discovering and rereading fanfiction you wrote when you were 13 and not cringing / making fun of yourself but genuinely being like "oh wait this was good for someone who had hardly ever written and was 13. this has heart to it" and sure maybe its not very Technically good but you do see yourself in the writing even way back then. its very heartwarming. like yeah its bad but its not bad bad. so reminder to everyone to always keep going no matter what and progress is exponential
This inspired me to revisit my Wattpad account from when I was twelve, and I was giggling and kicking my feet the entire time. I had almost the same writing style from back then as I do now??? Little me knew what she was from a young age, I guess. At the same time though, it sounded exactly like these journal entries from back then which is so adorable to look back on. Definitely recommend doing this
Currently writing a fanfiction called “Kaitou KID Goes to Court Because of a Video Essay” (exactly what it sounds like) and I’m debating straying from canon compliance with the source material to give a police officer character a backstory to justify his knowledge on nonsexual grooming that I need him to have if the story is to go the way I want it to. I’ve prided myself thus far on being canon compliant, scouring the source material time and again to add in little inane details because I love little references. However, creating a fanon backstory for this character would make things easier for me in the short run. More context under the cut.
Should I include a made up character backstory to help progress the plot in a canon compliant story?
Yes, flesh out that backstory
Yes, but keep it within the realm of canon if possible
What are we even talking about rn??
Do what the author thinks is best
No, it’ll cause more trouble in the long run
No, uphold the canon compliancy you hold dear
Remaining time: 2 days 16 hours
The main character of the story is a teenager named Kaito. His mom and dad were both thieves, and Kaito himself donned the mantle of his father’s thief persona when he found out at 16 that his dad was a thief. Before he faked his death without telling Kaito when the kid was 8 years old, Kaito’s dad was a famous magician, and taught Kaito everything he knew. It just so happened that all those magic lessons translated real well into criminal activity. Kaito worshipped his dad, thought the absolute world of him, so he took his lessons to heart whenever they happened, and held them even closer after he “died”. Because of his idolization of his father, Kaito immediately donned the thief persona to try and defeat the group of people who “killed” the man, only to later discover that his father is in fact still alive. Kaito is still stuck being a thief though, because the group who were indeed after his dad are looking for a magical gemstone and are using Kaito in their search to speed things along; if he doesn’t steal magical gemstone candidates, the group will steal them themselves and not give the gems back (something Kaito does that his parents didn’t) and kill people in their pursuit.
What can be taken from that word dump is that ever since he was a baby, Kaito’s dad had been teaching him magic tricks that doubled as skills required to be a competent criminal. Once he followed in his father’s footsteps and put those lessons into practice in a different yet equally effective setting, it’s clear to see Kaito’s dad either intentionally or unintentionally taught Kaito how to be a good thief. This, combined with his wife also being a retired thief and also having life lessons to share, means it might have been coming from both parents. No matter their intention, in hindsight it’s undeniable that Kaito was nonsexually groomed into becoming a criminal by his parents starting at an early age.
Then there’s the police officer, Mr. Nakamori. Not much is known about him, only that he’s an Inpsector on a special task force specifically created to catch Kaito’s thief persona, he started chasing said persona when he was 20 years old, he has a wife who’s a public prosecutor, and a daughter that goes to school with Kaito. They’re also neighbors and found family of course.
Before planning anything out, in the last chapter I uploaded of the fic (which was a confrontation/confession between Kaito and Mr. Nakamori about Kaito being a thief) Mr. Nakamori came to the extreme conclusion that Kaito had been groomed by his parents into becoming a criminal like them. Basically, he called Kaito and his parents a family of criminals, then paternal bias kicked in and he mentally separated Kaito from his parents, placing all the blame on Kaito’s parents and then seeing Kaito as a victim (which is true, but not as black and white as he believes it to be).
