I use the same name everywhere so I am ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
beatrice_otter on AO3.
Lovely author, here is my theory about letters: how much detail people want in a letter is HIGHLY variable. Some people (such as myself) prefer if their recip gives LOTS of guidance on their wishes. Some prefer as little as possible so they can be free as a bird. Most are somewhere in between. So! Here's everything including the kitchen sink if you find it helpful, but feel free to ignore it if it is not helpful. I would rather get a story you were happy with than "well, she said she liked x, so I guess I have to do x even though I don't like x and/or am just not inspired that way."
I'm fairly easy to please; I've been doing ficathons for over a decade and am very rarely disappointed with my gifts. I write long and detailed Dear Author letters because I find such things helpful when I'm writing for other people; if you are like me, here you go! If your style is different and a detailed letter makes you feel hemmed-in, feel free to do what works for you.
The most important thing for me in a fic is that the characters are well-written and recognizably themselves. Even when I don't like a character, I don't go in for character-bashing. If nothing else, if the rest of this letter is too much or my kinks just don't fit yours, just concentrate on writing a story with everyone in character and good spelling and grammar and I will almost certainly love what you come up with.
I have an embarrassment squick, which makes humor kind of hit-or-miss sometimes. The kind of humor where someone does something embarrassing and the audience is laughing at them makes me uncomfortable. On the other hand, the kind of humor where the audience is laughing with the characters I really enjoy.
Please no incest or darkfic. I don't count cousin relationships as incestuous. I define "darkfic" as stuff where there's a lot of suffering and no hope even at the end and all the characters are terrible. Angst with a happy ending is fine, I enjoy it, but there's gotta be a payoff. Even an ambiguous ending is fine! But there has to be some note of grace or redemption or hope somewhere, it can't just be "people are awful and the world sucks, the end."
Here are some other things to keep in mind:
I love outsider perspectives and academic takes on things. In-universe meta (newspaper articles, academic monographs--especially with the sort of snarky feuding common in actual real-world academia, social media feeds in current day or future worlds) is awesome.
Also, I'm picky about European historical clothing details. You don't have to talk about it! In fact, if you don't know much about historical clothing, I would prefer if you didn't mention it at all. My pet peeve is corsets: no, they weren't a restrictive tool of the patriarchy, no, they didn't interfere with most women's daily lives, no, most women weren't wearing them so tight they couldn't breathe.
I like religion but I'm picky about it. Basically, Christianity is deeply weird compared to most other religions in the history of the human race, and a lot of people whose only experience with religion is living in a culturally-Christian nation assume that what they know about Christianity is some sort of universal principle of What Religion Is Like, and that's just not the case. For example, in Christianity what you believe is more important than what you do. This is not to say we Christians don't teach and practice Christian ethics or have rituals we are very attached to, but rather that if you don't believe in Jesus Christ, it doesn't matter what rituals you participate in or what ethical things you do, you are not a Christian. Every Christian group has at least a minimal core theology that members must affirm, but participation in ritual is generally far less rigid a requirement. Most other religions rank what you do (both ethically and ritually) as more important than what you believe, and it is usually quite possible to be a member in good standing if you participate in the practices and rituals even if you believe none of the teachings. And this is just one way in which Christianity is weird, there are many others. So if you are doing worldbuilding for a fantasy or non-Christian religion ... unless it is explicitly a Christian-analogue, it should be different from Christianity. Get creative! Have fun with it!
The Goblin Emperor
There's so much depth and richness to this story, and Maia is only barely keeping his head above water and doesn't know many details and doesn't have time or attention to spare to wonder about it. I love how hopepunk it is: yes, terrible things have happened, and yes, there are genuinely evil people, and yes, there are people who aren't evil but are nonetheless really awful. And yet, despite it all, good people win. There are people who can be trusted to be good, and kind, and loyal. I love how three-dimensional everyone is, not just the heroes but the villains, too. If you wanted to bring in historical flourishes, I'd be happy with parallels to European history, but I'd be ECSTATIC if you brought in non-Western ideas, practices, structures, clothing styles, and institutions. On a costume level, I'm fairly knowledgeable about 1500s-present European styles, and have Opinions (e.g. corsets were not necessarily any worse than modern bras) so if you don't know much about it, might be better to either steer clear or use different cultures. I would be equally happy with canon characters or OCs. Like, a day in the life of a minor bureaucrat in the Barizhan court dealing with something (maybe the Great Avar being gone long enough to spend the holidays with his grandson).
