Michael Allen Zoeller

A nerd, Hufflepuff, Asexual Heteroromatic dude. Come hang out y'all. Check out my YouTube channel: Michael Allen Zoeller Current obsessions: Tangled the Series, Carmen Sandiego, Dragon Prince

[mikeallenz]

Hi to everyone following me. Me and my friends have started this superhero podcast called “Star Marked” on my channel called “MAZ presents…”.

If you are a fan of action, adventure, mystery, and superheroes with stupid superpowers, feel free to come aboard and enjoy the show. The first episode is already up and there is plenty more to come.

[soreiya]

Should we as a fandom collectively decide to step away from Vat7K and push for something completely different? Now don’t run off to grab your torches and pitchforks just yet. This isn’t a hate post. I just think it would be kinda fun to have a big discussion on the subject.

Keep reading

[mikeallenz]

If y’all want an alternative to Varian and the Seven Kingdoms, I’ve just begun my story “Age of Alchemy” on AO3. While it does have some references to the fan-story the fandom seems so obsessed with, this is meant to be its own thing. I also share a lot of the criticisms, and I think my story will be a nice, hopefully-un-controversial adventure of Varian finding adventure outside the series.

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[mikeallenz]

Hey everyone! It’s been a while since I posted a new story here! But I have been working on this story in my free time while working on my main series. If y’all like Varian and want to explore a story about him discovering a Steampunk-y mystery, feel free to read and enjoy!

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[aliciasinferno]

How is it possible that there is barely any fan-content about Cassandra using Varian's crush to get him to work for her

Seriously Cass, you want to have a villain-arc, use some emotional manipulation!

[californiannostalgia]

What some people don't understand about Bells Hells is that they are a diplomatic task force.

See, when they're in combat against each other? Classic dnd, bloody gouges, taking chunks out of each other (the furniture counts as pvp against chet)

But against non-party members? The infighting stops and they bring in either the most hyper-specific, blunt-force solution you have ever seen, or they bring the diplomacy.

(This is probably what any kind of coming-to-a-democratically-agreed-upon-stance is like: endless discussions right up to the very moment you have to commit to the united front, and then you project utter confidence to the outside world. They fight each other because they feel safe enough to be honest. Remember how conflict-avoidant they were in the beginning?)

This party is antithetical to everything a classic dnd campaign is supposed to be. They're so fascinating.

[dimension20official]

A new episode of Dimension 20: Misfits & Magic season 2 is out now on Dropout!

Things are getting dramatic in today's new episode...

[fischyplier]

Erika, the comedy sniper!

[lovecolibri]

Erika: My specialty is....bones

Brennan: *his character having recently died due to K trying to rebreak and fix a bone* That's triggering. That's actually triggering.

[thewholediamondsky]

This is literally Claudia and you can't tell me otherwise:

[raayllum]

Why is Clauderry together / why is Terry with Claudia?

This is a question I've seen posed more than a few times in the fandom, of people feeling confused with why Claudia is with Terry (despite her dislike of elves) and more so why Terry is with Claudia despite her being a walking collection of red flags. This has, admittedly, always questions I felt the show answered quite well and obviously, but if it's still being probed, then... why not?

Let's talk about it.

Why is Claudia with Terry?

The only prior examples we have with Claudia having any kind of romantic connection is with Callum, which never came to fruition; I've also gone on record saying myself that the show made it clear Callum's feelings for Claudia were a lot stronger than whatever, if any, she held for him. However, in her interactions with Callum even just as a friend, we can see what she appreciates in her free time. For starters, we see that Claudia enjoys being a goofball:

We see that a shared sense of humour is something that Claudia cares about, as one of the only compliments she gives to Callum is "You always make me laugh" and "That was very confident Callum" as he was able to go with the flow while asserting himself.

Words of affirmation is also something she clearly enjoys. Appreciation, acknowledgement, and gratitude are very important to her.

(Side note: This is also part of why she spirals into "I did all THIS FOR YOU" on the beach in a "You owe me your life" kind of way, because she was prepared and sacrificed and saved you, and doesn't that deserve acknowledgement? Doesn't that mean getting what she wants? What she's owed? But I digress.)