I believe his turn around could be explained if he had seen similar situations before, and being a police officer, it would be simple to say that as a fresh recruit right before he was pulled into the thief task force he had been part of a division that dealt with domestic situations or arrested abusers. It would be simple to say that he saw those kids in Kaito and is using that to rationalize his own coping with wanting to believe that Kaito is innocent in everything. But it’s not canon and most likely at least subtly contradicts it. A quick google search shows that for high school graduates, the training at the Metropolitan Police Academy takes ten months, so it’s plausible he might have gone into training right after graduating and had a little over a year spent being a normal police officer before the thief task force was put together, as well as experiencing an 8 year long hiatus from the thief, during which he probably did normal police work and cases as an Inspector. However, there’s never been any indication that Mr. Nakamori had done anything related to normal police work before he started chasing the thief, and it’s more than likely that he started on the task force and then stayed there.
I’ve always prided myself on staying canon compliant, and while adding this backstory would erase possible plot holes in character motivation while filling in gaps of character in Mr. Nakamori himself, it would go against what I’ve been doing up until now and I frankly don’t know how to write fanfiction if I’m not basing everything off of the canon setting and facts. Extrapolating plot from it, figuring out what the characters would do canonically if they were in a certain situation, that’s basically all my writing is. I’ve never added in too many headcanons, and certainly nothing as substantial as a fabricated backstory. It also might cause continuity errors down the road in cases where a vague past might benefit the character.
All in all, I’m not sure what to do
Here’s the fic if you’re curious and want to take a look or if you need more context than what I’ve given to understand things
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
That ‘comment on your a03 work’ email hits like a line of cocaine every time. unmatched dopamine increase. shoutout to everyone who leaves a comment on fics. you deserve the world
phm is decently popular in japan and i mostly see this when i check twitter and see accounts posting pictures of handmade rocky plushies that are so fucking round looking it brings a tear to my eye
I recently started rewatching Black Clover, and the idea that Asta is aromantic and/or asexual hit me in the very first episode.
Asta very loudly declares his love for Sister Lily, a nun at the church he lives in. It’s not said how long she’s been there, and I’m not aware of any Hage flashbacks she may show up in later in the series, but by the way all the characters seem intimately familiar with Asta’s antics, it’s probable that she’s been with their church for a few years at least. This would give her a sense of familiarity and comfortablility with Asta.
Another thing that’s important for me to note is that, in the fallout of the first of his attempts we’re privy to, Asta calls Yuno, his adoptive brother, a “big lady killing jerk”. Yuno is, by Asta’s own words, involved in the romance sphere. It’s more than likely that it’s unwilling on his part, and a separate case for Yuno being on the aro ace spectrum could be made, but nevertheless girls and romance seem to follow him around in Hage. Asta, having grown up with him and having a close bond with him (though it’s strained when we start off and the whole romance thing could be a contributing factor, though obviously not the main one) has most likely seen more than his fair share of Yuno “one-upping” him in that department.
These things come together with Sister Lily. Sister Lily is a woman of the cloth, stated plainly in the show. She cannot marry or have sex; she is off the table because of her profession. Not to sound too crass, but she is essentially an unattainable goal. Along with that, she is also familiar with Asta and seems to not hold his interest in her against him or take it too seriously as she treats him kindly outside of his attempts to ask her out.
It’s within the realm of reason that Asta is using Sister Lily, whether intentionally or unintentionally. He could be using his crush on her as a reason to not think about other girls that would be fair game, or to dissuade others from talking to him about it. He could be using his loyalty to her to justify his disinterest in others or console himself about how it seems girls don’t like him as much as his rival Yuno for reasons people seemingly have at the ready anytime to remind him of (noisy, short, lacking both composure and tolerance, and having nothing about him that appeals to women).
Asta grew up in a church, so it’s frankly impossible for him to not know what being a nun entails. He still pursues her despite knowing this. Maybe he pursues her because of this. He doesn’t have to think about love or sex because he’s given his heart to Sister Lily and could never love another.
By setting himself an unattainable goal (forgive the crass language once again) he’s setting himself up for failure. He’s shooting himself in the foot by soley going after one of the only women he knows that cannot and will not reciprocate his feelings.
GREETINGS EVERYONE!!! I've spent the last couple of months working on a full length comic adaption of @goodlucktai's beautiful 'fishbowl' fanfic!!! Below you can read the fruits of my efforts :) Enjoy!
i don't know if the requests are still open but could you perhals draw magne? she is so awesome but i can't find much for her and i bet she would look amazing in your style!
I drew her yayyyy, in dip pen blehhh
LOVE HER HEARTS AND SPARKLES.. i need to draw her more