I generally find worldbuilding that assumes an alien religion is like (Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant) Christianity either boring or cringeworthy. Christianity is deeply weird, compared to pretty much every other religion out there, and yet it's what has shaped our views on "what religion is like," so I really appreciate when people question those basic assumptions and go in a different direction.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
Imperial Radch
One of the things I love about this series is that pretty much every time there was an opportunity to fall back on standard SF/F worldbuilding and/or standard Western cultural norms, Leckie chose a different direction. This gives lots of scope for a lot of things. In particular, I'm interested in the way power structures function (and don't), the ways in which omnipresent surveillance on stations and ships functions and malfunctions, and the ways in which the Radch deals (and, crucially, fails to deal) with things that don't fit into their worldview. This could really go dystopic if you lean hard into all the ways that things are neither proper, just, nor beneficial to the underclasses, but please don't go any darker than the series itself. It strikes me that one of those long musical serials that Breq and Seivarden mention a couple of times--predictable, formulaic, Becoming A Client To A Worthy Patron Is Everything, plus singing and dancing!--might be an interesting jumping off point.
As for the Republic of Two Systems, all of the things the Radch has historically tried to keep a lid on have boiled over, often because Breq kicked the lid off. A perspective on that that isn't just Breq the White Savior would be really interesting. I love Breq! I usually agree with her! But this shit is complicated, yo, and she was a tool of Imperialism for centuries, and just because she's been intimately involved in a lot of annexations doesn't automatically mean she understands everything that's going on in the class-and-ethnic relations in the Republic.
Stations and ships are really interesting in how their identities are fractal, and I wonder what the difference between stations and ships is programming-wise, and I wonder how accurately Breq is remembering what it was like to be Justice of Toren--is the human brain even capable of it, when not actively hooked up to the ship? How does a ship's sense of self change when they don't have ancillaries any more?
As for Shis'urna, we got just a taste of what things were like there, and there's obviously so much more depth possible to how the ethnic groups interact, and what things were like before the annexation and what things were like after it, and how much difference DID Lieutenant Awn make in the long run? As for religion, I'm interested in both the politics of it (religion as a tool of Imperial conformity and uniformity) and the lived reality of it (religion as "how we live out our lives and ascribe meaning to things").
The one exception to my "please don't use Christianity as a template for Space/Fantasy Religions" wish is the Valskayan religion, which pretty obviously either IS Christianity, or is meant a Christian analogue.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
DC Comics
I love the batfamily, and tend to prefer takes on it that are more "people are screwed up but we still love each other and are trying" to "these people are awful and hurt one another." I love all of the characters listed and will enjoy stories about any of them, but I encourage you to focus on Duke if you can because even considering how new he is, there is very little fanfic in which he even appears. And also, as the newest member of the Batfamily, he makes a perfect lens from which to view the family both from an insider perspective and for outsider perspectives on the Waynes/Bats.
I am fascinated by the idea of what it would be like to live in a world in which superheroes and supervillains actually existed, and what that would do to society and how society would view them. I'm interested in complicated relationships and feelings on the matter: on the one hand, Batman and co. have saved a lot of people; on the other hand, how can you be sure they're only going after people who really deserve it; on another hand, even if they aren't are they any worse than a corrupt/racist justice system; on another hand, how does Wayne Enterprise's treatment of employees and their philanthropic stuff affect Gotham vs. Batman's treatment of criminals and crime. (I tend to be of the opinion that Bruce uses a "carrot and stick" approach of using his and WE's money for positive change while going out every night as Batman.) I like things that focus on Batman as a detective, not just a great fighter. And if you're interested, Kitty Unpretty has a great meta about "what is the corporate structure of WE anyway?" and if you wanted to use that as a jumping off point or background, I'd be thrilled (and Kitty has given blanket permission for its use).
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
Star Wars Legends
My favorite things in all of the old Legends EU were
*Luke and Mara and their relationship and all their combined issues with rebuilding the Jedi and Mara's past as the Emperor's Hand
*Corran Horn and Mirax Terrik and Corran rediscovering his Jedi heritage and also how his perspective on both smugglers and the Rebellion changed after he defected to the Rebellion.
