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neonnoir-ao3 · 3 years

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Some Words of Comfort.

Recently, I’ve seen a lot of people (especially those who have read spoilers/are actively searching for leaked content) lament about their future reactions to the deaths of our beloved characters in-game.

We all knew this was inevitable, and that them living was not an option for the plot of the game, but the time has finally come to face it head-on.

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I understand that someone outside this community might be like “it’s just a game”, but I know it’s way more than that to many: the concept of a female villain that, to many, can be seen as sympathizable and even endearing, is a bit of a new concept— especially on such a large scale as this instance.

In addition, Lady Dimitrescu and her daughters have become a bit of a comfort item for some (with an emphasis on sapphics/wlw, from what I’ve seen personally) in the form of a large, protective, and caring hypothetical partner, or even just a maternal character one can appreciate simply because of her love for her children. Regardless, most of us are here due to some desire for comfort.

Take my own story with this community, for example:

(tws for death, covid, suicide, and general medical emergencies)

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Frankly, 2020 and the beginning of 2021 have ruined me. I lost two men who were the only two positive father figures I’ve ever had. The last of the two tested positive for covid and deteriorated within days, to the point where less than a week after testing positive, my family was making the choice to pull the plug. This all occurred days before Christmas and my birthday. On the first day of the spring semester, having not had the time to properly mourn my grandfather, my mother is in the ER for multiple days with an internal infection that doctors said likely would have turned septic if she had waited to come in any longer. This led to three surgeries throughout the next few months. (Oh, and one of my relatives quite literally dropped dead on that first day of class, too). I am also estranged from one of my parents, and they have been trying to contact my family: they have multiple untreated mental illnesses (severe NPD, bipolar, and more) and they are extremely aggressive in that state of mind and they are agitated extremely easily. That only brings more stress, along with resurfacing trauma and related emotions. Every moment of every day has been a struggle. So much so that I failed half of my classes voluntarily simply because I couldn't do them anymore.

To be perfectly honest with you, I didn’t expect to be here right now. I expected that the pain of simply moving forward would have finally overridden my fears of death and that I would have already ended my suffering by now.

Then, in late January, I saw something trending on Twitter. About a new female villain in an upcoming horror game. And it went from there.

As cheesy as it sounds, this fandom and its content seriously saved my life. In the darkest of days, I’ve come to this tag for comfort. The oddest way I found said comfort was through those who were attracted to Alcina aesthetically. I have extremely long-term trauma related to being bullied and being the victim of a hybrid catfishing/'Oreo Game' on early social media by peers in middle school to the point where I do not think of myself as being able to be loved, let alone being worthy of it. Finding this community not only provided a great form of escapism (and opened a door into a fantasy world where I could imagine my own person vampire milf gf), but also gained a little bit of self-esteem (as many of you know, I share a lot of visual qualities with Alcina. -yes, I'm still kinda freaked out about it-) via seeing people where features/attributes like mine were actively praised and desired rather than insulted and pushed away like they have been until now.

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(okay sorry that kinda turned into a trauma dump but I needed to emphasize the fact that this community has seriously helped me during a really dark point in my life, and I know I can't be the only one with that sort of experience)

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What I’m trying to get across here is that, like many others, this community and its content have been comforting and therapeutic, and it really is more than just a game to us. It’s entertaining and even a form of escapism in these extremely trying times. We all have some degree of PTSD from surviving a literal mass plague— and this is something we're using as a method of coping. a distraction. a coping mechanism.

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With that being said, here are some ways to hopefully assist in lessening the emotional stress:

(please note that I am not a mental health professional and these may not be healthy coping mechanisms for everyone.)

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Understand that it’s just a game.

I know, this sounds completely counterintuitive, but it’s more or less about keeping your level of immersion down. Personally, I can’t do scary shit in general: I have to listen to music on low volume while watching dark ARG vids at night or when I’m alone because I get too into it, and then my paranoia kicks in. Sometimes just pausing for a moment and grounding yourself/reminding yourself that this is a video game: a jumble of code and 3D rendering that doesn’t have to affect your views/headcanons if you don’t want it to. Did your favorite character just get slaughtered? Nope, that 3D rendering of them just got un-alived, that’s all.

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Ignorance is Bliss/We are the Captain Now

Simple: Capcom can’t even pronounce Dimitrescu right, or even acknowledge the way it’s correctly said in Romanian culture itself. How can you trust them to give you a perfect canon? That’s the thing: with that logic, you can’t. What they say is true means little (if anything, for that matter) to your headcanons and preexisting ideas of the Dimitrescus. In short: fuck ‘em.

I’m currently seeking a double major in pop culture, and one of the cool things I’ve learned so far is affirmational vs transformational fandom. Affirmational is where official canon is seen as the law of the land, and followed to a T. Transformational is seen as much more inviting for audiences, allowing them to bend canon as they wish to fit their own creations. This fandom is obviously transformational, so take that game canon, rip it up, and get back to whatever you were doing.

Capcom’s canon is not the end-all, be-all. Far from it, actually.

Want to still acknowledge canon? Godmod your way out of it.

Character A died? It’d be a shame if they emerged from the rubble they 'died in' a few hours later, very beaten but alive nonetheless... how awful would it be if they sulked away, nursed their wounds, and continued to live... (/s)

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Ignore it completely.

Remember: give it time. Once the game drops, there w be a wave of grief, but eventually, we as a community will recover, and get back to business as usual. Think about it like the in any way. Stay with the version in your head that makes you happy.

Get Creative!

If you're into creating fanart, writing fics, or even just posting a list of headcanons, take some advice from the late Carrie Fisher: "Take your broken heart, and make it into art". Make the fluff oneshot of your dreams! Draw the fanart you've been wanting to! dump lighthearted headcanons into the tags! Not only will it cheer you up, but sharing it with the community will spread the love!

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I know a lot of people are struggling with this emotionally (especially with the pandemic making entertainment like this even more important sources of escapism and coping mechanisms) and I hope that, at the very least, I was able to help comfort one person who reads this.

Remember: give it time. Once the game drops, there will be a wave of grief, but eventually, we as a community will recover, and get back to business as usual. Think about it like the flowers that bloom after major wildfires: after a period of loss, some beautiful can still come of it.

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#tall vampire lady #lady alcina #lady dimitrescu #daniela dimitrescu #castle dimitrescu #alcina dimitrescu #dimitrescu daughters #dimitrescu family #dimitrescu sisters #cassandra dimitrescu #countess dimitrescu #house dimitrescu #resident evil #re: village #resident evil village #resident evil: village

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xb-squaredx · 3 years

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Rise of the V-Tuber

As a platform, YouTube has gone through a variety of “eras,” wherein a particular trend catches on and defines the website for some time. In the early days, you had funny cat videos, then Let’s Plays of video games became rather popular, and now we seem to be deeply entrenched into a new era that has exploded in popularity as of late. If you’ve frequented the website at all in the past few months, it is almost inescapable. Cutesy, anime-styled avatars that play games, sing, chat with viewers, or even cook! What does it all mean? Where did they come from? Are they here to stay? Most importantly, how does one crawl out of the rabbit hole once they fall into it? All that and more will be revealed as we delve deep into the wacky, wholesome and sometimes worrying world of V-Tubers. (photo credit YuuGiJoou. Check her out on YouTube, Twitter or Twitch!)

THE ORIGIN

To begin properly, let’s define the subject. A “V-Tuber” is a “Virtual YouTuber,” someone who streams on YouTube (or any other streaming platform) using a digital avatar as a proxy. The streamer in question typically uses face-tracking software so that the avatar can emote (or at least attempt to emote) to match their own reactions as they provide entertainment for their audience. While it may seem as if V-Tubers are rather new, in doing research on the topic, you’d be surprised how far back things go.

For starters, the concept of a virtual celebrity has been around for a while, with one of the most notable efforts being Hatsune Miku, a Vocaloid voicebank program. Hatsune Miku is every bit as famous and beloved as a flesh-and-blood singer or entertainer despite being nothing but voice synthesizer software. Vocaloid got its start back in 2000, eventually being reworked into a commercial product in 2004, though it wasn’t until the programs started receiving anthropomorphic character designs that it took off, with Hatsune Miku’s own debut in 2007, and the rest is history.

Many will consider “Virtual Idol” Kizuna Ai as the true pioneer of what we call a V-Tuber today, making her debut in 2016, however one could make an argument that Ami Yamato, a 3D-animated vlogging channel debuting in 2013, beat her to the punch. Honorable mention of course goes to Any Malu, a Brazilian animated YouTube vlogger who debuted in 2015 and eventually gained her own show on Cartoon Network Brazil. While Ai may not be the first, she is undoubtedly considered to be the codifier that many later V-Tubers would follow. Ai’s entire shtick was being an AI program that wanted to connect with humans, playing games, singing or interacting with fans. Following her explosive popularity, it was clear that other companies would follow the model established by Ai, with their own spins on it of course.

Nijisanji, established in 2018, proved that this trend could be incredibly profitable, becoming trailblazers in their own right as they established various “branches” of their company in several countries with their own unique performers that could cater to a wider range of viewers. As of this writing, Nijisanji employs over 164 “Virtual Livers,” most of which come from their Japan branch, alongside their Korean, Chinese, Indian and Indonesian branches. Similarly, there is the Hololive corporation, which saw substantial growth throughout 2020 in particular. Established in 2016 originally as Cover Corporation, at first Hololive was the name of an app meant for use in 3D motion capture, though following Nijisanji’s success, Hololive was rebranded as a V-Tuber competitor and also features a variety of colorful characters spread across many different main branches. There is of course the Japanese branch, as well as Hololive Indonesia, the relatively new (and highly successful) Hololive English, a defunct Chinese branch and an all-male Holostar branch in Japan.

Other, smaller V-Tuber groups have sprung up alongside the corporate powerhouses, such as VOMS Project, established in March of 2020, as an independent trio of streamers, and more recently at the tail-end of 2020 with V-Shojo, featuring a group of Western streamers (who ironically mostly stick to Twitch). Outside of this of course are the countless independent streamers who utilize avatars for one reason or another across many different platforms. Even prominent Twitch streamers seem to be getting in on the act, such as Pokimane, though that one has not come without some backlash. So consider that a rough history of how V-Tubers got started in Japan but how did they gain a more global fanbase? Well, in a word…”memes.”

GOING INTERNATIONAL

I won’t deny there had to be at least SOME overseas fans who enjoyed watching V-Tubers before they became more well-known, but for many Western fans their introductions to V-Tubers in general typically came from viral videos taken from various streams that spread like wildfire, eventually getting people curious enough to check them out. For Kizuna Ai, her playthrough of Resident Evil 7 gained notoriety for her mimicking the cursing of the English-speaking player character, and for Hololive, arguably the first real Western breakthrough for the company came from a now infamous moment from Sakura Miko’s stream of Grand Theft Auto 5.

