the council will decide your fate (being kissed passionately)

(we had a chat about Vet!Halsin, who walks around with little birds under his hair and can carry a mastiff like it's nothing)

Other benefits aside, do you know how useful it would be if someone actually had ‘Speak With Animals’ and could explain to that Labrador that he does, in fact, most definitely, need to stop eating socks if he wants to live.

We must do everything in our power to eradicate Mormonism.

I will wage a holy war in Utah the likes of which the world has never seen.

THERE IS NO CATGIRL SEVIKA AND I AM ANGRYYY

This beautiful woman has me by the throat and I ain’t complaining hehehehe

Video process of Kaladin & Syl sharing a moment ❤️‍🩹

Not to be a whiner but it fucking hurts that AO3 has nearly triple their donation goal already... while I'm struggling to raise funds for my family's necessities to live.

Like full offence to everyone who donated after they already surpassed $50,000, there are a hell of a lot of people who could use your money way more right now, and I don't even mean just me. Go do something actually meaningful with your donation funds and buy an eSim for Gaza or something!

Me being happy that one of the firefighters on the firefighter show is finally canonically Bi despite never watching a single episode:

the curse having character thoughts but none of them are coherent

how do i put it into words...... hmmm............. KHGDKGHRLUGHKJWRHBEJKGRBNUI:OTHJNLRJTBHM RGNJPBK KLDUHRGNKRJGNBDIUGRHNBUYG HJBHKDPGBNURHGNRBGHBEF<MGNRIPRYGBBPOIURGN CHARACTERRRRRRRRR CHARACTER CHARTACET CHARATCGERJ 👍

instead of continuously over-donating to ao3 when those running the site are racist zionist sympathisers who shut down support of palestine from its volunteers 1 / 2 (among myriad other issues that u should NOT be funding) please direct your attention to these incomplete fundraisers for people in gaza and various tangible operations doing work. this is a call that if u have donated even a cent to ao3 to a) match that in your donations to palestinians/causes and b) stop donating so uncritically and unconditionally to ao3, pressure them. id like to direct u to @end-otw-racism

fundraiser masterpost by @el-shab-hussein

mona

care for gaza

help gaza's children

operation olive branch

the palestinian children's relief fund

unrwa

the palestinian red crescent society

buy an e-sim / donate for mass buying

Finally watched Nimona.

RIP to the queen who said "hey maybe we should take one (1) step forward from the social mores that have stagnated for Literally A Thousand Years" and got immediately ganked by her head of security for it huh

she wasn't really a major character and obviously Ambrosius was the more proximate source of distress but you gotta wonder how much of Ballister's brooding in the first few scenes after that is grieving for a woman who clearly meant a lot to him, who got killed Literally Right In Front Of Him, even without the complicating factor of being framed for her murder

also Baby Bal is soooo precious omg T_T

How could anyone NOT root for him...

been thinking about fantasy/scifi rule systems and free will

Be Not Afraid

based off of this

[Webtoon / Tapas / Patreon]

Is this a flashback to their first time meeting, then?

No, this is.

who’s the klutzy Hyrule ditz dropping all their rupees in grass????

a few years ago when I was really REALLY in to Twilight Princess and none of the newer ones had come out yet, and I had planned to write some Very Intense Fanfiction, I decided that I would make it a worldbuilding thing. Like, a cultural phenomenon in Hyrule where people go out of their way to hide rupees all over the place– along roadways and streams, in grass, under rocks, in old pots no one has used in years, or in old shoes, under fallen logs, under big honking rocks that no one has any reason to move. Originally, it was meant to be a sign of goodwill to travelers and those down on their luck, of community generosity and goodwill. Anyone can go out, comb a bit, and scrounge up enough for a meal. Or kids can run around having fun playing their seeking games and find enough for a sling shot, or a sweet. Parents teach their kids not to take more than they really need, to put some back, to keep the chain going. They make a game of it. Who can find the best hiding place? Who can climb to the highest branch, or swim to the bottom of the pond. 

