins in the end hahaha. really intriguing which i know sounds funny on an omo fic but read it and youll know. i love this alpha dave

temporal sunset by Plajus | M, 19.5k over 5 chapters, complete. a!brodirk. holy shit what a ride. this one held me hostage and now lives in my brain rent free (bdum tiss sorry). dirk is terminally ill so i know it wont be for everyone but give it a try and goddamn you wont be disappointed. trust me

a swinging pendulum by ghostlyAnarchist | T, ~900 words, complete. a!brodirk time/dream bubble encounter. wow just wow. the want. the yearning immaterial by LPSunnyBunny | E, 1k words, complete. a!brodirk, trans dirk. holy shit!!!!!! holy shit!!!!! hot hot hot!!!!!!! shower sex sensation control!!!!

haldirk

singular by 2x2verse | E, 6.8k words, complete. hal has an existential crisis dirk catches him and then they fuck tenderly about it. genuinely so romantic. im addicted to this kind of haldirk. honestly i just recommend the entire series diagnostics by 2x2verse | E, 2.9k words, complete. i know i just linked this authors whole collection of haldirk fics but holy crap this one in particular. dom/sub electrostim with sensory deprivation, hal is the dom. i LOVE how hes written here. very attentive domming, great details

A Fatal Error Has Occurred by Mortior | E, 42k words, 4/5 chapters. oh mortior my haldirk regent. really fuckin good character writing in an au where hal has an android body before the alpha session is started. read the tags for warnings. the tension between them is insane endangered by Mortior | E, 100k+ words, complete multichapter. holy fuck where to begin with this one. this is a haldirk sensation. post apocalyptic au where androids won the human-robot war. dirk runs into AR. AR takes an interest in him. dirk takes even more of an interest in AR. if youre gonna read any haldirk read this one

"im basically fucking him" series by Elendraug | T & E, all complete. so!!!!! fucking!!!!! tender!!!!! really cute haldirk progressing through their relationship

ridiculously late by cinnamonfreak | E, 21k, completed multichapter. a/b/o au where dirk suddenly presents. REALLY intriguing hal in this one i fuckin love the power play

roboporn by smrtnik | E, 3.9k words, complete. really fun power play in this one. hal is waterproofed externally but not internally. he gives dirk a handie over his open chassis torso. theres also really sweet snuggling afterwards

fwiw that rude commenter is a transphobe, a post a few down on their blog is real blatant (and in that vein I think their comment was less a judgement of your anatomy and more saying Charlie is 'too' muscular/angular)

It's rude and out of pocket REGARDLESS but I also think you're a little hard on yourself! You even said, you hadn't illustrated exactly what you were after with her, and you hadn't intended for a collection of doodles you happened to still like to blow up. You're entirely right that we should all be drawing more than conventionally attractive people, but idk. It's a process and you're a great artist who's working toward it! Don't feel like you have to answer this btw I mostly wanted to let you know that commenter was a double idiot and started rambling. Hope you have a lovely day!!

oh absolutely! i have a feeling you're right abt what they meant considering i saw the transphobic comment they made a couple posts down on their blog lmao but i wanted to add that part anyway. and i appreciate your words a ton, but dw im not hurt or upset! i get a lot of weird comments all the time, i just wanted to use that one as a platform to bounce off of a thought ive been having lately. i wouldn't post a negative remark like that unless i wanted to use it for something. the actual comment was mostly irrelevant to the point i wanted to make, which is also not meant to be super serious, just a thought soup to stir around

and i mean my interpretation of my art as purely objective, i think its important to think critically about yourself and in general. from an objective standpoint, i dont believe the way shes drawn is too out of the norm and is fairly tame (disregarding her ox/bull parts lol), thats basically what i was aiming for with that section. i constantly get stuck in a rut without improving by much because im usually just drawing to doodle after a school day and not rlly with any purpose. i tend to keep drawing the same things out of habit and it gets stale really quickly. so i know my faults and im rlly looking forward to getting better!

also rq, what you said about how we need to draw more than conventionally attractive people- while i do agree with that, in my post i was more saying its important for people to be more open-minded about how they view gender expression and attractiveness in general, myself included! i dont think how i drew charlie was very revolutionary, but ive seen so many tags speaking otherwise. which is either reflective of how small the bubble is for whats acceptable or maybe i have a skewed perception of things? for example if having a bush or something is gender envy we need to look at ourselves. bush is so normal to me. (which i dont if thats what even drew ppl to it BUT. just as an example). would those same people say the same if i drew a very fat woman with a beard, unibrow, etc.? i have no idea. but i have had my eyes opened so many times before its incredible. little things ive never thought about before through new perspective. so thats why i want to encourage it too. i hope that makes sense. thank you so much i hope you have an equally lovely day!! 🫶🫶

Sorry, I forgot that your preferred term for us is TRAs. Tranny is a little too mask-off these days.

