ollie (they/them) adult. i do art sometimes but mostly i just shitpost. fandom historian, apparently. resident catboy spock enjoyer. mostly torchwood and doctor who, some star trek and buffy. header by serialreblogger
hard launch tour prediction!! Everyone is having a normal time. dnp seem fine. “We have a surprise for you guys.” Phil says. All of a sudden P!ATD come out and start singing “High Hopes.” When Brendon gets to the chorus, someone else starts singing… “every snowflakes different just like you.” Lights flash everywhere, and you see FOB singing “High Hopes” along with P!ATD, while MCR is singing their Yo Gabba Gabba Christmas hit. Everyone in the crowd is going to be ok. Then if things couldn’t get any more ok, Dan and Phil walk onto stage and kiss their secret girlfriends, holding the straight flag.
Kanaya Maryam (Homestuck) vs. The Thirteenth Doctor (Doctor Who)
Kanaya Maryam
The Thirteenth Doctor
Remaining time: 6 hours 51 minutes
Propaganda below the cut:
Kanaya Maryam:
She's always made into the "mom friend" who cares for others and has no problems or needs or qualities of her own
She is a weird autistic lesbian who loves fashion and solving all her problems with violence
Thirteen:
Despite being a great incarnation of the character, somehow she is uniquely bad. Despite having many of the same traits as the 'male' Doctors, somehow it is worse when she does it. She's constantly held up to greater scrutiny and one cannot help but see that misogyny plays a huge role here
Dared to be an incarnation of The Doctor who was played by a woman and all the needs and geeks were as normal about that as you'd expect
‘Jodie Whittaker (actor) killed the show’ ‘the Thirteenth Doctor sucks and is bad and new who sucks after her!!’ Etc holy moly. So much bashing of the show because of her and not because the writers just sucked for a while (which honestly is the case for most of the show)
She's literally the exact same character the Doctor has always been- hypocritical self righteous bullshit and all. But for sooooommmmeeee reason it's charming and compelling and adds great depth to the character when it's David Tennant but it's shallow and poorly written and inconsistent when it's Jodie Whittaker
She won the poll for Doctor most likely to bite someone even though Eleven bit someone onscreen. She's great
Azula (Avatar: The Last Airbender) vs. Leela of the Sevateem (Doctor Who)
Azula
Leela
Voting ended onJul 4
Propaganda below the cut:
Azula:
She is often given very little grace for her actions in comparison to her brother. I think people tend to forget that the only reason Zuko gets his redemption arc is because his banishment gave him access to an environment outside of his abusive home, as well as a support network who helped re-contextualize his experiences. Comparatively, Azula is younger than him, she's a girl in a patriarchal society, and she is systematically denied access to support and education that would inform her of the issues with how she is treated. Yes, the way she treats Zuko and her peers is often cruel, but she is also only 14 years old and lives under the constant threat of neglect and violence from a man who intentionally encourages competitiveness and conflates violence with authority. Any apparent delight she takes in Zuko's mistreatment is experienced alongside the understanding that if it wasn't him, it would be her. She does plenty of horrible things throughout the show, but I think her inability to understand the morality of those actions is more of a tragedy that people like to give credit for.
She is a child! Give her access to a support network, therapy, opportunities to learn about new people and places and the world outside of the bubble she has been kept in her whole life. She deserves a chance to deconstruct her experiences, to learn that how she was treated was wrong and that she deserves better, and that she has the opportunity to makes amends for her own actions and to break the cycle should she choose.
She's treated as an irredeemable war criminal and abuser at 14 while Iroh, a 50 something-at-youngest man who spent most of his life participating in a century of imperialism and besieged Ba Sing Se for 600 days before hanging up his hat as a general only after he personally lost his son and then proceeded to not actually take any steps whatsoever towards ending the war despite being the rightful heir, is a beloved fandom figure. People deny her humanity in every way they can at every chance they get and think she deserves to be psychiatrically abused and is incapable of being redeemed. Even a lot of the people who think she can be redeemed think more or less putting her on a leash so she can be Zuko's guard dog is "redemption." People won't even acknowledge that she's also a victim of her father's abuse.
Despite being a fourteen year old child soldier, she is adultified constantly. This usually comes in two forms - as an evil seductress or as evil incarnate, worse than even her father, Ozai. Some people even claim this fourteen year old girl SLEPT TO THE TOP. Or she is painted as evil and irredeemable despite her breakdown on screen. She is constantly hated on in order to prop her brother, Zuko, up.
