i've seen some posts about The Gender Of It All Or Lack Thereof in the mars house and started to respond but it felt dickish to disagree on someone else's post when their take on it is as equally #valid as mine is so, my feelings, briefly: i don't think the genderlessness was done perfectly by any stretch, but i also don't think that this was a book that was meant to Solve Gender, or even take steps towards it. i don't think we're supposed to assume that tharsis is better for "abolishing gender." the thing is that while i wouldn't call her books "romances" natasha pulley writes books that are primarily about relationships in difficult atmospheres - no one Solves Colonialism in the bedlam stacks, no one Solves Homophobia And Racism in watchmaker, and i didn't really go into the mars house expecting them to Solve Gender. gale being a senator does place more stress on the idea that these people, in particular, have the power to make changes and help people, so that may be why there's more frustration with the story than in bedlam stacks (where tbh merrick's involvement with the EIC bothered me a lot more than gale's political stances did).

again, i don't think it's wrong to not like how pulley dealt with gender politics; at the same time, it feels like a lot of people who did the bad reviews think that tharsis was supposed to be gender utopia, and i just. don't think we're supposed to assume that. there's so much else wrong with tharsis that i see no reason to think gender is the one thing they got Exactly Right. it's a "what if?" world, not a "here's how it should be" world - the people who built tharsis saw a deep wound throughout humanity's long past and said, "how do we deal with this?" and came up with an extreme solution for a society in extreme conditions. like.......they think it's weird and gross to have kids biologically, why should i think they have perfect ideas on anything???

tl;dr i read the Gender Abolishing as a flawed, wounded, but well-meaning and sometimes beneficial reaction to millennia of gender-based suffering. by no means do i think i was supposed to go "yeah, let's do that in the real world!" after reading the book, nor do i think it's a problem with the book itself that abolishing gender ended up not being as great at solving problems as they thought it would be. people will be people! they try to fix things and sometimes cause as many problems or more as the ones they fixed. but people try to fix things anyway.

It's been a really busy week so I'm just going to indulge myself and talk about exactly what I'd love to be doing rn with CEO!Bucky

When I imagine CEO scenarios though, I don't think of the reader as his assistant or an intern. Maybe the CEO and his comms director. Someone he considers an equal because I think that's a hell of a lot more sexy and still has a power imbalance 🥵

He knows you're incredibly capable. He knows you've got more drive than anyone else in the company. He knows you've spent years pushing yourself to get to where you are and you're determined to keep climbing.

But at the same time; it's nice to get a break from that too. Sometimes it's nice to just be tossed around and given orders. You get to switch your brain off and give in to whatever feels good.

And that's how you found your knees hitting the plush grey carpet of the CEO's office on a Friday afternoon.

"Good girl. So fucking pretty." Bucky's hand on your chin directs your face upwards. He's continuing the task you started a few minutes prior; stroking his own cock at a leisurely place and enjoying the sight of you in front of him with your blouse missing the top few buttons.

There's nothing else you'd rather be doing right now. There's no other release that lets you unwind like this. You don't have to think about anything other than the glossy bead of precum gathering on the tip of your boss' dick and the way that even the sight of it makes your mouth water.

His other hand is still holding your chin but you don't want to just watch when you can do so much more than that. You lean over, taking the head of his cock in your mouth, flicking your tongue over the very tip to lap up the precum you've been craving.

Your hand replaces his, jerking his length slowly with a measured pressure while your tongue swirls, keenly licking away any fresh evidence of his arousal.

"Fuck." He groans, melting into your eagerness. He's had a long week too. You know he needs this as much as you do but he's just as respectful as ever, conscious not to press himself into your waiting mouth.

"I bet you're wet already, aren't you? You look like such a sweetheart. No one would ever guess that you get off on sucking my cock. I bet everyone thinks you're so innocent but they don't get to feel the way you drip down your own thighs after you swallow my cum." You imagine that mouth of his has got him in plenty of trouble over the years but fuck, you love it. You swear he could probably get you off just by talking to you.

You hum happily, taking as much of his length into your mouth as you can manage, wincing slightly the first time his tip nudges the back of your throat. Your flat tongue rolls against the underside of his length, your hand cupping his balls and you feel his palm settle on the back of his head.

"You're so fucking keen." His blunt fingernails scratch gently against the nape of your neck and it feels like such a tender gesture. You get to be unashamed of how keen you are with him. There's no embarrassment or reservation. You don't have to hold yourself back to save face and it's refreshing to want someone this much.

