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We're about 24 hours from the close of nominations! Want to get more people into the thing you're nominating? Have an extra character tag or two to offer for a shared fandom?
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Supernatural: Night of the Marionettes
After exhausting himself in his research into the Shelleys' time at the Villa Diodati, Professor Howard Lawrence, his wife and his beloved daughter Mary arrive at an isolated Swiss guesthouse for a rest, but he's still obsessed by the question of where the Shelleys went afterwards and what could possibly have inspired Mary Shelley to write Frankenstein. Could the answer possibly lie in the Guesthouse Ritterhof and its macabre puppetshows?
What is it: Night of the Marionettes is an episode from Supernatural, a 1970s BBC series of Gothic horror stories, each featuring a narrator telling their spinechilling story to a mysterious club in the hopes of being admitted as a member. It's standalone, and just under an hour long.
Where can it be found: It's currently up on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuqafiyLnN4. Alternatively, I know the single episode can be bought from the UK version of Amazon Video.
Why do I love it?: Oh man, where do I even start? It's so much fun to watch, gloriously overwrought and stagey, and the actors are clearly having an awful lot of fun. There's scenery-chewing, Hammer-Horror-esque sets (a church graveyard clearly visible from a window), Howard in a loose shirt and undone waistcoat brandishing a candelabra as he explores the corridors of the inn at night and repeatedly running into his daughter who's doing the exact same thing, him and his family being forced to sit through a batshit and utterly excruciating puppetshow featuring rapey life-size puppets, and a heavily implied incestuous attraction between him and his daughter which includes some of the most uncomfortably hot moments I've ever seen in my life. Oh, and Mary may or may not be possessed by the spirit of Mary Shelley. It's absurd! It's ridiculous! It's glorious! I love it so damn much.
What sort of thing will I request?: I want so many things for this, starting with anything that unashamedly wallows in the absurd Gothic atmosphere of canon, or which tries to answer some of the unanswered questions of what the hell is actually going on. There is so much to dig into here, like: what happened at the Villa Diodati? Is Mary possessed? Are their hosts murderers or not? Or something following on from the end of canon, and/or digging into the relationship between him and his daughter. At the end of the episode he's so horribly guilty and distressed, and it's delicious. I'll be requesting Howard/Mary, and I'm open to anything from canon-style uncomfortable father-daughter smarm to explicit sex (ideally of the horribly guilty kind), but if you'd rather focus on the horror, plot and gothic atmosphere then it's fine to treat it as an & relationship instead. I'm just desperate to see something exploring the Gothic WTFery of canon.
Re: Supernatural: Night of the Marionettes
Peacemaker (TV, 2022)
Five months after the events of The Suicide Squad, Peacemaker gets out of the hospital, and is immediately recruited onto another black-ops team to take out the "Butterflies", an alien species that takes a human host and has been infiltrating America. He can't really say no, since his other choice is go back to prison, and there's still a bomb in his head from the Corto Maltese mission.
(You don't need to watch The Suicide Squad to watch this, since the plot-relevant clips are included, but it is fun.)
What is it: Eight episodes, 42 minutes each, so it's definitely watchable all in one weekend. I am also writing up episode recaps at my DW.
Where can it be found: Available on HBO Max (or probably wherever else you might "locate" things airing on various streaming services).
Why do I love it?: I was not expecting to love it! Or planned to watch! But then I heard there was a m/m/f threesome that happens, and that Peacemaker was now canonically bisexual. (Plus the cast is diverse and Peacemaker isn't the only queer character.)
The actual plot is wacky - the aliens look kind of like flying preying mantises - but we're here for Peacemaker learning to be a better human being, his BFF platonic chemistry with Adebayo, Vigilante's huge gigantic crush on him, racists getting their comeuppance, Harcourt beating up dudes, and the FOUND FAMILY feelings of it all.
What sort of thing will I request?: Peacemaker/Vigilante - Chris is struggling with his past and what his father made him into, and how he doesn't want to be that anymore, and Adrian's basically a clueless sociopath who could be easily tricked into being a slightly better person (since Peacemaker is his role model). Anything involving the whole team, since they started out all disliking and mistrustful of each other but ended up being friends who have a group chat!
The Heist: Monaco (Visual Novel)
What it is: A stand-alone visual novel by Pixelberry, released in the Choices: Stories You Play app. The novel is free, though you can only play a certain number of free chapters per day; certain choices within the games cost diamonds, which can be bought with actual money or earned by playing through other games and watching ads.
What it's about: You play as Lee, the up-and-coming Mastermind of a Caper Crew you lead along with your Partner In Crime/Fixer and longtime best friend, Rye. After a betrayal by one of your crew leaves one of your gang in jail and the others scattered and on the run, you and Rye must cobble together a new crew to pull off your biggest heist yet: stealing the crown jewels of Monaco in the middle of a royal wedding!
