Unapologetic @topazsink - Tumblr Blog

Remember when the fandom tried saying Caleb having feelings for Jester was weird because he was older than her (33 vs early 20s - Caleb was the same age as Fjord btw), and then they turn around and ship Occtis, canonically 20, with Julien, who has a similar age gap, or Kattigan, who’s in his FORTIES?

Ship whatever you want, but the way the fandom will try and come up with reasons to demonize a ship (and not even hold other ships to the same standard) because they don’t like it will always annoy me.

#it’s like when that one person tried to demonize Caleb for having feelings for Jester “without her consent #but then they shipped Beau and jester and didn’t have an issue when Beau was doing the same thing #this is not bashing any ships by the way it’s just the double standard that annoys the crap out of me #critical role discourse #cr discourse #critical role #campaign 4 #campaign four

hedalexa

Sometimes I see these long ass posts comparing Vox Machina and The Mighty Nein and while yeah, that’s a natural thing to do in fandom, and I’m about to do it myself, y’all be on here tearing them apart and forgetting the root of it all; Vox Machina was their first D&D campaign as a this specific group of people. Sure, there are some veterans in the mix but as a unit? Their maiden voyage. Of course their backstories weren’t completely fleshed out down to the 10th generation ancestor, of course they’re the world-saving heroes fighting dragons and brand name villains. Of course they wanted to play a ttrpg as the heroes their inner nerd kid always dreamt of being. They still gave us incredible characters and performances.

The Mighty Nein was their first chance as this specific group of players to play something outside of the classic hero for a campaign. They scratched that itch with Vox Machina. Now they want to branch out a little, and guess what? They also learned from their first campaign. Of course their backstories are going to be a little more in depth. Of course they want to play characters completely different than the ones they played for 6 years. Now they want to stretch their creativity, now they want a different kind of story.

Gods help Bells Hells. Those people are now veterans and have seen both sides of the coin. They either wanted to play the most ridiculous thing they could think of, or a really deep character. I hope they had a blast in campaign 3.

All I’m saying is, y’all need to fucking chill on over analyzing the campaigns against one another. Critical Role is still made up of real people playing a game together, and they’re going to learn and grow with it and with one another. Don’t forget each of those campaigns marked a point in their lives that is now frozen on the internet forever. It seems the further away we get from the past, the easier it becomes to criticize.

voxvexvax

“i skipped campaign 1” “campaign 1 is my least favorite” “campaign 1 is the least interesting” “don’t watch campaign 1” so you hate fun and whimsy and everything good and pure about this world

samwgirl

i'm not "holding your blorbo accountable" i'm saying he's canonically a piece of shit and you're getting mad at me because you woobified him to death and now you can't reconcile the OC in your head with the actual text of the show

voxvexvax

“i skipped campaign 1” “campaign 1 is my least favorite” “campaign 1 is the least interesting” “don’t watch campaign 1” so you hate fun and whimsy and everything good and pure about this world

allthingswhumpyandangsty

yes, I’d love for my ship to be canon too, but I feel like fandom culture today focuses too much on “my ship must be canon or else I will be a bitch and harass people about it” energy that we’ve lost the main point of shipping two fictional characters together, why we do it in the first place, which is that it’s fun. it brings us comfort and joy. and even if the ship isn’t canon, we have fan contents, so many amazing fan art and fanfics. you can create whatever you want about them. make them kiss. make them yearn for each other. make them confess their love under the rain.

“but it’s not canon” THEY ARE ALREADY FICTION. canon or not. they are a fragment of imagination forged by their canon creators, meaning YOU can create your own art about them too.

canon = art made by canon creators, they created it, it’s out there, it exists, it’s valid.

fan contents = art made by you, you created it, it’s out there, it exists, it’s just as valid.

broomstyxx

remember when the main critique against widojest was that it made Jester into a “manic pixie dream girl” for “sad boy” Caleb

and now the M9 animated show episode 3 is described as “Jester teaches Fjord how to have fun” and is full of her comforting him about his insecurities

you know, like a manic pixie dream girl would

animentality

When the literal M9 showrunner refers to Ess*k as “C*leb’s greatest love”:

I fucking knew the writers were gonna be biased. I’m not saying cut the storyline, but you just KNOW they’re gonna completely retcon his role in the story. And I worry it’s gonna be at the expense of C*leb’s development with the Nein, feelings for J*ster, etc.

There were intricacies and COMPLICATED feelings in C*leb’s story and character, ESPECIALLY his romantic storylines. And I’m terrified they’re just gonna simplify it and make it all about ESS*K. Like they’re just gonna SHOVE him into moments he wasn’t there for and give him redeemable qualities that just. Were not there.

#decided to censor the names so casual fans don’t have to see venting #anti essek #anti essek thelyss #anti shadowgast #anti shadowghast

tesseracaque

What a wonderful piece of media! Surely the fandom will be literate and normal

mothnem

Posts that read like a scrap of paper found clutched in a skeleton's hand found post apocalypse.

villadiodatis

I think the reason I’m so put off by all the pre-shipping and stuff going on with the C4 characters isn’t just that we don’t know anything about them besides appearance and the slightest vibe, it’s that it’s often phrased as “who is X going to romance” like this is a video game and the romance target is an NPC, not a TTRPG where they’re all protagonists. There’s been enough trouble in the fandom with people treating Jester like a doll for their favorite ship or not caring about Imogen and Laudna outside of their relationship or general shipping wars that this phrasing makes me feel like some people treat romance on CR like a choice one person makes rather than something that emerges naturally within the story because it’s best for the characters.

I really hope people don’t try and force another Matt/Liam romance 🙄

If it happens it happens, but C2 made me very wary of fans actually getting mad and threatening over it.

So Essek is getting a whole new character huh?

Because I’m pretty sure his loved ones had nothing to do with his motivations in the stream 🙄 It was literally just his ambition.

From this article:

The Legend of Vox Machina spinoff The Mighty Nein finally has a release date and guest voice cast confirmation, direct from Comic-Con 2025.

#critical role spoilers #mighty nein #the mighty nein #anti essek thelyss #anti essek #mighty nein animated

dreamswhistlesandstories

of course, at the end of the day, jester is a TTRPG character by laura bailey who played her the way she wanted to to enjoy her game.

but if i was writing jester, there would have been no doubt or contention that caleb would have been her endgame. because the crux of jester's character is someone who just wanted to be seen. and there was no one else who saw her more clearly than caleb widogast.

that is not even to say that the conflict of caleb's character is to see a life beyond his regrets, and how jester showed him that the darkness he carries should not preclude him from seeing the light.

but i wasn't the one writing them so

Spoilers for EXU: Divergence below

So does Asmodeus killing Erro finally undo all the woobifying he got in Calamity