#caffeinated thoughts

It is really sad how fandom etiquette has sort of died

And what I mean by this is that somewhere in a distant path, you could have something akin to a deep discussion of different thoughts of your favorite piece of media with different people in the fandom. Was it always civil? No. Was it always kind? No. But I miss the long theory discussion style posts of different pieces of media that I loved here on Tumblr dissecting different character's thoughts and feelings, narrative theming, and what-not, with people adding their own observations and proof or points that add a different perspective to something you might not have considered otherwise

But nowadays, it feels like that is practically non-existent

Stating your opinion that hurts absolutely no-one about any kind of media has people pulling up pitchforks because you don't like their ship or you because you dare suggest that the multi-billion dollar company has the budget to create a better animation for their multi million dollar show (ifykyk)

And civilly disagreeing with people on their own opinions has people acting like you personally kicked their cat and spit on them, or creates discussions that spans several days of someone trying to "own you" for disagreeing with their take on a fictional character

Lots of people treat fanart and/or fanfic as content to consume and discard, no kudos to the author, no comments, no reblogs, just a like that leads the fanart to die into obscurity and then you see those same people entering pointless arguments and in the same breathe crying out about how there's no content for *insert character or show here* but those same people are part of the problem for why fandom feels so disconnected nowadays

Thanks for the ask Anon!

27) What is something you love to see in TMNT art/fics?

Oh there's so much lol, but in general I just love reading/seeing art that explores the relationships of the characters in the show in an interesting way.

So for example, exploring a character's psyche when they didn’t have enough time to shine or be explored in the show, "fix-it" fanfics that actually understand what the creators were going for and why they failed so they can properly fix the issues in the show/episode without entirely changing the premise of a character/plot point (god I hate when people take April and try to "fix" her by completely changing her personality), and sometimes "what-if" scenarios, where different timelines or turn of events are explored.

Donatello from the 2012 show!

I think the 2012 show gets sometimes a lot of flak from certain sides of the fandom, but honesty I feel like it often times showed the very real dynamics between siblings and slightly dysfunctional family dynamics (as in, not inherently abusive, but can be unhealthy in some aspects)

I don't think people talk about how Donatello is the backbone of this family enough, and shows never seem to delve much into it, but Donatello being a prodigy/genius is often times the sole reason why the family was able to live for so long for most iterations, but for 2012 I think the show seems to imply that Donatello was very curious and very smart at a young age, and considering how he had his own lab even before the turtle's are allowed topside, I think it implies that Donatello was always the one fixing things, taking care of his brothers when they got hurt, and just generally being the maintenance guy at the lair.

Not that I think Master Splinter didn’t know how to do any of that —one scene I want to write one day is a scene of Master Splinter struggling to fix an okd fridge, giving up halfway through, but then a young Donatello manages to fix it up without much fuss— it's just that I think Donatello was just...naturally more inclined to those things and being a very pro-active person, would just naturally want to fix things for his family and feel "useful", I also think that Master Splinter being a mammal, not just as a human but also mutating as a rat, means that he didn't know fully what his sons went through a lot of the time. I feel like he tried to research about turtle anatomy in order to understand the boys better as they grew up, but there's only so much that stolen science books can tell you about your mutant children's strange biology. Donatello through his various experiments and also being a turtle mutant himself, was likely in a much better position to understand what his brother's and himself were going through when something happened, like a sickness, or a cold, or a shed, or any other condition that affected their reptile side. (I imagine Master Splinter must have freaked out the first time he saw the boy's shedding their scutes)

Anyway going back to the main topic I relate a lot to Donnie in a lot of ways, the awkward nerd kid, he is described as being OCD and I'm currently investigating an OCD diagnosis with my therapist and on the path to take a test to check both OCD/possible AUDHD diagnosis, and then when I was in my late teens I became the backbone of my own family due to a guardian's poor health and really related to feeling undervalued, overworked, stressed, while everybody else could get to mess up but I wasn't allowed to because I was "the smart one" y’know?