You head bobs on his length, your lips forming a perfect tight ring and every now and again, you're rewarded with the sharpness of some fresh precum smeared onto your tongue.

"You should slow down, sweetheart. I don't want to finish yet." His voice is a little strained and it's beautiful. Now you're torn though. You don't want this to end but you're desperate to feel hot ropes of his cum splash over your waiting tongue and across your face.

Somewhat selfishly, you do as you're told. Your body reminds you of your own desperation and you don't want to ruin your chances of getting bent over that desk.

rick becomes super into multiversal travel after prime introduces him to it, very hyperfocused on it and the opportunities it presents (like how the gotron episode establishes that rick can get carried away unless someone reels him in). diane might initially be supportive of this but as rick's appearances around the house become more shoddy, she gets fed up and they separate. after a much more complex deterioration of their relationship obviously rick considers this a win at the time, since he's now free to dick around and do whatever he wants, essentially adopts prime's life philosophy and hangs around him. him and prime would eventually have some sort of falling out, which leaves rick extremely bitter and annoyed. he ends up spending most of his life alone, still living by his pop nihilistic ideals because he thinks this is what he wants. eventually he'd still end up squatting in prime's dimension and realizes that he actually Prefers this family life. his infatuation with prime could develop into resentment when he realizes that he essentially robbed rick of a comfortable, idealistic life

yippee :)

Been seein some rather cold takes about Daisy lately…

I’ve seen some people say that she has no personality outside of fanon, but that’s just not true. There is a very very common misconception among the fandom (at least that I’ve noticed) that if a character doesn’t appear in a “mainline” game, then they have no personality. But I’d argue that the spinoffs actually offer waaaaay more in terms of looking into character personalities. And no, I’m not talking about the RPGs ala M&L and Paper Mario as those are obviously full of personality (and Daisy isn’t in those). I’m talking about the Party, Kart, Tennis, and other sports games.

Yes, Daisy hasn’t appeared in any mainline game since her debut, but she’s been in nearly every sports game and her traits, stats, abilities, victory/loss animations, and various other tiny details add up to her personality. The fact that she’s nearly always yelling or just speaking really loud in general (noticeably more than any other character), the fact that she constantly feels a need to say her name and make herself known, how she loves flowers and considers even a small patch of flowers worth protecting, how she’s easily bored by tasks that don’t excite her and isn’t so reliable for them. She tends to jump around a lot, and spin and dance around when she’s excited! She’s apparently a rather fast runner and that is considered her specialty! These are all traits that are displayed in the spinoffs, and there’s probably soooo many more that I just can’t remember right now.

Now, I do think her tomboyish nature is probably fanon, as I don’t really remember seeing anything to show that she acts that way in the games. I think people probably think she’s tomboyish due to how loud and energetic she is. But hey, there’s plenty of fanon for just about any character from any fandom out there. And what’s so wrong with that? Isn’t the whole point of making fanworks to expand on the framework already provided by canon? If we want to stick to what’s actually “canon” then nearly everything the fandom has created would have to be tossed, because there really isn’t much to work with. Fanworks and fandoms thrive on what fans can create based on the canon work, not just sticking to it perfectly.

It’s fine if you think the “fanon” Daisy outshines the “canon” Daisy and you dislike that. But to say that she has no personality aside from fanon interpretations just tells me that you have a very narrow idea of what counts as “canon” in an already rather simplistic world. The Mario games are very simple and straightforward without much consistent lore that actually makes sense cohesively, but the characters are what keep everything tied together despite that. The characters are nearly always consistent, and that includes Daisy. Even when the setting is completely different and some random new villain shows up with some random new power source to steal or species to torment, our same well-known lovable characters will be the center of the story and that’s what makes it fun!

I’m sorry if you don’t believe the gods care about us why are you trying to be a faith leader.

WILL DOODLE FOR VIEWS!!!!!! ✏️

Please watch SekaKeto’s tiktoks!

① Dance (30 secs)

② animal heads attacking keito (50 secs)

And reply with what you want me to doodle :)

ah okay. I don't want to gatekeep but imo if you've never interacted with a piece of media you claim to be a fan of, are you even truly a fan? like "I appreciate the aesthetics/what it features but I haven't actually interacted with it" is very different from "I have read, listened to, watched, played, etc. something and like it"

as I said in my author's note for soap hole, I'm not a fan of cod. however I'm enjoying my time observing y'all. I am having so much fun watching what y'all say and do

no yeah exactly, anyone can obviously do what they want, but (to me!!) actually being IN a fandom means you have interacted with the source material. i don't claim, or expect anyone else, to have played/watched every single cod game (or if you want to use a different example you can look at star trek or supernaturel or idk comic books) but None of it is just wild to me.

like ofc i'm not against engaging with the resulting fanworks, i enjoy stuff from fandoms i'm not in all the time, but like you said, to me that's different from being part of it if you don't know anything abt what actually spawned those works

maybe some people will disagree, but i personally believe that to actually be an apologist/defender of a certain character you have to be able to hold them accountable when they fuck up

DMC Questions Anon here!

