etho saying to grian "i think im gonna let you guys succeed this cause... it's you and cleo". even out of their presence, he defended them, insisted that his death wasn't grian's fault, told the other's pointblank he wouldn't kill cleo or grian.

he covered for both of them several times over, not only to his own detriment, but to the detriment of the entire server. because of etho, everyone failed. he would choose his teammates over anyone and anything, even the good of the many, even himself

I finally got around to watching the Dragon Age - An Entire Series Retrospective and Analysis video on youtube, and i was enjoying it up until the point of origins companions being introduced and hearing "Zevran, the bisexual assassin, whose main personality traits are that he's bisexual and an assassin."

I would really love for the rdr community as a whole to stop trying, (and failing), to defend Dutch, and shift the blame entirely onto Micah. Red Dead Redemption and Red Dead Redemption II are both beautiful and well thought out games both in the gameplay and the storytelling. But I think a lot of people simply ignore those things, hence my long rant of a post.

TLDR: I think Micah was intentionally written to be one dimensional, and Dutch was manipulative from the start. Arthur is just a unreliable narrator.

We play through Arthur's eyes and see/believe what he does. We can see Arthur's loyalty blinds him (and by extension, us) to Dutch's behavior. I would know peace if some folks to took a media literacy class. Red Dead one & two are shining example of the bias in an unreliable narrator. Video games are not exempt from literary tools because you control part of the story. That control is limited to the actions of your bias protagonist, in this case John and Arthur.

The same applies to Micah. Arthur never trusts Micah from day one, and so we as the player don’t trust him either. It would be incredibly lazy on Rockstar’s behalf to created as one dimensional of a character as Micah. But the thing is, Arthur views him that way, a no good money-hungry thief from the start. Arthur is able to see through him, but he is blind to Dutch’s similar behavior because of his loyalty. It’s an incredibly smart tool to use in video games. Once you replay the game without the blinders on of your first playthrough, you’re able to see that Dutch has behaved the very same ways from Chapter One, all the way through Chapter Six. The only difference is that Arthur (and we the player) is slowly becoming aware of the patterns for the first time.

Now, for the blatant mischaracterization of Dutch entirely. To blame everything on Micah diminishes Dutch’s character to such an extent it completely disregards the decades long manipulation he inflicted on the gang, that is very real and very obvious. I won’t get into the way each individual character’s behavior was effected by this, but I will speak about Arthur and John briefly.

Dutch takes in people that are vulnerable and that he knows he can manipulate for his own gain. Children included. Multiple children, in fact. He always has a plan, not to keep folks safe, but to keep everyone comfortably under his thumb. It was always, "Are you with me, or against me" from the beginning. Everyone was either a means to his end, or they were worthless. The second someone did not agree, it was a betrayal, and an attack. I don't doubt he did some things out of kindness, but there's always ulterior motives. Dutch is nothing but a man of pretty words that hide his manipulation.

Dutch maintains an air of grandiosity amongst the gang. He obviously holds the belief that he is above them in all ways. He believes he is their leader because he is simply better than the rest of them. He’s smarter. He’s this god-like figure in his mind. He’s their savior. Hence his distaste for any doubt, or even being challenged.

Lenny and the conversation he has with Dutch about Evelyn Miller for example. Lenny indirectly call’s Dutch’s empty words out and points out that both Miller (Dutch’s idol) and Dutch himself hide behind their flowery words and phrases. Or Arthur and Hosea voicing their concern about robbing Leviticus Cornwall, it’s seen as a betrayal. Or when Uncle pokes fun at Dutch in camp and Dutch says to him, “I would really like to kill you right now.” Dutch may not be entirely self aware, but any attack at him does dig at him for a reason. And this is all from chapter two! There has always been a pattern.

Dutch says he "saved" them. He saved Bill, and John, and Arthur and Lenny and Javier. He saved all of them, and he is above all of them. Dutch sees people as nothing more as tools to meet his goals. There are instances where he does seem to genuinely care, but the ulterior motive is always there.

Dutch and Micah were written with the idea that we see the story through Arthur’s eyes. Arthur is blinded by his decades long to loyalty to Dutch and slowly coming to the realization of the truth. Micah is incredibly one dimensional cause Arthur sees through him and views him as a rat from the start. The truth of the story can be seen through repeated playthroughs. Dutch’s paranoia from the start, questioning Arthur’s loyalty from Colter. Micah sniffing around about the Blackwater money from the beginning. Arthur’s journal entries about the his biased version of the truth. Media literacy is necessary even in video games. God.

Do you think Belos is not as complex as his fans makes him out to be?