Anyway, let's play your scenario:

Someone transitions at 30, having been taken seriously as a player for fifteen years. They win at the women's tournament, depriving all your "real women" of their acclaim.

Or maybe another scenario:

Someone transitions at 15, and is taken even less seriously than a cis woman. Receives little to no instruction, since any cis coach will be uncomfortable teaching them. At 30, she's forced to enter the men's tournament, having been at an inflated disadvantage you describe in cis women. She loses repeatedly, everyone who cried foul about cis women's social disadvantage is thrilled about the trans woman's.

Stop pretending this is about fairness. This is about slowly and politely eking trans people out of public life with a laundry list of whataboutisms and hypothetical scenarios.

And fyi: the language that you deemed so foul earlier is the same language I hear from your peers as they tell me I'll never be a real woman. Away from polite company, of course. After all, you have an image to uphold ✨

i literally dont use tra as a derogatory term cause i dont think theres anything wrong w advocating for trans rights but ok. youre clearly not here to argue w me youre here to argue w someone you made up in your head

yeah i did think like, what abt early transitioners 🤔 i personally wouldn't really have a problem w a childhood transitioner competing w women, but i don't make the rules & i understand that for the ppl who do, it's hard to know where to draw the line - bc it has to be drawn somewhere unfortunately, and not everything can b taken on a case-by-case basis. then again, i just rbed a version of the post a few min ago clarifying that the majority of chess tournaments are still co-ed anyway, so like. just play in the co-ed tournaments? & if women created their own leagues to give themselves a space in a male-dominated culture, maybe it would b cool if trans ppl took inspiration frm that and also created their own leagues to give themselves a space. ive seen some trans ppl do that in sports recently & i think it's a neat idea.

this literally isnt about eking trans ppl out of public life bc im not in any way at all suggesting trans ppl not b allowed to complete. are u even reading any of what i said.

who are my peers lol. none of my buddies use language like that except occasionaly when talking about themselves. once again u are not here to argue w me u are here to argue w someone u made up in ur head.

i kinda avoid talking abt horror even tho ive been really into it for months now bc i dont want ppl to get the wrong impression or to read my opinions with bad faith... i think its normal to be drawn to dark stories, its extremely common for ppl with deep fears and trauma to become fixated on those topics. the human mind is wild so i cant say WHY, but i would guess its bc of our need to want to know everything, to remove the fear. thats why mystery in horror is so effective. ive just never been able to engage in horror because of my extreme squemishness for live action gore, until now when i discovered books. if my ability to handle gore was a 1-10 scale (10 being unable to look at at all), real life would be a 10, animation would be a 6-9 (depending on how realistic, like invincible was a 9 for me), drawn/manga would be like a 4-6, and writing would be a 2-3.

anyways that out of the way. ive consumed many types of horror recently: psychological, gorefest, extreme horror, surrealist, tragedy... ive read good and bad written ones, literary classics like cormac mccarthy and tiktok trend horror books that probably only got big bc of their cool covers. its just a lot of fun going into these things and approaching them on their own level, like not expecting psychologically-thrilling prose in an extreme horror novel and not expecting constant killing in a deconstructional surrealist novel. and then judging them on those merits. bc its like that one post said, judging all of horror based on a specific genre of slasher movies just makes u look like the dumb one. and i like experiencing so many different ones, it gives me info and knowledge and comparisons and stuff its so much fun :)

4, 8, 25, and 26

weirdly specific artist ask game

4. Fav character/subject that’s a bitch to draw

bruce. fuck that guy fr. he gives me endless headaches i dont know how ppl draw him consistently or at all for that matter ive never drawn him in a way that i liked

8. What’s an old project idea that you’ve lost interest in

yknow i was just looking at my old series on ao3 and i gotta say. the superstuck au. i think i really just started it bc i wanted to be writing batman fic and hadnt read enough comics yet and now that i am writing batman fic i couldnt possibly care less about it

25. Something your art has been compared to that you were NOT inspired by

im gonna be so real and fresh w you chief. no one has ever compared my art to anything except maybe like. the obvious drag of saying i draw homestuck hair (which. i do). i feel like only the big boys get comments like that im just not popular enough fanart OR fanfic

26. What’s a piece that got a wildly different interpretation from what you intended

when someone commented some bullshit on my ao3 about how they got pro c*p vibes. it haunts me. ill carry that insult w me to the grave. just bc bruce is a bootlicker doesnt mean i am words hurt ok

also when someone told me my art reminded them of like. a weird wet dream they had?? sometimes you dont have to say things ok. sometimes we can just leave those thoughts in our head