In both cases, it's about how do we remember the past while working to create a new future? How do we avoid making old mistakes? How do we heal? I love all four of these characters separately and together, at any point along their journey.
(Note: my "ideal perfect Star Wars Canon" includes the PT, the OT, the Zahn trilogy and the X-Wing books, the Mandalorian, the Clone Wars, Rey&Finn&Poe as the only contributions from the ST, and HAPPY ENDINGS where something new and better results after all the pain and trauma. If you are inspired by other stuff, feel free to bring them in, but those are my happy places.)
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic, Kylo Ren
MCU
The Black Panther had such GORGEOUS worldbuilding on every level, which the MCU has ignored since. Wakanda existing would change things before the reveal, and revolutionize things after, and I'm curious about what that was like both inside and outside Wakanda.
Feel free to disregard major Marvel events outside of Wakanda. My ideal Marvel canon includes the first two Captain America movies, Agent Carter, the first Iron Man movie, the first Avengers movie, Black Panther, and Captain Marvel. And ignores pretty much everything else. Bring the other stuff in if you like it and it inspires you, I don't mind it, but you can ignore it if you like. (It's not like any of it actually has anything to do with the worldbuilding of Wakanda.)
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
Star Trek TOS
I love alien culture worldbuilding. I love boldly going and exploring and wacky science hijinks and time travel and alternate universe shenanigans. I love the hopeful attitude that we can become better than we are. All my feelings about Star Trek in general can be summed up with this vid. I love cross-cultural romance (especially when it deals realistically with having to figure out what compromises each is going to make on what they expect out of a relationship--love is not all you need, you also need a lot of hard work and communication). My headcanon on Vulcans was shaped by 80s Trek novels but I also enjoy trying to fit the *Enterprise* Vulcans with ... everything else we know about Vulcans. One thing I will point out, though, is that while there are a lot of things about Vulcan culture that seem/are sexist, the most powerful Vulcans we see throughout the series are elderly women. I love both Sarek and Amanda, but Sarek in particular is a terrible Dad and I'd like to know more about Amanda. I love Pon Farr, but mostly dealing with the implications of it (both before and after) and not the sex part. (I'm a Spock/Uhura shipper, not a Kirk/Spock shipper--even in TOS, Spock and Uhura had great chemistry.)
If you wanted to vid this one, I would be delighted. Feel free in this case to draw from every Trek media, including the animated show. In particular, for YEARS I have dreamed that someone would do a Spock and/or general Vulcan vid to The Logical Song. And there are so many Vulcan bits in the shows and movies where the visuals are just so evocative, if you get the right song it should be possible to do something really interesting.
But much as I love Vulcans, they are not the only things I love about Star Trek! Tell me about linguistics and what Uhura's job is all about besides "hailing frequencies open!"
Or tell me how the economy works. I used to think "no money" was pure utopianism, and then I learned that Universal Basic Income has been tried (and has worked) in multiple places. So it could work, but nothing is ever perfect even in Star Trek. (Star Trek's shtick is that most people are trying to do the right thing most of the time and be kind and merciful and just, and what happens when that's true, but that doesn't mean that people are perfect. And it doesn't mean that conflicting needs just go away. I want to see a system that works for most people in most times and places ... but isn't perfect. What does it look like, and how do they deal with edge cases and conflicting needs and foreign currency and other issues?
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
Deep Space Nine
I love Bajor, and I love worldbuilding about religion, but I also get nervous requesting it because so many people are really only familiar with Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant Christianity, and assume (even unconsciously) that all religion is Like That, when the Evangelicals are deeply weird compared to the rest of Christianity either today or throughout history, and Christianity as a whole is deeply weird when compared to ... pretty much any other religion on Earth. Now, the show often had parallels between Evangelicals/Fundamentalists and Bajoran religion because they were using Bajor to comment on US religious politics and history. (For example: Winn trying to shut down the school bc they taught that the prophets were aliens instead of gods was a direct commentary on the fundies trying to prevent schools from teaching evolution.) But I generally find worldbuilding that assumes an alien religion is like (Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant) Christianity either boring or cringeworthy. I want it to be ALIEN. Especially with Bajor, where we've MET their gods and they have such a fundamentally different perspective on EVERYTHING than us linear creatures, I don't want it to feel like another screed on What Is Wrong With Christianity In America.