We also see early fracturing in Callum not trusting her (1x03, 2x03), a subsequent breakdown in honest communication on both sides, and that Claudia reads Callum as being judgemental of her dark magic use, which is also something that frustrates her about Soren:

(Part of this is because Claudia has gone from seeing dark magic as just an amazing beautiful tool to a terrible but necessary one, so necessary that it overrules any other reservations... because she's attached to seeing herself as a Good Person—"But I'm not evil, it's me"—but again, I digress.)

Conversely, Terry has all of those things in spades. He admires and relies upon her dark magic use, he's someone she can be reciprocally goofy with, he's extremely attentive and loyal (and loyalty/devotion is something that is also extremely important to her), and perhaps most importantly, he's helpful and non-judgemental.

Terry also explains that one of the things Claudia likes about him is his smarts / creative thinking ("Goofy and glorious, just like you" / "You saved the day Ter-Bear") and his thoughtfulness:

Claudia says I think too much about everything, and that makes me weird, and wonderful, so...

This makes sense as Claudia values being prepared in her own day-to-day life curtesy of being a dark mage, and that Soren's tendency to being impatient when they were growing up together (lying about Harrow without consulting her, picking the fight with the dragon, etc) was something that got on her nerves.

As for the Elf 'elephant' in the room... Claudia also doesn't have an issue trusting Aaravos for one simple reason: he's helping her save her dad.

Even while she's warning Soren against trusting or forming friendships with other elves and dragons because they might "take advantage" of him and be fake friends, she can't see that's precisely what Aaravos is doing to her. In a similar vein, Terry also believes in her (as he says directly in 4x09) and is helping her save her father, so why would she have a problem with him even if he's an elf?

That doesn't mean there aren't problems in Claudia's worldview, or that exceptionalizing people is a Good thing to do, particularly to your partner, but it's a clearly defined and realistic cognitive dissonance. Claudia has moved past seeing all elves as Bad™ to "these ones are good" because they're helping her, and not getting in her way, and that's all she really personally cares about.

However, I think most people can understand why Claudia's with Terry, given how sweet and routinely supportive she is. The bigger thornier question then is the opposite. So let's talk about that too.

Why is Terry with Claudia?

One of the most common things people say when it comes to Terry and Claudia is that they wish we could see how they met (and presumably whether that initial attraction was there from the start or how it developed). This usually leans into an underpinning idea (and I could be wrong) that seeing their beginning would help indicate why Terry fell for her (and thereby why he stays). And I would definitely be interested in how they met, and am open to seeing it, whether in a show, graphic novel, or novelization mention.

That said, I think the show has also answered these accordingly. In a lot of ways, there's really only two reasons why Terry is with Claudia as she is in arc 2:

1) He doesn't have an Issue with dark magic.

He admires Claudia's use of it ("And your daughter's amazing, she brought you back from the dead, wow!"), is open and receptive to using it ("Dark magic has a tingly aftertaste, nobody ever tells you that"), and doesn't see anything fundamentally wrong with it ("Should I give up dark magic? Terry, tell me what to do" "Claudia, I can't"). On the one hand, this makes sense; there are spell ingredients of dark magic that aren't that different from hunting and given that Terry grew up near the Drakeriders, I'd find it hard to believe if the Drake riders don't hunt and eat meat, so even if Terry's village didn't, he was at least somewhat close to societies that did.

That doesn't mean he has zero reservations about dark magic ("I've seen you do some awful things, dark magic things" / "Are you mixing the pentapus ink with your own blood?") but that to him, it's not any different from how Claudia thinks about it. She also thinks she's done terrible things in the name of saving her father:

But I'm not evil. It's me. You know me.

I had to do things... [starts crying] I never imagined I would be able to do. (4x01)

This is also how Terry copes with murdering Ibis, citing "I had to, I couldn't let him hurt you," "and he was going to take Claudia's life, I had no choice," and "I'm going to be strong enough to do whatever I need to do and still have feelings." To Terry what matters most is exactly what he says in 4x09: why are you doing these things? Are they actually necessary?

Terry loves Claudia (and Viren by extension) above anything else. Everything he does is for them, good or bad. That devotional loyalty is something that Claudia also lives by, and is arguably her and Terry's biggest shared life value.

Doing terrible things is okay if it's in the name of love, and if it's not, then you shouldn't do them. This is why when he talks about his grief/guilt with Ibis, Terry always scaffolds it alongside the reason why he did it.