28 29 30

28. Any art events you have participated in the past (like zines)

i never see zines in time b4 the apps are closed!!! so i usually dont get the chance.... but also im not very good at following through LOL. ummm i helped a friend run a pokemon art contest thing once! i... didnt participate in it myself but i was one of the mods and designed a trainer that ran it and everything that was pretty cool. i also did get to participate in a south park zine once! the ppl in charge of that were nice enough to actually reach out to me to be a part of it so i didnt even have to worry about the app. but other than that im not much for events i dont keep track of time or projects other than personal ones very well

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically

to be fair i feel like i enjoy most media a normal amount and not as much in a fandomy whcih means not a lot actually inspires me to draw. i LOVE Friends which im sure some of u guys have noticed (tho i guess sometimes that does inspire art bc ive deffo just fully redrawn scenes from the show but like w tma characters) i love my various youtube men and im a huge fan of horror movies (especially found footage its by far my favorite genre and sometimes i like to just sit and sift thru some real shitty ones to find gold lol) im kind of all over the place. oh and i love a lot of adult cartoons ummmmm none that i currently keep up with bc i hate uhhhhh watching media thats still like... updatingi guess???? but ive been like CRAVING rewatching metalocalypse lately

30. What piece of yours do you think is underrated

this questions embarrassing bc as much as i love attention its also humiliating to talk abt the things i think should have more attention!!! ummmm not so much a piece but um as a whole my childhood au is really being slept on. not that i post much for it often but everything i have for it i love soooo so dearly and bc i havent made the plot of it super clear i dont think many ppl really get into it but i just think its so cool and the story isnt fully fleshed out but every time i get more and mroe thoughts for it it feels more like its own beast and like i could really go somewhere with it!!! for something like SPECIFIC? i think THIS messy comic was totally slept on i thought it was such a cool scene drawn out even without context i mean come on jmart in their lil ruined prom clothes and daisy taking mike down.... jon losing a shoe.... i really like it idk

Hiii^_^ what would you say are your main artistic influences/inspirations ?

VERY obvious answer but jojo and splatoon. In general. I am so happy i got into jojo because i never expected to but its like an infinite source of inspiration to me and my biggest inspiration now. Arakis art is absolutely incredible its like everything i love. the patterns and fashion, the variety in color palettes, i also LOVE group pictures, the poses, treating characters as models, the soul in each piece, the ornamentation(!) The unconventional character designs , the ATTRIBUTES (i am so fascinated by character attributes. I have always tried to think what attributes my characters could have.) High accuracy in items, which really makes you feel like theyre real...i really could go on. I really cant express it enough. I can never get enough of it. I havent even seen all parts yet and each time i do i literally cant wait to look at every picture that exists of it. It all feels like. So REAL. its like the most real art ever idk how to even explain it better. And I feel like with jojo everythings possible and i absolutely love it... and splatoon is also very inspiring to me. Ive started really enjoying sport-esque fashion because of it. it influenced me a lot especially in how i use color, it made me very confident in the way i choose them, even if it sometimes feels random. I love using vivid colors. Also i absolutely love splatoon stage designs. Story modes especially. But the amount of details in them, graffiti and stickers makes them feel so lived in. I really love street art and splatoon made me appreciate it more. I love designs of the gear and weapons, the accuracy when theyre drawn in official art too ...i think i started wanting to draw more accurate cuz of it. i just love it so much i would not be where i am without it. I own the splatoon 2 art book and i cant wait untill the third parts one comes out ... other than that, lately ive been very inspired by like early 2010s jojo fanart from pixiv lol. Ive been lookin at a lot of them reposted on tumblr mass reblogging and saving to my phone even despite me having literally no storage space cuz i just cant resist. i really like them. I would love to try to emulate the feeling of these. Its not very specific sorry but i think some ppl would understand. anyways thanks for the ask :)

obviously you know yourself better than anyone else but for me personally it was a huge realisation that liking fictional men (who are mostly written by women) is not the same thing as being attractive to real life men. Neither are celebrities because they're basically designed to be appealing and also I wouldn't actually want to sleep with my favourite celebrities irl it's very different from how I actually feel about the real life women I fall in love with.This is not me diagnosing you with lesbian I don't know you it's just me saying when you think about these things just think about the relationships you actually want irl and don't worry about anything else /1