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Also from Hololive, Inugami Korone in particular had a variety of memes spread about her due to playthroughs from various games that even got acknowledged by the developers themselves. Her playthrough of DOOM 2016 resulted in a short-lived Easter egg implanted into DOOM Eternal, and her video on Banjo-Kazooie (and the animated Eekum Bokum fan video that spawned from that) got the attention of Rare, Xbox and even Grant Kirkhope, the composer for the original game.

Honestly, the real unsung heroes of sorts for V-Tuber popularity might just come from foreign fans that would clip and translate various moments from streams that helped to build an international audience. There are dozens of Twitter handles and YouTube channels that specialize in spreading these clips around and if you factor in the YouTube algorithm, once you see one video your feed will be flooded with similar videos. It is no surprise fans call getting into the fandom “falling into the rabbit hole.” When you look at the more popular members of Hololive, often the ones with various viral clips have the higher subscription counts. In the case of Aki Rosenthal, one of the older members, her sub count exploded after a fan translated a section from a then-recent stream in which she talked candidly about her less-than-stellar growth as well as the difficulties of standing out in general. While at one point having the lowest amount of subscribers (well below 200,000), in the months since that video her sub count has more than doubled going past 400,000. Sometimes the talent needs a little push.

Now, within Hololive itself, I think Kiryu Coco is also partially responsible for expanding the fanbase, being one of the few employed talents with the ability to speak English (likely a native speaker), she gained a large international fanbase as she would work to translate what she or other members were talking about on the fly, and later on established an ongoing series where she would directly engage with fans over websites like Reddit and “rate” the various memes they would send in. Coco also pushed for establishing what would become Hololive English, which has proven to be a gigantic success, each member of that branch blowing past more established talent’s subscriber counts, with Gawr Gura becoming the first Hololive V-Tuber to pass one million subscribers and just recently passed the two million mark. So yeah, V-Tubers are a big deal now but…what is about them that makes people want to watch them in the first place?

THE APPEAL

So, right off the bat, if we’re going to ask why someone would want to watch a V-Tuber I think it’s fair to ask that of virtually ANY internet personality. The reason why someone would watch Game Grumps or Pokimane or Jojo Siwa or whoever else is the same reason they’d watch Kizuna Ai or Inugami Korone or Ironmouse: they’re entertaining. I guess that seems like a bit of a cop-out answer, right? There MUST be a reason why V-Tubers have blown up in popularity over the last few years, so are there things that make these particular Internet entertainers stand out from the crowd?

Undoubtedly, the fact that these streamers are playing a character is a deviation from the norm, though the dedication to staying “in character” seems to vary from person to person, and over time many V-Tubers tend to open up and are far more genuine. At any rate, even the best actor out there can’t possibly make up various daily happenings or childhood stories for their characters on the fly, day after day, stream after stream. Still, I’d imagine the decision to use a proxy as opposed to their real self can be liberating, a mask they can wear to speak more freely or a role they can play up for entertainment. For the most part, I think the persona aspect is mostly harmless fun that makes the streamer seem more distinct; ask yourself which is more eye-catching: some normal human playing a game and occasionally cracking a joke, or a one-eyed pirate girl discussing her raunchy past? Or maybe you’d rather watch the grim reaper practice her raps? Even talent that don’t really play up their character much still often have interesting character designs; we have princesses, dragons, devils, robots and more. A little something for everyone!

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Speaking a bit more personally, I find it interesting to watch streamers from an entirely different culture and how they interact with fans or engage with games. I find it funny when Inugami Korone or Sakura Miko plays more Western-oriented games like the DOOM series or Grand Theft Auto V respectively. Often times they’re blown away by the culture clash, or they view these games through a different lens since it’s so different from what they’re used to. In particular, those two are just genuine goofballs that are funny all on their own. More chat-focused streams are an interesting view into daily life in Japan, such as the stories Houshou Marine tells, though obviously a given V-Tuber’s viewpoint isn’t a metric you can apply to the whole country, but she’s still interesting to listen to. Takanashi Kiara is also notable for her multilingual skills, which has helped her bridge the gap a bit more between the various Hololive members through her Holotalk segments where she interviews other V-Tubers. Outside of Hololive, Amano Pikamee from VOMS Project is just a bundle of energy that’s fun to watch as she rages in Super Mario 64 or Super Mario Sunshine. Her tea-kettle laugh is also just kinda charming. The V-Shojo group stands out for being super vulgar compared to the more corporate V-Tubers and while I don’t watch them all that much, there’s still some fun chaos to be had. Still though, I think there’s one big elephant in the room that would also help explain V-Tubers catching on at this specific point in time: the pandemic. Streaming is one of the few jobs not really affected by the pandemic, and with people stuck inside, they’re more likely to scroll through YouTube or Twitter and find a funny clip and then…well, you know… It’s one bright spot in an otherwise dark time…but I’d be lying if I said it was all sunshine and rainbows.

THE DARK UNDERBELLY

The overall idea behind V-Tubers, at least in Japan, seems to be an extension of Idol Culture…and uh…if you know anything about Idol Culture in Japan, it is all kinds of scummy. Exploitative, filled to the brim with harmful rules and regulations and largely catering to some vary unsavory “fans,” I’ll make it no mystery that I find it incredibly distasteful. Look no further than what happened to Minegishi Minami from the idol group AKB48. To keep a long story short, the obsession with “purity” and being this idealized Japanese beauty means idols are effectively locked into their work, unable to discuss or in many cases partake in romantic relationships, as that would make them less “desirable” to their audience. This unfortunately does at times extend to V-Tubers.

Take Tokoyami Towa, who was suspended for some time and forced to make an apology video for…having some male voices briefly heard over Discord during an Apex Legend stream. She even lost a lot of subscribers and support from Japanese fans following this, though once learning of this, Western fans flocked to her as a show of support. Hololive has also dealt with a variety of issues coming from Chinese fans; though that’s a particular hornet’s nest I don’t want to delve into here too much. To sum it up, fans can get obsessive and toxic, which can lead to the talent being harassed. It is for this reason, it is generally agreed upon by fans to not delve too deep into the personal lives of the V-Tubers, for fear of being doxxed and the illusion being broken. These kinds of issues certainly bring up some interesting questions regarding how talent should be treated moving forward.

Are these V-Tubers characters or just alternate sides of real people? Where does the fantasy end and reality begin? Ultimately, the lines are somewhat blurred. Talent certainly brings some of their own personality into the performance, but they are forced to remain anonymous and as can be seen in the case of Kizuna Ai, they are not always in control of the character they’ve been given. Kizuna Ai’s initial actress was for a time replaced, and “clones” of the character with different voices and personalities started to spring up, likely as an attempt to compete with the likes of Nijisanji and Hololive. In cases where V-Tubers retire from the industry, or “graduate” as some call it, all of their hard work cultivating a fanbase might end up being for nothing as they were forced behind a proxy that isn’t truly themselves and I imagine it can be hard to start over again from square one. Never mind the attempts to step out of the shadow of your older work. Man, Perfect Blue was downright prophetic at times, huh?

I don’t want to dwell on the negatives too much though. It’s worth noting for one thing that Nijisanji seems relatively lax regarding how their talent operates, whereas it seems Hololive is the standout for adhering to the idol ideal, though considering how some of the talent acts (in particular Kiryu Coco), one has to wonder if they’re softening their stances a bit. Many V-Tubers generally talk about the positive aspects of the industry and being given the opportunity to reach people from all over the world. Shortly after Ina’s debut in Hololive English, she was actually brought to tears when told her art streams convinced people to get into (or back into) the hobby, which had been one of her goals for becoming a V-Tuber in the first place. Ironmouse, now a member of V-Shojo, has an immune system disorder that keeps her bedridden and forced to stay inside, so the opportunities afforded by this particular type of streaming has allowed her to reach out to others and as per her own words, has changed her life for the better. While there are definitely “fans” that go too far, corporate practices that are outdated, or harmful and a slew of potential unfortunate implications, ultimately I think most people out there are just looking for quality entertainment, and these digital proxies give these entertainers an outlet to connect with fans in a way that they might not have otherwise.

CONCLUSION

V-Tubers are in a bit of a boom at the moment, though I can’t imagine it’ll last forever. We’re quickly approaching market saturation and after a point, people can only follow so many streamers at once. Hell, as I was editing this up, it seems as if prominent YouTuber Pewdiepie is about to step into the ring, so who knows what kind of shake-up that could bring. The bubble will undoubtedly burst and what becomes of V-Tubers then is still up in the air. Or who knows, maybe V-Tubers will endure and replace all entertainment and we’re just watching the beginning of a cyberpunk dystopia. Stranger things have happened! Considering the world is still reeling from the effects of the pandemic, that should largely have an impact on the popularity of V-Tubers for some time to come, though as we emerge into a “new normal” in the world, it’ll be interesting to see how these entertainers continue to evolve. Now, I suppose there is one question I never quite went over before now, isn’t there? How does one escape the V-Tuber rabbit hole? Well, I’m sorry to say but there is no escape.

Enjoy your new home!

-B

#xb-squaredx #blog #vtuber #v-tuber #hololive #nijisanji #VOMS project #korone #sakura miko #pikamee #kizuna ai #youtube #twitch #v-shojo #ironmouse #houshou marine #eekum bokum

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nutty1005 · 4 years

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Xiao Zhan: It’s Your Turn

Translator’s Note: This article comes from VogueMe Magazine 2020 Feb Issue.

Currently, the trend in the entertainment business is to get famous overnight, the statistics dictate everything – a drama, a variety show, a song… all of which could give birth to a super idol, fame, commercial value and opportunities that come along with it. In 2019, the drama “The Untamed”, adapted from an internet novel, became this window of opportunity. This is the story of a young man who received the opportunity. And like other idols created by their era, his fanbase grew immensely, radiating throughout the youth, his name etched in time. All of these simply points to this – it’s now Xiao Zhan’s turn.

The summer of 2015, Xiao Zhan had not yet realized that he was going to job switch from the design firm opened by his teacher. The teacher did not feel so as well – as Xiao Zhan left for the talent search variety show, he told him, “Go play, come back to work once you’ve been eliminated.”

The show was called “X-FIRE”, and positions itself as a large scaled youth talent development inspirational show. During broadcast, the description says “16 secretly trained youths painstakingly selected from a few thousand 16-24 year olds”. At that time, Xiao Zhan was 23 years old – nearing the upper age limit.

Xiao Zhan just wanted to “play around a bit”. He felt that he would be just touring for a round, and he would be back after a week. As the former class Cultural Committee Member in his university, Xiao Zhan loved singing, won quite a few inter-school cultural activities awards, but never trained in dance-singing. Xiao Zhan, who graduated in graphic design, learnt drawing since young, but never thought of becoming an artist, because “it is hard to survive as an artist, you still need to earn a living”. He was willing to lead a simple life and go to work everyday, with a direct and clear life plan – as a graphic designer, do his work well, then open his own firm.