I don’t think it’s a case of more or less complex, it’s that a lot of Belos stans mischaracterize him to the point they make him a different character. The stans ironically completely erase what makes Belos, Belos.

The “Belos” a lot of Belos stans present is the guise he wears to manipulate others and himself, hiding his actual character and nature beneath.

Belos is one of my favorite villains, because he manages to be a truly reprehensible villain with no redemption in sight, while also having a lot of layers to his psychology. He’s a villain whose thought process/general psychology I find fascinating to think about, as I think it’s quite well-written and reflective of people like him in real life.

There’s this perception that in order to be interesting, a villain has to be sympathetic or redeemable in some capacity.

It’s popular to give villains sympathetic motives or backstory, and even redeem them, to avoid the simplistic “I’m doing evil things because I’m evil” type.

And this type of villain can absolutely work, it’s just not necessary for every story, or for a good villain. You can have a complex, layered villain whose psychology is fascinating to think about, without them actually being sympathetic in any way.

Belos doesn’t think “I’m doing evil things because I’m evil.” He justifies himself with a twisted line of thought built around his own selfishness, insecurities, immaturity, and possessiveness, as well as the Puritan ideology he embraced.

A big part of his character is that he warps reality in his own mind to suit his needs. That’s why his mindscape is literally layered, with the beautiful, heroic paintings at the start hiding the true, ugly memories. He isn’t just lying to other people; he’s lying to himself. He’s so caught up in his own delusions and persecution complex, he’s lost sight of reality and starts to be confused by his own lies, built into the very structure of his mind.

The show makes it clear how his view of the world, that he is an oppressed victim, is delusion. It shows Caleb embracing his brother warmly in the Boiling Isles, despite the aggression he displays. It shows people were friendly and trusting during the time period he arrived, and only lashed out at him once he began to kill and oppress, like the demons avenging their brother Blue Fang. His fake child disguise used to manipulate Luz is shed to reveal the true sinister man underneath as his real inner self.

His misery is of his own making. He killed Caleb, he refused to change. Even after four hundred years, he refuses to do anything but whine about what witches and demons took from him, despite the fact he was always the aggressor.

Belos’s story is the story of a man driven by an extreme selfishness, a desire for coddling and protection, to have everything revolve around him and his needs, at the same time as he claims to want to purge the sins of others for being selfish and evil. A man who is so caught up in his layers of lies and manipulation, he himself loses sight of what he believes, and eventually descends into crawling, whining slime. It’s a pathetic end that is his own fault.

But Belos stans want to ignore the story being told in favor of believing the simple narrative he presents at face value - that he was a mistreated kid whose brother abandoned him to cruelty and persecution on the Boiling Isles. They take the story to be a simple “tragic orphan was wronged and now he’s bitter” instead of an exploration of the psychology of this kind of truly reprehensible human being, who absolutely does exist.

The thing they portray is fine for a character story, but it’s not Belos. It’s so blatantly missing the entire point of his character, that they might as well just create an oc.

We have to shed this idea that a complex villain means a sympathetic one. You can have a rich, layered character who has basically always been a piece of shit, and remains so. Sometimes those are the best villains out there, depending on the themes of the story.

So no, Belos isn’t less complex than they make him out to be. He’s just a different character entirely.

Very rarely do I see people ship Fern and Huntress Wizard but when I do I can’t help but feel like they have a fundamental misunderstanding of both Huntress Wizard and Fern’s nature. Like on the surface it’s “haha!!! Plant boy and plant girl!!!! Huntress Wizard likes Finn and Fern is Finn but a plant so they’re perfect for each other!!!!” which just like, completely ignores everything core to Fern’s existence and Huntress Wizard’s complicated feelings toward love.

Fern is just more than just “Finn but plant”. He is LITERALLY Finn, but tainted with a curse. He is built out of fucked up evil twisted magic. Fern spends his entire existence finding his own identity and trying to reconcile Finn’s natural desire to do good with the corrupting nature of the grass curse. Fern’s struggle is internal, and he don’t have the emotional capacity for romance until he sorts his own shit out (which unfortunately due to the curse, he’ll never be able to do).

There's also the matter of the huge gap in emotional maturity between Finn and Fern. The Finn inside the Finnsword missed key moments of emotional development that our Finn experienced from season 6 to 8. Fern wasn't molded by key experiences like The Visitor, Crossover, Hall of Egress, Flute Spell, Don't Look, or The Music Hole. In particular, the massive emotional growth Finn underwent in Flute Spell is what allowed him to start a functional relationship with Huntress Wizard, and Fern lacks that growth. Fern is essentially a version of Finn stuck in season 6, and lacks the emotional intelligence to properly handle a relationship with anyone, let alone somebody as emotionally sensitive as Huntress Wizard.