What characters do you headcanon on the Aromantic Spectrum?

Uhhhhh noone. I just think most of them are not looking for a relationship, or do not allow themselves to entertain the thought of engaging in one, during events in canon. That alone doesn't make them aromantic to me.

the half of it and the beauty of quiet movies and the quietness of falling in love and the deep meaningful quiet connections that can happen between people regardless of gender and sexuality

my boss was nice to me again i love working here this is horrible (i probably need to quit next year)

hgs brainrot has returned due to tbosas .. speaking of hgs here’s an ask abt the hgs au: if things were totally different, and Wilbur were to be a 12 victor, what do you think a possible mentor-tribute dynamic would look like between him & Niki? I feel like it would be similar to Snow & Lucy in the way that he’s just going out of his way to cheat n help her

anon u have in fact struck jackpot because this is a concept i was spinning some thoughts abt before bee mentioned avoxes and we went OOOOH at that!!! so yes i have considered rainduo as a mentor-tribute dynamic and would love to talk about that concept too :]

so for this concept i think wilbur and niki would be close friends throughout childhood from 12, and then in their teens wilbur is reaped and, well, no one has particularly high hopes (he's a writer and a musician at heart, not a fighter) but through sheer trickery and dumb luck, he makes it to the end of the games. wilbur pulled some pretty fucked up tricks to win - when you can't use brute force, you have to use your brain - and partly due to the trauma of the games, partly due to his shame and survivor's guilt, he sinks into the capitol and relishes a new life there as a socialite. to him, the old wilbur died in the games and the new one has taken his place - to niki, and to his other friends in 12, whatever the games did to him made him into every vapid heartless capitol victor there is.

or. niki has her doubts. they all saw how horrible the games were, but surely there is some part of him left, some part that's hurting, even if it's buried deep?

anyway.

like og spin of the au, niki is reaped and this sucks - this time she does expect wilbur as her mentor on the train, and she expects some kind of warm welcome (maybe even an apology for leaving them so suddenly and silently? an explanation?) but she gets jack shit. wilbur is jaded and cruel and unrecognisable and niki entirely hates it. this is the part where i REALLY WISH we got some time of those two beefing with each other directly in canon (or at least interactions while niki was So Mad at him) but it's okay we fly blind. niki feels abandoned, lonely, thrown off of her kilter - she expected an ally in this place, but she doesn't recognise the person wilbur has become. she doesn't recognise his shallowness (...much), his ruthless advice for the arena, the way he doesn't seem to care for anything. she's scared and now she's lonely and it pisses her off - their mentorship is fraught. here are some thoughts from discord on that:

i tend to think of niki as a bit naïve before l'manberg or even doomsday - i think this is an au where this streak would come out real strong, and niki is stubborn that she can get through the games without losing herself. stubborn that she can stop things, that she can protect people. i don't think wilbur is cold enough (or, really, can bear to say aloud) to say that her odds in the arena are slim enough as it is, but he definitely tells her that she's making enemies and that her odds of survival dwindle with the more trouble she causes.

beyond that... hm. niki's trust in wilbur is almost unshakeable until nov 16, even when she outright says she doesn't recognise him anymore. i think she'd reluctantly listen re: don't burn down any buildings, but she would grow bolder each day she had to stay in the capitol. she gets more honest in front of the cameras. she makes more friends in training, and not the ones wilbur recommends. she throws barbs at him every time he makes one of those callous, cold-hearted comments about other tributes and rankings and odds. and besides, she's going in the arena this time, not him. she needs to practice her bravery.

it's like... she hasn't given up on him. she thinks the old wilbur is in there somewhere. (she is wrong. that is not how trauma works.) but she won't hold her tongue just because she

for extra angst points could definitely play up the whole 'feeling abandoned' angle between them as niki goes into the arena - probably due to how fraught their friendship gets leading up to the games. niki wants to focus on them and their friendship, wilbur has stringently cut off (almost) everything from 12 and refuses to let her in; he tells her to behave for the cameras, she tells him she never will. i think the last point in that screenshot would also make for a super tasty argument where niki feels wilbur has gone astray, that he's abandoned 12, and that he'll probably do nothing but sit on his ass and watch her die and he can't even bring himself to care about her anymore, can he? just more fodder for the arena. and honestly, i think wilbur would passively agree with most of that - he values niki's opinion, after all, even now, and if she says he's rapidly descending into a lost cause then she must be right. and it's niki, so she will be fine, and he goes to his bedroom that night and tries to pretend he is sleeping perfectly fine instead of feeling paralysed with fear.