The summer 4 years later, the name “Xiao Zhan” meant a lot of different things – a member of a pop group, the lead actor of one of the most popular drama, the owner of a Weibo account with more than 22million followers, or as what Chinese entertainment business puts it – a “top traffic”. The topics and imagery surrounding him includes – Xiao Zhan’s looks, Xiao Zhan’s design talent, Xiao Zhan’s professionalism, Xiao Zhan’s role as Wei Wuxian…

And like the other idols who broke out in this era, he has his own set of records – moderators of Bilibili (a video hosting site in China) nagged that his drama fans uploaded so much of his videos that they “almost see him 800 times a day”, Xiao Zhan was jokingly proclaimed as “The Man who caused the Bloodbath of Bilibili”; he became the cover person of a magazine, and the two mobile sales platform app broke down consecutively on the day of the sales; his popularity in 2020 only got higher – on 9 Jan, according to Tian Mao statistics (TN: Taobao eShopping Mall), the Portrait magazine, where he was the cover person, sold out 100,000 copies in 3 seconds, overall sales exceeding 13million Chinese yuan, a poster was spread all around the internet with the accompanying text “a fandom that brought paper media back from its grave” – this is the Xiao Zhan statistics.

But different from the breakout idols, Xiao Zhan did not encounter major controversies (TN: This was published early Feb), and his career did not seem to go through much fluctuations. He never thought that he would be at this point – “Sometimes you’re not ready, but life has already pushed you to ahead. What you can do is to quickly keep up with the pace.” He is now at the stage where any of his actions are “studied under a magnifying glass”, but he feels that his stress levels are not as high as his previous few years, “the past few years, I had the drive but nowhere to use that, now I know how to work hard.”

During the initial auditions, Xiao Zhan still continued to work as per normal, go onstage – sing – leave, which was quite fun. After the selection down to 32 persons, he did not think much of it, and left his work to go to Beijing to practice the dance for the variety show. After the selection down to 16 persons, he practiced everything – dancing, vocals and flexibility training.

He did not think much of what would happen later. The winter in Beijing was especially cold, after the show recording, it would be around 3am or 4am, and there would be fans waiting for him outside of the studio – Xiao Zhan felt quite sorry for them, “All are young girls, it’s so cold and so dark.” He felt surreal having fans. When the 16 of them went to Zhejiang TV “Running 2016” New Year Eve performance, he saw the stage and felt that it was especially big and he was especially happy, and kept making sure he remembered the moves so as not to make any mistakes. After the final battle, Xiao Zhan’s team lost, but he and a few of his teammates were rescued by fan votes.

In 2016, Xiao Zhan debuted as part of X-Nine. During the signing of the contract, Xiao Zhan finally realized that he was going to make a career switch. “When you look at it now, 23 year old is also still a child, but no one took me as a child then.” – Xiao Zhan was the oldest in the group, he made his own decision to sign the contract, he thought that if it did not work out, he could go back to work, there was no need for him to paint himself into a corner.

3½ years after his debut, Artist Xiao Zhan still had to explain to interviewers his obsession with going to work. That day, he had a pimple on the left side of his face, and the makeup artist was applying essences on his face. The makeup room was simply a curtained area in the basement of the Art Gallery, full of passing staff, the editor was discussing the shooting schedule with his manager, the stylist was here delivering clothes, and he sat there with his eyes closed, allowing others to apply whatever it is on his face.

Xiao Zhan’s eyes are long, and also wide, he is very fair and his side profile is graceful and beautiful. With his looks, one would imagine that his personality would be cooler, more introvert, with mild melancholy, like those prince-like male leads in romantic dramas. But his personality does not really match his looks – he is serious, disciplined, he does not talk much initially, but overall he is a relaxed person, and quite funny occasionally.

“A lot of art students do not want to go to work,” the interviewer said. Xiao Zhan learnt drawing since young, some of his happiest moments in his childhood would be to win drawing awards or to have his works praised by his teachers, other unimportant happy moments includes had a good lunch, went to an amusement park, or had a liking for a girl in high school.

“They never went through the society school of hard knocks,” Xiao Zhan said. He described himself as someone who went through “quite a fair bit of knocking”. Since young, his father thought him to be independent, taught him budgeting, and told him stories about Bill Gates’s children… “I wanted to say, god, you’re not Bill Gates.” Despite all these, Xiao Zhan stopped using his parents’ money ever since his university graduation.

Xiao Zhan not only learnt drawing, he also learnt violin, go and Chinese calligraphy… pushed him to study in “National Key” middle school, “National Key” high school (TN: National Key refers to the top range of schools in China). He was an obedient child, but as a standard art student, Xiao Zhan was better in humanity subjects, and his math was not good, hence all the while he had always been the mid-bottom of the pack, which worried his family of 3 quite a fair bit.

Studying graphic design in university, Xiao Zhan felt that his university life was quite comfortable – everyday before class he would adjust himself a bit, although in the end it seemed like it did not work well after all, but at least his results were decent. Xiao Zhan emphasized that he was “definitely not the school hottie”. He was a good student. After he had learnt what the teachers taught, he started a studio on the side. The design studio would take on poster and logo design work; the photography studio only have 3 persons, Xiao Zhan did the photo taking, the other 2 did lighting. Before graduation he went to intern in a design firm, hence it was easy for him to find a job. Within a year of working, his monthly salary was around 4,000 to 5,000 Chinese Yuan, which would quite alright for Chongqing at that point in time.

Being part of a boy group releasing albums, shooting web dramas. The way to do things right was quite different from his previous job – his characterization in the group is a warm guy, although Xiao Zhan did not like characterization, he seriously fulfilled his role, and he was obedient. When someone in the variety show suggested that he lose some weight, he replied “I’m quite thin already I still have to lose weight”. As a commoner, Xiao Zhan was 183cm and 150lbs, his mother would always say he was too thin, and he felt so himself as well. That person showed him the film, “the camera lens is a really scary thing, I literally looked like a ball”. It was not easy for Xiao Zhan to lose weight, so he did it brutally. He was so hungry that he dreamed that he was eating. Xiao Zhan is now 127lbs, but this was not his thinnest.

“How was it like after debut?” “Unoccupied.” (TN: Xiao Zhan used the Chinese phrase “picking at his feet” to describe the state of emptiness.) Xiao Zhan’s words were paced and gentle, most were caught unawares by the sudden switch to casual humor, he might not be laughing, after others laughed he would continue his conversation seriously.

After his debut, he felt that he was freer than the times when he was still an intern. But he did not allow himself to stay free, he took vocal and dancing lessons, making sure that he could do sing-dancing to the best of his abilities. But he was still a bit lost – when he was still a designer, his future was clear and straight, but after his debut he had no clue where his future led to.

“I could count the number of dramas I’ve acted in with my fingers,” Xiao Zhan said. After which, he started counting them – “Battle through the Heavens”, “The Wolf”, “Oh! My Emperor”, “The Untamed”, “Joy of Life”, “Jade Dynasty”, “The Oath of Love”… the earliest work “Super Star Academy” was not counted – It was shot with his boy group, he was still fat, and he had no clue what he was doing.

Acting was his own idea. When he started auditioning he had not even attended any performance classes, he saw the director, took a piece of paper that indicated the scene and lines, and just went for it. Xiao Zhan did not feel that it was awkward, it was something he wanted to do, so he would do so without any inhibitions, and grasp every opportunity to do so. Singing was something that he always liked, his first single after debut was a song voted by his fans. With the stage and his fans, with attention, he would always want to do it better. Acting was something totally foreign to him.

The first turning point was “The Wolf”. When auditioning, within 2 hours, Xiao Zhan had tried many roles – the bounty hunter who was threatening someone, the prince whose brother was about to be executed… Xiao Zhan won the role of the bounty hunter – the 4th character on the character roll, Ji Chong. During the pre-shoot training he was still acting in “Battle through the Heavens”, daytime he would be shooting, nighttime he would be having performance classes. He did not feel it was tough then, as long as he had time to sleep. “Work is something I am willing to do, I will only feel very motivated, tomorrow must be done better than today.” Xiao Zhan liked Wei Wuxian, felt that he was vivid. When acting, during the first month he would be second guessing himself everyday, is the portrayal accurate? Would the audience accept it? Xiao Zhan checked with the director everyday. After a month, he stopped asking, he felt that he was Wei Wuxian. Dramas adapted from web novels are rarely positively received, his hopes for Wei Wuxian was that “I hope people would not dislike the character because of my acting”.

The summer of 2019, the drama aired, and the real turning point arrived.

Billions of fans, frequent trending topics on Weibo, appearing on multiple magazine covers and even causing the sales platform app to crash…

He is one of the few artists in Weibo that sets his account as “only posts in the past 6 months are viewable”, but it did not affect his popularity. His interaction with his fans are witty, the statistics are more than enough to attract attention. Last year on the Chinese Valentine’s Day (TN: 7th of the 7th Lunar month), he posted a photo informing his fans that he had put on weight, his pants folded up, legs in the swimming pool. One of his fans replied, “Fine, good to know that your leg hairs are doing fine.” This reply was boosted to the top with 190,000 likes.

“After watching ‘The Untamed’ and ‘Joy of Life’ and then meeting you, I feel like you are very similar to your performance method, calm. You are like an AI, whatever you do you’re especially precise.” “You’re highly professional.” The interviewer concluded.

At the start of the conversation, Xiao Zhan just finished an exterior photo shoot, we were both seated, leaning forward and warming hands above the radiator. He said, “Artist is just a job, I don’t like artists to place themselves on a pedestal, just like today you are the reporter who is interviewing me, today I am someone being interviewed. Cooperation, is just so that we can complete our jobs, coming in for the photo shoot is my job today, every single staff is also executing this job, it’s just the role is different.” Because he went through the society “school of hard knocks”, he respected and understood the truth behind teamwork.

As someone who once had to face clients, he knew how it felt as someone at the receiving end of endless unreasonable requests, and therefore he did not want to be someone like that. His standards for work is consistent – high efficiency, good results, everyone is happy, no one has to serve another person. Also “once I am done I will knock off, after I knock off no one should come find me, let me be alone.”

“Everyone works to fulfill their needs, they have entertainment after they knock off, they have freedom and privacy. As a public figure, artist, the product is yourself, the works are also yourself. You have to output materials, contribute works, and then gain the opportunity to grow, for higher social status, value and better lifestyle. For some people, besides their career, they also included their dreams,” the interviewer said.

“The understanding is very thorough. You win some, you lose some, after becoming a public figure it meant that there are multiple pairs of eyes staring at you, anything you do would be judged. Whether it is positive or misguided. Truth and falsehoods, isn’t this circle just like this? Whether the rumors or the gossip is true or false, who knows?” Xiao Zhan said.

On 5 Jan 2020, Xiao Zhan was working in a sculpture garden in Shanghai Songjiang, shooting a series of photographs to be the cover of VogueMe. It was cold, the gallery’s doors were open, and the wind blew from the first floor to the basement. Everyone was wearing winter jackets.