/2 just don't every worry or feel obligated to feel anything in particular about men. your identity is about the experiences you want to have with other people and you're allowed to feel anything you want outside of that and not owe anything to anyone about it. you can also be bi and still want nothing to do with men if that's what you want. just bc you're attracted to them still doesn't mean you owe them anything

thank you so much!! 💖 this was so nice to hear cuz i feel like it’s such a messed up and complicated topic in my head so it’s reassuring to see it spoken about so directly. honestly i have no clue what my deal is - i can’t tell if i feel uncomfortable around irl cishet men because of my sexuality or because of misogyny or because of mental illness/trauma LMFAO. 😭 i know ive been attracted to them in the past it’s just becoming really rare for me now. with irl guys i mean. bisexual still feels like a comfortable label that makes a lot of sense to me, but idk - it could just be that im not as absolutely certain about it as i thought. and maybe i never will be until i start dating again, if i ever do that is. idk i didn’t used to care that much about the way i identify or about who i was into, but im realising it plays a bigger role in my life than i wanted to believe. which makes things really difficult for me because either way im not straight which is like, low-key a problem to a lot of ppl in my life so. it’s just shit. i think my brain just automatically is drawn to non threatening fictional / famous men who i can project onto and also never confront IRL lol. but yeah i definitely don’t want my life to be dictated by my proximity to dudes at all so yeah ur right!!!

2020 in review

it’s been a weird year for me.

by all accounts, it Should be a bad year.  

lots of bad things happened to me this year.  i found places i adore in my new town - a certain cozy chair in the library, a corner table at a 24 hour coffee shop, a park bench in direct sunlight for most of the day - just in time to lose them all.  i started pursuing health answers in january, only for all the hospitals to close on my birthday, rendering answers impossible to find.

i waited months for the hospitals to open again, from home, unable to pursue any of the nightlife or queer meetups or community theater i’d vowed to get involved in.  eventually i found out i have scoliosis and a serious vitamin D deficiency.  i hoped to get better by treating these things.  instead the health problems continued, worsened.  i slept through most of may and november, i had intermittent weeks where i’d sleep for 20+ hours a day and be in too much pain to get out of bed upon waking.  i missed rent a few times.  borrowed money too many times.  relied on my loved ones way more than i’ve ever been comfortable with. (it’s the adam parrish ass in me.)

i developed a painful deformity in my leg.  spent stupid amounts of time in urgent care and the ER.  thought it was a dislocation due to connective tissue issues, but my x-rays came back clean.  so did an ultrasound for blood clots.  my doctor referred me to a dermatologist, who did a biopsy.  not super pleasant considering i faint when punctured with needles, but i’d already had my blood drawn and IVs stuck in me, so whatever.  found out i have an autoimmune disorder.  went from the most-perceived-as-able-bodied person in my house to the one most likely to get killed by the pandemic in the span of a single phone call.  might have a shortened lifespan, might not.  don’t know yet.  probably will know by the end of the year.

so it should be a bad year.  none of this was pleasant.  i’ve had spans of time where i’ve cried harder than i’ve ever cried in my life.  had to keep myself from calling my mom and telling her i needed her, because i knew she’d drop her job and her responsibilities and her plans to race across the whole-ass country, and i didn’t want to do that to her

but i don’t think it was a bad year.  not really.

it was my first full year living in the portland metro area.  which, don’t get me wrong, deserves some of the Cringe Hippie Liberal Anarchist Moron reputation it gets.  but it meant living in a city full of queer people and openly trans-friendly businesses.  it meant having enough healthcare providers near me that i could actively seek out ones who could treat my complex mental and physical health issues without some of the biases i’m used to.  it meant that i found an adequate psychiatrist within 10 minutes of me, an adequate primary care doctor within 20.

i used to live in rural new hampshire.  i drove 70 minutes to see my psychiatrist.  i never found a primary care doctor for physical health issues.  i would have had to go to boston, and i don’t like driving in downtown boston.  (masshole reputations are real and boston’s city planning is hell on earth.)

i also had the very strange experience of being taken seriously by every doctor i interacted with.  i am not used to this.  without getting too deep into it, i have been pretty badly scarred by experiences with having my autonomy violated because of my status as a psychotic individual, even though my fears were not psychosis-related.  also less scarring but equally off-putting experiences with being a perceived-as-woman individual whose pain was shrugged off by men as, like, normal hysterical woman agonies.  or whatever.

so, i had a leg deformity.  and doctors took me seriously.  because it was a visible, inexplicable symptom.  and because a lot of them looked at it and thought, oh fuck, this girl is dying.

(i could still be dying, i guess.  just a lot slower than they worried i was.  i’m not about to keel over from a blood clot or from my rotting bones decaying into my bloodstream.)

this has gone a long way toward alleviating my intrinsic fear of doctors.  being SICK is scary, sure, but it’s odd to be able to (cautiously) expect that doctors will try to help me instead of hurt me.

it was also my first full year living in an apartment of my own, with the family i chose.  my first full year of having my own space that i built.  my first full year of being independent, aside from the times i wasn’t.  my first full year of interacting exclusively with people who make me feel happy and loved instead of people who drain me.  and i felt better, mentally, than i have in a long time.

