@ people who carry bags everywhere what do you put in them what is there to bring other than chapstick, keys, phone and maybe a tampon why are you packing a suitcase to be outside for 5 hours

I used to work for a trade book reviewer where I got paid to review people's books, and one of the rules of that review company is one that I think is just super useful to media analysis as a whole, and that is, we were told never to critique media for what it didn't do but only for what it did.

So, for instance, I couldn't say "this book didn't give its characters strong agency or goals". I instead had to say, "the characters in this book acted in ways that often felt misaligned with their characterization as if they were being pulled by the plot."

I think this is really important because a lot of "critiques" people give, if subverted to address what the book does instead of what it doesn't do, actually read pretty nonsensical. For instance, "none of the characters were unique" becomes "all of the characters read like other characters that exist in other media", which like... okay? That's not really a critique. It's just how fiction works. Or "none of the characters were likeable" becomes "all of the characters, at some point or another, did things that I found disagreeable or annoying" which is literally how every book works?

It also keeps you from holding a book to a standard it never sought to meet. "The world building in this book simply wasn't complex enough" becomes "The world building in this book was very simple", which, yes, good, that can actually be a good thing. Many books aspire to this. It's not actually a negative critique. Or "The stakes weren't very high and the climax didn't really offer any major plot twists or turns" becomes "The stakes were low and and the ending was quite predictable", which, if this is a cute romcom is exactly what I'm looking for.

Not to mention, I think this really helps to deconstruct a lot of the biases we carry into fiction. Characters not having strong agency isn't inherently bad. Characters who react to their surroundings can make a good story, so saying "the characters didn't have enough agency" is kind of weak, but when you flip it to say "the characters acted misaligned from their characterization" we can now see that the *real* problem here isn't that they lacked agency but that this lack of agency is inconsistent with the type of character that they are. a character this strong-willed *should* have more agency even if a weak-willed character might not.

So it's just a really simple way of framing the way I critique books that I think has really helped to show the difference between "this book is bad" and "this book didn't meet my personal preferences", but also, as someone talking about books, I think it helps give other people a clearer idea of what the book actually looks like so they can decide for themselves if it's worth their time.

Update: This is literally just a thought exercise to help you be more intentional with how you critique media. I'm not enforcing this as some divine rule that must be followed any time you have an opinion on fiction, and I'm definitely not saying that you have to structure every single sentence in a review to contain zero negative phrases. I'm just saying that I repurposed a rule we had at that specific reviewer to be a helpful tool to check myself when writing critiques now. If you don't want to use the tool, literally no one (especially not me) can or wants to force you to use it. As with all advice, it is a totally reasonable and normal thing to not have use for every piece of it that exists from random strangers on the internet. Use it to whatever extent it helps you or not at all.

Ed getting a moderate injury and really not knowing how to react when Stede shows him genuine care cause up until now he and his friends have always just laughed it off like no big deal!!!

never thought i'd say this but at this point the anti-AI crowd has caused me more emotional and mental distress than the whole AI thing itself. the ai crowd stole our art, the anti-ai crowd is accusing us of our art being AI.

idk who needs to hear this but you can be anti-ai without being a complete and utter asshole, just so you know

if you're witch hunting for ai and flinging ai accusations, especially with zero research into the artist you're accusing, you don't actually care about artists or about art. all you care about is tearing people down, and using the fight against genAI makes for a very neat excuse, because valid cause, right?

you know what's the best way to actually fight ai? go make stuff instead of wasting everyone's time by being an ignorant dick on the internet. you won't, though. cos making art is hard work. virtue signalling, hiding behind a keyboard typing shit is easy. "hey guys look at me being all anti ai by shitting on every piece of art i see that i think is too good to have been made by a human cos i can't do it so it's impossible anyone else can", while simultaneously talking about how bad ai generated stuff is and calling it slop xD like make up your mind or shut the f up

to everyone who has been talked out of testosterone HRT because it will make you "scary": no it will not. testosterone isn't "scary". masculinization isn't "scary". being masculine or a man isn't "scary". it's just another way to be a person. testosterone HRT is a good thing. it helps many people. if you want to take it, take it. don't let anyone else tell you not to because it "scares" them. it's not happening to them. their fears don't matter to you. it's happening to you. it's your choice.

