Bonus Features: We Give You the Whole Seat but You'll Only Need the Edge + The Heart-to-Heart of the Matter · 9:31pm Jun 16th, 2020
Q: Why did we give Flash self-esteem issues with his body?
BEVIN: Oh gosh! So it's no secret that I've had a huge, huge soft spot for Flash since before Legend of Everfree was even released. And I think he writers must have too, since what ended up started happening with him in the actual show that really helped people soften on him, was making him this sort of Charlie Brown type of character. He never does anything wrong, he is by all accounts a well-meaning, honest, kind person who does his best to support the people around him, but over and over he keeps not getting what he wants. He never gets bent out of shape over it or takes it out on anyone else (unless there's magic mind control involved), he just gets up and keeps trying. And man if it doesn't just make you root for him so hard! And it's become such a big piece of who he is in this universe, and one that I absolutely adore and that speaks volumes about what sort of person he is. So naturally we felt like we needed to keep it going a bit.I think the specific body image issues came about really slowly. Like it was little things I'd noticed while working on the show, like Flash's appearance in the "Snack Psychic" short where Pinkie mentions that he eats grilled cheese when he's stressed about a test, and the fact that his beach outfit has him in a t-shirt, and even going back to Everfree and how he was designed there, he looked bigger than his previous build had, which was then added to by his hoodie makeover for the series.
None of it was planned intentionally by anyone on the show, that I know of, there were just these little things here and there that I noticed and then squirreled away in my brain until at one point I mentioned this off-hand musing to you, Steph, where I was idly wondering if there was an underlying reason for these things.
MARVEL: Awww, yeah, I fucking love that about Flash, that he's such a well-meaning guy but the universe keeps taking the football away from him! And he keeps trying anyway! Him getting back up started to become what defines his character, and I think that's just so damn endearing, that no matter what, Flash learns from it and moves on.
When you told me about that headcanon and why it came about, it just felt like a great evolution for Flash's character: the guy who was introduced to series solely as Dreamy Adorakable Love Interest not only matured emotionally past the girl he was introduced to be in love with, but has to deal with feeling decidedly not dreamy (even if Timber would very much argue Flash still is).
And feeling unhappy with some part of your body is something a lot of teenagers have to deal with. Hell, everybody has something they wish they could change about themselves, so to me, if we were doing a body swap story, it made sense to have a character dealing with that because of course it would come up! It was just a full circle moment to have the person in his body be the counterpart to the girl he used to have thing for.
But the other lovely thing about having Flash deal with this is seeing his friends comfort him about it, because in truth he really doesn't have anything to be ashamed of for having a few extra pounds. His boyfriend and friends value him the same, and I think that's an important take-home, if nothing else.
Also, I have to say: I fucking love Twi and Flash as friends. Absolutely sweet, totally lovely.
BEVIN: Oh my gosh, yes! I love their friendship and the way you showed their similar insecurities about living up to some idealized expectation, and having that be the thing they start to bond over! Yeah, Flash is still a total hottie! He's the only one who doesn't see himself that way.
Q: No Spoilers but: What's up with Solstice Shiver?
MARVEL: Ohhh man, we'll get to know Solstice more as we go and I'd much rather everybody make up their own minds on him, but I think we can talk about character creation a little bit and what it's like to introduce an OC into a cast of already beloved characters.So, okay, the non-spoilery answer for why I created this character is because I had an idea I really fucking wanted to try, which happens in the second half of the story. I built the character around that moment—he didn't come out fully formed like Athena from Zeus's brow, not by a long shot, but that motivated me to plot backwards and build up to it. It got me thinking that he could be a counsellor at the school, which Canterlot High needed anyway after everything they've been through.
And the counsellor aspect of it all was something that I really enjoyed because I'd been training to become a counsellor myself until a year ago when I switched career-paths. I've interned at a counselling office, volunteered at others, and my undergrad major is in psychology. Not to mention I've gone through counselling multiple times for social anxiety and grief, and supported friends through counselling and mental health issues, too.
Mental health and counselling isn't something I'm an expert in, but I have some know-how on how counsellors think and operate. So, naturally making Solstice was... well therapeutic for me
I love how ambiguous he is in the first half, and I'm glad that's the impression a lot of people were getting, and I also love that a therapist can still be an ambiguous figure in the friendship and feelings franchise.
I think inserting OCs is something a lot of fan-creators have done ultra well, and some notoriously bad. And I was nervous I'd just make a character no one wanted around, but creating any amount of intrigue and getting to use my love of mental health support in a genuinely ambiguous character was too fun to pass up!
MARVEL: Here's one I wanted to hear you talk about more solo because it's so interesting to me!
Q: What was it like learning how to paint digitally for the title-cards in this project?