But enough about Fern. I’m not a Fern expert, and this is only my B-rate interpretation of his character. The REAL egregious mischaracterizations of a Fern x Huntress Wizard ship lay in people just not understanding Huntress Wizard properly. For starters, you have to understand that both Fern and Huntress Wizard are two very magical beings, but their magics come from different sources. Huntress Wizard is a wizard (surprising, I know) and Fern is a CURSE. Fern is an unnatural, malicious magical force. Huntress Wizard would be off-put by Fern’s existence because he is a perversion of the natural world that she ties herself deeply to. Huntress Wizard assumes the role of a sort of “keeper of nature” in the forests of Ooo (as seen in her quest to slay the Grumbo for being invasive in The Wild Hunt), and Fern is a disruption to that natural order. A relationship between the two would never work because Huntress Wizard would be uncomfortable with Fern’s very existence.

There’s also the matter of why Huntress Wizard is attracted to Finn, and how Fern lacks many of the qualities Huntress Wizard likes Finn for. For starters, there’s the matter of emotional development I talked about before. Finn is extremely well-put together during the time he spends with Huntress Wizard in Flute Spell, and it’s easy to see how deeply he respects Huntress Wizard and her objectives. Finn isn’t determined to help Huntress Wizard with her mission to talk to the Spirit of the Forest out of a blind infatuation for her, but out of his natural drive to help people. Finn is very in-tune with his emotions (and can handle rejection like a champ), and Huntress Wizard can see that in him. This emotional in-tuneness is part of why Huntress Wizard so deeply respects Finn. Huntress Wizard seems to value her ability to stay true to her feelings (which even she struggles with; see my Flute Spell megareview for more) is drawn to his honesty and selflessness. Unfortunately for Fern, whether it is because of his lack of emotional development or because of his curse, cannot handle all his conflicting feelings inside him and doesn’t have the same kind of emotional stability that Huntress Wizard is attracted to Finn for.

I could go on and on and list even more reasons to why Fern x Huntress Wizard wouldn’t work, but those stray further into the “headcanon-ey”school of thought and I’m trying to be more objective with my character analysis as possible. I know being complexly objective is impossible and you have to leave a little room for individual interpretation but overall the entire ship is built on a very flimsy basis of “what if the two plant people liked eachother” and that’s it. There’s way more to these characters that make them special, and reducing them to just their visual similarities does a disservice to their character depth and creative potential.

the thing that i think trips a lot of people up about silver and makes them wildly mischaracterize him is that they mistake his traits of childishness and social ineptitude for innocence. people only accept the good parts of these traits and completely ignore the just as if not more present negatives (like as an example people using his lack of social skills only to make him clueless in a cutesy way, completely ignoring how it often makes him act incredibly rude). silvers childishness and social ineptitude make him very brash, single-minded and aggressive. he isnt actually all that nice, which contrasts how kind he is and how he always puts others over himself. this is what makes him an interesting character. if you only show the good parts of silver it completely removes what makes him compelling.

have you ever noticed how part of c!jack’s character is he is obscure and nobody really knows him and how in the fandom he is also obscure and nobody really knows him

Jack Manifold was never really given the time of day. Sure, he had a small part in the server (ultimately the one who ended the whole thing), but his presence was not respected all that much. Placed into the lowest rank of L’Manberg’s cabinet, killed by Wilbur Soot for ‘not being seen’. He never got a REAL apology for that, by the way. I will stand by the fact that Wilbit’s apology to Jack was manipulative, half-assed, and more for himself than Jack’s wellbeing. It was well before the ‘Apology arc’ and THAT IN OF ITSELF shows just how little it actually meant to Wilbur. He was just doing it to make himself feel better and didn’t actually have Jack’s feelings in mind.

The biggest thing I see going around is Tommy being excused for what he did to Jack. Killing him when Jack went to visit him in the Nether during his Exile. Tommy has trauma. We all know that. He was a victim to extreme manipulation and abuse and a slew of other things. Yet he blatantly ignores every attempt, denies and/or doesn’t fully grasp that he did what he did. Which I can understand because the dude went through severe trauma, but that’s not an excuse. He still needs to take the accountability for his actions.

Jack deserves so much more than he’s ever gotten and it SHOWS. He literally wants friends. That’s it. He wants friend and companionship and he wants what he THOUGHT he had. Because he never actually had it. If he had it Wilbur wouldn’t have killed him, Tommy would actually listen, and he would be shown an ounce of respect for his own traumas and hardships when he tries to talk about it all. All everyone does is dismiss, downplay, and invalidate c!Jack’s pain. That’s a big reason why he’s the way he is! Every other attempt to let himself express his issues ends in him feeling worse about himself.