Examples (feel free to do other stuff, though): you could lean into the Prophets' timey-wimey non-linearity and what that means for a religion that worships them. Most Earth religions are heavily time-based, with regular repeating festivals that serve a lot of purposes both social and religious--how would that work (or not work) when worshiping beings who see everything happening at once? Or explore the Orbs! What other orbs are there besides Time and Prophecy, and what do they DO? You don't have to have any ritual or belief or ANYTHING to use them, if they have line-of-sight to you they can DO THINGS. Give you visions! Send you time traveling! Whatever it is the others do! No Earth religion has any artifact that is anything like that, and besides wondering what the other orbs even are/do, I'm curious as to how they shaped Bajoran religion, and how it was that the Bajorans ended up worshiping the ones who SENT the orbs instead of the orbs themselves. Especially given that the Prophets mostly ... don't seem to want to be gods or care about being worshiped or what's going on on Bajor or anything. So it's not like they were sending messages with the Orbs about who sent them and why, which leaves a lot of scope for interpretation on the part of the Bajorans who found them.
Also, if you include Winn, please make her three-dimensional and complex. That was one of the best things about her character, that she was an antagonist but never a simple one or a one-note one. And her relationship with the Prophets was so complicated.
Sisko's position as Emmisary is endlessly fascinating to me, and how it shaped his relationship with Kira, and how he came to be more comfortable with it as the show went on. I love Winn as an antagonist. She's unpleasant and manipulative, but she always had reasons for what she did and why she was that way. (Not always good reasons, but generally not Muahahaha Evil ones, either.) Both Sisko men are such great dads, and I love that about them.
I love Dax's relationship with Sisko, that lasted three hosts. When Sisko comes back from the wormhole (if he ever does) will Dax still be Ezri or will enough time have passed that the relationship stretches to four hosts?
I haven't read the novels, but if you want to take the idea that after the show ended Kira eventually became a Vedek and later Kai and explore her faith and relationship with the Prophets, I wouldn't mind.
Besides religious issues, there is so much scope for exploration of what Bajor is like and how recent history has shaped them and what is going to happen post-series.
As for the Trill, I am really fascinated by the possibilities for how some (the few lucky elite) get symbiotes and practical immortality through them and how that shapes the Trill and their culture and government.
If you are a vidder, and you want to vid this, I would be overjoyed.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
TNG
Geordi rarely got a chance to shine, but I always liked him, and aside from that one episode with the genetically engineered society, they didn't do much with his blindness besides "disabilities give you superpowers" with his visor. What are the downsides to it? What, if any, tradeoffs did he have to make, and was it his choice or something his parents decided for him? Does he ever get grief from fellow officers about "what happens if your visor gets knocked off, you'll be blind!" as if not being able to see would make him incompetent.
Data and Lal were so sweet together, and I'd love to see more of them being sweet. Also, I don't like the way people treat Data as either childlike or as someone who doesn't really get it. His poetry's actually pretty good, but they all treat it like it's a trial to be endured. Geordi's the only one who doesn't do that, and that's one thing I appreciate about his friendship with Data. Another plot idea, what would have happened to the court case and Lal's custody if she hadn't died?
I love Guinan, but too often canon treats her like a Magical Negro, and giving her some depth and context and complicating that would be awesome. I ship Guinan/Picard.
Or you can go the Vulcan route: I love me some Vulcans, and have many Thoughts on the Subject (as noted in the TOS section). Or you can explore starship life and what it's like to be one of the people the camera isn't focusing on. Missing scenes, day-in-the-life, backstory, episode-like-fic, anything would be awesome.
If you are a vidder, and you want to vid this, I would be overjoyed.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
beatrice_otter on AO3.Lovely author, here is my theory about letters: how much detail people want in a letter is HIGHLY variable. Some people (such as myself) prefer if their recip gives LOTS of guidance on their wishes. Some prefer as little as possible so they can be free as a bird. Most are somewhere in between. So! Here's everything including the kitchen sink if you find it helpful, but feel free to ignore it if it is not helpful. I would rather get a story you were happy with than "well, she said she liked x, so I guess I have to do x even though I don't like x and/or am just not inspired that way."
I'm fairly easy to please; I've been doing ficathons for over a decade and am very rarely disappointed with my gifts. I write long and detailed Dear Author letters because I find such things helpful when I'm writing for other people; if you are like me, here you go! If your style is different and a detailed letter makes you feel hemmed-in, feel free to do what works for you.