In the morning, beside the metal sculpture on the first floor, Xiao Zhan and model Chen Yu faced the camera separately. As the shutters rolled, they did not exchange glances or touch each other. As the photographer requested the model to sit on the ground, Xiao Zhan said his only sentence to her, “Careful your head.” and used his hands to shield her head from the protruding portion of the sculpture.

That day’s Weibo opening advertisement was also Xiao Zhan. As per the photographer’s request, he tilted his head up slightly and gave a cold gaze, or side glancing a faraway place, but also at the same time, he was smiling sweetly on mobile phone screens, promoting a series of instant food products.

In the afternoon, the team went to the exterior, to a concrete sculpture beside the gallery entrance, where he and the model stood in front of, facing the camera. The arm was on the model’s shoulders, and the two of them looked at the camera – he was even thinner than the model. In yet another set, the staff erected a ladder to one of the rooftop grass patches on the gallery buildings. An ice cold rock slab was selected, which the assistant padded using a jacket, and tested the light levels. After which, it was Xiao Zhan’s turn. He was wearing a red jacket with blue shirt, wearing a baseball cap, lying on his side on the rock slab, supporting his head with his arm. In between shoots, the assisted would hand him a long wool top, with deep blue diamond checks, quite thin. The top was flipped over, he slipped his hands into the sleeves to protect the front of his body, his assistant handed over another water bottle that contained warm mineral water to warm his hands. Xiao Zhan basically did not speak, he placed the bottle on his neck to gain some warmth.

An artist’s job, the profession included losing weight, staying hungry, freezing and staying up overnight, wearing winter clothes in summer is the norm, not drinking water prior to any shoots to prevent water bloating on screen… people who do those well may become famous, if they look good or are lucky they may become even more famous. Now Xiao Zhan has an opportunity, and like his previous job, he chose to be down-to-earth and do it well.

In the evening, the green screens were setup in basement 2 of the gallery. 17:44, Xiao Zhan was in position, his manager reminded the stylist to take note of the clothes’ proportion – “The sweater is too long.” Hence, the sweater was folded up. After the camera assistant brought down the Apple machines, the cameraman adjusted his machines, and started shooting the video. Quite a few scenes were done in one take, in the middle there was a break, the manager and the camera crew were discussing camera positions. This was the 10th hour of the shoot, Xiao Zhan sat behind the table, laid his head on a prop gift box and waited quietly – we could not see if he was tired or not.

The shoot ended, and the sky was already dark. Xiao Zhan has not yet knocked off. The media had ended their work, the manager was darting around, arranging for Xiao Zhan to change out and get on his car, to rush to his rehearsal that night – they were already behind schedule. Both teams bid their farewell, Xiao Zhan warm and gentle, still unclear whether he was tired. After less than an hour’s journey, he would need to go onstage to sing, and thereafter, his work would be to complete the costume testing of 20 different sets of clothes.

The Initial Cold

The time set for the shoot was 9am, Xiao Zhan arrived at the rural set at 8.30am. His overnight flight arrived only the day before, meeting Xiao Zhan on the cold morning of a deep southern winter, his spirits looked great, his face having the same kindness as usual. The endless job schedules taught him how to conserve his energy – no casual conversation, not even to his staff; take every opportunity to eat or rest; absolutely no procrastination, ensure efficiency, do his best to accommodate and complete every job. He is a highly disciplined and professional artist.

In this shoot, the warm, gentle smiles have been replaced by cold, sharp glares, the metal and concrete sculptures gave him a few minutes of inner emotions and narrative, his scenes with the model was almost like he was acting in the set of “Last Year at Marienbad”. Xiao Zhan displayed emotions and charm very different from usual self – this is the power of an actor. The darker filters and monochrome imagery restored the caution that the youth of his age would have, it was the concealed feelings of a sunny boy. With such an idol, not only he can warm your hearts, there are still much to expect from him.

#xiao zhan #sean xiao #xiaozhan #肖战

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angelofbenignmalevolence · 4 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Grandma Tracy, John Tracy Additional Tags: Family Bonding, scared of the dark Series: Part 3 of IR Relief 2020 Ficlets Summary:

John’s night light goes out in the middle of the night. Sometimes a little love from Grandma is all it takes to make it better.

A brother scared of the dark. (Bonus points if you include Jeff or Grandma Tracy) submitted as prompts by @LouTheStarSpeaker for International Rescue & Relief (https://nutty.gumnut.net/irrelief/).

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Grandma rolled over and looked at the clock as she heard the terrified wail of a small child. The red letters on the clock read 3:22. She held back a yawn as she threw back the sheets and moved to the door, the wail growing louder as the door opened into the hall. Jeff and Lucille were off on a well-deserved retreat together, so it was up to her to avert whatever crisis had caused the episode before it spread to the other boys. She looked up and down the hall a moment, trying to figure out which boy was having trouble tonight.

She turned to her right and moved along the hall, stopping in front of John’s door. The poor thing was barely four years old and he still had trouble sleeping through the night when his parents were gone. She gently pushed open the door and the light from the hallway trickled into the room, leaving a triangular expanse of light that illuminated John’s small form. He was tangled in his blankets and clutching his pillow to his chest as he wailed. Grandma moved into the room and gently untangled John from his rocket-ship sheets, pulling him into her lap and leaning him gently into her chest.

“There, there, now,” she said soothingly, smoothing his bright hair with her free hand in a repetitive motion she had perfected after raising first Jeff, and then assisting with her grandsons. John’s wails subsided into whimpers as the contact and security of his grandmother’s presence began to soothe the fear that had consumed him only moments ago. Grandma kept up her soft murmurings until even his whimpers were on the verge of disappearing altogether. “What’s the matter? What’s the matter with my little Johnny?” she asked. He buried his face into her chest, as if he could hide the answer that way. Grandma gently dislodged the boy from her chest, tilting his chin up to look at her. Tears had made trails all down his cheeks and she gently wiped them away. “What’s got you so upset, little man?” she asked again as he sniffled, his bright blue-green eyes looking up at her.

“It’s so dark, Grandma,” he said. “My night light’s not working anymore…” Grandma turned to look at where the nightlight had been plugged in. Sure enough, the little bulb had ceased to glow. Grandma smiled at him as the familiarity of it all came rushing back. She had gone through this with Jeff so very long ago, and even Scott and Virgil had had a few nights where the dark was too dark for them. She shifted and got to her feet, swinging John onto her hip in a practiced motion.

“Well, let’s see if we can’t fix that, huh?” She said. John leaned his head on his grandmother’s shoulder as she moved down the hallway. She kissed the top of his head as she went in search of a new bulb for the little nightlight. She opened the closet where they kept the spare lightbulbs for the house, but frowned as the search turned up empty for bulbs for the nightlight. She closed the door and rocked John gently on her hip as she thought about where else Jeff may have hidden the extra lightbulbs.

She ran a hand over John’s back. She wasn’t sure if she had yet started going senile or if it was just the fact that her brain was not made to fire on all cylinders at 3:30 in the morning, but she couldn’t seem to think of another place in the house where there might be spare night light bulbs. She had to think of something.

“What’s got you so scared of the dark, sweetheart?” Grandma cooed as her mind struggled to think of an alternative.

“There’s monsters in the closet,” he said. “Big scary things that come out of the shadows.” Grandma frowned. Where had he been getting those ideas? Sometimes, the fact that he read at a reading level nearly equivalent to the eldest of her grandchildren was a curse. She shook her head and looked at John.

“Those monsters?” She said. “You don’t have to worry about those monsters.” John sniffled and looked up at her.

“I don’t?” Grandma reached for a tissue to clean up his face.

“You sure don’t. Do you want to know why?” she asked. John nodded. Grandma began to head back down the hall, turning off the lights as she went along. She moved into his bedroom and sat down on the windowsill, settling John in her lap. “What do you see up there?” she asked, indicating the sky.

“Stars,” he said. She smiled.

“Yes. Stars. They are kind of like nature's night lights. And do you want to know something?” John nodded again. “Some of those stars are linked together in patterns called constellations.”

“Consolations?” John asked.

“Not consolations. Constellations,” she corrected gently. “And each of those constellations has a story to them.”

“They do?”

“They sure do, sweetheart. Like….that one there. You see that group of stars?” She traced out the pattern with a finger, indicating a constellation. John followed her finger.

“I think so,” he said.

“That’s Leo,” she said. “He’s a great big lion.”

“I don’t see a lion, Grandma,” he said. “I just see a bunch of stars.”

“Well, some cultures see it as a lion,” she said. “And it’s pretty close to the big dipper, which some cultures call the big bear.” John looked up at the sky again.

“Show me,” he said. Grandma smiled.

“What’s the magic word?”

“Please show me, grandma,” he said. She traced out the pattern of the big dipper. “Wow…that’s cool.”

“And you want to know a secret?” John nodded earnestly. Grandma reached over and picked up John’s teddy bear from where it lay among the tangled sheets. She showed him to John. “This little guy right here? He talks to the big guy up there.” She indicated the constellation with her eyes. John’s eyes widened.

“He does?” Grandma nodded.

“Cross my heart. This little guy keeps an eye on you while you sleep. And if any of those scary monsters would even dare come out of the closet? Your teddy bear tells the big guy up there and he comes in and scares the monsters away.” John’s eyes widened and he looked at his teddy bear as if seeing him in a whole new light. Grandma handed the bear to her grandson and stroked his hair back as he cuddled the stuffed toy close. She hummed softly as she felt him begin to relax in her arms, hoping to put him back to sleep.

It was another several minutes before she felt his breath even out and she gathered him up into her arms again. She moved to put him to bed again, tucking the covers around him and kissing his forehead goodnight. She crept from the room and shut the door quietly behind her, letting out an exhausted sigh, though she couldn’t help the smile that came to her features as she did so.

Teddy bears talking to the constellations? Not sure where she came up with that idea, but she had to admit that it was a pretty good explanation for such a late hour. She re-entered her bedroom and looked at the clock as she settled in. Almost 4 am. Now that all was right with the world again, it was time to settle back into her own sleep. She set aside her glasses and pulled the sheets up over herself once more, closing her eyes.

“Don’t let the big bear bite,” she murmured to herself as she drifted into a quiet sleep.

#thunderbirds are go #john tracy #grandma tracy #irrelief2020 #irrelief #one of mine #fanfiction #my fanfiction

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9or10allgood · 4 years

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I love Tumblr. Far more than Facebook, which has become a seething morass of political partisanship, and while I’m all about seething partisanship when it’s discussed by people willing to engage their intellects, I’m less so when “debate” means posting memes and gifs which are, let’s be honest, the electronic equivalent of saying “nanny nanny boo boo”.

Anyway… Tumblr. You can, to some degree, control your content. If you are, like I am, mildly (*snort*) obsessed with a certain tall, lanky, Scottish actor, you can find like-minded individuals and follow them and bask in his glory to your heart’s content. Likewise, you can follow fandoms based on television shows and movies and plays and music… and you get my point. You’re all here so, of course, you do.

