Elriel.

Elain & Az

[lettheskyfallletitcrumble]

......................................*Elain PSA*.......................................

Hey just so ya'll know just because a female character enjoys traditionally feminine things like baking, gardening, and wearing frilly pink dresses doesn't mean they aren't a strong female character.

It doesn't mean they can't fight. It doesn't mean they can't wield weapons.

It doesn't mean they don't deserve YOUR favorite male character.

It doesn't make her useless. And most of all it doesn't make her boring.

[cdalexsworld]

I implied it in my previous post, but I’ll say it much more clearly now:

I have ZERO respect for the people who created and spread the womb theory.

And no, this isn’t about disliking a ship or disagreeing with a theory. People can theorize about fictional characters and ships all they want. My problem is with reducing female characters and their narrative worth to their reproductive anatomy and essentially treating their bodies as evidence for which man they’re supposedly meant to end up with.

You can dress it up with paragraphs of ‘analysis’ and call it foreshadowing or symbolism, but I still find the entire premise deeply uncomfortable. Especially when it contributed to years of discourse where Elain was treated as irrelevant, interchangeable, or somehow less important because another character’s body supposedly provided the answer to the romantic endgames.

And what I find even more disgusting is seeing this kind of thing coming from people with huge platforms. When you have tens of thousands of followers, whether you like it or not, you inevitably have a certain amount of power and influence within the fandom, and I don’t think that should ever be underestimated. The things you choose to promote, repeat, and normalize are going to reach thousands of people and inevitably shape fandom discourse. At that point, you can’t pretend your words exist in a vacuum or that you have absolutely no responsibility for the environment you help create.

So yes, I’m being completely explicit about it this time: I don’t respect that theory, I don’t respect the reasoning behind it, and I don’t respect the decision to popularize that kind of discourse in the fandom.

And I also don’t respect the fact that, after countless opportunities to address it, after the entire CC storyline SJM wrote and everything she has said about reducing female characters to baby-making machines, you still haven’t apologized or even attempted to walk back this disgusting theory.

[lovemyromance]

And if I said fated mates means nothing to me unless they fall in love before discovering they are mates....??

Otherwise I'll always have the question do you love each other truly or just because you're "assigned"?

[haruktj]

I’m tired of not saying names. Yaz the bookish, if you or any of your followers is reading this, I hope you know you can’t stir the pot and run away. You’ve harassed artists and web managers, you’ve spread lies and terrible theories among the fandom and encouraged others to spread misinformation and to bully. You’re trying to wash your hands and claim you don’t want to be a part of “fandom wars” when it all started because of you. You’re trying to get away from the backlash that will come, but nobody will forget what you did, and I hope it weights on you.

[cdalexsworld]

I’m sorry, but I cannot take seriously the person who created the womb theory and spent years feeding into this idea that Elain is somehow useless by excluding her from basically every single theory and acting like her character barely even exists, suddenly coming out to complain that ‘the fandom isn’t what it used to be.’

You have actively contributed to creating the exact kind of fandom environment you’re now criticizing. You can’t spend years reducing one of the main characters to irrelevance, encouraging theories that conveniently erase her from the narrative, and then act surprised when fandom discourse becomes increasingly hostile and divided.

And this isn’t even something from five years ago that you’ve clearly moved past. Literally two weeks ago you manually edited Elain out of a piece of fan art. Like… please 😭

Obviously people are allowed to change their opinions and reflect on their past behavior, and I’d actually respect someone acknowledging that they contributed to the problem. But acting nostalgic about how much nicer the fandom supposedly used to be without acknowledging your own role in fostering this exact mentality is genuinely ridiculous to me.

[warmcupoflemontea]

[lettheskyfallletitcrumble]

I felt duped by Gwynriels.

When I first started reading the books I had just read the first one and was nearly done with the second. I googled characters to get a better grasp of what people looked like.

When looking up Az came dozens and dozens of photos of him romantically tied to Gwyn. My immediate conclusion was that they were endgame/mates. I didn't care for spoilers so I read a few things here and there, I read about how he gave her a necklace.

Book after book I waited for Gwyn to show up, and when she finally did she had barely interacted with Az at all. AND HE DID NOT GIVE HER A NECKLACE.

Why are we gaslighting a ship into existence when nothing is there?

[simplysimple-blep]

Whenever I see a terrible Elucien take I remember Sarah Janet eviscerating, incinerating even, their ship into the wind. Not even a crumb left. I laughed so hard.

“You get mated to someone and you don’t want to be mated. I’m like eugh what do you do? Like you’re stuck with this person?”