The most important thing for me in a fic is that the characters are well-written and recognizably themselves. Even when I don't like a character, I don't go in for character-bashing. If nothing else, if the rest of this letter is too much or my kinks just don't fit yours, just concentrate on writing a story with everyone in character and good spelling and grammar and I will almost certainly love what you come up with.
I have an embarrassment squick, which makes humor kind of hit-or-miss sometimes. The kind of humor where someone does something embarrassing and the audience is laughing at them makes me uncomfortable. On the other hand, the kind of humor where the audience is laughing with the characters I really enjoy.
Please no incest or darkfic. I don't count cousin relationships as incestuous. I define "darkfic" as stuff where there's a lot of suffering and no hope even at the end and all the characters are terrible. Angst with a happy ending is fine, I enjoy it, but there's gotta be a payoff. Even an ambiguous ending is fine! But there has to be some note of grace or redemption or hope somewhere, it can't just be "people are awful and the world sucks, the end."
Here are some other things to keep in mind:
- I like stuff that takes side characters and puts them center-stage, especially when they are characters of color or women. I enjoy seeing them come to life.
- I don't like it when characters of color or women get relegated to the sidekick/supporting/helper role so that it can be All About The White Dude.
- I like it when female characters are more than just the Strong Female Character(tm) or The Nurturer.
- I like fluff
- I like angst with a happy ending
- I like stories that make me think about things in a new way.
- I like cultural diversity, and to know that culture matters to people, and to see how different cultures interact and where the clashes are.
- I like quirky characters.
- I like unreliable narrators.
- I like acknowledgment that different people can have different points of view without either of them being wrong.
- I like stories that engage with problematic aspects of the source, and which deal with privilege in one way or another instead of sweeping it under the rug.
- I don't like it when plots hinge on characters being selectively stupid, or selectively unable to communicate. Like, if they are stupid or a himbo or whatever in general, or have problems communicating in general, that's fine! But if it's just "the only way I can think of for this plot to work is if the character spontaneously and temporarily loses half their intelligence and competence," then I'm going to spend the rest of the fic wondering why the character didn't just ____?
- Crackfic is really hit and miss for me, sometimes I love it and sometimes I can't stand it. Basically, if it's the characters we know and love in a ludicrous situation, that's great. If they're OOC or parodied in order to make something funny ... it's not funny to me.
I love outsider perspectives and academic takes on things. In-universe meta (newspaper articles, academic monographs--especially with the sort of snarky feuding common in actual real-world academia, social media feeds in current day or future worlds) is awesome.
Also, I'm picky about European historical clothing details. You don't have to talk about it! In fact, if you don't know much about historical clothing, I would prefer if you didn't mention it at all. My pet peeve is corsets: no, they weren't a restrictive tool of the patriarchy, no, they didn't interfere with most women's daily lives, no, most women weren't wearing them so tight they couldn't breathe.
I like religion but I'm picky about it. Basically, Christianity is deeply weird compared to most other religions in the history of the human race, and a lot of people whose only experience with religion is living in a culturally-Christian nation assume that what they know about Christianity is some sort of universal principle of What Religion Is Like, and that's just not the case. For example, in Christianity what you believe is more important than what you do. This is not to say we Christians don't teach and practice Christian ethics or have rituals we are very attached to, but rather that if you don't believe in Jesus Christ, it doesn't matter what rituals you participate in or what ethical things you do, you are not a Christian. Every Christian group has at least a minimal core theology that members must affirm, but participation in ritual is generally far less rigid a requirement. Most other religions rank what you do (both ethically and ritually) as more important than what you believe, and it is usually quite possible to be a member in good standing if you participate in the practices and rituals even if you believe none of the teachings. And this is just one way in which Christianity is weird, there are many others. So if you are doing worldbuilding for a fantasy or non-Christian religion ... unless it is explicitly a Christian-analogue, it should be different from Christianity. Get creative! Have fun with it!