which is reflected in my creative work.  this was my most creative year in... ever, i think?  even though i was so sick and slept through so much of it.  even though the pandemic kept me from seeking out inspirational experiences.  i made a lot of fandom friends & got closer to friends i met last year.  i got a lot more confident in writing what i wanted to and talking about what i wanted to and not worrying about pleasing anyone but myself.

i published over 150k words of fanfic.  the vast majority of it was exploring feelings about chronic illness.  i outlined an original fiction project from beginning to end, added about 30k words to it.  i started fucking around with digital art a bit, although i have nothing even Remotely worth showing people.  i gained something like 900 tumblr followers from a combination of shitposting and earnestly talking about my feelings re: chronic illness, mental health, fictional meta.  i gave some ppl life advice that i guess was helpful.  apparently i inspired some people to survive the year, which is very weird to think about, but also very nice.

so, uh.  that’s my year i guess.  should be bad, but it wasn’t.  dunno how to conclude this so i will simply say:  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

wittwe muwues

jgriohagorhbiorghfvhgifvoghf ano really tho this is a gonna be a rambling weird gender shit post i just wanted to have a stupid name ghriohaguohguovhoge ok under the cut if you wanna read if not just move along bye lol

ok disclaimer on gender swap/genderbends, stuff like that

personally i am the person on the right of this post that doesn’t mind rule 63 of the internet its a good post that explains how some ppl may be ok with this trope and some are not

also more nuanced post explaining how genderswap/genderbends can be transphobic if not done well, etc.

anyways!

ive realized that in hindsight maybe i shouldve realized that i was not cis sooner bc i was always drawn to female/afab characters that crossdressed or hid their gender such as:

haruhi from ouran

mulan

haru from aoharu x kikanjuu that really edgy anime about some japanese ppl who have local bb gun tournaments in the woods, etc.

jackie faber, a girl who for various reasons disguises herself as a boy and sneaks onto a british navy ship

also altho it was minor and she wasn’t doing it in real life, moriko morioka from mmo junkie played her mmo with a male avatar

also not cross dressing or anything, but i was very interested by gender bends of characters and especially love the fiona and cake episodes of adventure time

alex dragalia lost (she doesn’t hide her gender or crossdress or anything, but she is very androgynous and i love her)

i guess that, much like how i never referred to myself with feminine terms or with she/her pronouns when thinking of myself, on some subconsciousness level,  related to/with or wanted to be like them in the way that they were able to physically pass as male or be at least gender ambiguous. in hindsight, i probably was experiencing some major gender envy or something.

anywyas uwuwuuwuwuwuwu i wish that shapeshifting or devil fruit powers like iva’s (instant magical hrt via control of hormones) were real so i (and all other trans/gnc ppl can just instantly get the types of bodies that we want and can just change them any time or day and stuff like uuu that’d be so cool

maybe thats also why sci-fi things like altered carbon and ghost in the shell also appeal to me. like. if you have enough money, just. make your own android body and put your brain in it. discard your former useless flesh prison.

anyways ill probs make some meme with more recent characters that are like. gender envy. to me lol. more recently its just. like. androgynous boys. lol. like. mascula, summer norwin, vice, and delphi from dragalia lost. albedo from genshin. just. short king representation. love to see it lol.

(ironically, despite being a short person irl and i guess wanting to look like a short androgynous monarch of some kind, my ffxiv avatar is just. tall. tall man. tall lizard au ra manly man. fjrhiaoghreogiheriogheiohfg lol i couldve picked an average or slightly smaller than average cat man avatar but no. i want to be tall. playing ffxiv and having basically all the other scions look up to me in cutscenes bc they’re all not male au ra and im literally the physically tallest person in the room (other than urianger ig lol) gives me some small joy in my heart daily lololol)

Would you be willing to share how you might rewrite Yukizome, Sakakura, and Munakata to make them likable characters (if not ppl Bc there’s a big difference)???

ahhhhhhh this ask got me so stupidly excited that I was like wavin my hands around. I think about how to rewrite their characters OFTEN. very often. I’m gonna go with likeable character over likeable people because I think they work better where they’re actually not that likeable people. 

The one I think about the MOST is Munakata. He was SUCH wasted potential and I partially blame the medium for that (a single season anime is too constrained for future, it needed more time and care to be a proper story). But Munakata is actually so close to being a compelling character but they made some MAJOR mistakes with him. This ended up getting really long and more like a 3 page ADHD ramble essay. SO IM VERY SORRY to anyone who cannot read this but TYTYTY if you did because these ideas make me very happy! Oh it’s only about Munakata btw because of how long it got

The thing about Munakata is that he is designed to be a foil to Naegi. In fact a majority of dr3 future FOCUSES on this foil dynamic. It is Naegi’s hope vs Munakata’s hope. The World’s hope vs The FF’s hope. And more importantly it is True Hope vs Corrupted Hope.

