Tag: elfmaiddryope

elfmaiddryope replied to your post:
Flu recovery (and IOS Final Fantasy games) nixed…

oh no I’m sorry to hear you had the flu! (am I just behind, is tumblr not giving me posts in order again)

I hadn’t advertised it, and it was more ‘lingering effects’ and not energy, persistent sinus – but everyone around me was coming down with fevers and getting bad cases of it. So I’ve been curled up in blankets catching up on reading and games and trying to force myself to cook when I don’t have much of an appetite.

Tangentially – Garth Nix’s Frogkisser is a cute book, very young YA fantasy in the style of Wrede’s Talking With Dragons, Lloyd Alexander , Ella Enchanted, etc… where a big plot point is fantasy Magna Carta, and I’m not sure if it’s intentional but the main character reads are very much not-straight, which isn’t something I usually pick up on but I wonder if tumblr agrees with me.

elfmaiddryope:

squirrelwrangler:

@anghraine tagged me in the post-a-bit-of-something-you’re-working-on meme!

The arrow arced like a comet over the plains. Wind screamed in agony in its passage, shrill and short, and air rippled out like water from the impact. Earth liquefied under the arrowhead, and the impaled shadow-shape writhed like a spineless deep-sea creature brought to the surface before it dissolved into the ground. Faint wisps of steam rose from the crater around the embedded arrow. A tuft of matte-black fur lingered around the arrowhead before disappearing with a foul odor,

though no elf was close enough to behold this.

why is your prose so GOOD don’t tell me it was hard work I want to believe it involved some sort of unholy rituals 

*blush* 

Glad you like. It’s not quite purple prose, but it was a tad overindulgent on the descriptive metaphors. I was worried it was too much, but okay, it gets to stay.

Here’s the preceding line as a gift for the comment, btw:

The muscles of his back bunched and strained as he pulled back an arm, then let loose the arrow as that arm flung up with the graceful curve of a hunting cat’s tail.

aka heget watches korean historical dramas, can’t you tell? *tiger tail archer pose*


Of Ingwë Ingweron has really morphed into a weird bastard amalgamation of style and variations on my authorial voice and pov, because there’s that semi-detached quasi-scientific voice looking back- the lore-master voice- then the dialogue heavy full scenes where I sit with the characters and describe everything blow by blow like I normally do – Chapter Three is where that started and every chapter since has secretly been me as the lazy author wanting to find a point to winch back to the style of the first half of the first chapter- and then moments starting with the passage where I first described Oromë (end of Chapter Three) where I decided to go for broke on layering the metaphoric imagery and then because of the positive feedback for that paragraph I now had to commit. I don’t think the differences are as pronounced for a reader as it is for me writing it.

As for unholy rituals, well, I can admit that more often than not, snippets of Of Ingwë at least are written because I get stuck in a car/running errands/waiting at a park with someone who is a hardcore Pokemon Go player when I don’t play it, so I write lines to stave off the boredom.

elfmaiddryope replied to your post “I take it that as someone only interested in Finn and who despises…”

I wouldn’t see it until it’s on digital either way. I’m just curious, bc everyone else I know who saw it loved it, but you’re the closest to sharing my TFA feelings so I figured your opinion would be more relevant to me

The people hating on it feeling betrayed honestly I laugh a little because TFA was the root of problems continuing into TLJ, and I knew it wasn’t going to give me great Finn scenes with depth going into the next film and that Luke was going to be a more disillusioned disheartened hermit who had driven away Ben in a moment of weakness/handwave smidgen of blame on Snoke (who is he-lol that doesn’t matter) and sorry, the tropes had been primed to be used from the set-up of TFA. Only in the “Rey Random” which I doubt will remain true even if I hope for the next film was I feeling something big I disliked about TFA was rectified.

I take it that as someone only interested in Finn and who despises Kylo I should not go see TLJ?

As someone who is also only interested in Finn and despises Kylo- The arcs that have nothing to do with Kylo (aka Rey’s arc and also Luke -and those only intersect with anyone else’s plot-lines at the very beginning, technically, and then at the end battle), are a mixed bag. The first couple Finn scenes start off good but then they play Finn as the butt of physical humor gags that honestly pissed me off. Finn’s arc is a characterization arc; it isn’t completely shallow, but it doesn’t fulfill me as a Finn fan, let’s say. And the script is very preoccupied with subverting trope expectations and pulling the rug under the heroes/audience- and yet for all it tries, is still hitting predictable beats. I’d say- pay for cheap tickets if you can find a theater where it is $5.00 or less. There are some very pretty cinematography, some of the minor new characters are good- or would have been good had the script not tried too hard to be clever and have characters or script itself withhold information for a subversion bait-and-switch that doesn’t hold up for any logic. The new character that Finn interacts with for the majority of the film, Rose, is good even if there were a few points where the script fell down for me- mostly because the script failed Finn. As a standalone film I’m trying to decide if it works better or not. A big problem, i feel, is it’s trying to make themes and statements about Star Wars as it is in pop culture, and therefore those meta concerns are driving it. 

