Trabia Garden

When 2020 was looming, I posted an entry about the media that had made a real impact on me in the 2010s. I had fun with this, but it's hard to narrow things down across an entire decade! Maybe I should start doing these media roundups more frequently? Every half-decade, perhaps?

Oh, hey, it's 2025.

In alphabetical order, here are ten canons from the last five years that I think I'm going to remember! Note that this is media I originally experienced between 2020 and 2024, rather than necessarily being media that was originally released in that period.


1. Celeste. One of my absolute favourite games. Great music, charming characters, satisfying gameplay. It's tough, but I rarely found it frustrating, and I was delighted to realise how much I'd improved when I went back to replay from the beginning. Playing Celeste is a lot like playing the piano, learning the right pattern and timing of button presses through repetition until you can run smoothly through a level. I'll often find myself replaying Celeste levels when I've got a little time and nothing else is grabbing me, in the same way I'll often take a moment to sit at the piano and play a few pieces I know by heart.

2. The Coffin of Andy and Leyley. The relationship between these siblings is just so awful and intimate and fascinating; I can't get enough of it. I want to swim around in all this hideous codependency. When I first drafted this list at the start of the year, I noted, There's a chance I'm being too hasty with this one; I discovered it right before 2024 ended, so I haven't had time to be sure it's going to be a lasting interest. But, having had my mind obliterated by the latest chapter, I can now say with confidence that I am never going to stop thinking about this horrible game.

3. Lost. What an experience! I love it when characters are stranded together and forced to bond under high pressure, and this is an absolutely stellar example. Went in some wild directions, too; I said 'what the fuck' so many times while watching this show. Jack Shephard is a wreck of a man in a way that I find fascinating.

4. Omori. This game fucked me up. A lot of it is fun and charming! And then there are the parts that severely messed with my head. Two separate aspects gave me trouble sleeping. Some really interesting uses of gameplay, including one of the best-executed plot reveals I've ever seen.

5. Person of Interest. In a lot of case-of-the-week shows, the case itself is the least interesting part for me. In Person of Interest, I found the individual weekly cases absolutely gripping. The fact that the murders they're investigating haven't happened yet gives each case a living main character, usually the would-be victim, which makes them so much more fun to watch. I really enjoy Reese as a character, too.

6. Persona 5. I picked up Persona 5 in lockdown, when it was heavily discounted. I'd heard good things about the Persona series, but I'd always been intimidated by how long and complicated the games sounded. Still, it was 2020, and I wasn't able to leave the house, so it seemed like the right time for a hundred-hour RPG. It was an incredible decision. What a stylish, fun game! What great kids! I played it non-stop for a month and a half and had an absolute blast.

7. Persona 4. I was a little concerned about going back to Persona 4 after playing 5. I'd loved Persona 5 so much; what if the previous game was a disappointment? But I ended up loving Persona 4 just as passionately, largely because of Yosuke; he's a good-hearted but slightly shitty disaster of a teenage boy who's helplessly in love with the protagonist, and I find him endlessly endearing.

8. Severance. I've always been compelled by stories about weird things happening to people's memories, and by stories about people developing intense relationships while isolated together, so Severance is essentially the perfect canon for me. By a long way, it's the most gripping show I've ever watched. I'm so nervous when I sit down for a new episode; I never know what to expect!

9. Taskmaster. What a show. It makes me laugh like nothing else. The way it keeps a single set of contestants for each series adds a lot to the experience; you really get to know the contestants and their approaches to these ridiculous tasks over the course of a series. The New Zealand and Australian versions are just as great to watch; Greg Davies remains an unparalleled Taskmaster, but, if I'm honest, Paul Williams is my favourite assistant.

Wait, that's only nine! Okay, I'm going to add a tenth, but this is definitely cheating:

10. Death Note. I absolutely did not first experience Death Note between 2020 and 2024; I've enjoyed it since 2008! But I feel it sort of fits in my 'canons of the last five years' post because I got back into it in 2023 in a way I'd never been into it before. I watched the stage musical, absolutely lost my mind and spent months thinking about nothing but Light Yagami. Let's say the tenth canon here is Death Note: The Musical.