And we’ve seen time and time again that everyone else Jack tries to talk to and vent to takes Tommy’s side! (Ex: Puffy) There’s bias that Tommy can do no wrong and is the ‘savior’ of the smp. But even if he’s the ‘main protagonist’ doesn’t diminish he causes pain.

They give the excuse that Tommy was a child, that children should be protected and yada yada. Jack was more-or-less a child when he first joined, too! He should have the same excuses, the same treatment as all the other kids on the smp but he doesn’t because he was left alone and had to grow up faster.

He didn’t have anyone to lean against, so he just never let himself fall. And when he inevitably did no one cared or batted an eye because no one was there. He died 3 times and no one batted an eye.

The fandom is so bias sometimes. I’m not huge on DAMP fanfics that involve Jack because they mischaracterize him so much. Put him as a bully in School AUs, make him mean and rude for no reason. The reason in canon is because no one gave a single fuck about him. (not including Niki) Jack had a reason for being ‘cruel’, no one else did. It comes with the fact that Jack’s POV just isn’t as watched, so people don’t know his side of things. But what bothers me is that it feels like fans don’t even try to see stuff from his point of view. He was abused, manipulated, killed, and used in his own right. If everyone else gets excuses for the shit they did, he deserves it too.

Below is how I interpreted Jack’s ending, and how, despite everything he’s gone through, his character gets some sort of ending that isn’t completely angsty. I acknowledge that Jack isn’t the morally-perfect character, that he was fueled by anger and rage. He had a slight victim complex. But from a more basic pov, and for the fans who don’t really understand his character, I think he was redemptive. In his own right.

REDEMPTION:

From its literal definition Redemption is “An act of redeeming or atoning for a fault or mistake, or the state of being redeemed. deliverance; rescue.” The state of being redeemed comes in many shapes and sizes. Actions and words big and small. For some it may take great showings of purpose and selflessness. For others it can be as simple as “I’m sorry.”

Someone can go their whole entire lives fighting with something they ultimately in the end agree with. A lot of it is a matter of perspective. Jack only had one perspective.

Jack was alone for most of his life on the dsmp. Yes he had friends in the beginning but wars and betrayal had him distancing himself and trying to find ways to fix it. None ever worked. Because he was alone. When you only work with one perspective you don’t understand the other side, and how it might actually clear things up and switch your own views.

It only took Jack a matter of minutes after arguing with Tubbo for him to realize he didn’t have the whole picture. Someone so close to Tommy, someone who WAS there to see the other side of things. Someone Jack trusts and respects, who’d he call a friend, to listen and then fight him on his thoughts even if it was in the form of an argument. Though he fucked up and killed everyone, I think his actions of still attempting to save Tommy with Tubbo have given him a bit of redemption. Not all, everyone has faults. But he was on the path to healing when he died. If only for a few minutes.

Jack died by his own hands trying to right his wrong. If that’s not a symbolic Jack ending I don’t really know what is.

Hai I'm sorry for the random ask immediately after the follow, but your "stannarrator anti" post speaks to me on such a level and I just wanted to say that I 100% agree.

As much as I love seeing different Narry interpretations, the consistent yoaification of this guy from people in the fandom who also HORRIBLY mischaracterize him is REALLY starting get my nuts in a twist.

I don't think anyone characterizes him perfectly. Narry's a pretty complex character to begin with. Not fully understanding his motivations is what makes him so interesting. But seeing people either make him an overly loving, devoted partner who would never hurt his precious Stanly uwu, or the most fucking evil, horrible, tyrannical man in existence who just straight up wants to abuse Stanley, kinda makes me think some of these people haven't actually played the game. Either that, or they COMPLETELY misinterpreted MANY aspects of it.

I'm obviously not the authority on Narrator characterizations, but I don't think some people who ship stannarrator realize just how unbearable the ship can become when Narrator, Stanley, or both of them are just like...awful in some way, you know? Like if you're gonna make them wildly OOC, the least you can do is make an AU or just straight up make your own OCs.

