#scarfdyedshadow

[weaselandfriends]

Hello Bavitz, I hope you're doing well! I just finished reading Fargo, which was absolutely excellent rest assured I will mercilessly force it upon all my friends, and just had a few thoughts I wanted to share. Due to misremembering when you said you read MGRP (after Fargo and before Chicago) throughout my read I was thinking "oh I can thoroughly see the MGRP influence, the way the ensemble is focused upon and their thought processes are delved into, just how colorfully individualistic so many of them are (the Terminatrix would fit right into MGRP), the ways the deaths are written and happen, so often cruelly abrupt, the endings of many of the Minneapolis girls are so much more comparable to MGRP character deaths than Madoka character deaths" and now I've realized that's complete fortuitous coincidence derived from you and Asari Endou simply having similar thought processes and narrative styles, so no surprise you clicked to the extent you did with his work

I was also struck by how prophetic Fargo was of assorted Madoka spinoff material written well after it, principally a lot of MagiReco Arc 2 material @ Puella Magi gang warfare and structural navigation, as well as more specific things

In particular I was perhaps reminded most of Null Magical Girl, which may be the one and only Madoka spinoff you might be interested in, because it differs considerably from all other spinoffs that focus on miscellaneous characters living in PMMM world and are thereby inconsequential. It's a just above short story length title written by franchise outsider and deranged hard sci-fi author Kusano Gengen, whose general sensibilities I think well align with yours, and has a lot of philosophy, classic sci-fi, and generally approaches the systems of PMMM from angles I think you'd find interesting

That recommendation aside, absolutely loved Fargo, will read Chicago immediately as well as get into your other works, and will definitely write longer thoughts on Fargo soon!

Thanks for the support!

You're not the first person to think Fargo was also influenced by MGRP, but as you said, it's more than my sensibilities just happened to align with MGRP particularly well. Every so often I kick around the idea for an essay on the Death Game genre on the whole in which I would explain how MGRP is one of the few works that maximizes the genre's potential. (My recent obsession with the currently-airing Shiboyugi has gotten me thinking about this a lot recently, actually.) What's the point of a genre where the core conceit is "anyone can die at any time" if you're going to kill off characters in only the most predictable order? That MGRP develops in its later arcs into a complex political thriller involving a kafkaesque magical government is only icing on the cake, and it's that aspect of the series that most influences Chicago.

By the way, your timing is a bit unfortunate, as I'm currently finishing up Fargo DX, a new edit of the story. My goal is to have it done by the 10th anniversary of Fargo's finale (April 16). I'm working on the last 6 chapters now, although some of these chapters are the length of 3 or 4 chapters.

I've heard the name Null Magical Girl but never knew anything about it until now. I'll look into it.

If you write anything more about Fargo, let me know. I always like reading that stuff.

[tainbocuailnge]

While I'd presume you haven't done it yourself and won't be doing it yourself in all likelihood since you dropped FGO before it was implemented and probably will just be externally reading the finale and such, out of curiosity, /theoretically/ what would you have picked for your nine Grand Servants? :O I can make fair assumptions on some @ Grand Assassin Phantom and Cu when possible but uncertain of others

saber lancer caster berserker are cu chulainn and assassin is phantom yeah. extra 1 QSH extra 2 bazett archer and rider idk honestly probably just good ol emiya and medb. maybe arjuna. if extra was split differently it'd be goghie instead of QSH but bazett is non negotiable

[cerastes]

Out of curiosity Drimo, do you have a Krooster? :O I'd love to look at your roster

Kroomfie!

Here’s the rest of the relevant clown gang:

[pokeology]

Since you live in Pastoria City have you ever met or worked with Crasher Wake? What are your thoughts on him?

We have communicated a few times as my work does directly affect his own- sometimes trainers I give starters to will run straight to his gym and try to challenge him with only one pokemon with zero training, haha. I do not know him well as a person, though- we are distant professional acquaintances at best.

