#marston241

OH MY GOD EVERYONE LISTEN TO THIS

(also i’ve decided to put this in the actual tags in case people wondered what the hell happened with this because it could NOT have just been us)

so during Gakkou Gurashi’s University Arc (the one where I thought the story’s quality dropped and never quite recovered from), they very briefly talked about this character: Sumiko. if you read GG and don’t remember her, she’s that drunk gothic lolita chick

Touko said she’d “talk about her” with Miki later, clearly missing her. the story then proceeded to never talk about her ever again (other than a brief mention by Hika), with the implication that the girls would likely meet her when they left the University, and then years later showed up very briefly in the epilogue, alive and well. so me and my very good friend Marston​ really wondered what happened, and we learned the mystery

so Sumiko’s appearance is based on the woman who sang one of the EDs. she is an idol; and if you’re unfamiliar with Japanese/K-pop idol culture, i’m not gonna delve into this here, but understand public image is a very important part of it. this was not done with her permission. it was mean to just be a cute little shout out; but essentially a character based on an actual person’s likeness, someone who probably cares a lot about her public image was created and was portrayed as this heavy drinker fun loving girl, and she literally had no idea until she read the issue, and either Kaihou or chiba actually apologized to her for it. personally, i honestly wonder if Aosoi’s role in the story was supposed to be her’s, but that’s besides the point.

i legit 120% thought GG just abandoned a plot line due to how all-over-the-place the narrative was at the time, and the actual answer is more than i ever imagined? and then she showed up again out of nowhere, years later in real time, in the epilogue… which sounds like another way of basically saying sorry?

SO YEAH UH

MORAL OF THE STORY

if you want to give someone a shoutout in your story as a cute little thing… don’t uh. portray them as fun-loving drunks… especially people who need to worry about their public image asd;flkasjd;laskjdf

Mhmm. Absolutely. Far too many to count in one ask, to be honest.

Whenever I do an arc I try to reflect on what I could’ve done better. Maybe the dialogue was too difficult to understand, or the characters’ motivations weren’t clear enough for the readers, or I built it up for too long  just to have it end too quickly, or I had characters that became completely irrelevant for far too long, or I made a character do something that is completely out of character, etc.

I am aware of my state as an amateur writer, and I know I’m going to accidentally butch a lot of stuff, but I always try to find the weaknesses in my storytelling to fix it in the next big event. That way, when I reflect on the latest arc, I will find new stuff to fix, and I’ll be able to keep getting better little by little ❤️

Have I? lelSomehow I doubt that….

But I suppose the main appeal for me is that they seemed to have a like-dislike relationship.  Similar to the one Natsuki and Yuri are usually portrayed having but… less(?)Like… more witty banter rather than all-out verbal smack-downs.