..............so what I'm hearing is that I need to ship starscream and arcee as two tragically weepy broken birds who take comfort in each other's arms and cry on each other's shoulders and tell each other all their deepest, most hidden fears and vulnerabilities
I hadn't considered that comparison before, but you're right! And personally? I headcanon that Hermione lied when she said she'd mindwiped her parents and sent them to Australia - because, see, Hermione knew that Harry was still doing shit at keeping Voldemort out of his head. And these are her parents. Basically the only people who can be used as hostages against her who aren't able to fight successfully. And she's willing to keep info from Harry, if telling him is considered a greater risk than keeping him in the dark. In my headcanon (and in the fic I'm writing), they're not mindwiped. She definitely did some illegal spellwork, but not on them (it's ethically wrong to Imperius civil servants so that they'll put your parents in witness protection, but it's probably less awful than 'so you mindwiped your parents so that they don't remember you exist, and then sent them to Australia', and it also resolves the issue of "how did you set up fake identities" because that's...really not one of the skills we've seen Hermione able to do?) But she knows that Harry doesn't question things, if he's not prodded to do so, and neither he or Voldemort know anything about how the Muggle world works, not really - they don't know how hard it would be to set up plausible new identities that won't get questioned as soon as it's investigated by the government. So going "oh, I mindwiped my parents and sent them off to Australia, they have no idea that I exist any more and they're safe there; either I'll be able to fix it, or I'll be dead" - well, Harry's going to swallow that just fine, and Voldemort isn't going to bother sending someone off to Australia when he's got easier targets closer to home. Augh, Tonks/Lupin and James/Lily. Y'know what, I have a solution for both of those that doesn't even require splitting them up? :3 Obviously, someone dosed both Tonks and Lily with Amortencia. (I mean, come on - Lily was being very open about loathing James and not being impressed with him, right before the werewolf caper. I honestly don't believe that someone who holds grudges the way she does would do a sudden 180 on how she felt about him.) (It does require ignoring that some of the open loathing she does seems to be pretty performative, mind you - but I bet that if Petunia got told "hey, your sister hooked up with a guy she despised up till last year", Petunia's first question would be "did anyone check to make sure she's not being compelled into this?" Lily and Petunia both cling to their grudges; Lily had every right to never forgive Snape, but even if she'd lived - she never would have.) (As a fairness to James, I don't headcanon that it would've been James who dosed Lily. It would've been Sirius, who figured he was just doing a solid for his best mate.) Heck yes. Hermione/Ron is - they're very good friends? They're great argue-buddies! They are not a good "and now we're adults" ship. Like, just starting at the bare bones of it: Ron wants a life where he's not getting challenged too much, where he's getting cossetted a bit and getting the praise and acknowledgement that his mom won't give him, and where he's basically got Mom 2.0 who makes him sandwiches he likes and lets him do what he wants. He's not dumb - I think that if he put the effort in, he could easily be as intellectually terrifying as Hermione is; the thing is, he'd have to put hard work into that, and I don't think we ever see him really put a lot of effort into anything that'd clearly get rewards for the effort put in - not after he looks at the Mirror of Erised and sees everything he wants laid out in front of him. (And I have thoughts about that mirror, frankly, and why Dumbledore went to such an effort to make sure that Harry looked at it several times before cutting him off from it.) Hermione, meanwhile, wants someone who's going to acknowledge her achievements and quite possibly try to match them - she wants someone who's happy spending time with her in the library while she studies, who she can rave about Arithmancy with, and who understands that she's insanely passionate about things and goes "yes, I will support you, your passions are Good and Valid". She gets that from Krum, I think - at the very least, he's not dismissing her passions every other sentence. She could theoretically get it from Draco, if he ever got over her being Muggleborn; he's second to her in every class they share, and I doubt he's slacking off at all, and he's the one who's behind a lot of rather clever spellwork and witty jibes aimed at Harry. I don't think she's ever going to get it from an in-character Ron, not without a lot of demonstrated character development on his part. What Hermione doesn't want is to be Molly Jr - she doesn't want to be stuck at home, doing the washing-up and cooking, and while Molly's probably got a lot of things she does when Hermione's not around? The running around and henpecking and being in charge of seemingly all the household chores is what Hermione does see, and "you're the girl, you're in charge of the cooking and stuff aren't you" is the treatment Ron gives her while they're on the Forever Camping Trip. Their goals don't really mesh well. I'm not sure how long it'd take Hermione to actually realize that, but she's proven that she's perfectly willing to go "fuck this, you're treating me like garbage, I'm done" - she did it once before, in canon, where she refused to talk to Harry or Ron at all for months in the first book, and again when she and Ron refused to talk to each other at later points.