Honourable mention to The Quarry for the burst of intense ficwriting it inspired in me! I wasn't that drawn in by the canon itself, but the potential in Travis and Laura's relationship really grabbed me by the throat.

EDIT: WAIT, I just thought of a legitimate number ten!

10-2: Die Hard. We were locked down for Christmas in 2020, and I was sorry that I couldn't visit my family, but the upside was that I joined in my housemates' Christmas tradition of watching Die Hard. This film was such a delightful surprise for me! I went in expecting a badass, stoic action hero; I got a desperate, terrified mess. I found John McClane's suffering so compelling. What a blast.

About a week ago, I posted an unfinished fanfiction meme to Tumblr, and I thought it might be fun to play here as well!

Name a canon you know I have at some point enjoyed, and I’ll dig up and post an excerpt from the unfinished fanfiction I’ve almost certainly got lying around. (If you name something I don’t have any unfinished fanfiction for, I may write a few lines on the spot. We’ll see!)

I’ve posted this before, many years ago, but don’t worry about avoiding canons that were requested back then; I’ll just try to dig up something else.

Here are the excerpts I posted in response to requests on Tumblr:


Cinder_Quill: For the fanfiction ask meme: any unfinished stories about DN Angel?

This was tricky! But I dug through an old notebook, and I managed to uncover a tiny paragraph. This was from a Kingdom Hearts/DN Angel crossover I have zero recollection of contemplating, in which Kingdom Hearts Riku is talking to Daisuke. Both Riku and Satoshi are self-loathing teenagers who are intensely in love with someone they feel they don’t deserve, and I have a lot of emotions about them.

“Maybe it’s not my place,” Riku says. He glances in Satoshi’s direction. “Or maybe I’m just… projecting or something. I don’t know. But I think you’re important to him.”


academicgangster: Ace Attorney for the unfinished fanfiction meme?

Here’s a snippet in which Apollo and Athena stay up working too late and end up accidentally falling asleep on each other.

( Ace Attorney unfinished snippet: Apollo and Athena. )


futuresoon: Danganronpa!

I took this to be a request spanning the entire Danganronpa series and dug up a little Danganronpa 2 snippet. Major Danganronpa 2 spoilers under the cut.

( Danganronpa 2 unfinished snippet: Hinata and Komaeda. )


wyomingsmustache: Okay so I know it's been well over a decade since you've written anything Top Gear related but I was showing my roommate an episode the other day and telling him stuff about my Top Gear fandom days so now I am curious if you've got any bits and pieces leftover from back when, so for the fanfiction meme, Top Gear? (And if you don't, completely understandable)

We’re really getting into the deep lore here. Here’s something… mildly weird and dark? By Top Gear standards, at least. Because apparently I decided I should write two crossovers between Top Gear and Silent Hill. But Silent Hill is in Wales, for some reason.

(I know the reason. It’s because this was also going to be a crossover with Torchwood. It’s probably for the best that it never got finished.)

( Top Gear unfinished snippet: the trio unknowingly approach Silent Hill. )


doreyg: Death Note for the unfinished fanfic meme!

I responded with a Death Note/Silent Hill snippet I’d previously posted on this journal. So it wouldn’t just be material I’d already posted elsewhere, though, I also uncovered a few lines from a notebook (a regular non-death notebook):

In another world, you might have been someone else. Nothing special, but enough. Light Yagami, an ordinary man with an ordinary life.

But this is the world you’re in, and you’ve become a god.


tweetymcbastardface: Waterloo Road. Do it.

I can’t believe anyone would do this to me.

( Waterloo Road unfinished snippet: Tom/Izzie/Lorna. )


And that’s all the unfinished fanfiction requests I received on Tumblr! Feel free to request a fandom in the comments here, and I’ll see if I have anything lying around for it, or, failing that, I’ll see if I can scribble something down.

When I have a fic idea, I’ll usually scribble it down in the back of my diary. It’s time to switch diaries again, so I’m going to carry on the tradition I started last year!

