rhymes with orange

The core conceit of Lord of the Rings is pretty funny. You are a twenty three year old in a suburb of Maine. The little bracelet in your grandpa’s attic has an inscription on it that is the password to the world’s entire nuclear arsenal. It is up to you to walk to the only hydraulic press in the world, located in Arizona, before the FBI finds the bracelet, kills you, and enslaves the suburb of Maine you currently live in

Also the 90-year old hobo that your grandpa beat in a rap battle for possession of the bracelet while hiding from the Romanian secret police really loved the bracelet because it was coated in small amounts of LSD and tried to hunt and kill your grandpa to get it back. He was then apprehended by the FBI and instantly gave them your grandpa’s address. Seal Team Six is about to break down your door and shoot you, says your local congressman who can also do cool magic tricks

There's a guy in NY who MIGHT be capable of destroying the codes but won't coz he simply wants to spend time with his wife. So it's up to your grandpa's old friend in rural Ohio to get you the friends capable of finishing the task.

And we must not, at any point, remember the existence of aircraft and ask aloud why we can't just fly to Arizona

The aircraft are all under the command of the Australian government, which has declared that the nuclear arsenals are not their problem and that no aircraft will help anyone out with that problem. Your grandfather did fly with the bracelet one time, but he only got away with that because no one involved knew what the bracelet was and it would have been a huge deal if anyone had realized what was up. If you charter a flight towards the world's only hydraulic press, the Australians will know and throw lightning at the plane.

You can't fly to Arizona because the FBI has a massive radar installation located right next to the hydraulic press, and part way through the story Seal Team Six gets upgraded to also being fighter pilots.

Also, one of the guys on your team who used to be a Green Beret has decided the best way to solve this problem is if he becomes President and takes over the nuclear arsenal himself, because the bracelet told him so.

Taught my living weapon how to do backflips on the trampoline

There are many fun reasons to have a character avoid using guns, but I think "this otherwise-awesome fighter is a really terrible shot" is an underappreciated one. Yes, they're available in my setting and would work against my enemies. No, I don't have a moral code against them or a power that makes them redundant. I just can't aim for shit!

In general IMO the more badass and hypercompetent a character is, the more they're enriched by having one skill they're just absolutely hopeless at. Terrible shot, terrible liar, terrible dancer, no poker face, no sense of direction, can't drive, can't swim, can't cook, can't read, always broke, always late, always falls for a certain trick...

this is true. I figured out recently that one of my favorite questions for fleshing out a character is "What is something they can do, but not well?"

As a scientist I find the concept of Cecil freely yapping about Carlos on the radio so funny because if I was in the lab just going about my experiments and then some person on the radio started talking about how hot I am I would get clowned on it by my coworkers beyond belief. Every time I walked into the lab the grad students there would’ve been like “there he is with his perfect hair 😩” and if the centrifuge broke “try asking it to work with your sweet caramel voice 😫” like deadass the lab would be insufferable for months

shipping the popular yaoi pairing but shaking my head while i do to indicate that i also care about the work's themes and other characters

happy pride 🌈