CONSPIRACY GUY: This video is brought to you
by Campfire Everyone! There is something really important I need
to talk about. Something very serious that affects lives
of people in the real world. Something is going on right now that needs
to be addressed. I’m of course talking about shipping! For those who don’t know what I’m talking
about, Shipping, not be confused with the logistics of moving items from on location
to another, is a fan term for the audience rooting for certain romantic pairings between
characters to happen in the story. Basically fans wish for certain characters
to get into a romantic relationship hence the fans ‘ship’ the two characters together. This sounds like a good innocent fun right? WRONG! Shipping is serious business! There is nothing more high stakes and important
than two make believe characters hooking up in order to vicariously satisfy my emotional
investment in their entirely fictional lives. Shipping isn’t something for casuals or
hobbyists. You gotta be all in, victory or death! Handling such a serious subject is a task
that any writer should be wary of. That’s why Terrible Writing Advice is going
to ship all writers with this handy video on how to properly steer their ships through
the narrow straights of shipping. Now the first thing to consider as a writer
when it comes to shipping is that the level of vitriol in the fandom shipping debate is
inversely proportional to how much the writer cares about their romantic pairings. Basically if a writer adds no romance into
their work then the fans probably will, even if it’s a really bad idea. This is why an author should just tell fans
to not ship characters together because telling people on the internet they are not allowed
to do something always works out. Could a creator just ignore the shipping? Of course not! Gotta double down and let everyone know that
this thing bothers them and that internet trolls better not do the thing that garners
an over the top reaction. What else could a creator do to minimize or
control shipping in their fandom? Well the biggest thing is go through the story
rudderless when it comes to the romantic endgame for the characters. This is best accomplished in collaborative
projects by making sure every writer on staff have their own preferred romantic endgame
for the characters and then make sure everyone works at cross purposes. Now the fans can’t start the shipping war
because the studio staff are already having one. On the other end of the spectrum, when a writer
has planned their romantic endgame, they should never stop during the editing process and
take a good hard look at the characters to see if their pairing still makes sense. We must stick to the holy outline! Never bother to tightened up the writing to
make sure the canon relationship is working nor bother with a pragmatic pivot to a better
pairing. If a writer does decide to pivot, it should
be done to appease the loudest fans rather than a decision made because it makes the
story better. And if it doesn’t work out then this method
comes with bonus of being able to lay the blame at the feet of said fans rather than
a creator’s lack of either competence or a backbone. Probably both. Another way to make sure fans don’t flock
to their own ships is by making sure the cannon pairings are… just freaking boring! This is fairly easy to accomplish; no chemistry
between the romantic leads, no screen time for the canon love interest, zero scenes that
show why the characters work as a couple, or just anything other than the vague sense
that a love interest was added in by some editorial mandate. Could the writer introduce new sources of
conflict to keep the relationship interesting? No. See writing about the ins and outs of a long-term
relationship is hard. So is actually developing a romantic relationship
in a compelling way other than just dropping the occasional suggestion of sexual tension
before tying everything up in the closing scene, I mean that’s if the audience is
lucky. The main couple may have to be satisfied with
a still picture in the background of the closing credits. But hey, having the canon couple be as compelling
as two dish rags tumbling around in a dryer will certainly dissuaded shippers from advocating
for their own far more interesting and dynamic parings. Now if this fails then a more direct tactic
may be needed to stop the shippers. It’s time to sink their ships! Torpedoes away! Now ship sinking is what happens when a writer
establishes that a couple will not become a romantic pair in the canon text. This is best accomplished by both characters
loudly declaring that they have no romantic interest in one another and then proceed to
add in heaps of romantic subtext by accident. A writer could highlight why some couples
do not work together in an attempt to dissuade shippers from pairing them. I mean it won’t work. But the main reason to avoid this is that
it might at least provide some interesting story opportunities. And if a writer employs all of these tactics
then… well it still won’t stop the shippers even
if it can curtail some of it. This is why a writer can just discard all
of that! That’s right! Toss all of that in the bin! Containment and curtailment is for suckers! We’re going to lean into the shipping wars! Is using fan shipping wars as a creator like
playing with fire while bathing a tub full of gasoline? Obviously not! It’s more like sailing an oil tanker into
a munitions dump in that it looks dangerous, but I’m sure it till turn out just fine. By leaning into the shipping wars in promotional
material we can stoke the fans and hype up the next chapter in the story. Just play both sides of a shipping debate