This post lists all the fic ideas at the back of my 2022-23 diary. If I’ve written the fic, I’ll include a link to it. If I’ve started the fic, I’ll share a snippet. If I haven’t started it, I’ll write at least a hundred words on the spot.

First of all, here are the fics I’ve written in full. Fandoms: The Book of Mormon, Life Is Strange, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Do Revenge, Person of Interest, Lost, The Dark Pictures Anthology: Little Hope. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( Written fics from my 2022-23 diary. )


Next, let’s look at the works in progress (or at least the works that were started; I’m not sure they’re actively progressing). Fandoms: The X-Files, Silent Hill, Hypnospace Outlaw, Final Fantasy VIII, Lost, Animorphs. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( In-progress fics from my 2022-23 diary. )


Finally, it’s time for the fic ideas I haven’t touched and now have to write something for. I’m a little intimidated by this category, but let’s see how it goes.

Fandoms: The Book of Mormon, The X-Files, Beacon Pines, Person of Interest, Community, Lost, Scrubs, Silent Hill. There may be spoilers for these canons below the cut.


( 2022-23 fics I hadn't started... until now. )


I’m glad I started doing this! Most of these will probably never become full fics, but it’s good to at least make a start on these concepts, rather than letting them languish eternally in my old diaries.

Now that I've finished Lost and no longer have to fear spoilers, I thought I'd poke around the fandom. It turns out it's tragically difficult to explore Lost fandom without running into people talking about how much they hate my favourite character!

I mean, yes, my favourite character is Jack Shephard, so I can't blame them, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

To clarify, some of you have mentioned a dislike for Jack in my post comments, and I don't mind that at all! I like you guys, so I'm interested in your opinions, and my post comments are a place for discussion; you are welcome to comment here going 'well, to be fair, Jack is a bit shit'. It just gets a bit wearing when I'm, say, looking for nice gifsets of Jack crying (here's one, courtesy of lightcommasticks) and I have to navigate all these strangers talking about how much they hate him.

Which is their right, even if it's bad for my heart! It doesn't really have any consequence more dire than me aggressively loving him more in response. Although that's pretty dire, because I already love Jack Shephard more than anyone really should.

I recently spotted a fuck-marry-kill poll about Jack on Tumblr on which 'kill' had fifty percent of the votes (as of 76 votes; 'fuck' has 33%, 'marry' 17%). My favourite character is so tragically unpopular that 'kill' gets the majority vote on a fuck-marry-kill poll, and very nearly an absolute majority, even when there are no other characters to choose between.

I realise I may seem like a hypocrite for being wounded that people want to kill Jack, considering that, y'know, I've written a fic in which he's stabbed to death by someone he cares about. But that fic came from a place of love! (It really did, Jack, I promise. There's a distinct difference between being killed in fanfiction by an author who hates you and being killed in fanfiction by an author who loves you. Stop looking at me like that.)

'Kill' is at least better than 'marry', which is the worst possible option when it comes to Jack Shephard. The man's a disaster. He is absolutely going to torpedo your relationship by obsessing over whether you're secretly sleeping with his father. I love him, but marrying him would be an atrocious mistake. (Again, Jack, I'm going to need you to stop looking at me like that.)

It's not like I see anything in Jack that the Jack haters don't, really, beyond possibly finding him more interesting. If you asked both me and someone who hated Jack to write individual assessments of his character, we'd probably hit on similar points. I might be slightly more generous, and I'd probably be more enthusiastic about being asked, but the main difference is that their assessment would end with 'he's kind of awful!' and mine would end with 'he's kind of awful ♥'.

In any case, the show has a lot of focus on my favourite, so I can't resent the fandom too much for preferring to focus on different characters. For all Jack's flaws, I feel Lost loves him as much as I do, which I appreciate. Both Lost and Person of Interest have flawed, messy characters who have made mistakes or done terrible things, but they're treated with compassion by the narrative, they're given the opportunity to do better, they're treated as deserving of love and they're able to find people who love them. It's a theme I find very compelling.

When I saw her on Thursday, th_esaurus showed me this Lost trailer she remembered seeing before it came to UK television. Who came up with this? Why are they dancing sexily in formal wear around the wreckage of their plane? I don't know, but it's great.