And, if you are interested in things like politics or social issues or the environment or science or all of the above (and more), that content is also readily available on Tumblr.

Generally speaking, I find the folks on Tumblr to be considerably more relaxed and open and accepting than on Facebook. I attribute that, for the most part, to the members being mostly younger. I’m a great believer in young people. The future belongs to them and I am, present circumstances notwithstanding, mostly optimistic about the future.

I’m a Boomer. I was born eleven years after the end of WWII. (Good Lord, I feel old!) There were no twenty-four-hour television or radio stations, and the internet wasn’t even conceived of, even by the most forward thinkers. Doctors still made housecalls as a matter of course. Milk was still delivered to your door every morning. The polio vaccine was still being tested. Putting a man on the moon was a science fiction fantasy.

As a generation, we “Boomers” were guilty of a lot of things, beginning with not quickly enough shedding some of the baggage from the generation before us. We were still largely segregated and we are paying the price still and we will until - I don’t know how long and that disturbs me more than I can say. We were too quick to distrust the other - just ask the immigrants that came to these shores during and after the War. There was a dear older lady in my church when I was in high school. A kinder, more charitable, more joyful woman you could never hope to meet. She was a German war bride - met an American soldier and they fell in love and married and he brought her home to his small, south Georgia hometown. Their first decade was tough - folks were slow to forget and she was sometimes ostracized. Even when I knew her, people would sometimes refer to her (in lowered tones) as Leroy’s German frau.

We were abysmal when it came to the environment. I mean, look at the cars we drove in the sixties and seventies before the oil crisis forced a turn toward economy cars. Gasoline was $.37 a gallon - and that was hi-test! What did it matter that my mother’s 1971 Mercury Grand Marquis land yacht only got 11 miles to the gallon? Gender equality? Seriously? Gender Identity?!?!? How you came out of the womb is what you were. Period. And if your family had that special uncle or the aunt with a Very Close Friend, well, it just wasn’t talked about, was it…

On the other hand, there were things we did do. That social conscience that drives our society today? You can thank those who loudly and visibly protested the Vietnam War for a lot of it. Sure, there were anti-war movements always, but the Vietnam War lit a fire that, with the availability of news cameras and microphones and news cycles, burned hot and bright until the last helicopter departed the US Embassy in Saigon on April 30, 1975. And when the war was over, there were plenty of other things to get riled up about: the environment, women’s rights, the right to choose, civil rights, gay rights. Anger over things that are wrong today didn’t just start in the 2000s. A lot of us - and I mean a lot! - have been pissed off for a while.

Putting a man on the moon belongs to the generation before the Boomers, obviously, but the drive to continue space exploration - the space shuttle, the probes that are still sailing toward places beyond our solar system, the International Space Station, the Hubble telescope - belong to us. Medical advances? Advances in diabetic screening and treatment, the MRI, treatment of HIV/AIDS… Cancer research was largely theoretical until the ‘70s. The idea of DNA re-sequencing as a therapeutic treatment? Late ‘70’s.

And as for culture? My generation embraced the idea of embracing the accoutrements of other cultures. Clothing, jewelry, hairstyles, music, food… we were all about it. I see people commenting on “cultural appropriation” as if it’s a bad thing. We - my generation - considered it to be a tangible form of acceptance.

(As an aside, I have a dear friend who is battling uterine cancer. She has lost all of her hair due to chemotherapy. On one of her “good days”, she and her family took in an Indian (the country) festival and, while she was there, saw an artist creating henna tattoos. On impulse, she asked the woman to create one for her scalp. It was a masterpiece, absolutely glorious, and it gave my friend so much of her joy back. For the first time, she was proud to show herself without a wig or scarf. I think if I’d heard anyone say anything about “cultural appropriation”, I would have punched them in the mouth.)

My point to this ramble is this. Lately, I’ve been seeing anti-Boomer things on Tumblr. Boomers are rude. Boomers are backward. Boomers are outdated. And while I get that it’s just a thing for generations to complain about each other, it’s the absolutism that I see that bothers me. When I was young and dealing with my parents’ generation, I didn’t consign the whole kit and kaboodle to the Dark Ages. And, from my viewpoint as an older person, I don’t heave a great sigh and clutch my pearls over the entirety of the Gen X'ers, the Millennials (raised one!), or the Gen Z'ers. I may get annoyed with one or two individuals and have a sudden urge to shake my cane and yell “get off my lawn, whippersnapper!” but I manage to contain myself. (There was the young man in the electronics department at WalMart who, in his most condescending manner, asked me if I knew what a USB port was. I wanted to tell him that I’d been working with computers since before his father first bought his mother a malt at the chocolate shoppe. Instead, I just gave him The Look™ and he mumbled an apology.)

Absolutism about anything is corrosive. I mean, think about it. It lies at the heart of so many of the evils that are tearing at us now. It feeds the desire to hate all of the “other” because of a crime perpetrated by one or a few. Wars result from this kind of thinking. Down through history, you see it. And it’s so much more easily spread now with social media. Again, I would abandon FB altogether - except that it’s how I keep up with the folks back home - because it’s become a political, partisan, largely unintelligent cesspool. All because those on the Left believe that those on the Right are the Minions of Satan and those on the Right think that those on the Left are Bloodsucking Snowflakes. And, of course, they don’t all think that, but it’s so easy to click a “Like” or a “Share” without really thinking about the message they are sending, and before you know it things are out of control and we’ve put a dictator wannabe in the bloody Oval Office!

(Sorry. I’m still upset.)

There are those who ask why boomers are offended. I mean, “ok boomer” is just a joke, right? Well, yeah, but that same reasoning has been applied to how many derogatory labels. (I read one comment that “Boomer” isn’t an ageist slur. Except it kinda is, y'know?) And, again, it spreads and it gets blown out of proportion and there are those who are just ready to jump on a bandwagon - any bandwagon! - and the next thing you know, it’s trending on Twitter and we’ve got one more thing to get mad about that shouldn’t be anything at all because there are so many other things that we really should be mad about and trying to do something about…

Do you get my point?

If someone of any generation gets on your last good nerve, by all means, express yourself. (Short of violence, obviously.) But ease up on projecting the “they’re all bad" mentality. It isn’t true. It doesn’t make anything easier. And we’re all better than that.

Aren’t we?

#boomers #ok boomers #just a few observations #by a boomer

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wiredandrewired · 5 years

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Was trying to actually work on something but my brain is stuck on loop. So instead I’m gonna make a post of the Voltron stuff sitting unposted in my writing WIP folder to help me organize my thoughts.

I guess since I’m posting this, if you have anything you wanna say/ask about any of these feel free. I respond well to outside interest.

1. Project ReVolt is without a doubt the project I’ve posted about the most here. And talked about in random tags. And tangents. Originally it was just the name the project had in my internal brain filing cabinet but it’s kind of spread and stuck to where my wife and I just refer to it as that when we talk about it.

ReVolt is basically going to be a VLD series rewrite more along the lines of how my wife and I would have done it or at least liked to see it done. In some places it will probably stick pretty damn close to the events of the series canon, but in others go completely off the deep end. We’re each going to be doing one, so a lot of the headcanon and worldbuilding and such that we’ve worked out together in various other stories and RPs will be consistent between the two stories, but it will also give us a place to veer out and do things without the others’ input (as we’re not gonna let each other see our fics until they post, tee hee). I’ve done a SHITPOT of rules and infrastructure work using actual alchemy tracts to try and make sense of the series’ largely Powers As The Plot Demands system, and am pretty convinced I’m going to A)fall hard into my very common Esoterica Ranting Mode pitfall and B)enrage literally everyone who reads it with my character and plot choices. Most conservative estimate says this will be six ‘books’ long as again, we’re doing literally the entire series. Current status: at the ‘ridiculously large amount of notes and setting up actual arcs and outlines’ stage, and waiting for the wife to finish ‘Happier HOPEless’.

2. There Are No Monsters Here is a fic I really want to do but cannot seem to get off the ground, set to take place entirely in the ‘last universe’ from season 8--the one native-Honerva died in and crazed-death-god-Honerva picked out as her ideal and tried to wedge herself into. I guess the basic idea was that, like the ‘main’ universe, it got rebuilt pretty much as it was prior to Nightmare Mom Ruining Everything, and I have it with no one fully remembering the events of season 8 that took place there, but characters really closely tied to those events having some itching feeling that something happened, and all the Altean alchemists agreeing that some kind of massive quantum Event certainly occurred even if they don’t know what.

Mostly the story exists as a place for me to have a canon-compliant AU that still lets me explore stuff like Altean history, the racial and cultural tensions of the Coalition, dink around with Oldadins that DON’T die in one fell swoop, a living Daibazaal and Altea, Lotor growing up with a decent-but-not-without-strains relationship with his dad, teen Allura and tiny Lotor being absolute shits to each other while also coming to terms as they grow up with who and what they MUST be both on a political and quantum scale, and generally prove that even a perfect universe isn’t, all in one place. The title is entirely facetious, and anyone who’s read any of my alien culture headcanons for this series knows that. Lol. Current status: lots of bits and pieces, but no good beginning or connective tissue. I have a lot of notes, some arc outlines, and a few scattered scenes and bits of dialogue from later in the story, but my god, I CANNOT get it off the ground.

3. Someone Must Get Hurt (But It Won’t Be Me) is supposed to be a pretty wholly Honerva-centric fic that starts...sometime in her youth?...and carries forward to an as-yet-undetermined point. Probably her death. I mean the first one. I’m not sure. Another chance to dig my fingers into Altean culture and Alchemy, this time leading up to All The Bad Shit That Happened, with the added bonus of being done from a focal point of a character I have a lot of really strong feelings about both positive and negative that’s resulted in me somehow being EVEN MORE wrapped up in her than I was before I added abject knee-jerk trauma hatred to the mix. In no way meant to make Honerva more sympathetic, I think I just want to write her even more like my mother so I’ll feel EVEN BETTER about killing her? Idk man my feelings about her are so complicated. Also an excuse to write a shitpot of her and Zarkon because listen, I’m really glad they’re married because I ship them so fuckin hard. Current Status: SO many notes. SO much infrastructure. Like three pages of an opening I’m almost definitely throwing away because I can’t decide where, when, or how to open but feel like this isn’t it. One short but very telling scene of Honey and Zarkon from late in the story. I’m obsessed with it but I can’t get anywhere.

4. Currently Untitled Demon Hunter AU started because my wife talks to me about Happier HOPEless a LOT and I just got an itch in my bones to work on one myself. In spite of the entire Demon Hunter AU thing getting started by a prompt on a Shance blog, neither Shiro nor Lance are set to appear for at least a chapter? And I am not confident in my ability to not veer off into utter non-shipping anyway because man, am I bad at it. Or like...just an entirely different ship for either or both of them. Current Status: A lot of vague notes, a POWERFUL urge to structure the chapters and overall arc after Ripley’s Gates even though that limits my chapter count and means I will DEFINITELY have 20k+ word chapters, and about seven pages of the first chapter so I guess I’m committed now?