NO LITERALLY THIS. the fandom will mischaracterize the shit out of both stanley and the narrator in order to ship them and ignore every single other aspect of the game. you tell these people there are characters other than stanley and the narrator and a lot of the time they either don't know or simply don't care.

the fandom feels like a big game of telephone entirely separate from the source material. a lot of individuals seem like they've never even touched the base game, or even watched part of a playthrough. now, don't get me wrong, of course there's going to be SOME deviation from canon in the fandom because of concepts such as gijinkas; the narrator would likely never physically show himself because he's... the narrator. he's not meant to be a physical, visual asset. but that fandomization is mostly harmless and pales in comparison to the things people in the fandom are doing to deviate from his personality as a whole. the fact that people will just take one or two endings and bloat that aspect of him, i.e. seeing the countdown ending and making him into a cunning, tyrannical, heartless villain when that is not what he is. the narrator's entire personality is dependent on what you, as the player, do with him. he isn't innocent, but he's not entirely against you.

and as for the other side of it all, people will woobify both stanley and narrator so much, completely ignoring the fact that they are literally out to get eachother while being so, SO dependent on eachother. stanley and narrator don't HATE eachother, not at all; they're just constantly struggling between a power imbalance- the scales are tipping on either ones' favours constantly. there is instability, there are times in which the scales tip. that doesn't mean incompatibility or even ABUSE (don't even get me started on abuse ships, that's a whole other aspect of mischaracterization), but it certainly does mean that the ship isn't entirely sunshine and rainbows with nothing wrong. by all means have your AUs, but don't let those views overtake the actual game. stanley is also horrendously mischaracterized. he DOES have a personality within the game- granted, that's also influenced by the player, but that doesn't make him into a woobified "soft uwu boyfriend" for the narrator. a lot of the time he disobeys him- that's most of the premise of the game. stanley's existence isn't to be the narrator's boyfriend and i sincerely wish the fandom would realise that

what would you say are the traits to keep in mind for preventing mischaracterization of Yuma?

It's worth clarifying before I go into this that these are traits I personally look out for whenever I plan to write for Yuma. This isn't a targeted critique at anyone else's interpretation of Yuma. Writers are free to write however they want for a character, and I just happen to stick closer to canon while still taking creative liberties with elements that I believe can be expanded upon. If anything, this is just a nice reminder for myself, while potentially giving advice to those looking for it. Anyways, I gotta actually answer the question!

I haven't written as much with Yuma as I've done for Vivia, Yakou, Yomi, and even Shinigami (I really need to write more for Hitman Zilch too augh). But I still like to have some things in mind just in case I ever decide to write for him. The main aspect of Yuma's characterization that I try not to slip up on is his amnesia! From what I've noticed, Yuma remembers what things are, but doesn't remember any experiences he has with those things. For example, he knows what detectives are, but he doesn't remember ever working as one, which extends over into all memories of the WDO. He knows what cooking is and remembers the basics of how to cook, but he can't remember any actual recipes that he's read, so he ends up making horrible food. In essence, it's like if a phone wasn't factory reset, but the photo album and downloaded apps were completely wiped, and only the basic apps automatically on the phone remain.

This next element isn't necessarily for Yuma specifically, but it's a very important part of his arc: don't forget Shinigami! She's here, she's there, she's everywhere! While she can turn invisible at will (as shown by chapter 0's aftermath), she's still chained to him throughout the entire game and loves to comment about almost everything going on around them. They tend to bicker in their shared thoughts, which is fun to capture when thinking about scenes for them. This is something that matters to me a lot since I'll be writing a lot of Shinigami for my Death Knight Yakou AU. I always want to keep in mind that Shinigami will most likely have something to say at anything that catches her eye, and whether Yuma (or Yakou in my case) ignores it, replies to it, or turns it into a full-on conversation depending on what's called for and if it'll add anything small to their characters or have some entertainment value.

Last but not least, Yuma isn't wholly innocent or exempt from indirectly killing culprits. Yuma actively decides to access the Mystery Labyrinths as a sort of self-defense mechanism. When he or his allies are at risk of being hurt or killed, he calls upon Shinigami, despite knowing that the culprits will be killed and that it won't ensure their safety. The only reason Yuma and his allies weren't killed in chapter 3 and 4 was because of good timing from others intervening. He may have killed in an act of self-defense and to better understand the conflict, but it doesn't mean he's clean of any blood on his hands, especially when he wanted to kill Icardi for the murder of Shachi. When he's angry, he's angry. He has shown that he can be enraged enough to want someone to die, so I like to have that stored in the back of my mind if ever I need to write for a wrathful Yuma that can and will choose violence if his back is to the wall and his allies are in danger.