[raionmimi]

Medb for the first impression meme, because I'm genuinely curious whether you fell in love with her at first sight or had a first impression p different from ur feelings now

First impression: Years ago, my ex had mentioned to me that I’d like a pink queen character that was involved with Cu, which was his fave Fate character. I loved her design on sight, but I wasn’t really sure how I felt about her at first becuase I studied her myth lore and then what I knew from JP, she initially rubbed me the wrong way

Impression now: I got over my first impression with Medb really quickly though, and she’s become my number one Type Moon character and a core wife in my Holy Trinity of Wives. I would murder people for Medb if she asked me to, I love her so much

Favorite moment: If I had a nickel for every time Medb has actively had people out to assassinate her, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s hilarious that it’s happened and failed twice becuase she woke up one day and said “I think I will rid myself of weaknesses.” 

Idea for a story: I’ve been reading a lot of isekais with female characters, and one sub-genre is ones that die but are sent back to the past to avoid their terrible fate. For like a year, I’ve been thinking about if Medb or Cu got a second chance at life to prevent the war from occurring in order to save certain people from dying, but also getting Medb to train with Cu and Ferdiad under Scathach so she could kill Conchobar herself. Not as a canon thing though, just a fun au that I’m too lazy to write

Unpopular opinion: I think Medb x Cu would be more popular if she was a male character (which I’m glad it’s not popular becuase I enjoy posting without some tumblr weirdo arguing about headcanons with me like I’ve seen with actual popular ships) and Medb x Scathach/Skadi are my two least fave ship for her

Favorite relationship: Medb and Alter Cu specifically becuase I’m a whore for goth x preps, but I’m also a big fan of Medb x Emiya as well as Medb x Marie Antoinette

Favorite headcanon: Medb is biromantic and asexual with a preference for men!!

And here’s a lil hime gyaru Medb doodle because hime gyarus are best gyarus besides agejos

[askvectorprime]

While you've spoken of Meantime before, what are your thoughts on the other Deception watch of the Real Gear Robots, Midnighter XR-4? Have you ever encountered them?

Dear Punctual Penpal,

I once nearly had an encounter with the Decepticon of which you speak… unfortunately, he was running late for our final showdown and I was able to foil his plan while he was still fussing over his calendar!

[versegm]

The kind of vague contradiction between Lalter in story and her My Room is probably because a fair amount of her My Room is 1:1 copy-pasted from /Salter/ in Unlimited Codes; "the duty of a hero to be hated", "It was a long dream" etc. are all stuff Saber Alter 1:1 says in UC word for word, and the other stuff less directly goes off of that

Nice

[padawanlost]

How do you personally reconcile TCW in areas where it contradicts the EU (which is to say most prominently the clone inhibitor chips and the Mandalorians basically wiping out Karen Traviss's stuff, less prominently stuff like Ventress). Do you prefer one over the other (clones doing it voluntarily vs. involuntarily, pacifist Mandos vs. warrior ones), or do you just kind of shrug and not really take it as a big deal, or some other approach? :O

Tbh, i didn’t have to reconcile TCW with the older canon because I only got deep into the EU after watching the show. Before TCW I had only read a few novels and comics and since I was never a big fan of Clone wars (2003) accepting the new canon wasn’t hard at all. sure, now that I do know more about the preexisting canon, there’re some things I wish they had done differently but nothing bothered me as I watched the show for the first time. Beyond the obvious ‘Anakin never had an apprentice!’ initial show, the only time I was upset because the show deviated from the canon was the Slave of the Republic arc. I love that storyline and I incredibly excited about watching it but, in the end, it did disappoint me. Other than that, I can’t think of anything else that me immediately go ‘I don’t want these’ :P

I still remember being shocked by Cody’s betrayal when I watched ROTS for the first time but looking back I realized I never saw the clones as ‘evil’. My interpretation was that they were following Orders, that they didn’t know who Palpatine really was or why he gave the order to kill the Jedi. idk, I’m conflicted. The idea it was voluntary gives the clones agency as people and that makes them more dynamic characters to explore. On the other hand, the chip plot makes it abundantly clear they were the victims as much as the Jedi and judging by the lengths some jedi fans go to dehumanize clones and their suffering I’d say it’s better that way. I mean, it makes much harder for people to go out of their way to pretend the clones slave status did not matter so I’m okay with that. I support anything that makes the lives of slavery apologists harder :P

As for Mandalore, i knew nothing about the planet or the people beyond the Fetts so there was nothing to reconcile there. My main problem with Mandalore in the show is the whitewashing, that bothers me way more than they being portrayed as pacifists.