This is a fantastic concept...so why didn’t it work in canon? I think that the biggest most glaring issue with Munakata’s hope is his logic. Munakata is meant to be a logical man, although with corrupted morals that lead him astray. Yet in canon his logic is laughably infallible. For example as a major figure in the FF and someone who wants to spread hope....why would he tell Naegi to kill himself? More importantly why does he continue to try and slaughter Naegi? The issue here isn’t from the fact that he wants him dead but from the fact that he is under the IMPRESSION that this entire game is being broadcast to the world.

Think about this for a second. In Munakata’s eyes he is going to kill the Ultimate Hope, an international symbol of a better life, live on TV. He doesn’t just want to kill the Ultimate Hope..he wants to do it BRUTALLY as a MAJOR FIGURE OF THE FF. IMO this should have happened later on as the game furthers the emotional turmoil in Munakata’s head and he eventually snaps and gives in to the desire to kill Naegi despite the fact that this is live. And then there should be CONSEQUENCES for that. I wanted so badly a realization where Munakata realizes that he is hurting the Ultimate Hope in front of what he believes is the entire world. 

Another issue with Munakata’s logic is saying things such as...implying that the HPA KG was...just a game. I mean...people DIED. it's not hard to see how wrong that logic is. you can't say “this is the real world now” when what Naegi experienced WAS the real world. I think that this could be fixed through a bit of world building. DR3 Future is rather isolated from its world. We don’t really know much about the world and its dynamics. I think it would make perfect sense if the general public viewed the HPA KG as a tv show, they got numb to the sight and even those untouched by despair had a hard time connecting that these are REAL people suffering. With this previously established Munakata expressing that the KG was not real would make a lot more sense and play into his corrupted idea of hope. 

There is also Munakata’s connection to his other friends. Now I’ve talked about this before but the game was clearly designed to BREAK Munakata and Naegi. This way the FF would die, both the FF and World’s hope would be broken, and upon seeing this Mitarai would have no choice but to deploy his own forced hope. So it makes perfect sense that Yukizome’s death would break him (in fact if she hadn’t died in that way, her NG code was designed to be Munakata’s fault). But something about it felt...superficial. Again I think this is the mediums fault but it almost feels as though Munakata just forgets about Yukizome until later. I think they should spend more time establishing his pain and what he has lost and why this pushes him to kill. In his eyes if she can die then nothing else matters. It should be THE breaking point, not the first push. I do like the betrayal he feels towards realizing she had despair but it needed more time to fester. 

And his relationship with Sakakura also felt weak. In all honesty it was hard for me to feel as though they were ever friends. Sakakura is written as though he just follows Munakata like a loyal dog and Munakata just orders him around. Establish their relationship more! Why are they such good friends? Why is Sakakura important to him? And more importantly why did Munakata decide to cruelly gut Sakakura knowing he was about to confess? This is because he believed that Sakaura was despair and that his confession was more manipulation, but they didn’t show this well at ALL. Munakata just comes across as a major a-sshole who does not care. I also personally found it distasteful that when changing his heart Munakata only seemed to cry for Yukizome. I understand that was his love interest but Yukizome at the end of the day killed herself. Sakakura however was an unnecessary betrayal he took into his own hands AS HE HIMSELF KILLED HIM. He should have more guilt over that! Not just in that moment where he runs to Sakakura, but ahead of time as well! Maybe even DURING his rampage they could have shown him having moments of guilt but he is so absorbed in the idea that all despairs have to die that he doesn’t even realize he has become despair in the name of hope.

A BIG weakness on Munakata’s part comes with interacting with other characters. He is a man who should know how to take charge, lead, and doesn't know what to do when things are getting too crazy even though he THINKS he does. Munakata is heavily flawed, OBVIOUSLY flawed, but many of the interactions with him are as tho his rampage isnt a big deal. There should be reasons for this! Why do people trust Munakatas guidance so much? I dont know! All ive seen from him is that hes insane! Maybe even pieces where around others hes a lot nicer so you can understand why they follow him, even though hes ready to gut Naegi alive with a flaming katana. His interactions with others feel like the writers just wanted to see the next big evil thing they could think of, but for Munakata’s character this doesn't make sense because he was appointed a high status in the foundation for a reason. Maybe even have people say they disagree with some of his methods but at the end of the day he gets the job done!

There is another major missed opportunity here and it's why Muanakata wants Naegi dead so badly in the first place. The remnants. Hiding terrorists in the apocalypse is a PERFECTLY valid reason to want someone dead and think they're a bad guy! But I think since Naegis initial arrest was already so hostile and violent we get the sense that the FF is simply just...crazy. 