BEVIN: Oh! It was really fun! Learning to paint digitally was something I'd been wanting to learn for a long time—prior to now and a brief stint in school with learning to speed-paint a little bit, my only real technique with digital color was cel shading. Nothing wrong with it, but I wanted to branch out. And then this project came along and it turned out FimFiction had this whole "cover" thing for fics, which gave me the perfect excuse to try, and then I was off work for a while due to injury and then the whole pandemic thing, so I had the time!Technique-wise, it was a lot of breaking my old habits and establishing new ways of approaching the concept of coloring. My brother got me the book "Color and Light" for Christmas, which was a great resource, and I found some online tutorials, and basically I just took in a whole bunch of info for a bit, and then started messing around.
Lots of trial and error, finding brushes I liked, figuring out what sorts of textures and brush strokes I liked. Lots of me just flopping around in the mud for a while, making tons of mistakes, but gradually learning what worked for what I wanted and what didn't. It's definitely something I'd love to keep going with, especially since there's so much I have left to learn about it. But doing these chapter covers alone has been really fun. Figuring out what the most important moment from, or the concept that underpins the chapter is and trying to represent it in what is hopefully an aesthetically pleasing way. (I love getting to go a little ham on the symbolism.)
MARVEL: It's been so fucking cool to see you level up your skills!! The title card have all turned out gorgeous and it was such a joy to letter them for us because you made such great pieces that deserved proper lettering to go along with them!
BEVIN: Q: So that soccer match was thrilling! How did you manage to write a sports match in a way that was exciting and fun to read?
MARVEL: Hahaha, aww, I'm glad it worked! I'll be honest that I don't follow sports (I'm closer to Twilight than Rainbow Dash in my sports know-how), but I can't say I don't get the appeal. I played soccer as a kid and grew up going to my brother's hockey games (even better: getting to go to Niagara Falls and stay in a hotel when his team had their exciting finals for the season). Growing up bumming around hockey rinks and rooting for my brother probably has an influence in why I at least understand why sports are exciting for people.
But personal stories aside, my approach to writing a sports game was basically the same as writing a fight scene (with an audience no less!): You have to have wins and losses back to back.
We have to see Lightning Dust kicking the Wondercolts' asses for there to be any tension and not only that, but we have to time it with the character beats.
The reason any fight scene, or soccer match as the case may be, matters to a reader is because of how it impacts the characters. Timber needs a fucking win after that conversation under the bleachers. Not only that, but Twilight and Flash need something (or someone) to get some common ground on. And Sunset, well, she needs to start trying to understand what Timber's going through, because up until now we as the readers might be able to read between the lines with his behavior, but Sunset's been so focused on her own issues and trying not to share her own feelings that she's missed some obvious signs with him.
So I put Lightning Dust winning after the conversation under the bleachers just matches the blow they all just took emotionally, but as the game goes on, they one by one start to win until Timber finally kicks the winning goal. And since everyone was cheering him on, it was everybody's win.
(Another hot tip for new writers: action writing is mostly full of active sentences rather than passive. They don't have to be short sentences, in fact vary the length up, but you do need strong verbs).
Oh and Rainbow Dash starts out hilarious to watch, but I think we feel for her more and more as it goes on. Like no duh she would care, and I had fun writing her freaking out over it, but there's a certain point where you can see how much it matters to her in a sympathetic way. She deserved that win, too, after what I put her though haha
BEVIN: Haha, yeah! That's the thing that blew me away the most about it—apart from the fact that I could understand what was happening as a not-a-sports-person either—was how emotionally invested I was in reading it because the stakes of that game kept becoming more and more clear.
For Dash, obviously, but also for Timber who was taking it pretty seriously but was just out of his depth in terms of experience, and for their friends in the stands whose own emotional pieces were starting to click into place around this game. From someone who knows very little about sports, I felt like I learned something about sports in general from this, and was rather shocked at just how much fun it was to read!
Soundtrack x2! Chapter 6 songs here:
- Phantom of the Opera Medley by Peter Hollens (For our very own lead in Shadow of the Symphony)
- Where is my Mind by The Pixies (Twilight's existential crisis activate!)
- GUY.exe by Superfruit - "Wish I could synthesize a picture perfect guy/six feet tall and super strong..."
- Hey Ya by Obadiah Parker - "Thank god for mom and dad for sticking to together 'cause we don't know how"
Chapter 7 songs here:
- Thunderstruck by AC/DC - "You been... lightning thunder stuck!"
- Ladies and Gentlemen by Saliva - "Ladies and gentlemen, good evening!//You've seen that seeing is believing!// Your eyes and your ears may be bleeding//Please check to see if you're still breathing!"