5. Currently Untitled Post Series Fic basically exists for me to vent my frustrations about two main things: The Universe is Fucking Huge And There Are Dangers Other Than Galra, and The Galra Empire Was Huge and Is Not Going To All Fall In Line Behind Voltron Coalition and Especially Behind Keith Who Just Arbitrarily Fucking Decided To Tell Them They Couldn't Pick A New Leader According To Their Own Traditions And Need To Do What They’re Told Now What The Fuck. Also there was a lot of stuff in the series that got left hanging, and while ReVolt is an IN-series fix-it fic, I wanted something that patched up loose ends in a way that was satisfactory to me but also kind of canon-compliant. Current Status: A lot of notes and screaming. No one has seen my progress on this and they might never.

6. Dog Runs And Death Dreams is a warmup file turned deeply self-indulgent series of scenes in which I choose to assume that Shiro’s rare neuromuscular disorder was left so ambiguous so I could plug the symptoms of mine into it. It’s genuinely not any deeper than that. The whole thing is set pre-Kerberos, and includes copious Shiro x Adam content because of it, but also not the kind that makes me feel good about writing because that means it includes the ‘slow fizzle’ that leads up to their breakup before the mission. Ugh. Working on it does make me feel better when I've been having symptoms, though, and I’ve been letting myself write it, unchastised, in a really loose rambly way that I usually deride myself for. It’s just cathartic. Current Status: no notes, no plan, just strain-writing between seizures, but somehow it feels like it has some kind of structure and just keeps growing? Possibly too close to the bone for me to ever post.

7. Birth and Rebirth was born out of two things: the fact that Zarkon is shown to have two ENTIRELY DIFFERENT reactions to first being presented with his baby son in different flashbacks and different seasons, and the fact that in spite of the flashbacks we get at the end of the series, earlier on, the impression I got of Lotor and Zarkon’s relationship wasn’t of a young man who had never had affection from his father, but who had instead lost it. Well, three things: I have a lot of underlying issues at work, at play, and at large when it comes to the Galra Imperial Family. Also, anyone notice the monitor blips in the first baby Lotor flashbacks indicate a heart murmur? Anyway, it was supposed to be a thoroughly self-indulgent and thoroughly self-hurtful examination of Lotor’s early life and the death by degrees of what was left of his father in the husk Rift Adventures left behind, but I got stuck on it a little way in. Current Progress: ten pages, a lot of notes, and some wistfulness. I keep hoping I’ll get inspired to pick it back up again. Contemplating rewriting some of the beginning, maybe it’ll help?

Bonus entry that is not actually in any form of progress soever:

50/50 Voltron Trashfire Edition is spawned from the ‘50/50′ challenge on an old TF board I used to haunt. It’s a fifty-prompt smut challenge using the list of ‘50 reasons to have sex’ from some tv show, and the idea is to write a different ship for every prompt (hence the name). My wife is blazing through it and has several (like twelve?) up on her AO3, but I’ll be utterly blunt: I haven’t written fifty porn fics in my LIFE. Over ALL my fandoms. Current Status: Literally all I have done is assign a ship to each prompt, and I might actually have some prompts with just question marks beside them still. I have one aborted start to one entry. That’s it. It’s not happening. But the empty file is technically in the folder, SO.

#things Rewire Writes #disregard I'm decompiling #writing woes #fanfiction: the struggle #the state of the rest of these makes me a little worried about Revolt tbh #I need to unclog the writing pen in my brain

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romeorussia · 6 years

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If you don't mind me asking, what is your take on the whole milo controversy?

I don’t mind at all as we all are shaken and devastated and need to talk…

To give a proper answer, I guess I should reproduce the events and the emotions they gave in chronological order as, within those three days before the agency made an official statement, I passed through all possible stages, made up all plots and scenarios and even managed to lose faith in humanity a few times.

On Feb 18 (Sun) around 2AM KST Korean fansites dedicated to Milo started closing down one after another. Some went on rest, but the majority (including the oldest and respected PINK2MILO and COMEON_MILO) closed down. After some research I found the screenshots posted by Honoka on instagram and the account which was created to spread this information. That account sent the screenshots to Romeo and staff, underlining that Honoka was underaged and it was illegal. Also, it stated that “guys of that type” usually didn’t act alone and mentioned Noh Kangmin (which wasn’t brought up anywhere later).

I translated the screenshots from Korean and Japanese till morning, trying to figure out if it was a fake as I couldn’t believe that such a responsible person as Minhak could call a barely known fan cute, pretty and sometimes sexy, discuss meeting at Haneda airport and, as Honoka lived far from the airport, end up suggesting that she stayed with him when he came to Japan alone. I consulted a native speaker of both Korean and Japanese languages who confirmed that the texts were a bit sloppy. My suspicions were fed with rumours circulating around concerning that fan’s reputation and a “rich” experience in interacting with celebrities.Japanese fansites made a furious storm on twitter, a few fansites on other members closed, and I was waiting for Hunus to end this nightmare. On Sunday evening Dispatch dropped an article with the scandalous screenshots, and on Monday morning all news agencies competed in a “make-a-catchy-headline” contest.By that time I realized that the lack of official statement might imply the rumours were true. One of my friends sent me a screenshot with a notification where Romeo liked Honoka’s video from their official account. What scared me more though was the fact that our fandom was falling apart, and the wave of hatred from fansites to Minhak and from international fans to kfansites and jfansites for leaving. On Monday evening the merciful HY’s CEO tweeted that the official statement would be posted the next day. The rest is history.

What am I to add here… Everyone decides for themself how to interpret the messages and judge the reaction that followed. How careless it was of Milo to flirt with a barely known fan and tease her with unreal promises about coming over to Japan alone and spending time together in his room? How fair it was of that fan to take a revenge on him for something and post screenshots of personal conversations, knowing very well it would blow up a scandal and ruin his career? How relevant it was for the fansites to believe rumours and close before the official confirmation?

If you ask for my personal opinion, Minhak has made a mistake, no doubt. But all sides in this story got deeply hurt, and now we have a group falling apart, a fandom falling apart and an ocean of frustration. Minhak is withdrawn from activities for half a year at least, the comeback is cancelled, the other members will have to face the furious fans. What makes me really angry though and what I will never forget and forgive, is the position of Hunus. They could have solved the issue immediately by posting the confirmation the next morning, letting Minhak apologize publicly and not making us go through this hell, losing fans every second. I am sorry if it is too harsh, but screw it, you could have saved so many lives, Hunus! I will never forgive you for making these wonderful boys and all of us go through so much suffering.

Anyway, what done is done, and all I want to say is please have a heart. Don’t blame Minhak as he’s got enough and lost everything he had. Don’t blame kfansites as we will never understand how betrayed they felt that their idol trusted some Japanese fan and acted against the strict rules of Korean culture in general. Blame Hunus for complete incompetence. I am not trying to justify anyone, just tired of hatred and pain. Let’s be kind, let’s support the other members who did nothing wrong, let’s forgive Minhak for his mistake, let’s stay Juliets and be people.

#Ask #Admin #20180221

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bxngtan-fanfics · 6 years

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On the whole “English Album business” (REPOST from main blog)

I’ve seen some people who think that it’s not a big deal that BTS are being bombarded with English Album requests. I’m here to clear up exactly why people should stop and why it’s disrespectful and entitled to expect it. Read to the end, and PLEASE reblog!!!

Language Barrier

First off, BTS are Korean. We all know this. Their first language is Korean and Korean and English are not similar languages and trying to learn English as a second language is very hard. My mother works with ESL kids, and even at a young age, they struggle with such complex and abstract grammar rules. Adults have less ability to learn languages like kids, so automatically BTS will have an even harder time learning English. While RM is fluent, he cannot, and should not have to carry the weight of the entire team. BTS has already worked their asses off to give us the English they do speak. Appreciate their hard work. Realize that trying to make an entire English album would be difficult, unfair to BTS’s work ethic and force them to translate lyrics that were meant to be Korean. This means many of BTS’s beautiful lyrics would be lost in translation, and it would sound much more dumbed down and might even change the entire feel and meaning of the songs. That would ruin so much of an album that what point is there anymore? Making BTS sound Western is to lose a huge part of their sound and style.

Their Korean Pride

BTS love their country. They love Korea and they are so proud to be Korean. Jimin makes jokes that he was born in Busan first, lording it over Jungkook playfully. Suga will literally never shut up about being a D-boy, and that he’s from Daegu. BTS was so proud of their cities they made a song about it - Ma City. They didnt even care when it got banned for the song being what it was. If they could tell the world how much they loved their town, they didn’t care. Also, one of my favorite BTS songs is Satoori Rap. This song was the first idol song to feature Satoori (or certain Korean dialects) as it’s main point. Most idols have to lose their Satoori when they move to Seoul or they are made fun of or something of the like. The song features the complexities of different Korean dialects and they rap about how sometimes it’s so different the Satoori’s can sound like different languages. Obviously, they put so much pride into where they come from, and they don’t want that to change. Suga has vehemently denied English album propositions before, and a lot of the time in America he doesn’t speak much or just speaks in Korean. He 100% can speak some English, but he doesn’t want to. He could give broken English answers but he knows he sounds better in Korean. He doesn’t want the message he cares about to be lost to translation. He’s Korean, and he loves it. They all do. They smile so wide and are so happy when international ARMY’s learn some Korean, know the fanchants, or sing along to Korean lyrics. Why take that joy away from them? They love when other people learn to love Korea through them. Don’t make them give that up. Asking them to make an album in English is like asking them to give up so much of their pride in their culture. That’s asking them to turn away from a place and a country they love with all their hearts. Essentially, trying to make BTS more westernized is… Well… Kinda trying to white-wash them and make them pretend they’re western when they aren’t. And that’s wrong.

It’s Unfair

English may be a very widespread language. So is Chinese and Spanish. Western artists are not forced or pushed into learning another language because they are popular in that country, much less pressured into making an album in a different language. Why on Earth would you expect BTS to do it? Don’t make them set this precedent for Kpop in the Western world. They are pioneers right now, and what they do shape American opinions on Kpop. If another K-artist makes it big in America, they will probably have to follow similar steps to BTS. No Korean artist should be forced to learn English or write English songs unless they want to.

It’s Entitled to Think You Deserve it

You don’t. No one does. BTS are their own people and they give so much to ARMY no matter what. You may think an English album would be connecting with them better, but you’re wrong. Korean fans won’t understand the songs. How will the album fare in their home country? An English album could fucking flop and it’s just not worth it. If you want to know what they’re saying so bad, look up lyric translations that fansites work their butts off to give you, assholes.