And let’s think about what Munakata WANTS from Naegi. He does not just want Naegi dead he wants something worse. He wants Naegi to suffer first. He thinks that Naegi doesnt understand his own personal pain. He thinks that because Naegi protected the remnants he must also not care about the suffering the remnants caused. He wants Naegi to feel despair and then die. This is important to his corrupted hope. He thinks the suffering must be shared in order to understand who must die, but he is creating a cycle of pain. Tie this back to the broadcasting issue. He wants Naegi to break for everyone to see. I think..and this is just a concept..I think it would have been a great idea for Munkata to force Naegi to watch the despair video so that he has no choice but to understand. 

AND themes are majorly important to Danganronpa. And I don’t think its a stretch to say that there are parallels between Munakata and Naegi. In fact I would say that there are aspects of the og trio in this new trio. I think it would have been really cool if they showed how our favorite trio could have ended up if they had been corrupted as well. But the parrellels dont stick strongly. I think it would have been cool to show a past where Munakata’s idealism lies more strongly than Naegis. As the student council president there was a time where he himself had to use his words to solve problems. Perhaps he learned that sometimes his words made things worse. Munakata does not have Naegi’s talent of emotional intelligence. He is a man of action over words. So he interprets this as WORDS being the problem rather than understanding he does not have these skills. Especially when the apocalypse breaks out, it becomes all action over words. So he sees Naegi who is all talk as a genuine threat who will let everyone die through his “weak ineffective” idea of hope. 

Another parallel could be drawn from the fact that they both have hope based careers. Their job is too keep things hopeful. Maybe Naegi stays safe doing public broadcasted speeches, while Munakata is on the field weeding out despairs. This would cause Munakata to feel as though Naegi is doing no real work yet getting all the credit for being a savior.

Munakata constantly complains that Naegi does not know true pain. But he and we as an audience have followed Naegi through his entire process of trauma. We know he is in the wrong. But what do we as an audience know about Munakata’s suffering? We are shown almost nothing! There are some implications, but for how intense he is implications are not enough. We need to see his suffering. We should see how he has witnessed death. Yukizomes death is not nearly enough for this because he talks as though he has suffered for years. How can we as an audience understand that when we have never seen it? How can we understand Munakata when he is outright denying Naegi’s trauma that we KNOW existed with no proper justification for his reasoning?

I also believe that Munakata should have died. It actually upsets me a bit that he was PLANNED to die but didn't. He should have died protecting Naegi after all that suffering and relentless brutality he offered him. Munakata again is a man of action over word, and protecting Naegi with his last breath is the perfect way to show how in the end he changed. Especially when all he wanted initially was for Naegi to die. I find that much more satisfying than just…...walking off to who knows where.

So lets recap some changes. Munakata needs a proper display of his past traumas and his relationship with Sakakura and Yukizome. Munakata needs a proper display of his work relationships and the respect he has earned. Munakata needs to fall into corruption at a better pace, and have geniune reasons for his illogical attacks on Naegi. Munakata needs to care more for his friends. Munakata needs to deal with the turmoil of wanting to hurt Naegi while he believes the world is watching. Munakata needs to die for Naegi

This has gotten long...and I still have things to say. There is so much to make Munakata a good character. Future had a lot of potential and is amazing for a rewrite concept. As for Sakakura and Yukizome since this has gotten long feel free to ask for another round of this individually when asks are open again! If you read all of this somehow….TYSM

ty for answering! and something that all of that discourse brought up for me was my whole inner debate on whether it's appropriate to create and consume real person fiction. i enjoy reading larry fic but some time ago, i remember questioning whether i should bc i came across some ppl (just tumblr users in general, not particularly 1d fans) saying that rpf is invasive. so like where is the line drawn? if louis is uncomfortable being depicted that way on a show, does he feel the same w fanfic/art?

ive always been a firm believer in keeping fan lit and fandom discussion in the fandom space. it’s never meant to crossover, and if you are a celebrity of any kind who decides to cross that line and look into fandom space on your own— you should be prepared for what’s there. i’m not at all talking about louis here, i’m talking about others who venture into this sector and then want to make public declarations about it. fandom spaces are not.... meant for celebrities. it’s never meant for celebrities. it’s a place for fans to culminate together to express adoration and create art over something/someone that inspires their creativity so strongly. those who have critique over rpf are ignorant to how fandom dynamics work and are only looking at the surface of what it really means in regards to that environment.

there’s a difference between fanfiction and fan literature, and that’s why it upsets me when there’s still depictions in 2019-2020 of the basis of fanfiction online that is such a very close-minded display of what it really can be. fan literature is more than what the generic perception of fanfiction is. fan literature, which is more prevalent in this fandom space than i’ve ever seen, are wonderful outlets of creativity and innovation not only for fans but for pop culture as a whole. it’s changed the very way people use storytelling, and it pushes inclusivity and representation farther than normal mainstream lit ever has. fan literature is world-building on it’s own. it is a literary world with characters/people that can be placed in any scenario and environment where everything, everyone, and every story is welcome to create. this is why rpf is important as it is built off the model of those that do not need a backstory or prior characterization. for example, so many HL writers create an entire universe around the two characters that are so complex and detailed that it is a unique literary story on its own with just those two people featured.