The Goblin Emperor
There's so much depth and richness to this story, and Maia is only barely keeping his head above water and doesn't know many details and doesn't have time or attention to spare to wonder about it. I love how hopepunk it is: yes, terrible things have happened, and yes, there are genuinely evil people, and yes, there are people who aren't evil but are nonetheless really awful. And yet, despite it all, good people win. There are people who can be trusted to be good, and kind, and loyal. I love how three-dimensional everyone is, not just the heroes but the villains, too. If you wanted to bring in historical flourishes, I'd be happy with parallels to European history, but I'd be ECSTATIC if you brought in non-Western ideas, practices, structures, clothing styles, and institutions. On a costume level, I'm fairly knowledgeable about 1500s-present European styles, and have Opinions (e.g. corsets were not necessarily any worse than modern bras) so if you don't know much about it, might be better to either steer clear or use different cultures. I would be equally happy with canon characters or OCs. Like, a day in the life of a minor bureaucrat in the Barizhan court dealing with something (maybe the Great Avar being gone long enough to spend the holidays with his grandson).
I generally find worldbuilding that assumes an alien religion is like (Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant) Christianity either boring or cringeworthy. Christianity is deeply weird, compared to pretty much every other religion out there, and yet it's what has shaped our views on "what religion is like," so I really appreciate when people question those basic assumptions and go in a different direction.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
Imperial Radch
One of the things I love about this series is that pretty much every time there was an opportunity to fall back on standard SF/F worldbuilding and/or standard Western cultural norms, Leckie chose a different direction. This gives lots of scope for a lot of things. In particular, I'm interested in the way power structures function (and don't), the ways in which omnipresent surveillance on stations and ships functions and malfunctions, and the ways in which the Radch deals (and, crucially, fails to deal) with things that don't fit into their worldview. This could really go dystopic if you lean hard into all the ways that things are neither proper, just, nor beneficial to the underclasses, but please don't go any darker than the series itself. It strikes me that one of those long musical serials that Breq and Seivarden mention a couple of times--predictable, formulaic, Becoming A Client To A Worthy Patron Is Everything, plus singing and dancing!--might be an interesting jumping off point.
As for the Republic of Two Systems, all of the things the Radch has historically tried to keep a lid on have boiled over, often because Breq kicked the lid off. A perspective on that that isn't just Breq the White Savior would be really interesting. I love Breq! I usually agree with her! But this shit is complicated, yo, and she was a tool of Imperialism for centuries, and just because she's been intimately involved in a lot of annexations doesn't automatically mean she understands everything that's going on in the class-and-ethnic relations in the Republic.
Stations and ships are really interesting in how their identities are fractal, and I wonder what the difference between stations and ships is programming-wise, and I wonder how accurately Breq is remembering what it was like to be Justice of Toren--is the human brain even capable of it, when not actively hooked up to the ship? How does a ship's sense of self change when they don't have ancillaries any more?
As for Shis'urna, we got just a taste of what things were like there, and there's obviously so much more depth possible to how the ethnic groups interact, and what things were like before the annexation and what things were like after it, and how much difference DID Lieutenant Awn make in the long run? As for religion, I'm interested in both the politics of it (religion as a tool of Imperial conformity and uniformity) and the lived reality of it (religion as "how we live out our lives and ascribe meaning to things").
The one exception to my "please don't use Christianity as a template for Space/Fantasy Religions" wish is the Valskayan religion, which pretty obviously either IS Christianity, or is meant a Christian analogue.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
DC Comics
I love the batfamily, and tend to prefer takes on it that are more "people are screwed up but we still love each other and are trying" to "these people are awful and hurt one another." I love all of the characters listed and will enjoy stories about any of them, but I encourage you to focus on Duke if you can because even considering how new he is, there is very little fanfic in which he even appears. And also, as the newest member of the Batfamily, he makes a perfect lens from which to view the family both from an insider perspective and for outsider perspectives on the Waynes/Bats.
I am fascinated by the idea of what it would be like to live in a world in which superheroes and supervillains actually existed, and what that would do to society and how society would view them. I'm interested in complicated relationships and feelings on the matter: on the one hand, Batman and co. have saved a lot of people; on the other hand, how can you be sure they're only going after people who really deserve it; on another hand, even if they aren't are they any worse than a corrupt/racist justice system; on another hand, how does Wayne Enterprise's treatment of employees and their philanthropic stuff affect Gotham vs. Batman's treatment of criminals and crime. (I tend to be of the opinion that Bruce uses a "carrot and stick" approach of using his and WE's money for positive change while going out every night as Batman.) I like things that focus on Batman as a detective, not just a great fighter. And if you're interested, Kitty Unpretty has a great meta about "what is the corporate structure of WE anyway?" and if you wanted to use that as a jumping off point or background, I'd be thrilled (and Kitty has given blanket permission for its use).