- If I'm Being Honest by dodie - "All of my best bits pulled forward, collected, displayed//sadly I just think that I was disgusting today...//You blew me up like a big balloon, far too soon//I'm just a stuttering teen"
- Tall Tall Shadow by Busia Bula - "You can't run away when you know that the tall, tall shadow... tall, tall shadow is yours"
- Monster by dodie - "I'm guessing that I've grown horns//I guess I'm human no more... // You break the rules and spikes grow from your skin//please let the devil in"
- The Heart of the Matter by Don Henley - "The more I know, the less I understand//All the things I thought I knew, I'm learning again//I've been trying to get down to the heart of the matter"
And with that, we've officially finished part I! I realized it's not quite accurate to say the first half, since part II is longer both in word count and the number of chapters, but this was the best stopping point to leave you on a proper cliffhanger.
Who hasn't wanted to know what the other Sunset's deal is? I've seen so many fantastic takes on her in the fandom, so when I approached how I wanted to handle her in this story, I just wanted to do something interesting I hadn't seen before.
But, of course, the question remains:
When is Part II Coming?
The answer is when part II is ready!
I've written 107,000 words total in this story and you've only gotten 41,000 so far, so rest assured that part II is well, well under way, it's just a chapter and a half away from the first draft being done (and revisions are also underway!). Bevin's designed some characters, title cards, and has a lot of different pieces in-progress, too.
That said, we aren't going to promise a timeline. I'm finishing up my last semester of university this summer and Bevin's working hardcore on a really tightly scheduled production and her contract won't end for a while yet.
We're both so passionate about this project. You can probably tell in how much we enjoy talking to each other and you all about it! In some very real ways, it's an escape for both of us, and something we're really proud to be working on as we leveled up our creative skills to do it. Hell, part of the reason we planned this midway break was so we could savour finishing the production of the second part totally on our own time, we love it that much!
We'll keep you updated here on what's going on with us and when we do have a date set for part II's release. There's other parts of this project in the works I'm dying to share, too, so all I can say is stay tuned.
And thank you for reading, for reacting, for commenting. All of it. The ride only gets more wild from here.
Devilishly yours,
Marvel
There's a reason I ship him with Derpy, and it's not just the shoulder pats.
That is fantastic advice for any action scene, athletic or otherwise. Thank you for it.
Eagerly looking forward to Part II whenever it's ready. Thank you both for all you've already done with this story.
i’ve loved Flash ever since he was introduced into EqG, just him trying even though life is an ass sometimes! i really liked this headcanon you included into Empathy, it really works with what in the show, even if none of it was intentional
i have considered this headcanon in the past, but decided against it due to my own battle with this, so it was a surprise (adding to my crying lol) to see some others sharing the headcanon too! i love my boy so fucking much, he deserves a lot of love.
all right, Solstice! he doesn’t give me a lot of villain vibes, i’ma be honest, though i might be wrong! he reminds me of Sombra a little too much but i feel like that’s intentional or something haha! i’ve never thought about CHS getting a counsellor but it makes sense and is something i’ve never seen before, so i’m looking forward to getting to know him more. (hopefully he’s not a Frozen Hans lmao)
i didn’t comment on the soccer game (or football game, since i’m a Brit hehe) because everything i wanted to say had already been said by others. Timber being down because he thought he wasn’t going to win made me wanna hug him :( absolutely loved the cheering from SciFlashSet (is that their trio name???), especially with Twi and Flash. love those two dorks.
again, can’t wait for part 2!! i’ve been hyped since the beginning and knowing that this is the part that has more word count and probably more shit going on has me even more pumped!
I'll admit that my feelings on Flash have evolved over time. At first, I didn't like him all that much because he was in the unfortunate position of filling two of my least favorite tropes: the love at first sight trope and the sudden, obvious love interest character trope (not coincidentally, that's also why Timber's introduction got under my skin like desert rock nettle).
But now? Now, I will say that Bevin et al. did a good job of endearing me to the guy and making him feel like a character I can cheer for over the course of the show's run, even if I still don't really ship him with either of the Twilights or Sunset. He's gone from just being another "designated love interest" to a character in his own right, and that's something that will get me to like a character if it's done well.
Re: Flash's body issues. I'm glad that Flash has the kind of friends that love him for who he is, regardless of his own image of himself. It's a rare blessing.
@ Bevin re: painting - I went through something similar when I was learning to work with acrylics (I've always just used pencil and charcoal). Figuring out the tools, how to blend the colors right, etc. It was a learning process, but it was fun. Sadly, its a skill I don't really get to practice much anymore. And seeing the fruits of your efforts adorning each chapter is such a delight. Kudos.
Well, I'll say that you've got your hooks in me now, and I look forward to whatever zany antics our heroines and heroes get up to come part 2.
...and for me more than even Flash (who has had some love from eg Skirts), you've given me reasons to appreciate Timber even where canon just put him in the "steal Sunset's waifu" box for me. Exes Club was real neat and you've been keeping it up, kudos :)