I wonder how I'd have experienced Lost if I'd watched it when it first came out. Would I have liked different characters; would I have shipped different things? Would I have written fanfiction and, if so, what would it have been about?

Maybe I'd still have ended up fixated on Jack. Lost started up around the time I was falling in love with James Sunderland, so I certainly wasn't above looking at an absolute trash fire of a character and going 'that's my trash fire'.

What's the point of this post? 'I have bad taste in characters and I'm mildly sad that the fandom as a whole has better taste than me', I suppose. Very important bulletin. I'm sure you're all glad you read this journal.

I dreamt last night that Malcolm of Malcolm in the Middle was abducted, taken from his family and forced into years-long training to compete in some sort of tournament to the death.

There was a timeskip to the time of the tournament itself, and it opened with Malcolm staring at a television on which Dewey was being interviewed for a soundbite about the upcoming tournament. Malcolm was frowning slightly, as if the guy on the television was familiar to him somehow, something was bothering him about this, but he couldn't pin down what. It was strange and sad to realise he could no longer remember his family.

This is haunting me slightly; it's a concept I'm both fascinated and repelled by. It's interesting, but it's so at odds with the tone of Malcolm in the Middle!


Below the cut, my increasingly bewildered notes on Lost continue. I'm up to episode fourteen.


( Lost spoilers up to episode 1.14, 'Special'. )


Lost must have been a real experience to watch when it first came out. I can't imagine what all the episode reactions and speculation must have looked like.

Eight episodes in, and I'm getting a bit more into Lost. My attention still hasn't really fixed on any character in particular, but I'm engaged enough to keep watching for now. It's not Person of Interest, but I'm going to severely limit my options if I introduce 'must be Person of Interest' to my criteria for watching things.

In episode four of Lost, we start seeing the survivors bonding more in different combinations, which I think creates a large and valuable shift in the entire feeling of the show.

Seems strange to frame 'we should move to the caves that have fresh water!' versus 'we should stay on the beach in case rescuers come!' as a big conflict when it clearly benefits the entire group to have camps in both locations.

Alarming levels of sexual tension between Charlie and Liam, frankly.

Charlie might be my favourite at this early stage, which is a bit of a surprise for me, because I often find addiction storylines uninteresting. That's a very tentative declaration, though; it's not like Person of Interest, where I laser-focused in on a character in episode one, went 'that's definitely my favourite' and then loved him more with every episode.

I liked the scene where Charlie and Jack were trapped in the cave together (I often like stories where characters are trapped together; it's what drew me to watch Lost in the first place!), although I haven't entirely pinned down my feelings about Jack. The trouble with Jack is that he's not John Reese, and I realise that's a problem shared by every other character on this show, but Jack is especially not John Reese on account of sharing several superficial similarities with John Reese while not actually being John Reese.

I do like that the show is prepared to give Jack flaws, rather than making him the Perfect Hero Guy he comes across as at first glance. All the characters seem to have both offputting moments and moments when they get to show their better sides.

I find myself weirdly proud that Shannon carried out her part in the bottle rocket/antenna plan! I was very stressed out by the possibility that she might forget.

I love that this island is exactly where Locke would choose to be. Everyone else is going 'oh no, we're marooned on a hostile island with no hope of rescue, that's bad,' like a bunch of whiners, and then there's this guy having the time of his life.

The show is so determined to make Kate/Jack happen, but Kate has more chemistry with literally everyone else she interacts with. Charlie! Sawyer! Sayid kissing her hand made my heart skip a beat.

It's sort of nice to have a television series on the go, and in particular a series from before binge-watching became expected. An episode of television is something you can sit down and experience from start to finish if you have a spare forty minutes or so. I love videogames, but it can get exhausting if you need to put thirty hours into every story to get any payoff.

For a few years, I fell out of the habit of watching things in my own time by myself, rather than just on a schedule with my housemates (which I also enjoy, of course, but which means you can't just watch an episode whenever you feel like it). It feels good to rediscover it. Thanks for dragging me back in, Person of Interest.