You Love The Way Korean Culture Has Shaped Them

Don’t deny it. They’re respectful, sweet, keep their noses clean and never step too far out of line. Korean culture and the Kpop industry is what made them that way. If they were Western, they’d most likely be much more closed off, have less of a bond with their fans. They wouldn’t dance or make covers for you. They wouldn’t make Bangtan bombs or half of the events they do in Korea. They wouldn’t rush to make so many songs and wouldn’t worry about taking a while to come back. Their music videos would be vastly different. Their songs and image would most likely be sexualized worse than it is now. Admit it. You love the way Korean culture and Kpop has shaped them. You can’t have both. You can have a Western artist or a Korean one. Asking BTS to adhere to your American standards and still take what you like about Korean culture with them is appropriating their culture and that’s not okay. BTS may not be a racial minority in Korea, but the U.S. they are, and racism has already reared it’s ugly head on them. Don’t add fuel to the fire.

They Already Accommodate For You

BTS already incorporates English into their songs. If you’ve been a fan for as long as I have, then you noticed that the English in their albums increased the moment they realized how many international fans they actually had. They want you to appreciate that. They want you to hear the English they do put in and know they thought of you. They love international fans, and they try so hard for you. They just try in ways that lets them keep their central identity.

You’re Ignoring What BTS Taught You

BTS have repeatedly said that music is a universal language. Ive heard so many ARMY complain that people don’t understand that not English language music is just as good as English music. How does it look if we demand English music from them now? How does that reflect us as a fandom, us as fans? We seem hypocritical as fuck, and that’s not what we want. BTS taught us that all music can speak to us, no matter the language it’s in. Remember what those seven wonderful young men taught you.

Before anyone comes for me, know I am an American. I like Western Artists. I don’t know Korean, and I only know English. But that doesn’t mean everything I said wasn’t true. If you’re American like me, understand that asking for an English album makes you sound horrible to other ARMY’s. Realize how ignorant and selfish you make Americans sound when you say that stuff. Please. Our reputation already sucks.

Add on if you can, send me asks if you want to ask questions or want me to explain more. Spread this. Please. Reblog this so every ARMY can see it. They need to know why asking for English albums are wrong, not just the fact that it is. Make this known that true fans of BTS only want them to do want they want, not what a society pushes them to do.

BTS deserve their own creative freedom.

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gocchisama · 7 years

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Thoughts on the love ban rule (恋愛禁止条例)

In her recent Radio program, Koike Minami from Keyakizaka46 mentioned a paper adressed to all members, officially banning any relationship during their idol activity. It is also known as the Renai Kinshi Jourei, the love ban rule. To allow or forbid this rule have teared apart the fandom for many years, and the ambiguous stand of Akimoto Yasushi (stating there wasn’t such thing as love ban rule) doesn’t help to clear things up. But the issue regarding this rule goes beyond it’s own existence. This is an eternal debate between those who argue we can’t own idols as they are humans with feelings, against those who think it is necessary to preserve their image. To sum things up, what we debate for is our conception of an idol. Through this write up, i will attempt to list all legit arguments from both side so you can make your own opinion on that matter.

“Sasshi scandal was the most talked topic at the time, even more than Acchan graduation”

First, a little bit of history. The love ban rule is much more older than AKB itself. In 1997, Nakazawa Yuko, leader of Morning musume at the time, stated that in their contract, they were forbid to have boyfriend or marry. Ten years later, Kashiwagi Yuki expressed the same statement, that they had to sign a paper in which they pledge to not be in a relationship. What is the purpose of the love ban rule? Simply speaking, it helps the idea of an idol “pure and innocent”, completely devoted to the fans. Management is afraid that the fan significantly decrease his dedication to buy goods and ticket to see his favourite member if she’s in a relationship.

But Let’s take an example of other pop culture. Justin Bieber is a singer, with 99.9% of female fanbase. He works a lot on his image, yet he dated many other celebrities like Selena Gomez. He’s directly concerned with appearance, but his staff allow him to date. In the super strict Kpop industry, even though entertainment companies are very discrete about it, they often acknowledge a relationship when they are revealed, and not opposing them (Exo Kai and F(x) Crystal for example). The question is, why is it allowed in Occidental and Oriental countries like USA and Korea and not in japan? Especially the case of idols.

1st hypothesis, It’s about culture. USA have build their civilization on freedom, and it’s quite hard to “forbid” someone to love, especially someone as popular as Justin bieber. Management strategy to keep hardcore fans would backfire at them, being blamed for pressuring the artist. In Kpop It might depend of the age and experience of the artist. When management knows the artist fanbase is mature enough to accept, they lift the ban. But if the trainee has just debuted with the group, it’s better to not create unnecessary waves that would be an hindrance to the group promotion. Japan has a huge history of hierarchy between genre, family often assimilated with a father who work, and a mother who stay at home to raise the children. Sexism is still rooted in society as it is largely accepted to have gravure photoshoot of idols (often very young), but also promote the girls as cute and innocent. Unconsciously, Japan paradoxal society still allow to reduce a woman basic right in order to preserve a certain idea of what an idol should be.

2st hypothesis, we can say it’s the fan fault for being unrealistic about the concept of an idol. Before being an idol, she is an human being. You can’t mix up reasoning with feelings, as one is led by the brain, the other by the heart. Also, if the idol you support is being happy with someone else, shouldn’t you be happy for her own happiness? It’s not like you’re being her fan in order to date her in the future. You can also be a fan of someone without being physically attracted to her. Like many hardcore metal teenagers adoring metallica. A fan’s love, is different. Something more personal, but loving someone as a 17 years is different from loving at 26, and 40, etc. A teenager should live to the fullest.

“Minegishi scandal blow out to international proportion, wrongly the symbol of Japanese excess”

Not long ago, a company sued a girl for “breach of contract” blaming her for her idol group failure in the market, because she was dating one of her fans. The young girl retorted that i was never mentioned she couldn’t date anyone, even though it was “professionaly” obvious to avoid this situation. The result of the court was that indeed the girl was wrong for not taking into account that it would hurt the group image, but since she dated her boyfriend without the intent to harm the company, she was exempt to pay fee for the prejudice caused.

There’s a big difference between european and asian culture. The first is a lot about freedom (artist love life is his privacy) but asian point of view is about responsability. Japanese are often serious in their work (sometimes they die from it). Even though you have the freedom to come with T-shirt and jeans, you have the responsability to look decent for an interview, which means wearing a suit. Otherwise we don’t take you seriously. In entertainment, you shouldn’t behave in a way that would be a threat to your company or group image. But this rule can’t be applied to everyone because each person has a different situation.

Let’s take the example of Watanabe Mayu. She became very popular, very fast, in a young age. Not only we can assume she didn’t have a lot of free time, but having a relationship exposed would have create an uproar on tabloid. She was very serious about her image because she was aware an incident would break her momemtum. On the other hand, when you’re unknown, like a KKS, it hasn’t the same impact at all, and you have much more free time than a popular member. (and probably the reason why Sasshi’s scandal was exposed only when she became popular).

The problem with micchan scandal, is that not only she was a popular member, but also the captain of a team. What foreigners don’t know, is that in japanese culture, people often shave their head after admitting being in the wrong. Micchan obviously shaved her head on her own will. But foreign newspaper, with little care of details, implied it was a sanction done by management (the video was published on AKB official youtube channel after all). The malicious gossip spread and it was a huge blow to idol entertainment. It doesn’t matter what was the real reason, and the damage was done.

“Shunkan bunshun is often involved in many scandals related to idols”

In fact, it isn’t really about the fan behavior toward her idol that define the existence of the love ban rule. In the case of Kashiwagi Yuki scandal with NEWS’s Tegoshi, it was up to her fanbase to decide if they keep following her or not. In the case of Matsumura Sayuri scandal (above), it turned out more bitter because Nogizaka has a strong image of elegant, calm idols compared to the 48group. Image is not only related to fan, as big companies (a potential source of revenue for popular idol group), won’t choose girls who are involved in a negative image to endorse their products. It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not, it’s how those scandal divert from the expected result. Do you remember when Kouhaku utagassen chose HKT instead of Nogizaka in 2014? We will never know, but it’s possible that Nogi appearance was cancelled because of this negative coverage.

Why is management not willing to make a decision, always being ambiguous about it? Because both choice have a negative impact. If you make the love ban rule official, you are seen as a bad company who suppress a girl basic right, and if you officially allow the girls to date, there’s no turning back, and fan’s reaction is unsure. The best alternative is “not to get caught” or “adapt to the situation” rule. In Yukirin’s case, management decided to let it through, because she was too important to the group. Same with Sasshi. We can’t say the same for Murashige Anna, who got almost perma-ban from HKT senbatsu, or Owada Nana and Nishino Miki who soon graduated after being seen at 2AM in a game court with some ex Johnny’s (again).

The love ban rule can be seen as something not coming from fans to their idol, but a rule of self discipline (coming from within), like how you are committed to your work. When you date someone perfectly aware of a bad coverage, you’re taking a risk. This self discipline increase as you became popular. When someone try to get best of both worlds, it can be seen as recklessness toward your job. After all, Kikuchi Ayaka or Komori Mika graduated AKB to get married. When someone get outside of the idol field, fans are much more keen to be happy for their idol happiness. Because they are past their idol phase. Jurina once said “i will date after being an idol. But for the moment, i want to focus on my work”.

“Yukirin votes dropped up to 70 000 votes for the 8th Sousenkyo. Note that 7th Sousenkyo was her fanbase last push to put her 1th, with a 60k increase too ”

To the question if the love ban rule is something fair or unfair, it’s hard to decide because feelings are involved with it. I personally hadn’t my oshimen being involved in a scandal, so i don’t know how i would react. However, what i believe is, for japanese, that the renai kinshi jourei is a self inflicted rule. It just depends on how serious you are toward the job of idol. If you don’t accept to have your love life put on hold, just don’t be an idol. It’s even more true that an idol not only care for her image, but is also responsible for the group image. When people quote Sasshi’s case that scandal doesn’t influence the popularity of a member, keep in mind that it happened when she was a KKS, barely being an extra in Everyday Kachuusa MV. Taking such a risk to date someone when she’s 4th in sousenkyo, her answer would have been completely different.

My humble opinion : If my oshimen was caught in a scandal, i would probably be disappointed. Not because i thought of her as pure and innocent (let’s be real, women also have libido, and love is something wonderful), but because she’s taking a risk to damage her or the group reputation. She’s aware of the damage, and she took it anyway. To be responsible, is a form of respect.

In the future, we probably will see a change of mindset, with a more accepting industry toward idols. Because, there’s no proper definition of an idol.