when people write about why ofmd is important to them usually they talk about representation, mostly, and why it's such a big deal, and why ofmd's approach to it is different from most other tv, even stuff with overt & obvious queer themes. in particular stede's arc through s1 tends to resonate deeply with queer people on a metaphorical level; most of us are not abandoning our kids to pursue a life of violent crime but nevertheless coming out, especially later in life, does tend to feel like you are throwing your entire perfectly nice life away and betraying everyone who's ever cared about you in order to do something stupid and ridiculous that's probably just going to get you killed, and yet it's what you have to do if you're going to live honestly as yourself. (and, i mean, for a lot of queer people that's less of an exaggeration than it sounds like, especially before VERY recently.)

so anyway that's all true and important but i'm not going to talk about it here because many many other people have already said it better, instead i am going to talk about something that really impresses me about season 1 of ofmd on a pure writing-craft level, which is how it handles the tone shift.

you're watching the first episode for the first time and it's this funny little workplace sitcom about pirates and it's enjoyable in its own right but you do not think for one second that it's ever going to make you sad, right? and you can proceed through seven or eight episodes continuing to think that, and then the last two hit and you suddenly experience like fifty different shrimp emotions you are absolutely not prepared for, and right as you are absorbing that it ends on a cliffhanger that is completely focused on the relationship you have just developed a bunch of entirely new feelings about.

i know this is the point where i got weird about the show, because i have this very distinct memory of watching the first nine episodes - yes, all nine, even after the kiss - and liking it a lot but in a basically normal kind of way. and then after the tenth i remember just sitting on the couch kind of stunned for a minute and then going outside to walk the dog and being unable to stop thinking about it and just feeling like i was going insane, which i guess i did because i am still here talking about it.

the weird thing about this is how much the shift doesn't feel jarring, though? like there's other media i can think of that goes through a dramatic tonal shift. anime does it more often than western tv for some reason; puella magi madoka magica and the original 1998 trigun anime both famously start out very light and happy-go-lucky and then proceed to break your heart. but those don't really feel like what ofmd's doing. in both of those cases it feels like a change in the story - a sudden one for madoka, more gradual for trigun. but with ofmd it feels more like the curtain is being pulled back to reveal what was always there.

when i rewatch season 1 of ofmd i always feel sort of like i am watching two narratives at once. the first one is the surface-level story, which is a goofy sort of adventure-comedy about a silly frilly rich man and his absurd guybrush threepwood quest to become a mighty pirate. and then buried underneath it, the entire time, is this much more earnest and heartfelt story about queer self-discovery and romantic melodrama.

in the first episode that subtext is buried so deep i don't think anyone would see it if you didn't know it was coming, it lives mostly in the image of a little boy bullied for liking flowers and derided by his father for his inability to do "a man's work." but it's there, this dark space at the center of the story that no one's allowed to name, a silhouette you can barely make out lurking under the water, and for the rest of the season it gradually, relentlessly draws closer and closer to the surface: not all beards are beards and then jim's reveal to the crew then i was just uncomfortable in a married state then you want to do something weird? then we don't own each other then you wear fine things well then take your sword and run me through then this is happening.

and then calico jack says you two buggering each other?

and that's the subtext kicking the door down, that's the thing nobody was willing to say out loud before that point. izzy thought they were already fucking and lucius thought they should be fucking but neither of them would say it, but jack didn't know the rules, now he's said it and you can't put the genie back in the bottle, the subtext has become text, after that you get the chain and what makes ed happy is you and pining for his boyfriend (that's another word nobody was allowed to say out loud before this point!) and his name is ed.