i just want to comment on your post about the jjk fandom and just…. yes. like let’s be honest, yuta is NOT dating anyone! rika wouldn’t even let maki, inumaki, and panda get close at first, what makes people think he’s going to be able to have a relationship??? and gojo, i love my white haired silly man but he’s not this sex god that everyone sees him as. that man came out of the womb and the world was AGAINST HIM. ik this is about jjk but it just reminds me of when people see law or zoro as these mean dominant men. like they probably could but let’s be honest, you stare at zoro and he gets flustered!! like ugh i get that it’s fiction and everyone can paint a character how they want but when it’s so fucking far fetched i just can’t anymore. sorry for the rant, you can completely ignore this

no no

i agree with the first part tho i will say

I think yuta and maki are cute together whether they are canon or not jdksjskns

but as for the gojo thing he’d be canonically very good at sex because he perfects anything he tries but ik he isn’t a damn player and gets pussy a lot. I KNOW THAT MUCH

nOw as for law/zoro agree 1000000%. Law can’t flirt worth a damn n i will stand on that let alone be some kinda mean man to his girl same w zoro.

he got flustered over the smallest things….a literal himbo.

i feel like u can mischaracterize a character to an extent. i understand some ooc hc/fics but some are so bad i wish i could sue for defamation of character cuz wtf is that.

I ship zutara and call the people who ignore canon hate on aang/mai and insist katara is a MOM and zuko is DAD. Fantara shippers i didnt ship zutara just to ignore the whole rival part but a lot of these fantaras share do plus as a zuko fan the whole softening of his character angry traits kinda felt like ableism

Oh it is absolutely ableism. "Of course he can show signs of mental health issues! But only the ones we can romanticize and he has to magically be healed by hearing 'I love you' and getting a hug, otherwise he'd be a lunatic like his sister!"

I get extra annoyed at people using "Autistic Zuko" as a headcanon to infantilize him, because I'm autistic myself - and I know that just a decade ago, the one getting labelled as autistic would have been Azula so people could completely mischaracterize "low/lack of empathy", just like they use the diagnosis of schizophrenia, ASPD or narcissim to go "See? Azula can't ever be redeemed, she has the Evil Serial Killer Disorder(s)!"

people dont write wheatley mean enough, ive decided. like, he's an asshole. that's a huge part of his character. YES he is also pathetic and a fucking loser who i could drop kick.

that's why he's an asshole.

he's mean and self-centered and uncaring because that is how he has always been treated.

he frequently calls you brain dead, he throws out the idea of turning you in to GLaDOS' so he can live, he spends a full minute insulting children and calling manual laborers stupid - because that's how he's been treated. he was made to be stupid, he was abandoned by his creators because they didn't care, and then he's insulted time and time again by being called a moron when, if you actually look at the game from his perspective, he's the one who's did all the work!!

he has been kicked, insulted, almost killed and ignored his entire life no SHIT he's more than happy to turn those exact same actions onto other people without any sort of care for their feelings. no one's ever cared for his?? so why should he??

people either have him as a stammering uwu little baby who's either completely helpless or a creep or they make him super over confident when he's neither. yes, he stutters and yes there are times he's embarrassed but that's because he overthinks and has a hard time putting things into words. he is fucking terrifying, yes, but it's not because he's confident. it's because he's willing to do anything just to prove he can.

wheatley is so mischaracterized it hurts and it makes me so upset. this game has been out for ten years and i need my guy to be seen as the actual nuanced character he is.

20) part of canon you found tedious or boring

The crossover parts in the light novels... thog dont caare (minor bit of canon but I literally paid cash money to get it translated so... -_-U)

Also that one episode in the second season / later volumes that was basically a repeat. The one with Saiki being invisible while Teruhashi tries to find him. We've already scene this exact same sitch play out, there's no development to either their characters or relationship, everyone knows their deal at this point so it's not even funny.... The anime should've replaced this one with the YouTube episode SMH, 10000% more value.

21) part of canon you think is overhyped

Not necessarily overhyped but I personally would have never picked the domestic abuse chapters to be the first ones in the series hsfjdlshfks. Yeah it's funny but like. It's still domestic abuse. Let's save the terrible home life for when the audience is more invested yeah? Though I guess people also don't notice the domestic abuse as much since it's front-loaded maybe?? I would like to see some research on this sort of thing tbh!!

22) your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

All of the Aiura moments... She's always so so funny and sweet, and the way she and Saiki interact is wonderful, she's the person he's the most real around (Toritsuka doesn't count because he mostly gets Saiki's bad side for good reasons hsfjdlshfks).