(The other advantage of watching things on your own: you can pause episodes to make notes for Dreamwidth entries without driving all your friends up the wall.)

I really thought the first Machine pairing I wrote would be Machine/Finch or possibly Machine/Root, but apparently not!


Title: User Preferences
Fandom: Person of Interest
Rating: 15ish?
Pairing: Shaw/Machine, Root/Shaw
Wordcount: 1,500
Summary: The Machine never used to get in touch just to chat.
Notes: Set post-5.10, 'The Day the World Went Away'.


( User Preferences )

I rammed my knee into my desk, and I tried to console myself in the pain by going 'it's just like I'm a minor Person of Interest antagonist and Reese has shot me in the knee'.

Three episodes of Person of Interest to go! Here are my notes up to episode 5.10, 'The Day the World Went Away'.


( Person of Interest spoilers up to episode 5.10, 'The Day the World Went Away'. )


I can't imagine how all this is going to end and I'm scared.

I'm two episodes into season five of Person of Interest! The closer I get to the end of this show, the more nervous I become.

Let's get it out of the way: Reese ruthlessly, one-handedly murdering people while carrying the briefcase at the start of season five is pretty hot. It's also hot when he's being strangled and punched in the face on the dock. I'm sorry I'm so wildly into this fictional character and you've had to hear about it for a solid month.

'Did the Machine ask you out on a date?' Nathan asks Finch, and I appreciate his support of my ship.

'I'm useless there. This, I'm good at' slightly broke my heart for Reese. I promise you can do things other than shoot people, Reese! You can also be extremely attractive, and that's an important skill.

They're going to build a home for the Machine out of PS3s? Incredible. I'm sure this can be worked into a crossover premise for PS3 games somehow. Person of Interest/The Last of Us. Person of Interest/Final Fantasy XIII.

Riona: In my show, they needed a supercomputer to house the Machine, and - okay, I swear what I'm about to say is actually literally true, it's not a joke or an exaggeration and it's not sort of what they did, it's exactly what—
Rei: It's okay. You don't have to stall; just tell me.
Riona: They built the supercomputer out of three hundred PS3s.
Rei: Fuck off. You can't just make things up.

(Apparently, building computers out of PS3s is a real thing, and Rei wasn't any happier to learn that.)

Finch unthinkingly calling the Machine 'she' because of Root's influence is adorable.

'SNAFU': Michael Emerson playing Root is absolutely incredible. He's got her body language down so well!

Also enjoyed Root asking Finch to buy her supplies, kissing him on the cheek and slapping him on the arse. Finch is so entertainingly awkward, and Root is great at bringing that aspect of him out.

I constantly forget that Iris exists and am confused to be reminded.

'Directly responsible for deaths and disappearances of 62 persons' inexplicably had me smiling fondly at the screen. I love Reese. I love how much murder he's done. He's perfect.

('That's a lot of murders,' Tem commented, before pausing to contemplate for a moment. 'He should do seven more.')

'SNAFU' is doing some really interesting things with the Machine. I love that it concludes the protagonists are threats - you can't really blame it! - and it's interesting to see how it deals with threats that are directly trying to interact with it. I'm particularly interested by the way it responds to 'we're the good guys' claims by showing them footage that says otherwise. To challenge them, go 'I don't believe you'? To request an explanation? Or because it thinks they need to be convinced that they're bad people?

I like the way this episode challenges the idea that you can go 'okay, these people are good, these people are bad' and draw clear lines between them, too.

Also, everyone having a picnic is extremely goddamn cute.

I had a dream where Shaw straddled Reese just to screw with him, and I woke up doomed to write this, in which the two of them have platonic sex(?) and Finch gets an earful.


Title: Pressure Valve
Fandom: Person of Interest
Rating: 15
Pairing: Reese/Shaw (with references to Root/Shaw, Reese/Zoe and Reese/Kara)
Wordcount: 1,400
Summary: Shaw zips up her suitcase, looks over the room for a moment. Looks at Reese. “You want to get some use out of this bed?”
Notes: Set around season three.


( Pressure Valve )