also, fan literature is one of the only opportunities where communities can come together for one common love and then recreate it for the writers and the readers to feel represented in any way deemed possible. like for this fandom, especially, within the LGBTQ+ community, real people can inspire them so strongly (like HL) that they create stories that are distinct from mainstream heteronormative love stories. it’s the ability to not just read the fiction but to believe in it and to see a piece of you inside of it. and if we were to dive deeper within LGBTQ+, one must look past the surface level display of what fanfiction is— which is the bad rep for smut and oversexualization (which is how i differ fanfiction from fan literature). there can be those aspects without basing stories around that exact topic. it’s the adaptation and ability for queer identities of all kinds to be fully explored and challenged regarding societal expectations in different universes, circumstances, and time periods.

fan literature has never been meant for those it’s being written about. no one writing it is hoping the person featured will see it. that’s not why it’s being written. its written for the fans. it’s written and read and adored because these fans create a world that’s meaningful to them and their identity. and fandom spaces should never be invaded just to pick apart things that are NOT meant for you to begin with.

shooting out ideas for supernatural!shinichi don’t mind me

i think ive settled on the idea that he is a fae, a changeling to be precise, placed in human society. and kaito is the replaced human raised (unknowingly) by fae. i mean kaito is just the DEFINITION of fae raised human

fae rules here are that far changelings are maleable, and grow simply according to their environments and persona (rather than their parents) so you can end up with different “types” entirely— hence how shinichi is some kind of ominous thing drawn to death, not something playful like the kurobas. if its not a changeling (which probs requires some ritual or. whatever) the fae is just the same “kind” as their parents

fae age normally in human realm, but have their own realm they can chill out in and not age. they can slow down aging with fae food called “ambrosia,” tho to humans it acts as poison/weakening thing (if eaten in real world) and acts as a thing that traps them if fed in the fae world (you know what they say about fae food). fae also just generally need it to live, tho in a pretty small amount (it esentially helps them process whatever “natural” feeding they do, which is normally abstract like on emotion or even in an action). the BO are after immortality/longevity. 3 guesses as to what their APTX was trying to be originally

concerned fae always offer shinichi ambrosia because theyre like “damn this boy is starving!!” bc hes never eaten any fae food and gotten that good magic!! this of course just ends up convincing shinichi its some underground drug, even tho him trying to trace the market has lead nowehere. he finds it odd that he encounters “dealers” frequently & obviously and yet nobody else knows anything about it.

in general thats how a lot of fae interactions go; fae will often allude to themselves and him being fae, shinichi will be confused, and then they often back off & say something about understanding that he’s maintaing cover or he fits in so well or whatever. it drives him CRAZY

anyways the APTX is some kind of fake ambrosia. it doesn’t kill him, just weakens his magic and sends him back to this childish state. Were he to have had strong magic (from, you know, eating) he’d probably be fine, and heck thats probably how the cure works for him (as in, haibara manages to get close enough to fae food to sorta work). because of this, haibara becoming a child is unrelated (more to do with the cell death stuff yadayada) and the cures don’t actually work on her...

as briefly mentioned in another post, she becomes fascinated in the genetics that would cause her and shinichi to have not died from the aptx (hoping it will help find a cure), and begins trying to find latent conditions regarding cell multiplication, stem cells, the like (aka isolating the subset of the population thats immune to the aptx). she finds evidence of anomolies in herself. she goes to shinichi to take dna & confirm. only to find his dna is uh. Its weird. She freaks, of course

from here it could spiral off in so many ways. does shinichi find someone whos like “haha very funny, you dont have to pretend to be human tho” and reveal him for what he is? does he accidentally stumble upon occult stuff working a case, triggering more weirdness? does haibara go digging through the more occult side of the BO and testing some of the “less scientific” stuff with shinichi, curious about his completely wack biology? all of that?

whatever way it goes, its really funny, because shinichi would be in denial for such a long time despite stacking evidence lmao, and ppl who knew about / are magic would just be slamming their heads into a brick repeatedly about it. and then there’d be the exhausting “ah i see ive lost it or im on drugs or something, might as well do anything” phase of nihilism of course

anyways id imagine this would eventually become a KID crossover as pandora (and general KID adventures) become very much in his wheelhouse given the blending. also i need the “hey we’re like kind of almost twins” realization and the “holy crap my parents arent people” realization from kaito (and the somewhat surprised “huh that means my parents ARE” from shinichi).