She is clever and ambitious. She was able to restore her brother's honor, conquer Ba Sing Se, and kill the Avatar in one fell swoop. Evil actions? Yes but damn she did it well. She's been abused all her life and deserves a chance to heal from her trauma. She's the only one we see in the series wield blue flames, immensely powerful. She slays every outfit and scene she appears in. Insanely quotable. "Do the tides command this ship, or do I?…Then I think you should stop worrying about the tides, which have already decided to kill you, spend more time worrying about me, who's still mulling it over."
Leela:
Objectified and reduced due to being 'for the dads' in her costume, constantly considered as dumb and inferior while also an 'innocent primitive' (racism also playing a big role here), just misunderstood constantly when she is not being overlooked, even in a spinoff in which she's a major character
Gwen Cooper (Torchwood) vs. Farah Black (Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency)
Gwen Cooper
Farah Black
Voting ended onJun 30
Propaganda below the cut:
Farah Black:
Treated as the competent cheerleader to the popular m/m pairing. Despite being one of arguably four main characters in the second season, she spends the finale lying half dead in a ditch while everyone else gets to go have interesting interactions with each other and save a world.
She's such a weirdo and a mess in a way I think Black characters and especially dark-skinned Black women don't often get to be. She wants to be normal so bad but she's not. I actually enjoy her relationships to the main guys too, she plays off them really well and even one of them having a crush on her and them hooking up is handled pretty well and doesn't overshadow either of their characters.
Gwen Cooper:
If you go back to like 2016ish or earlier in the torchwood ao3 tag it's like you might as well have gone back to a time period pre women's suffrage. She ofc got the usual "getting in the way of yaoi" allegations and also people hating on her for cheating on her boyfriend (which perhaps pisses me off the most. It was funny as fuck when she cheated on her boyfriend it's what gives her half her swag) but also a lot of people just seem to not get her or her personality or goals or values or relationships to the other characters at all. Which is infuriating considering she's the literal audience pov character. Fortunately people mostly seem to have got more normal about her but I do occasionally see takes in the tag that I cannot believe people are willing to type out and post publicly in big 2026. Anyway all I truly have to say at the end of things is god forbid a woman be messy and toxic and bisexual in the messy toxic bisexual show.
She's everything to meeeee!! Serial cheater AND serial optimist! The heart and conscience of the team except instead of her moral compass making everyone else better they all just make her worse instead. The only person to join Torchwood purely of her own volition without having some kind of tragic backstory to explain why which makes her the biggest freak there. Sniffer dog in human form who will never ever let go of a trail. Wears her big ol bleeding heart on her sleeve and is doomed to forever fall in love with some poor soul she desperately wants to help but can't. Also microdosing Jack's own curse of immortality purely by just being the person who always happens to survive, cockroach-like, while everyone she loves dies. Punches a CIA agent in the face for calling her English. Has a toxic yuri episode. World's first female deadbeat boyfriend who loves blowing up her interpersonal relationships. Loves people so so so much even when she doesn't treat them well. Briefly a wanted terrorist. There's like a million other things I could say about her that I'm forgetting rn but I love her so so much
"gwen cooper bashing" is a canon tag on ao3 with OVER 200 FICS. IN A FANDOM WITH 20K FICS. 1% OF TORCHWOOD FICS ARE TAGGED GWEN BASHING. She is constantly made the villain for "getting in the middle of" the main gay ship even though that ship is canon and her being there hasn't stopped that from happening. People also hate her so bad for cheating on her boyfriend, but these people usually also have the guy she cheated with as their favourite character even though he fully coerced her into it and kept pushing until she eventually gave in.
In recent years there has been a push against this but instead of actually exploring what makes her interesting and the nuances of her character people just turn her into a toxic yuri girlboss who totally doesn't need any man in her life and definitely pegs her boyfriend/husband
I entered the fandom pretty recently, and there isn't much hate towards her anymore, but she was villainized for cheating on her boyfriend, and probably other things that I'm not aware of.