this is a trick you can only do once; season 2 really could not possibly have repeated anything similar even under ideal circumstances, and in fact that's part of why the season opens on a scene you could see on the cover of a romance novel, to indicate that we're done with subtext and we're living in romance world now. (and despite this a lot of viewers seemed to buy into the surface-level story so completely that even after the way season 1 ended they're still confused by the shift; you can see this in several of the mainstream reviews of s2 that liked the season but sound genuinely baffled by stede suddenly appearing to care much more about pursuing true love than about his pirate ambitions. sorry guys the piracy was always a metaphor!)

anyway that's the thing i really admire about season 1; it's so carefully constructed around that one elegant trick, and i don't know if i will ever be able to pull off anything like that in my own writing, but i think from here on out i will always be trying.

im sorry to blorbo tag out loud but this is a lupete au waiting to happen

i do not minmax i do not play competitively i do not optimize my build i do not grind i do not topscore i do not give a shit about leaderboards. i play to have fun and if im not having fun i go do something else

The thing about Harry Potter is it just makes me fucking tired?

I don't especially give a shit if somebody is reading the books or watching the movies in private, but if you're being loudly, stridently, openly fannish about it you've got to be aware at this stage of things how that's perceived? At the bare minimum, being perceived as transphobic wasn't a deal breaker.

A doll forum I frequent is discussing whether or not to ban pictures of Harry Potter merch, and wow do I recognize a lot of the people going "Um, nobody cares about politics actually, sweetie" "Why does everything have to be political?" as having said some virulently transphobic shit elsewhere.

Someone asked me ":( So you want to DIVIDE people?"

Yes. You can't UwU Let's All Get Along about whether or not a given group of people should have human rights.

You can't shake the devil's hand and say you're only kidding.

"Listen," one guard said, "I know we have only just met-"

"No," the other guard said, "we've worked together for years!"

"-but you can trust me when I say-"

"I can't, you have the curse that's opposite from mine!"

"I don't care for you at all."

"Well, I… oh… I love you too."

i dont make comics often but this was too cute.

I still harbour a lot of attachment to the idea that Ed and Stede would genuinely be a really irritating couple to hang around with in real life. The kind where like 75% of their conversations consist of goofy bits and weird esoteric in-jokes that they can never be bothered explaining to other people. They'd start laughing together mid-exchange about some random anecdote and if you asked them about it they'd respond like "oh yeah it was a thing... it's really funny... you kinda had to be there. Yeah no, you wouldn't get it" and just start giggling and ignoring you again. Their wedding ceremony lasts for several hours, is a delightful experience for them and an absolutely excruciating one for everyone else.

I did it. I actually wrote the pre-canon Spanish Jackie/Ed smut. Everybody clap and cheer for me.

Title: An Island of Their Own Making

Additional Tags: Bisexual Blackbeard | Edward Teach, cunnilingus, hand jobs, love bites, smoking, Edward Teach Fancies a Fine Fabric

Summary:

An Island of Their Own Making (2k+ words, Explicit)

The thing is, love didn't save Ed. Or solve all his problems. Ed had to do that himself, untying the rope off his own waist (the rope he, or at least a partial manifestation of himself, put there). He had to make up for what he did to the crew. He had to apologize. Ed and Stede had to learn better communication. I know a lot of us focus on Stede's voice/appearance as the thing that brought Ed back to life, but I don't think that's entirely true. I think if Ed had chosen to give up right there, no amount of Stede yelling his name and holding his hand would have done anything.

Mermaid!Stede is arguably a manifestation of Ed's desire to live, rather than a manifestation of Stede coming to rescue him. Because Mermaid!Stede doesn't actually do anything , he's just there.

Obligatory shoutout to The Wig. Look at her. Gorgeous.

OFMD friends I need your help!

There's a gentlebeard fic I read a million years ago that I was reminded of yesterday while reading a fic in my other fandom, and I got the urge to read it again because I like my historical gays when they're feeling existential. Here's what I remember:

I tried every search trick I know but once you start messing with tags in a situation like this it can be a lot to process, especially knowing that not everyone remembers to use post-canon and established relationship tags. Does this sound familiar to anyone?