#AKB48 #Nogizaka46 #idols #scandal #kashiwagi yuki #watanabe mayu #love ban rule #renai kinshi jourei

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seonghwa-things · 5 years

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The Korean Wave: A Developing Relationship Between Korean and Western Music

This paper aims to explore the music of the Korean Wave, or Hallyu. Hallyu, which directly translates to “flow of Korea”, is a term for the rise in popularity of South Korean culture on a global scale.. The Korean music industry was greatly influenced by the American industry, and this can be seen clearly in their style of music, clothing, and videos. Over the course of 30 years, a large increase in students wanting to become entertainers can be seen, much of this was due to the fact that the industry had grown, making this profession more accepted.. Now, in 2018, the industry is large enough that idol groups, such as BTS, are bringing their music back to the American industry. Many companies in South Korea are creating larger groups, that include different ethnicities, further spreading their culture by bringing in fans from other countries. The increase in popularity can be seen statistically across YouTube, Gaon, and other platforms.

The Korean Wave, better known to some as the Hallyu, is the term used to describe the rising popularity of South Korean culture globally. The term “Hallyu” was first used in China, in 1998, to describe the sudden craze for Korean cultural products from Chinese youth (Kim 2014). Now this is seen through things such as k-dramas (television shows), k-movies, and k-pop. K-pop is the industry which has taken off the most. It has been influenced by the American industry, shown both within their music and their styles. Because of the growing popularity of k-pop, it has become a more welcome occupation in Korea. The amount of fans has increased worldwide, giving k-pop the ability to enter the American industry, and for international members to join groups.

The American industry has had a huge effect on k-pop. During the Korean War, Americans and Koreans had a fairly close relationship. The American troop stationed in Korea - USAMGIK - brought a radio channel called AFKN. The channel’s original intent was to inform American’s of Korean culture, yet instead seemed to do the opposite. Koreans became increasingly interested in the style of American music, and starting including it within concerts. Korean artists had to learn American songs and dances to perform for the soldiers. As the USAMGIK started leaving for the Vietnam War, the artists who once performed at these camps had to integrate these American elements with a Korean style to gain a more domestic audience. In the 1980’s and 1990’s, genres like hip-hop, pop and ballad became prevalent in the Korean industry - to the point that artists like Seo Taiji starting including rap and rock styles into their own hits (Stephen 2018).

This type of influence can still be seen heavily today. After the popularity of the Latin-American song “Despacito” by Luis Fonsi, the style seemed to reappear again a few months later in Korea. Songs like “Lo Siento” by Super Junior featuring Leslie Grace, “Senorita” by VAV, and ��O Sole Mio” by SF9 became popular hits, all featuring Spanish lyrics, and a strong Latin guitar line (Herman 2018). As we see Charlie Puth rise in the American industry, we see males in the k-pop industry wanting to mimic his falsetto sound. Singers like Jungkook and Jimin of BTS have covered his songs, and groups such as NCT are showing males doing falsetto much more often (e.g. The 7th Sense or Simon Says). Jungkook even got a chance to perform a duet with Charlie Puth at the 2018 MGA, before BTS performed their hit “Fake Love”, with Puth singing the chorus (TWOWAIISHU 2018).

With this increase in popularity, the acceptability of being a performer has also improved. Statistics taken from elementary school students in 1981 showed that students didn’t even toy with the idea of being performs. When the survey was retaken in 1999, the amount of students that wanted to be entertainers was up to 9%. This study was done again in 2012, and the statistic had again grown - up to 38.8%. The main cause of this growth is “what some researchers call “cosmopolitan striving” or“han/melancholia””. Koreans tend to see Western success to have more social legitimacy. With the rise in popularity of k-pop, some of their own success has become legitimised, therefore making being an idol, or entertainer, more acceptable (Oh and Lee 2013, 115).

As the entertainment industry grows, so does the fanbase. The k-pop industry is giving fans many bands and groups to choose from, and very rarely is a fan part of just one fandom. Groups that don’t gain as much recognition in Korea are greatly recognized in Brazil, Japan and Europe. Countries like Austria don’t have as large of a fanbase, but the fans are still just as supportive. As stated in Song’s essay, “ German and Austrian people are very conservative, and they have a very strong pride in their own things.” This explains why in some countries, the fanbase grows slower. Many countries, including the United States take pride in their own industries, and aren’t always willing to open up to new things — especially in the older generations. Since “Gangnam Style” by PSY has gotten popular, the amount of k-pop fans in Austria has increased. And has been growing slowly, but steadily in the past years (Song 2013, 93-94).

K-pop’s popularity has recently increased significantly in the United States. Groups such as NCT and BTS have attended the AMAs in the last two years (Jin 2017, 1). Both groups, plus others like K.A.R.D, and Monsta X, have also released songs that are mostly in English within the past year to try and attract more attention from their American fans. While these hits have gotten quite popular, they aren’t the first to do so. Groups like Girls’ Generations, also known as SNSD, had their hit “The Boys” released in both English and Korean back in 2011, and were even on Good Morning America — which was easily accessible to them as several members are from America. The Korean wave has been growing stronger and stronger over the years. CL, an idol formally from the group 2NE1, released multiple English songs with her group, such as “Can’t Nobody”. More recently, she has released her own song “Lifted” which is fully in English, and has worked with the group Black Eyed Peas to release the song “Dopeness” (SBS 2018).

Many Korean artists now tour North America, hitting big cities in both the United States and Canada. BTS had a world tour this year, going to America, Canada, and Europe. The tour was received so well that they are already planning another, perhaps even larger tour in 2019 (Vivid Seats 2018). Groups such as Monsta X and GOT7 have become regular guests for big events, such as KCON, which has been held in both LA and New York over the last few years (KCONUSA 2018). NCT, GOT7 and Day6 have plans to further their promotions in America, as they have members coming from the country.

While these groups may be sharing their music internationally, some of them are actually quite diverse within their groups. NCT, an eighteen — and soon to be twenty-one — member group under SM Entertainment, has male idols from all around the world. NCT stands for Neo Culture Technology, and the group’s concept is to have an unlimited amount of members. The group includes nine Korean born members (Taeyong, Taeil, Jisung, Jeno, Jaemin, Haechan, Jaehyun, Doyoung, Jungwoo), one American (Johnny), one Canadian (Mark), one Japanese (Yuta), seven Chinese (WinWin, Xiao Jun, Hendery, Renjun, Chenle, Kun, Lucas), one German (YangYang), and one Thai (Ten). NCT is split into many sub-units, to save them from the struggle of performing with so many people on stage. As of right now, they have 4 units, and a fifth one, NCT Vision — the Chinese members — will be debuting by the end of 2018. SM’s CEO, Lee Soo Man, has stated that he has plans to create a new unit, currently called NCT Vietnam. There have also been recent rumours of debuting a female unit within NCT (kprofiles 2018).

Many other idol groups are diverse as well, though most times with a smaller amount of people. RaNia, a female idol group under DR Music had Chinese (Ttabo,Yijo) , Thai (Namfon, Joy), and African American (Alex) members, and GOT7, a male idol group, under JYP Entertainment has Chinese (Jackson), Thai (BamBam), and American (Mark) members. Not only is the diversity being seen in idol groups, but also within Korean bands. Day6 includes American (Jae) and Canadian (Young K) members, and W24’s lead singer is from Chile (Howon). This diversity is only able to happen because of how widespread k-pop has become. Many young fans dream of becoming idols, and sometimes an audition pulls through. (kprofiles 2018).

The diversity may seem great, but it must be done with care. EXP Edition, an all male, non-Korean group under IMMABB (I’m Making a Boy Band) has been met with malicious and hateful comments globally. The fact that they are mostly of caucasian descent isn’t the problem; many fans love the diversity. The problem is that this group has not gone through the years upon years of training that most idols have had to go through. For example, Johnny from NCT was in training for nine years before he could finally debut in 2016; he had been training since he was ten years old. Most of the anger about EXP Edition was that they spent no time training whatsoever. They wouldn’t have necessarily had to have started as young as idols like Johnny, but the training is necessary to compete in such an industry. A three member female group from Japan, Honey Popcorn, made their debut as k-pop idols in March of 2018. While none of the members in this group are Korean, they were received better, as they had gone through similar training to what k-pop idols would in Japan. It is understandable that with the spread of k-pop, there will be more people who want to become idols. To be successful in the industry however, you must go through the same training and struggles that other artists do (Blessedkpop 2018).

The Korean music industry has grown in America, reeling in many international artists. Due to this k-pop is becoming a bigger topic at households in Korea, and due to the fact that being an idol is more generally accepted as an occupation. Korean idol groups will be continuously touring North America, and likely releasing even more English tracks. The Korean Wave has certainly taken off, and it doesn’t look like it will be stopping anytime soon.

“15 Amazing English-Language K-Pop Songs.” 2018. SBS News. SBS News. May 22. https://www.sbs.com.au/popasia/blog/2018/05/22/15-amazing-english-language-k-pop-songs.

“2019 Concert Tours: Predicting the Top 2019 Tours.” 2018. Vivid Seats. Accessed December 1. https://www.vividseats.com/blog/2019-concert-tours-predictions.

Blessedkpop. 2018. “Honey Popcorn Expresses Gratitude And Discusses Divided Opinions About Their Debut.” Soompi. Soompi. March 21. https://www.soompi.com/article/1143605wpp/honey-popcorn-expresses-gratitude-discusses-divided-opinions-debut.

Herman, Tamar. 2018. “K-Pop Turns Toward Latin American Market With Collaborations And Tours.” Forbes. Forbes Magazine. June 1. https://www.forbes.com/sites/tamarherman/2018/05/31/k-pop-turns-towards-latin-amerian-market-with-collaborations-tours/#1d519513960d.

Jin, Dal Yong. An Analysis of the Korean Wave as Transnational Popular Culture: North American Youth Engage Through Social Media as TV Becomes Obsolete. Simon Fraser University. 2018.

“KCON USA OFFICIAL SITE.” 2018. KCON USA OFFICIAL SITE. Accessed December 1. http://www.kconusa.com/.

Kim, Youna. 2014. “The Korean Wave (Hallyu).” Accessed October 28, 2018.http://seaa.americananthro.org/2014/07/the-korean-wave-hallyu/

“Kpop Band Member Profiles and Korean Celebrity Profiles.” 2018. Kpop Profiles. Accessed November 28. https://kprofiles.com/.

Oh, Ingyu and Lee, Hyojung. K-pop in Korea: How the Pop Music Industry Is Changing a Post-Developmental Society. University of Hawai’i Press. 2014.

Stephen. 2018. “American Music Influence on Kpop in the Past and the Present.” Accessed December 1 https://blogs.ubc.ca/asia327girlsgen/2018/10/01/american-music-influence-on-kpop-in-the-past-and-the-present/.

Sung, Sang-Yeon. K-pop Reception and Participatory Fan Culture in Austria. University of Vienna Press. 2013.

TWOWAIISHU. 2018. “Charlie Puth, Jungkook, BTS Perform ‘See You Again’, ‘We Don’t Talk Anymore’, ‘FAKE LOVE’ @ 2018 MGA.” YouTube. YouTube. November 6. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pTA0260QKs.

#kpop #anthropology #term paper #my writing

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