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic
Star Wars Legends
My favorite things in all of the old Legends EU were
*Luke and Mara and their relationship and all their combined issues with rebuilding the Jedi and Mara's past as the Emperor's Hand
*Corran Horn and Mirax Terrik and Corran rediscovering his Jedi heritage and also how his perspective on both smugglers and the Rebellion changed after he defected to the Rebellion.
In both cases, it's about how do we remember the past while working to create a new future? How do we avoid making old mistakes? How do we heal? I love all four of these characters separately and together, at any point along their journey.
(Note: my "ideal perfect Star Wars Canon" includes the PT, the OT, the Zahn trilogy and the X-Wing books, the Mandalorian, the Clone Wars, Rey&Finn&Poe as the only contributions from the ST, and HAPPY ENDINGS where something new and better results after all the pain and trauma. If you are inspired by other stuff, feel free to bring them in, but those are my happy places.)
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation, darkfic, Kylo Ren
MCU
The Black Panther had such GORGEOUS worldbuilding on every level, which the MCU has ignored since. Wakanda existing would change things before the reveal, and revolutionize things after, and I'm curious about what that was like both inside and outside Wakanda.
Feel free to disregard major Marvel events outside of Wakanda. My ideal Marvel canon includes the first two Captain America movies, Agent Carter, the first Iron Man movie, the first Avengers movie, Black Panther, and Captain Marvel. And ignores pretty much everything else. Bring the other stuff in if you like it and it inspires you, I don't mind it, but you can ignore it if you like. (It's not like any of it actually has anything to do with the worldbuilding of Wakanda.)
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
Star Trek TOS
I love alien culture worldbuilding. I love boldly going and exploring and wacky science hijinks and time travel and alternate universe shenanigans. I love the hopeful attitude that we can become better than we are. All my feelings about Star Trek in general can be summed up with this vid. I love cross-cultural romance (especially when it deals realistically with having to figure out what compromises each is going to make on what they expect out of a relationship--love is not all you need, you also need a lot of hard work and communication). My headcanon on Vulcans was shaped by 80s Trek novels but I also enjoy trying to fit the *Enterprise* Vulcans with ... everything else we know about Vulcans. One thing I will point out, though, is that while there are a lot of things about Vulcan culture that seem/are sexist, the most powerful Vulcans we see throughout the series are elderly women. I love both Sarek and Amanda, but Sarek in particular is a terrible Dad and I'd like to know more about Amanda. I love Pon Farr, but mostly dealing with the implications of it (both before and after) and not the sex part. (I'm a Spock/Uhura shipper, not a Kirk/Spock shipper--even in TOS, Spock and Uhura had great chemistry.)
If you wanted to vid this one, I would be delighted. Feel free in this case to draw from every Trek media, including the animated show. In particular, for YEARS I have dreamed that someone would do a Spock and/or general Vulcan vid to The Logical Song. And there are so many Vulcan bits in the shows and movies where the visuals are just so evocative, if you get the right song it should be possible to do something really interesting.
But much as I love Vulcans, they are not the only things I love about Star Trek! Tell me about linguistics and what Uhura's job is all about besides "hailing frequencies open!"
Or tell me how the economy works. I used to think "no money" was pure utopianism, and then I learned that Universal Basic Income has been tried (and has worked) in multiple places. So it could work, but nothing is ever perfect even in Star Trek. (Star Trek's shtick is that most people are trying to do the right thing most of the time and be kind and merciful and just, and what happens when that's true, but that doesn't mean that people are perfect. And it doesn't mean that conflicting needs just go away. I want to see a system that works for most people in most times and places ... but isn't perfect. What does it look like, and how do they deal with edge cases and conflicting needs and foreign currency and other issues?