What I love about it: I'm a sucker for fun heist capers, and this one is very fun and very caper-y! It has all the hallmarks of a satisfying group heist: competence kink, people with very specific skill sets teaming up to get the job done, fun action and subterfuge as you evade law enforcement and other bad guys, fast-moving plans with many moving parts that have to shift on the fly. It's also got that Ocean's Eleven and Leverage-type bonus of the heist feeling moral-ish, because you're ultimately stealing from and conning bad people who have stolen from you in the past. All the characters are really fun -- you have choices on which ones you want to add to your crew, and those decisions really feel like they matter to how the story goes. I also love the camaraderie and loyalty that develops between the main character and the rest of the gang, and how the relationships you build affect the ending of your story.
What I'm likely to request:
• Male!Lee/Rye, Male!Lee & Rye: The two leaders of the crew and the main characters, who have been grifting together since they were kids, always have each other's backs, and have a long history that's desperately in need of exploring through fic! I am suuuper into the loyalty and trust between these two bros, especially after a semi-betrayal is uncovered that tests their bond, and I love them as best friends or as lovers.
• Mervin "Uppercut Jones" Kalani/Anton Edison: Jones is one of the options for your Muscle, a gentle giant of a professional wrestler who has vowed only to fight to protect others (outside the ring, of course) and is adorably optimistic and encouraging. Anton is an option for your Hacker and is the New Kid on the team, young and gung-ho but also anxious and struggling in the shadow of his father, a famous professional thief (who is also an option to have on the team, although I didn't choose him so I don't know what that's like). I shipped these two from the moment they met; they're so impressed by each other's skills and have a genuinely cute friendship despite being total opposites. At one point Jones promised to always protect Anton and my heart couldn't take it, so currently I'm just smashing them together and shouting "now kiss!" (Also, that size difference. I'm just saying.)
Other resources: The wiki has articles on the story's characters! Here's the TV Tropes page. There are also playthroughs on YouTube, including this one.
The Royal Romance (Visual Novel)
What it is: A series of visual novels by Pixelberry, released in the Choices: Stories You Play app. The novels are free, though you can only play a certain number of free chapters per day; certain choices within the games cost diamonds, which can be bought with actual money or earned by playing through other games and watching ads. The characters I've nominated are featured in several series of novels by now (The Royal Romance, The Royal Heir, The Royal Ending), but you only really have to play The Royal Romance Book 1 to know the characters and their relationships!
What it's about: You play as a struggling New York waitress who happens to meet a visiting bachelor party, hit it off with the bachelor, and then learn that he's a prince who has a bunch of ladies competing to win his hand... and you're invited to join in! In far-off, beautiful
MadeuplandiaCordonia, you must find allies and friends, navigate court customs and intrigue, and dodge scandal and sabotage to win the prince's heart (or somebody else's...)What I love about it: It's very silly and dramatic and full of romance-with-royalty tropes (fancy balls and gowns and costume changes, jetsetting to gorgeous destinations, silly traditions and etiquette, backstabbing court ladies, avoiding the overbearing press, etc), and it's got a bunch of really great characters who are super shippable. I'm all about the NPC ships for this one!
What I'm likely to request:
• Liam Rys/Maxwell Beaumont: Liam is the Crown Prince of Cordonia, who is earnest and duty-bound and just trying to do what's right for his family and his country while also trying to follow his own heart; Maxwell is his longtime party!friend and a member of another noble family who's the MC's guide and confidant throughout the story. though he's kind of an adorable failboat at this sometimes. The Beaumonts sponsor the MC in the marriage contest because each noble family is allowed to present one lady as a suitor and Maxwell doesn't have any sisters. I think that's unfairly heteronormative (especially considering that the prequel book set hundreds of years earlier allowed gay pairings!) and Maxwell should totally be allowed to be the suitor. Liam likes Maxwell more than most of the ladies anyway, and he always makes him laugh and makes sure he doesn't take himself too seriously! They would be so sweet together!
• Liam Rys/Maxwell Beaumont/Drake Walker: Drake is the prince's commoner best friend who's fiercely protective and suspicious and pessimistic, and Liam/Drake is one of the fandom's bigger ships. I am stupidly into the idea of Liam/Drake secretly being an established couple who don't plan on letting Liam's eventual mandatory marriage to a noblewoman (...or nobleman) split them up. Maxwell is so optimistic and bright and kinda flaily! Drake is kind of an asshole on the outside, but he has that shiny heart of gold! They balance each other out really well and they're both so good for Liam.
Other resources: The wiki has a list of characters. The TV Tropes page is here! And you can find various playthroughs of different routes on YouTube, such as this one here.