They tend to end up heavily clustered in the grass and under rocks along the main roads and paths. People leave out their old, well loved pots and butter churns and tipped over tubs, collect pretty rocks and bits of crystal, grow their herbs and bushes just a bit that wild out front– all to make an attractive place to maybe tuck a green or a red under. For some it’s a point of pride; for all, it tells you a bit about the person who lives there. It’s even practical, when you think of it! We all sometimes end up a little short, but there’s always some from the community to find, or something to tuck for yourself int he future when you realize you’re a bit skint. And when you’ve got a bit extra, well, it’s just NORMAL to go and find a little place to tuck it away and imagine who might find it. Maybe soon. Maybe in a few weeks or months. Maybe years, or decades. Don’t we all get a little big of excitement from the thought?

Communities don’t have really deep poverty that you can’t climb out of, not in Hyrule. There’s no embarrassment to have to pop out and look around a bit to afford a bit of milk or if you’ve forgot your wallet. If someone’s a bit too old or can’t see too well, there’s no shame in hinting, “Under the flower pot, grandma,” or, “Tomla, run out and fetch Mr. Tinkins a few rupees, there’s a love, always good at finding the odd ones out, that girl.” 

Sometimes you find shiny rupees that weren’t hidden too well (maybe by that ferociously sweet village kid who keeps hiding them as quick as he’s finding them, bless him, just not very well). Maybe they hadn’t been there long. The contrast is huge when you find dusty, dirt-encrusted things that you think must be at least a few decades old. And then, sometimes you go digging back, adventuring down into the deep places and the old places where no one has traveled in centuries and you turn over a pot or open a little chest no bigger than a bottle and feel a little shiver to think of how long ago someone put this here. A little thankfulness to an ancestor, a little appreciation, a little shock because a silver rupee? Really??! How rich had they been, how powerful the empire, now all in ruins…

Sometimes in his travels, Link comes upon an old, dusty rupee tucked under an ancient discarded shield or a particularly handsome but impossible to move boulder that only a little magic or magical strength can budge. He grabs up the rupee under and feels a little shiver of familiarity… :)

Anahira has some thoughts about Cazador...

Coming out from hiatus (sorry, life got busy) for a very quick and not polished artwork.

I've recently been relistening to the songs for Galavant and some work really well with BG3!!!

If your OC is a bard it makes perfect sense!

Let me know what Galavant songs you think work the best for your playthrough!

PLEASE DO NOT EDIT/CROP/REPOST ANYWHERE WITHOUT PERMISSION

me: I'm going to write a fic to my own entertainment

also me, writing said fic:

Hot take: Actual literary analysis requires at least as much skill as writing itself, with less obvious measures of whether or not you’re shit at it, and nobody is allowed to do any more god damn litcrit until they learn what the terms “show, don’t tell” and “pacing” mean.

Pacing

The “pacing” of a piece of media comes down to one thing, and one thing only, and it has nothing to do with your personal level of interest. It comes down to this question alone: Is the piece of media making effective use of the time it has?

That’s it.

So, for example, things which are NOT a example of bad pacing include a piece of media that is:

Bad pacing IS when a piece of media has

Another note on pacing: There are, except arguably in standalone movies, at least two levels of pacing going on at any given time. There’s the pacing within the installment, and the pacing within the series. Generally, there’s three levels of pacing–within the installment (a chapter, an episode, a level), within the volume (a season, a novel, a game), and within the series as a whole. Sometimes, in fact FREQUENTLY, a piece of media will work on one of these levels but not on all of them. (Usually the ideal is that it works on all three, but that’s not always important! Not every individual chapter of a novel needs to be actively relevant to the entire overarching series.)

Honestly, the best possible masterclass in how to recognize good, bad, and “they tried their best but needed more space” pacing? If you want to learn this skill, and get better at recognizing it?