against one another. It’s free press! Pour on the hype and set everyone’s expectations
sky high, and only then does the writer truly tip their hand to reveal that while they promised
a royal flush, all they really had was a two of hearts, a basic land, a reverse UNO card,
and a bit of pocket lent. I mean yes I promised a LGBTQ ship in the
story, but hear me out! What if instead I kill off all of those characters
for cheap drama? Is it bait and switch? Well I prefer to call it a landmine, because
it’s loud and flashy, but don’t worry! I’m sure it wont blow up in a creator’s
face if they step on that hot button. Remember, setting the fandom on fire is always
a good idea since fire doesn’t spread. Creators should never be shy of the potential
consequences of stoking the flames of a shipping war because there is just no way it could
wrong at all. Now this is all well and good for a creator,
but what about the fans? Is there any wisdom I could instill upon fans
in regards to shipping? Of course! I am a genius after all! The first thing fans need to consider about
shipping is some basic etiquette. For example, what if two fans are having a
debate about potential pairings, like in a show made for children? And then what if it turns out that both fans
prefer different romantic pairings in this show made for children. Since it is a show made for children, the
show’s creators are probably not going to take any romance very seriously if they even
include it at all. Clearly there are no stakes here in this show
made for children and that any shipping is going to mostly be limited to fan fiction. Therefore how should a fan deal with fans
of a rival ship? Well obviously they must die! Attack! It’s the only option! If it’s one thing the internet has taught
me it’s that anyone with an opposing view is literary Hitler! Tear them down! Crush their augments! Insult their face, their mom, their mom’s
face, their lineage, their hopes and dreams, and then to rub salt into the wound by insulting
their ship! This is war! There can be only one winner! A fan has to win this battle or else… um… these characters in a show made for
children might wind up in the wrong relationship! The stakes couldn’t be higher! Clearly there is no room for polite disagreement
or getting a life outside of fiction. If that’s not enough, then a fan should
expand their war onto the creator of the story. I’m sure sending in poorly worded death
threats to the writer or showrunners will totally change their mind on which characters
wind up with who in a show made for children. More importantly, this is an excellent use
of time of resources and not a frivolous indulgence brought about by projecting onto characters
WHO DON’T EXIST! while we live in a world full of real people
with real problems. If, for some odd reason, these expletive ridden
death threats fail to stop the opponents of a fan’s ship, then they will have to resort
to fan fiction. Now writing shipping fics could be like…
a whole other video and probably a video better focused on writing romance specifically, so
I will only touch upon a few key things. Now the biggest obstacle to writing fan fiction
for a fan’s preferred ship is usually the canon pairing. The best way to handle this is to viciously
murder the canon love interest in the most petty, brutal way possible. If this doesn’t sit right with the fan fic
writer then be sure to write the offending love interest as a controlling evil psychopath
for no adequately explained reason. The point is to make sure all obstacles to
the fan’s ship is removed with the grace and subtly normally reserved for the Nevada
test site. If a fan fic writer wanted something a little
more subtle though then they could just settle for quietly lobotomizing the rival characters
off screen or just shove them into the arms of some side character and move on. Remember, never demonstrate, instead demonize! Don’t show why the canon pairing would never
work in a way that makes sense, sticks to the spirit of the canon characters, and shows
meaningful conflict. If I do that, then who will show up out of
nowhere to hurt the protagonist so I can play out my twisted hurt comfort fic? With all obstacles removed from a fan fic
writer’s path what comes next? Nothing. Enjoy your ship. Really. That’s all there is to it. Once the romantic rival is dead, lobotomized,
and/or shipped off with a side character then the rest is just saccharine lovey-dovey garbage
with maybe a lemon or two thrown in. Internal conflict? Introspection? Showing why the fan pairing would work better
than the canon one? Nah. I want to have my cake and eat it too and
ship it with some sparkling wine while I’m at it! Besides, fan fic writers are excused from
creatively pushing their boundaries and should be free to wallow in their indulgence. But what about when a fan fic writer should
not ship characters together? Don’t worry about that. Never consider that chemistry and compatibility
are in fact two different things. Characters can share chemistry, but not be
romantically compatible? Impossible! What if all of the characters are asexual
aliens or magical creatures not driven by a biological imperative to reproduce? In truth they all secretly want into each
other’s pants and anyone who says otherwise is just blatantly ignoring the obvious subtext. What about shipping underage characters? Ha ha ha! Yeah… Yeah. You have fun with that. Just be sure to express shock and surprise
when other people find it gross. Now with all of this fighting over the romantic
lives of people who don’t exist, could a writer just decide to like ignore all of this
nonsense and not bother with it? Why some foolish writers may even decide to
write a story that doesn’t have any romance at all? This is a big misstep, but if a writer avoids