I want you to know that I am now a tragic weepy broken bird, because this is the thing that hurt me the most in the world.
uhhh okay im just as confused i did not know this was a thing. why would anyone think that was gonna work out?
Also on the subject of Bioware I can't do Kaidan/Fem Shep or that fuckhead you start with in Kotor/fem. EVIL MAN because both of those guys skeeve me out heavily. The guy in KotoR in particular bothers me and I quit playing the game the first time because he flirted with me and I was very, very NOPE with how it went about. Solas is also skeevy really, but not as much as THEM.
okay, but then who the fuck dosed Tonks, and why because given how uncomfortable Lupin was with the romance, I'm not buying it if you say Lupin dosed her. with Tonks/Lupin, I'm kind of more inclined to think Tonks ended up infatuated with Lupin for some reason--maybe it was just 'cause Lupin was the closest thing she had left to Sirius now, I don't fucking know--and then Lupin got heavily, heavily pressured by others to go along with the relationship. and because he can be kind of a pushover, he went along with it. because if we assume Tonks was dosed with Amortencia....then there's the question of who and why. and I don't think Harry or Ron or Hermione would've bothered. it wouldn't have helped Ginny particularly, who I could see doing it if it would help her, but....it wouldn't. Lupin certainly didn't do it. Mr. Weasley and the rest of the Weasley children probably wouldn't even have considered it. and I doubt Sirius would've done that, since Lupin didn't even seem interested in Tonks before Sirius's death, nor she in him. I can't see Snape having the opportunity or motive to do it, same with all the teacher-types at Hogwarts.... and that just leaves Mrs. Weasley at that point, as far as I can see.
I really like how shit the relationships in Harry Potter are, honestly. But then I want them to be unhealthy and shit. So things like "Lupin felt pressured into marrying Tonks" just appeals a lot to my brain. no happiness only pain bad marriage we keep even though we hate it
idk, I like unhealthy relationships, but only when they're unhealthy in certain ways, and the Lupin/Tonks thing just doesn't appeal to that for me. it's not unhealthy in the ways I like, it's just....pinning Lupin into a life of constant drudgery with a wife he doesn't really love who he's going to have to pretend to love for the rest of forever now, alongside Tonks, who may or may not pick up on the fact that he doesn't love her and probably never will, and then she'd just be sad. it's just....crushing and suffocating and mundane in its unhealthiness. and that makes me feel crushed and suffocated and I get enough of that in my daily life, thankyouverymuch. so I just hate it. Ginny/Harry isn't necessarily unhealthy, imo, it's just fucking boring, and honestly seems a bit out of character for how Ginny acts in parts of it, and there's never really a relationship developed. it's just "Ginny has a childhood crush" to "Married". there's no substance and nothing for me to look at. Lily/James....I mean, I can see how it absolutely could've been unhealthy, but they're so ~blissfully happy~ in every instance of canon we see them in when they're married, so while I can think of scenarios the relationship appeals to me in, I don't care for it in canon. it's another boring one. and that just leaves Hermione and Ron, which, honestly....I don't know. I feel like 90% of their relationship would be them screaming and shouting at each other--nothing physical, probably, just a lot of noise and anger. and that's still not falling into the unhealthy I like. so yeah I hate every relationship in Harry Potter
i don't think anyone love potion'ed tonks or lupin, im thinking that tonks got super depressed after sirius died, latched onto lupin, and given the circumstances (they're at war, tonks is so depressed and he wants to help her, his own lifelong loneliness, his own grief for sirius, his own probable depression) EDIT : lmao i forgot to finish my sentence: given the circumstances he couldn't say no + war fueled desperation making people rush into relationships because What If We Die Tomorrow
[distant sound of Tez having never participated in the fandom for one of her previous major special interests even before the nonexistent season because of frigging Hei/Yin]
And those are all sorts I do like! Hadn't thought of the being pressured into things idea before with Lupin/Tonks so I want to thank you for that. Has resulted in a thing I really like.