When they work so well together at saving Yumehara's life despite being strangers... When Aiura shows so much kindness to Mera and is so determined to help her that Saiki ends up helping her even though he was originally against it... When Saiki saves Aiura from the gang and she still trusts him completely even though they'd fought and Saiki just did something violent, which most other people would consider monstrous... Her willingness to help out Saiki anytime, no questions asked, just because she cares about him... Their hilarious & effective co-performances against Imu and Yumehara (as Kaido)... When Aiura realizes "lucky feel" moments / her usual methods of seduction won't work and switches to just finding out when Saiki's free and hanging together eating dessert + talking... When Saiki clearly enjoys those dates so much that he immediately agrees to another in his tsundere way when she asks him... When Saiki chases her around for coffee jelly, so brain-empty and silly (see: my blog header)... Her faith that Saiki will fix things even when he has a death mark on him too... When Saiki trusts her with the fate of the world... When Saiki's clones carry her so closely when they could literally just levitate her completely physically apart and she never tries to cop a feel or get fresh... When she asks Saiki if he wants a kiss and respects his "no" but just has to share the physical comfort they both need in that moment...

And yet everyone always mischaracterizes her and cheapens her relationship with Saiki, especially when favoring another ship for him.

Or they think that she would be soooooo emo about it if Saiki rejected her. Hello?? She literally told him to fuck off because he tried to stop her from helping people, and did NOT look back or change her mind. Just because she's into bdsm doesn't mean she's going to compromise her morals for a dude, even if he's her soulmate. And she's clearly had no trouble pulling dudes before, so it's not like she'll be pining after him for long if he's being a dick.

On the other hand, she knows he's tsundere as fuck and that she'd have to play the long game with him, and she's clearly fine with it. She has confidence in her powers and has already seen how well they work & play together, so it's just a matter of time.

Anyways I get so so heated when people don't do my girl justice, as I'm sure you can tell hsfjdlshfks

Thanks for the ask @hillbilly---man 💜💜💜💜💜

I saw your opinions regarding Morningmark and I wanna ask, how do you feel about his Ship War Au and Starco Citadel stuff?

Personally, I never cared for it because of how starco biased they bother were. But I did like the concept of a fankid multiverse.

No opinion. Not really invested in any fankids, they always felt like cheap attempts at shipping fodder for me. (And not even good shipping fodder. Just blatantly shoving your OC into things and pretending it makes the story any better? Where's the themes? The status-quo breakage? How does it affect the world?)

Honestly, basically the only fankids I like are the Pines triplets (children of Mabel and an OC) from Gravity Falls' Transcendence AU, because they fit with the story's themes of growing older, and how Dipper will never be able to do that again. They are characters in their own right, but more than that they are excuses to see how the main characters deal with parenting, and where their flaws and weaknesses translate to actual parenting issues that make sense for them. Their personalities are mirrors to which we can understand the main characters better, and their arcs follow the story's themes. (And I was introduced to them when I was young and wasn't immediately turned off by years' worth of fankids just being fun mix-and-match OCs with no connection to the thematic part of the stories they came from. I do admit bias.)

I suspect JessTheVampire's fankids are similar, but I have untreated attention deficit problems and no free time, so I've never actually read her story.

But I did read the Citadel comics; it was impossible not to be active in the svtfoe fandom and not read them, after all. And they... were more of the same. The Citadel itself was far too sci-fi and had no connection to the story of the actual show, the main, non-fankid characters of svtfoe were non-entities, and the story was basically an excuse to dick around with characters the creator was clearly enamored with but that I didn't care about.

And the Ship War comics... *shudders* They somehow outdid the show for stupid shipping nonsense. I don't know how that's possible, but they did it. But even worse, they mischaracterized just about everyone, especially my fave, Toffee. I've gone over this already. I've talked about this already. But it still stings. Man.

I know fankids don't have to be that deep and it's completely fine if people ignore my thoughts on what makes a good fankid and just do what they want. But it's also perfectly fine for me to bitch about it.

Anyway, yeah, don't like fankids. Sorry.

(Also from now on I'll be tagging it #morning mark salt because I suspect his fans are looking him up and then seeing my posts and getting mad at them.)

PROPAGANDA

Tartagllia

He's a high-profile government agent who deals especially in debt collection. Carried out an elaborate scheme and betrayal to awaken an ancient water divinity which attempted to drown a harbor city, in order to force a god to come out of hiding so he could steal their power for the benefit of his god (in charge of the government) that he's devoted to. However, he has since befriended the protagonist and has helped them. He also loves his siblings fiercely and goes to extreme lengths to lie about his occupation to protect their innocence.

People either absolutely despise him or act like he did nothing wrong ever. Genshin has a lot of flanderization in the fandom, but Childe takes the top spot for it. Some people ignore the fact that he's aligned with the villains and sees himself as a killing machine. But some people also ignore the good--he cares very deeply for his family, and he even helps you a few times. And some people just mischaracterize him completely. Not many playable Genshin characters can be considered morally grey, but Childe is definitely one of them.