okay now onto the games - YES HE SO WOULD. or at least i think he would go out of his way to help. as for cheating - he's a recent victor for 12 and i think he would value tommy (no doubt a link to him... i think they'd be in touch in this au also) too much to risk the punishment falling onto him as well. i get the vibes this is a games closer to 74th than 10th, so there are far fewer opportunities to cheat and the consequences of getting caught are higher. but schmoozing up sponsors? making stupid ass radio interviews or whatever to talk up niki's odds? sharing anecdotes from their childhood - some real, some entirely fabricated - across capitol airwaves to stoke their sympathy? 100%. with less to lose in this au, i think niki would be far less inclined to play nice for the cameras - i hope you starve, she spits at one of them, and wilbur appears on a talkshow two days later as she scrambles for survival in the arena to talk up how she always saved loaves from the bakery for the poorest mothers and children in 12. he borrows and begs and swindles to the point where it feels like cheating. but hey, this new wilbur is capitol-branded. he knows how to play the game.

if anything he probably sinks into the game a little too much. self-preservation is not his forte. probably wracks up a few heavy debts and favours to owe, but those are not priority until niki is out of the arena, alive. as long as she wins, and as long as the family he has isn't in danger, he will manage. wow it would suck if at some point those two goals became impossible to co-achieve. anyway

i kind of see niki's victory in the arena being similar to the one in the main au - if only because planning out an entire games is hard for meee >-< . she walks in bolder and braver for sure, and with a less strategic pick of allies, but they all get picked off and she spends a few weeks so terrified she can barely sleep and then she ruptures some fuel line and sets the arena alight with a fire that burns brighter and more ravenously than it should. but she wins, and she's airlifted out of a filthy, muddy creek she had resigned herself to die in, and wilbur barges his way through as many peacekeepers so that he can actually see her with her burnt skin and hair and unfocused eyes and trust that what was on the screens wasn't a fluke, and that they made it. and then it's just a matter of surviving the after.

i'm sure there are some other random quirks or tidbits i can think of re: this take on a c!rainduo hunger games au but these are my base thoughts!!

Just saw a post quoting that HBO douchebag on how they're trying to figure out if it makes sense to renew for s3 based on bullshit metrics.

How about you crunch the data on how many people dropped their Max or Binge subscriptions the same day s2 finished fucking airing.

You're not even a professional artist or modder. It doesn't matter if people love your art freelancers aren't as valuable in the community.

Forgot to answer this one as response to you saying I dont make enough money to matter- Listen Never Once did I say I was a professional at ANYTHING regarding art or modding. Ive done a couple big projects that I was paid for, and Ive joined organized events, but professionals actually go to school for this shit and get degrees. In fact I regularly mention how I'm literally just doing whatever the fuck and hoping it works. Like I could not make that any more obvious in any post I have ever made, I am literally always saying 'I'm just doing shit until it works, I have no idea, I'm just doing whatever,'

And look anon. This fucking community wouldn't exist without freelancers and hobby artists and modders. Fandom as a WHOLE wouldn't exist at all if it weren't for us. Go ahead lets just all get rid of freelancers and ppl who do this for enjoyment and see how fast everything disappears

i really do think that the most interesting way for rouxls to become a serious character is for him to keep his incompetence. like. as in he may have weird ass powers but he doesn't really know how to fully use them or even be fully aware of their full extent. i just CANNOT see him as someone with some huge overarching plan- he couldn't even be assed to come up with a real plan with what would happen after he played the houses game against ralsei and kris. he's just. not some sort of mastermind. at least, if he by some miracle he does turn out to actually be, i'll honestly be really disappointed because i feel like this angle is just so much more interesting. hell, you could even tie that in to his desire to serve- just because he may not know how to take advantage of those powers doesn't mean someone else won't, and i feel like the idea of him following along with someone else's plan fits a lot better with what we know about his character. i just really dislike the idea of "rouxls is the knight/gaster/deltarune version of sans" because it all just feels like it's trying to twist his character into some genius with a larger plan when i really just. love his character for being a fucking idiot. yknow.