As for Kylo Ren/Ben Solo- as I was wincing through watching his scenes and mentally trying to block him as it was happening- can’t tell you how tolerable they were; truthfully I couldn’t and didn’t even try. And yes, a scene towards the end I am not at all surprised that people who had been in abusive gas-lighting relationships were triggered hard by him – I felt uncomfortable by it just via secondhand.

If you want spoilers I could go into them- hard to be very vague. Is it as awful as the worst hyperbole? No. Is it great? No. Is it even BvS where I can blame the decon-recon characterization arc and the fight against audience preconceived opinions and entrenched nostalgia for a biased and unjust backlash? No – I loved BvS with every re-watch and my problems with the dream sequences or a lack of enough Clark or Lois scenes weren’t a problem with the script seeming to shoehorn them into arc statements that revolved around themes and characters at their expense or because I thought the entire universe built on shaky foundations of wanting their cake and trying to eat it too.

Tell me good things abouuuut Aes Sedai

A fantasy universe (mainstream, very popular, author is an old straight white dude btw) where the formal institutions of magic -until late in the plot- are solely women. All the Gandalf and Saruman figures are ladies. Often much other women. Often unmarried and have no regrets about that lack of husband or children. That they divided themselves into factions based on these qualities- what ambitions do I have: pure knowledge? using diplomacy? ambitious politics maneuvering? pure logic? (this one especially for a fuck you at women aren’t in STEM fields) war? fighting a little more narrowly focused on the #1 magic danger to the world (men w/ magic)? Based on goals more than personalities, and that these aren’t gender stereotype limited.

That all the most important political maneuvering – the stuff that would be the cardinals and popes in the equivalent pre-1700s European history when it was the scheming and influence of said cardinals that were as important if not moreso than the actual kings and princes- these are all held by women. And that the groups that come in conflict with them on the magically scale really aren’t the Black Tower male magic wielders but the other groups of women. The majority of the magical big guns are ladies. For all the bitching about gender issues in WoT, that this is the foundation and that the Aes Sedai are so central to multiple plots and so incredibly varied – aren’t just regulated to one narrative corner like Bene Gesserit or hedge witches. The political maneuvering inside their groups- the factional infighting, the schism, the Black Ajah conspiracy, the apprentice-journeyman-master parallel and how structured it is, the internal ranking via strength and how it is different in other non-Aes Sedai groups.

Yeah, especially the wide variety of characters for Aes Sedai .

salty asks #27 gooo

27. Least shippable character?

Ohh. interesting because could go either of a few ways- which character in fandom doesn’t get any ships, just doesn’t read as interested in romantic relationships, or has a lot of a ships but I have zero interest in shipping said character because I don’t like that character?

For instance, Star Wars: Luke Skywalker reads as ace to me, but if pressed, I am more open to semi-crack shipping him with Han or Lando (Luke/Lando I think has unexplored opportunities). Lando is rarely considered in fandom shipping compared to the other major characters. I don’t ship Palpatine with anyone nor think it feasible. And while he’s a big cornerstone of Sequel Series ship wars, I hate Kylo Ren/Ben Solo and his character and the decisions writing around him -and I haven’t even seen The Last Jedi- so there’s not a single ship I want to ship him in. (Unless through him on the trash fire with Kyp Durron and post-Vong Jacen Solo and let them be that unappealing character types and arcs together)

Silm –  Eru Ilúvatar for least shippable.;p And Ulmo. 

I also don’t ship Haleth. 

even though I know at least some of the answer to #22 I’m asking anyway because reading your rants NEVER GETS OLD. Also #18 only because I have no idea what the reasoning behind that question even IS so I’m curious about your take on it.

22. Popular character you hate?

Oh gods. Rand al’Thor is a fucking bigamist, and his chapters from around book four start to become nearly unreadable. Why should I care about his deteriorating mental state when he is written as this asshole who’s overwhelming sexist-coded guilt complex isn’t interesting? Oh the weight of prophecies and being the messiah of the world~ Bleuch. You’re why I don’t like Chosen One main protag figures. I hate his shacking up with Min -who is the ‘not like other girls, I’m enlightened unfeminine and cool’ that I really don’t like.

…Oh, you wanted that other popular character heget hate rant? Kylo Ren is boring Okay, okay. Look, Fëanor is not a champion of free will. Fëanor is a champion of HIS ability to control his autonomy and fate, and he wants subservience from others. Why else to make his sons and then have them reaffirm that Oath? His disgusting xenophobia should be called out more; the rally in Tirion during the Darkening am I blind here to be the only one that sees the parallels to a fascist rally and coup d’etat? Like, hell, that scene is so grossing unsettling. It makes my skin crawl.

18. Does not shipping something ‘popular’ mean you’re in denial and/or biased?

I think it’s asking if something feels a sense of smug superiority for not following the popular trend. Hipster mindset.

Look, shipping is based off a person’s subjective feelings, and pretending it’s not and is motivated by rational thought or purity or progressive values is an ugly fandom problem. Do i not ship popular ships? Yes. Because I am biased; everyone is.