Sunny

There's a part of the fandom that will bend over backwards to try and remove Sunny's agency in any situation where he behaved questionably, usually pinning the blame on Basil. The whole game revolves around Sunny being morally grey and it drives me up the wall to see some people try so hard to take away his entire character arc.

In defense of 8-Ball

A lot of people in the BFDI community don’t really care for 8-Ball, and that leads to a lot of people mischaracterizing him. Because of this, I decided to make a mini essay ranting on several topics relating to him. This includes the following:

-Mischaracterization in the fandom

-His relationships with other characters

-His missed potential

With that said, let’s start with the first section!

Mischaracterization in the fandom

I can’t stress how much it infuriates me whenever I see a piece of content that portrays him as an asshole. 😭

I know it’s easy to see him like that, since he almost makes his team lose twice. But the thing is, he’s not as bad as people make him out to be. When both TB and GB died, there was pretty much no one else to lead the team to victory. 8-Ball, however, took initiative and became the “temporary” team leader. I honestly think it says a lot that he was willing enough to take on a role like that in a dire situation. Sure, you could say he was rude to ignore Grassy, but let’s be real, would YOU want to be led by the literal child of the group who does nothing besides say his name? (By this point at least that was all he did) And hey, he wasn’t THAT bad of a leader either. Yeah, he use TB’s contraption, but fair use I guess.

Also, it’s not like he was bullying Grassy, he was just more focused on the game. In fact, it’s actually GB who was bullying Grassy, but I don’t see many people hate on her for that? (This is not GB slander btw! I love her)

While yes, most of his dialogue boils down to, “I don’t have a favorite number” it’s important to note that it’s not his ENTIRE character. He’s smart when he needs to be, as shown when he used TB’s contraption in an admittedly smarter way than GB. Plus, he genuinely cares about his team. Even though it doesn’t seem like it, you have to remember that he went (with Blocky) to Four to ask him to bring back GB and TB. If he didn’t care about them, he probably would’ve held off from it and just continued to lead the team himself until they inevitably came back.

I think the fact that 8-Ball’s whole reason for the team leader thing makes him seem so much better than how he’s normally perceived. He just wanted to lighten up the mood by making jokes, but he just took it too far by not realizing that it was actively harming their team dynamic. When he realized this, he apologized in an oddly genuine way to GB. The fact that he took accountability just goes to show that he’s a pretty decent guy who may or may not be autistic. /hj

His relationships with other characters

This is probably gonna be my favorite section lol. I absolutely love his banter with the others, especially with GB. Speaking of GB, let’s start with her!

8-Ball and GB’s little rivalry is honestly really fun to watch. The way they continuously fight for the attention of their team members, their small moments of bickering, it’s just so sjahjwzjhsjshsh

At first, GB hates him because in her eyes; he’s an asshole who tries to sabotage the team and steal her role as team leader. But when 8-Ball apologizes, she admits herself that he isn’t that bad of a guy/“a completely useless moronic dumb robot”.

After that, they don’t get many more interactions, which is unfortunate because they had such a fun dynamic! I would genuinely pay so much money just to see them have more one on one conversations. 8-Ball’s teasing + Golfball’s temper would’ve been a nice way to spice up the interactions of ABNTT. But alas, we can only dream. :(

I also wish that he got more interactions with the EXITors, since they have the feeling of a found family, so 8-Ball being included in that would be nice.

His Missed Potential

Sighhhhhh, this is the most annoying part of this whole thing: the missed potential of 8-Ball.

It bothers me that he was eliminated so early on in the series. Even though his “arc” was pretty much completed, there was still room for them to expand on him. Like I stated in the previous section, his interactions with GB could’ve served as nice comic relief, along with perhaps touching on his comedian side a little more? Maybe learning to crack jokes that fit the situation, and making sure that they don’t hurt people. ALSO! There could’ve also been more interactions between other characters besides GB and Basketball. Like maybe TB or Blocky? Hell, even Grassy. Oh yeah, and they could’ve also expanded on why he’s so adamant on convincing others he doesn’t have a favorite number. And maybe, just maybe, a little angst? Typing this all out is annoying because there was SO MUCH potential but they missed out on it. 💔

Conclusion

Ending off this small rant, I just hope in future TPOT episodes he gets more than one line per episode. (His only lines so far have literally been “Four’s back, let’s go!” and “Blah blah blah blah”) At the very least, I hope this short essay has made you like him a little more than before, or even like him more!