yeah so many of the relationships in harry potter are "childhood crush" -> "married with 2.5 kids" which just feels really artificial to me? like i know there are parts of the world where it's normal to marry your high school sweetheart right out of high school but for me it feels really..... blaaahhhhhh. half assed and boring.
that plus the fact that Mrs. Weasley clearly kept at him about it for a while, as did Tonks, and then there's an entire fucking scene where a bunch of people who have nothing to do with the relationship and probably hardly understand the circumstances or how Lupin feels chime in and go "LUPIN DATE HER" so yeah pressuring was definitely A Thing there you're welcome I guess? I just wish there were more relationships like. idk. something like Jaspis. Jaspis is good. but only when supremely unhealthy. give it to me give it to me give it to me
screams endlessly into the void I actually ship Cullen/Inquis a lot and I think it's one of the least clumsy Inquisition romances, but goddamn how can people get his character so wrong. Cured with the Power of Vagina is up there with Christian Grey Type!Dom!Cullen in the list of things that make me fucking unable to read my own fQuisitor OTP. And I feel you so bad on the doribull thing. I think it's straight-up dishonest to tag background ships when they're that background - if you're not like, dividing the shippy time equally it's not cool to tag the other ships, at least not in a way that doesnt make it clear that it's not a forefront thing. As for Harry Potter... if JK needed to give Harry a female woman wife instead of a good trained therapist, Luna fucking Lovegood is right fucking there.
stop shoveling all the female characters into Mandatory Romance especially stop making them pine uselessly about it just stop. fucking stop.
Honestly, EquAra is the only ship I genuinely cannot stand ever. Which makes me feel pretty guilty because, y'know, EquAra Anon is a person that exists, but...the whole "forcing someone to love you against their will" thing reminds me way too much of my stalker, and is a major trigger for me. So I find it squicky at best, horribly triggering at worst. It's weird, because I like a lot of highly fucked up ships (hello yes give me all the unhealthy jaspis), but Equius' actions were far too similar to what my stalker wanted to do to me, all things considered. :c Also, I genuinely Do Not Get pale SolAra--I don't dislike it exactly (though it's annoying when you're actively looking for flushed and all you can find is pale), but I don't get it and I really don't think they'd work well pale. And for an I-love-this-ship-but-why-is-the-content-shitty gripe, most of the flushed SolAra fic is terrible and makes them both super boring, which is Upsetting because they're both snarky little shits in canon and affectionate needling is what they do! It sucks 'cause it's my OTP but there's so little good fic for it. :/ (Also, my unpopular opinion: I love JohnRoxy. I also love Roxiope. I also love the idea of Roxy being poly. Basically just give me Roxy dating both John and Calliope and everyone being happy.)
.....I have to admit some of my squick re: JohnRoxy might be because I have an alter who is a fictive of Roxy and who viscerally despises the ship, but outside of that, I just find it kinda boring. that said, a Homestuck ship I do enjoy in unhealthy relationship terms is GamNep. like. give me red or black, I don't care, just make it super unhealthy and I will love you forever.
Starscream and Megatron. if it´s done canon following aka abusive and fucked up, I can just leave it be A Thing Which I Do Not Read. Sure it´s triggery but the dead dove won´t hurt me if I don´t touch it. Sweet and nice fluffy versions on the other hands are The Worst. (Same with sweet fluffy JokerxHarley Quinn. I´m not even it the fandom and it upsets me.)
I feel like there's potential in John/Roxy, but I've virtually never seen anyone (including canon, before canon kinda shrugged and abandoned it) do anything with it that isn't "pair the spares diet grimdorks" which, uh, no.
