Ravendas

canon is what happens in the text. e.g. merlin tries to poison morgana

a headcanon is a fact that you have personally made up as an elaboration of canon. it is your invention. e.g. i think morgana and gwen had a teenage lesbian situationship before the events of canon. or, i think modern morgana would love evanesence.

an interpretation is how one reads the existing text. it is not an invented fact nor is it a headcanon, it is a reading. e.g. i think merlin tries to poison morgana out of misplaced self-hatred. or, i think that one line was delivered with suppressed malice and shows a nuanced relationship.

fanon is the general fandom’s accepted headcanons and interpretations that elaborate or recontextualize canon. e.g. merlin is a badass waif and morgana is a bitch.

Dawntrail Walk Complete!

Thank you to everyone who could make it out to a walk this year, even if you could only attend one. We had an AMAZING turnout this year for each one, which blew me away. So please know you've all made this a year of walks to remember, and I am eternally grateful for your company.

We hope to see you all again next year, as well as any new faces who wish to join us! We'll be starting in February with ARR so people have time to get through new MSQ! The dates will be posted at the start of 2027!

In the meantime, enjoy Evercold!

Also, please remember to tag us if you post any screenshots! We love sharing them here after every walk!

Close-ups below!

⟢ "Something is wrong with me. Has been for a long time. I've gotten very good at hiding it in plain sight."

⟢ "You want to know what fear really is? Fear is realizing the monster was someone you ate dinner with every night."

⟢ "I know what darkness looks like from the inside. It doesn't look like anything. That's the point."

⟢ "There are rooms in me I don't go into. I sealed them up for good reason. Don't go looking for the doors."

⟢ "I've been smiling so long the muscles remember how even when nothing is funny."

⟢ "Something happened in that house. Nobody talks about what happened in that house. I talk about it now. I talk about it because silence is how it survives."

⟢ "The thing about real evil is it looks so normal. It sits across from you at breakfast and asks how you slept."

⟢ "I'm not afraid of the dark. I'm afraid of what I think about in it."

⟢ "You want the truth? The truth is ugly and small and doesn't make sense and that's exactly why it's true."

⟢ "I kept the secret so long it became part of me. Now I don't know where I end and it begins."

⟢ "Something broke in me a long time ago. I've just gotten very skilled at arranging the pieces so it doesn't show."

⟢ "The worst things don't happen in the dark. They happen at noon in kitchens and living rooms while everyone pretends."

⟢ "I'm not scared of dying. I'm scared of all the years before it."

⟢ "There are things I remember that I've never said out loud. They live in me like something feral."

⟢ "I know what I'm capable of. That's the part I don't share at parties."

⟢ "You think you know what happened. You have the outline. Nobody has the inside."

⟢ "I've been haunted for so long the haunting feels like company."

⟢ "The thing nobody says about surviving is that sometimes survival looks a lot like damage."

⟢ "I don't sleep well. Haven't for years. The nights got too loud for too long and my brain never forgot."

alphinaud's heavensward and stormblood outfit has these lapel things and these glove things

y'shtola's heavensward and stormblood outfit has this gem on the collar

alisaie's heavensward and stormblood outfit has this red pin on the lapel and a red gem accent on the belt

lyse's early stormblood outfit has a smaller red gem on the blue gem necklace

and g'raha's outfit has smaller red gems on his big necklace.

i think these might be in reference to the post-arr quest Ancient Ways, Timeless Wants, where Tataru gets a bunch of "blood pearls" with the intention to make everyone charms with them. they're red pearls! these accents don't really look to be made of pearl, but... idk, it feels like a reference.

anyway, the outfits which were explicitly designed by Tataru (not counting the ones that were constructed by her but designed by someone else, like the stuff Y'shtola, Urianger, and Thancred have been wearing since Shadowbringers) that do not have these accents are pretty much just the ones intended for the WoL — neither the Scion Adventurer attire, the Scion Traveler attire, nor the Wayfarer's attire have red gem accents — but when presenting the WoL the Scion Adventurer set, Tataru does mention sewing the blood pearl charm into the lining, so it is explicitly in there, for the Adventurer attire at least.

⚖: Has your muse broken the law before? Broken a vow or promise?

⚔: Would your muse kill if they had to in order to protect a loved one?

🌟: Do they consider themselves a good person?

👑: Is your muse honorable?

☯: What do they think of ‘good’ and ‘evil’?

🌹: When would they tell a lie?

🍷: Would they manipulate someone to get what they want?

⛨: What would they sacrifice their life for?

💋: How easily are they tempted?

☽: What is their alignment?

I think the most important thing to remember from all of that is the simple fact that there is no monolith. The "fandom" is just each of us individually in our circle of friends and acquaintances. There can and should be room for those circles to grow and overlap over time, and that requires a conscious effort being made both ways.

This was about meta discussion, and whether it is still happening on tumblr, which, just factually, it is. I kind of felt compelled to respond over on bluesky not just because I'm a meta nerd myself but because maybe other people are looking for that kind of thing too, and genuinely don't realize it's still happening here. Bluesky is just not designed for long-form text-posting, which is a comment on its format, not its culture--and I do kind of regret reblogging a post that, in hindsight, characterized bksy as having a uniquely toxic fandom culture when tumblr is hardly immune to that sort of thing. I apologize for that.