Doctor Who.

ESPECIALLY Classic Who, which has clearly-delineated “serials” within their seasons. You can pretty much pick any serial at random, and once you’ve seen a few of them, you get a REALLY good feel for things like, for example…

If you’re not actively trying to learn pacing, either for literary analysis or your own writing…honestly? Just learn to differentiate between whether the pacing is bad or if it just doesn’t appeal to you. There’s a WORLD of difference between “The pacing is too slow” and “the pacing is too slow for me.” 

“I really prefer a slower build into a universe; the fact that it opens in medias res and you piece together where you are and how the magic system works over the next several chapters from context is way too fast-paced for me and makes me feel lost, so I bounced off it” is, usually, a much more constructive commentary than “the pacing is bad”. 

And when the pacing really is bad, you’ll be doing everyone a favor by being able to actually articulate why.

Show, Don’t Tell

This is a very specific rule that has been taken dramatically out of context and is almost always used incorrectly.

“Show, don’t tell” applies to character traits and worldbuilding, not information in the plot.

It may be easier to “get” this rule if you forget the specific phrasing for a minute. This is a mnemonic device to avoid Informed Attributes, nothing more and nothing less. 

Character traits like a character being funny, smart, kind, annoying, badass, etc, should be established by their behavior in-universe and the reactions of others to them–if you just SAY they’re X thing but never show it, then you’re just telling the audience these things. Similarly you can’t just tell the audience that a setting has brutal winters and expect to be believed, when the clothing, architecture, preparations, etc shown as common in that setting do not match those that brutal winters would necessitate. 

To recap:

Violations of Show Don’t Tell:

NOT Violations of Show Don’t Tell:

Keep in mind that “Show, don’t tell” is meant to be advice for beginning authors. Because “telling” is easier and requires less skill than “showing,” inexperienced authors need to focus on getting as much “show” in as possible. 

However, “telling” is also extremely important. Sometimes, especially in written formats, the most appropriate way to deliver information to the audience is to just say it and move on.

Keep in mind that a viewpoint character in anything but…a portal fantasy, essentially…is going to be familiar with the world they’re in. Not every protagonist needs to be a raw newcomer with zero knowledge of their new world! In most cases, a viewpoint character is going to know things that the audience doesn’t. Generally, the ONLY natural way to introduce worldbuilding in this situation is to just have the narration point them out. (It makes sense for Obi-Wan to have to explain the Force; it would make no sense for Han to explain the concept of space travel to Luke, who grew up in this universe and knows what the hell a starship is. So, if you’re writing the novelization of A New Hope, you need to just say “and so they jumped into hyperspace, the strange blue-white plane that allowed faster-than-light travel” and move the hell on.)

For that matter, in some media (ie, children’s cartoons) where teaching a moral lesson is the clear intent, a certain level of “telling” is not only appropriate but necessary!

The actual goal of “showing” and “telling” is to maintain a balance, and make sure everything feels natural. Show things that need to be shown, and…don’t waste everyone’s time showing things that would feel much more natural if they were just told.

But that’s not nearly as pithy a slogan.

(Reblog this version y’all I fixed some really serious typos)

Quick addition: When you Show, you Slow.

Taking the time to Show something rather than simply Telling it slows the moment down–and that can be a good thing! When you want a moment to have real emotional impact, when you want the audience to linger and really connect with the scene, use Show to slow them down and really make them live in it. Use descriptive language, engage the senses, and make your audience spend some time with it.

This is Not always desirable. If you’re heavily Showing in moments that aren’t truly important, your audience will disengage and get impatient and then bored. I always err on the side of over showing in a first draft, over trimming to lots of telling in a second draft, then marrying them together in a third once I’ve gotten a better understanding of the pacing with the second Telling draft.

My brain will just create new WIPs against my will, it’ll just start going, I have no say in which one I work on, in fact, WIP actually stands for Writer in Peril, help