any romance or shipping in their work then they can always just kick that can down the
road. Then during the epilogue they can resolve
all of the shipping there and sink a fleet’s worth of ships all in one sitting. Could the writer just have left things opened
ended? Of course not! I got to get the last word in no matter how
little I care about the romance in my work! See! I just sank the fans’ ships by keeping low
and striking from the depths. So basically the best way to deal with shipping
is with unrestricted submarine warfare. Now if only I could send all the annoying
shippers down to Davy Jones' locker? DARK LORD: What is this garbage? This is just JP in a green shirt? BARRON: And after all of that buildup? What a letdown! KNIGHT COMMANDER: Oh no… It’s… him! EMPEROR: Who? CONSPIRACY GUY: Yeah. Who in the plan are you? INNER GREED: I… am… Greed. DARK LORD: You’re greedy? MEGACORP CEO: Get back in the box! INNER GREED: No. I am Greed itself. JP’s inner greed made manifest thanks to
your desires. CONSPIRACY GUY: What do you want? INNER GREED: Everything. KNIGHT COMMANDER: We will stop you! You won’t let you have any more sponsors! INNER GREED: You mean like this video’s
sponsor? Campfire? KNIGHT COMMANDER: Ah crap! I set him up for a smooth segway. INNER GREED: Campfire, is a series of tools
to help organize, improve, and showcase your writing and is used by over a hundred thousand
writers! Utilize character sheets, timelines, detail
relationship webs, and a full manuscript editors that references notes in Campfire Write. Or home your craft in Campfire Learn as a
central hub of education resources. Campfire Explore lets your share your work
with a live community and build a following. Select what parts to share and craft a homepage
to present your story. Creating a Campfire account is free and only
pay for the features you need with a flexible pricing structure ranging from monthly subscriptions
as low as a few cents a month to affordable lifetime purchases. TWA fans can write better stories faster with
Campfire at bit.ly/TWA2-22. Don’t forget to use the Code TWA to get
20% off all lifetime purchases of Campire modules. Link is in the description below. DARK LORD: Wait. Did he just get stronger? KNIGHT COMMANDER: He’ll grow more powerful
with each sponsor! His mere presence threatens the end of the
very TWA expanded universe! Soon we will be overrun with ads like never
before! We will have to band together to stop the
evil ads before they destroy the universe! INNER GREED: Oh. How little you understand, Sir Knight. I was there when this world began. I saw the inners born and scattered across
the TWA universe when JP broke himself it smaller shards. I watched as the world expanded and as all
of your little genres came crawling out of the primordial energy of creation. It has grown and prospered and now lies ripe
for a reaping. How you fail to understand this world’s
true nature when you claim to fight against advertising. Oh how the Knights of Artistic Integrity have
shielded themselves for the truth. KNIGHT COMMANDER: The truth that ads are the
source of this world’s evil! INNER GREED: Oh no, my poor little knights. Did you not know why JP made this world? The entire TWA universe is a mere construct
designed to help sell his books. This universe’s very inception was made
as a vehicle for promotion. KNIGHT COMMANDER: It can’t be… INNER GREED: Open you eyes, little one. See the world for what it is. KNIGHT COMMANDER: Impossible! There’s is no way… INNER GREED: Oh yes it is. The entire Terrible Writing Advice Expanded
Universe is in fact, one. Giant. Advertisement! KNIGHT COMMANDER: NNNOOOOO!!!!!!
Painfully accurate.
I found a comment that says “This episode is for the RWBY fans. You know who you are.”
Ha! I knew somebody was going to put a post in relation to this video today. Dear Lord why is so many of this dudes videos seem to be so on the money with everything wrong with RWBY. Many of the points he makes are pretty much word for word the fandoms complaints about the sheer dysfunction trash fire that is bumblebee.
Very often, any time the trope in his video is even remotely applicable to RWBY it is painfully accurate. I'm not sure what would be better: if he'd seen RWBY and was using it as an example directly or if RWBY just fit that perfectly in sarcastically bad use of tropes lol.
I didn't realize you posted this first before making a text post about the video, but I'll paste my own text-post of the video and my thoughts here as a comment:
Case in point, I don't exactly know what the ultimate endgame for any RWBY ship would actually be. How far would Rooster Teeth take a ship like Bumblebee? An onscreen kiss? An offscreen, implied "intimate" scene (the characters could turn 18). Perhaps an onscreen scene with PG-13 level intimacy (i.e. clothes on, nothing below the waist seen). Perhaps a years-later epilogue showing them married with adopted kids?
While I'm aware that many different ships are teased by the show, I don't think RT goes out of their way to inflame their fanbases. There are different songs that reference ships, for example (or at the very least can be interpreted that way), but that's not as inflammatory as what TWA seems to be talking about.
While the show has harmed and killed characters who have been used in non-heterosexual ships (i.e. Yang losing an arm, Penny dying), I don't think the show has ever had a Bury Your Gays approach to its characters. It's not a show that wants to make being gay tragic, and several prominent same-sex ships are protected by the normal plot armor of being main characters (i.e. White Rose and Bumblebee are safe considering RWBY would never kill off any member of team RWBY).