“Versus Feyre and Nesta where it was so easy for them. Like ‘nature picked right’”

LMFAO

[merymoonbeam]

Sarah: elain is part of inner circle

Antis: no

Sarah: lucien is responsible for Elain's trauma

Antis: he is not

Sarah: Elain is kind and she will have a book

Antis: she is evil and we dont see her as fmc material

Sarah: I dont wanna fit into a box

Antis: you are a fated mates author. Done

Sarah: bryce and hunt are mates

Antis: bryce and azriel got it

Sarah: nessian is endgame

Antis: cassian hates nesta

Sarah: tamlin is abusive

Antis: wel...feyre...rhys they are evil. Poor tamtam.

Sarah: rhys is my love forever

Antis: rhys is evil got it.

Sarah: mating bonds could be wrong

Antis: mate bond means endgame got it.

[ofduskcourts]

Funny how it's "Elain should leave the Night Court and be friends with the Band of Exiles" until we get "back with the Inner Circle" from the publisher and it suddenly becomes "IF YOU DROP THE 3 AND CARRY THE 1 LUCIEN IS PART OF THE INNER CIRCLE TOO!!!" Goalposts: moving at the speed of light

[lettheskyfallletitcrumble]

Hey so when you say stuff like "Elain can't be with Az because her womb isn't fit for his children"

You're making a misogynistic statement/theory

Saying Elain shouldn't be allowed to reject her mating bond is also misogyny.

Saying Elain should shack up with Tamlin the guy who abused her sister is misogyny.

The male centeredness of this fandom is actual brain rot. Unpack why you hate Elain so much.

And no it's not all of you that say or believe these things, but if you've said or believe any of the things mentioned in this post sorry to inform you but you are indeed a misogynist.

[lettheskyfallletitcrumble]

In case you need a recap of the groups and their members in these books

The Inner Circle: Rhys, Feyre, Cassian, Nesta, Azriel, Elain, Mor & Amren

The Valkaries: Nesta, Gwyn & Emerie

The Band of Exiles: Lucien, Vassa, Grayson & Jurian

Hope this helps ❤️

[mabevil]

e/uciens: elain better GROVEL for lucien!!! she’s so evil and cruel for not giving him attention!! she has a lot of work to do before she’s good enough for him!!! but she better end up with him anyway because he’s so suffered so much!!

also e/uciens: why would lucien need a redemption?? he’s a perfect princess pookie who has never done anything wrong in his life, he is a victim of these mean mean teenage girls, THEY better apologize to HIM!!

[acourtofquietdreamers]

It’s so funny seeing the Azriel obsessed ignore such important Azriel scenes.

- Someone calling Azriel’s scars beautiful

- Azriel figuring out someone is a seer by being kind and attentive

- Azriel going feral to rescue someone, even if he could die

- Azriel letting someone use his blade for the first time ever

- Someone noticing Azriel enough to know he’s been suffering from headaches and giving him a solution for those headaches

All because that someone is an Archeron sister they hate and they can’t stand how obsessed Azriel is with her.

ACOTAR 6 will not be kind to them because that someone will be haunting Azriel’s every thought.

[elainarcheronsvisions]

BB: “we will be back with the inner circle soon”

Random comments: “Can’t wait to be back with the Valkyries and Band of Exiles”

[lady-surieldown]

Mama I fear the call is coming from inside the house lmfao

[elainsgirl]

"all elriel has is lust!"

1) No, they have more than lust

2) This is ROMANCE series. A NEW ADULT romantasy. Lust is crucial for a couple, it is literally a required element to establish mutual attraction.

A couple not having lust between them, after developing for the last few books, is more concerning.

They love accusing elriel of being "just lust" but whats far more troubling is that 3 books in and Elucien are still uncomfortable around each other. For the book that was meant to set up the great gwynriel romance, Azriel still does not consider Gwyn a friend. Even after meeting his "mate"...he was STILL down bad for another woman.

Lust is essential for couples, thats just common sense.

[adifferentsortofstrength]

The thing that really solidifies my confidence in Elriel, other than what is already written in black-and-white canon, is the fact that E/ucien was never a real option.

In a series centered on women and their choices, on their autonomy and their strength, there is no possible way to go from:

“He is no such thing to her.”

“It means nothing.”

“I don’t want a mate. I don’t want a male.”

“So that entitles him to my time? My affections?”

“You betrayed us.”

“I belong to no one.”

(Just to name a few)

And have the entire narrative flip on its head to accommodate the—clearly unwanted—mating bond.

There is not one single moment across any of the books where Elain has softened towards Luc/en, not an inkling of her coming around to even entertain the idea of the bond. She has been steadfast and consistent in her refusal, and to stray from that would be completely out of character for her, and for SJM.

Luc/en was always going to play the role of a rejected mate. That was his fate this entire time. He was initially intended for Nesta to reject, but the fact is she would have killed him the instant “You’re my mate” left his mouth.

The boy moms who whine on and on about how he “deserves to be happy” are in for a rude awakening when the realize that every single female character’s happiness comes before any of the males. All of her series are about women, for women.