At first she seems like the normal one, but she isn't! She tries so desperately to cling to a life outside of Torchwood, but she can't! She's so cool!!!!
fandom hates on her for cheating on her bf and lying to him when the male characters do the exact same shit
shes my beautiful badass action hero boytoy
There was a time when hating on her was like an un-agruable default in the fandom. Even tho she's one of the main characters, arguably - thee main character as we start everything from her pov. It got better now but still occasionally I encounter a post that calls her annoying or bad, while completely misinterpreting her character and that pisses me off. If a guy was like that you'd call him your favourite pathetic meow meow or something, but a woman in the same role gets hate
Yes my girl made so many questionable choices but cmon. that's what makes her interesting, that's what makes her alive! She's stubborn and deeply flawed and occasionally selfish and she's an amazing character not despite but because if it. I wouldn't want her to be any other way
She 'gets in the way' of the uber popular M/M ship, so for the longest time people acted like she was the scum of the earth, super evil and manipulative, etc. etc. To this day there are over 200 'Gwen bashing' fics on AO3, where she gets murdered, 'exposed' as being evil, or just treated horribly.
Honestly Gwen is the most interesting character on the show! She starts out as this more innocent and naive foil to the rest of Torchwood, who reminds them that they're actually dealing with real people who need their help, but as she experiences more and more trauma she struggles to deal with it and makes, frankly, a lot of bad choices but ones that totally make sense for what she's going through. Her character development is fascinating, and even as she becomes colder and more distant, she still cares so much about other people and doing whatever she can to save the world. Also she's gorgeous! God forbid women with big beautiful eyes do anything.
This is one of the best posts I’ve ever made. It’s just people talking about wanting rain. Or who have too much rain and want other to have their rain.
Drusilla (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) vs. Nancy Wheeler (Stranger Things)
Drusilla
Nancy Wheeler
Voting ended onJun 28
Propaganda below the cut:
Drusilla:
Fandom punishes her for getting in the way of their OTP
She's treated as an obstacle to another ship, either having her somehow predict that her partner would go on to fall in love with someone else and save the world (two things that she did not know and would not care about) and graciously "set him free" so he could "fulfill his destiny" or she's nothing but vindictive bitch who did nothing but abuse him.
Honestly she deserved much better from both the fandom and the shows themselves. Despite having powers we see very few other vampires in the series have she doesn't manage to be the main villain for more than a few episodes. She's so interesting in her relationships to both the titular vampire slayer and the three vampires she was in a fucked up polycule with. Yes she's a tragic character but she also canonically has no problem eating children. Stop flattening her!
Nancy Wheeler:
Nancy's character arc of seeking retribution for her dead best friend and her loss of childhood went from being very nuanced and interesting to just her becoming a cold, killing machine. A lot of her character is boiled down to being a gun-wielding badass who doesn't give a fuck about other people and is the smartest person in the room, and people look over how complex, traumatized, and vulnerable her character is. Also, a lot of her character is hated on for not being "enough" for her canonical love interests, and it makes me grind my teeth.
Nancy is beautifully contradictory. She is kind, but brazen. She is on a constant search for justice because her ultimate trauma (losing Barb) can never be rectified. She cannot save her, so she does what she can to save everyone else. Whenever Nancy's grief is shown, there is such a fascinating way she deals with her pain in a way that is imperfect and messy. She pulls away, she gets cold. Not because she is just "that way," but because she has to detach herself from the events of the show to keep her pain and grief in check. She IS a badass, but she is also someone who loves puppies and pink clothes, and those things all exist at once. She's so interesting, and complicated! She rejects her emotions and tries to keep them submerged underneath because if she actually spends a second with her own thoughts, she is drowned in her sorrow and grief. She holds herself accountable for her friend's death despite the fact that nothing she did could have been prevented. It was just terrible timing, and because she put her desire for being with her crush above leaving with her friend, she blames herself for being selfish - when really, she had no control over what happens after. I hate that her grief never gets truly resolved or explored in later seasons (minus a few small scenes). But, yeah, I just really love Nancy Wheeler.
a new reality tv show called So you think you can write Doctor Who
twelve episodes, twelve contestants - a mix of annoying middle aged sci fi authors, fan fic authors and random people off the street
a variety of against the clock writing tasks, big finish scripts, ability to interact with actors without shouting at them and challenges where you have no budget or doctor for an episode
judged by solely by christopher eccleston
this is how you find the new doctor who showrunner
Okay, real talk now. People love to tag male characters in posts about women, but this post is gonna take this seriously. Is there actually a canonically male character you believe is a trans woman? Or at least has made into a trans woman for a fanart or a fanfic? Excluding the ones canonically implied.
Sound off in the tags! Link to the fanart or fic if available. Do it. Give me the girls. Make more women.
romaincrisis
dededos
blakekathryn
germansingergirl
turnnoffyourmind
andulkaphoto
yousharknotpass