This is also why Terry steps in exclusively when what Claudia is doing is unnecessary. She didn't need to trick Rayla in order to get away. She doesn't need to kill the dragon ("It won't follow us anymore, it's trapped") as it's already helpless. They're actions without good reasons, which is also why Terry distrusts Aaravos, because he realizes:

Maybe this story started out as a story of love, but along the way it got twisted. [...] He isn't doing anything for love. He's doing it out of revenge.

So long as Claudia is doing things out of love, Terry will stick by her. And if she stops doing it out of love, then she stops being the Claudia he knows.

Which, I'll also note, is fundamentally different from the Claudia that everyone else knows, because

2) He didn't know Claudia beforehand.

Terry doesn't know Claudia as a semi sheltered girl growing up in the palace who did dark magic solely for fun, nor how most of her close personal relationships (Soren, Callum, Ezran) got destroyed in the span of 3ish weeks. He only knows Claudia who uses dark magic (seemingly) 90% out of complete necessity for flight, safety, and bringing her father back. He seemingly doesn't really know how Soren and Claudia had their falling out, nor does he have any real clue who Callum or Ezran are.

Because Claudia was his only way to know these things rather than knowing multiple people involved, or even living through experiences, Terry would've gotten sparse details or the version that is how Claudia experienced them, and he has no reason to doubt her.

To be clear, I'm not saying that their set up is perfect or that their relationships is perfectly healthy. It's not. Claudia's singular control over how Terry knows the experiences of her life when we as an audience know it's very different is an issue, but is not that dissimilar from when you meet / date new people to begin with (i.e. was their ex really that bad, or were they the problem is sometimes something that can only be known in time). Terry's passivity and mirrored worldview helps enable Claudia's even when she's being destructive to herself and others, and her treating Terry as an exception for his people is also not good in the long run. Clauderry walks this line of being incredibly sweet and uncomfortable, and I think that's one of the things that makes it interesting and with spades of tragedy, particularly going into S7. Terry may not yet have a deep seated issue with dark magic (which enables Claudia but also frees her up to grow on her own terms), but it is the reason they may be torn apart in the future for a time.

I do think they'll find their way back together eventually (even if they'll always be Divorced Eventually in my head). To me, it's clear why they love each other, and while TDP could say that's not enough (and I think that'd be a very interesting valid route to take), I don't think that they will. This scene exists, after all:

[thrandilf]

Aaravos manipulating Claudia: whispers in her ear for two years, promises bringing her father back, keeps his word, sets things up so he's the only thing she has outside of Terry after killing her father and getting away with it, opens up about the daughter he lost, so much time and effort Aaravos manipulating Callum:

[mikeallenz]

WHY ISNT MATT MAKING SAM ROLL DECEPTION

[eluviannaa]

I absolutely love Claudia's arc. Her corruption is so nuanced. Being a villain isn't about absolute evil, often just a path someone falls into.

The series of events for her from Season 1 really blows Aavaros's story out of the water. Basically the most interesting thing about him is his long game and charm. Revenge is a good motivation, but rarely offers an resolution that makes it all seem worth it. It's a story we all know the ending to.

But her conflict is real, an inescapable fate she didn't choose. She wants to do the right thing but is shown again and again that dark magic is the only solution. If only people could see that, she might actually be able to fix things. And Terry's morality and understanding makes us believe.

Villains that make you question what is morally correct, despite the risks, are so much more compelling. She's constantly fighting against hope and despair. And you really want her to win.

Most of the characters are similarly complex. And S2 just throws you right into the runaway train. Man, writing goals.

[bloodyshadow1]

Braius is a paladin of asmodeus in the same way Cody 'Nightangel' Walsh was a 'paladin' of lucifer. He's just a fucking poser who thinks he's so much cooler and more important than he actually is

[ariadne-mouse]

Braius Doomseed: my party I've known for less than 24 hours said no pickles

[revvethasmythh]

i think we all deserve to see jester make braius her new best friend. you know she would do it. if anyone could

[mapleandgingeroatmeal]

Leave it to Sam to create a character who’s entire motivation is tracking down and enacting revenge on one of his previous pcs.

The funniest part is that if he ever meets Veth he won’t even know it’s her.