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
Deep Space Nine
I love Bajor, and I love worldbuilding about religion, but I also get nervous requesting it because so many people are really only familiar with Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant Christianity, and assume (even unconsciously) that all religion is Like That, when the Evangelicals are deeply weird compared to the rest of Christianity either today or throughout history, and Christianity as a whole is deeply weird when compared to ... pretty much any other religion on Earth. Now, the show often had parallels between Evangelicals/Fundamentalists and Bajoran religion because they were using Bajor to comment on US religious politics and history. (For example: Winn trying to shut down the school bc they taught that the prophets were aliens instead of gods was a direct commentary on the fundies trying to prevent schools from teaching evolution.) But I generally find worldbuilding that assumes an alien religion is like (Evangelical/Fundamentalist Protestant) Christianity either boring or cringeworthy. I want it to be ALIEN. Especially with Bajor, where we've MET their gods and they have such a fundamentally different perspective on EVERYTHING than us linear creatures, I don't want it to feel like another screed on What Is Wrong With Christianity In America.
Examples (feel free to do other stuff, though): you could lean into the Prophets' timey-wimey non-linearity and what that means for a religion that worships them. Most Earth religions are heavily time-based, with regular repeating festivals that serve a lot of purposes both social and religious--how would that work (or not work) when worshiping beings who see everything happening at once? Or explore the Orbs! What other orbs are there besides Time and Prophecy, and what do they DO? You don't have to have any ritual or belief or ANYTHING to use them, if they have line-of-sight to you they can DO THINGS. Give you visions! Send you time traveling! Whatever it is the others do! No Earth religion has any artifact that is anything like that, and besides wondering what the other orbs even are/do, I'm curious as to how they shaped Bajoran religion, and how it was that the Bajorans ended up worshiping the ones who SENT the orbs instead of the orbs themselves. Especially given that the Prophets mostly ... don't seem to want to be gods or care about being worshiped or what's going on on Bajor or anything. So it's not like they were sending messages with the Orbs about who sent them and why, which leaves a lot of scope for interpretation on the part of the Bajorans who found them.
Also, if you include Winn, please make her three-dimensional and complex. That was one of the best things about her character, that she was an antagonist but never a simple one or a one-note one. And her relationship with the Prophets was so complicated.
Sisko's position as Emmisary is endlessly fascinating to me, and how it shaped his relationship with Kira, and how he came to be more comfortable with it as the show went on. I love Winn as an antagonist. She's unpleasant and manipulative, but she always had reasons for what she did and why she was that way. (Not always good reasons, but generally not Muahahaha Evil ones, either.) Both Sisko men are such great dads, and I love that about them.
I love Dax's relationship with Sisko, that lasted three hosts. When Sisko comes back from the wormhole (if he ever does) will Dax still be Ezri or will enough time have passed that the relationship stretches to four hosts?
I haven't read the novels, but if you want to take the idea that after the show ended Kira eventually became a Vedek and later Kai and explore her faith and relationship with the Prophets, I wouldn't mind.
Besides religious issues, there is so much scope for exploration of what Bajor is like and how recent history has shaped them and what is going to happen post-series.
As for the Trill, I am really fascinated by the possibilities for how some (the few lucky elite) get symbiotes and practical immortality through them and how that shapes the Trill and their culture and government.
If you are a vidder, and you want to vid this, I would be overjoyed.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
TNG
Geordi rarely got a chance to shine, but I always liked him, and aside from that one episode with the genetically engineered society, they didn't do much with his blindness besides "disabilities give you superpowers" with his visor. What are the downsides to it? What, if any, tradeoffs did he have to make, and was it his choice or something his parents decided for him? Does he ever get grief from fellow officers about "what happens if your visor gets knocked off, you'll be blind!" as if not being able to see would make him incompetent.
Data and Lal were so sweet together, and I'd love to see more of them being sweet. Also, I don't like the way people treat Data as either childlike or as someone who doesn't really get it. His poetry's actually pretty good, but they all treat it like it's a trial to be endured. Geordi's the only one who doesn't do that, and that's one thing I appreciate about his friendship with Data. Another plot idea, what would have happened to the court case and Lal's custody if she hadn't died?
I love Guinan, but too often canon treats her like a Magical Negro, and giving her some depth and context and complicating that would be awesome. I ship Guinan/Picard.
Or you can go the Vulcan route: I love me some Vulcans, and have many Thoughts on the Subject (as noted in the TOS section). Or you can explore starship life and what it's like to be one of the people the camera isn't focusing on. Missing scenes, day-in-the-life, backstory, episode-like-fic, anything would be awesome.
If you are a vidder, and you want to vid this, I would be overjoyed.
DNW: bashing, incest, explicit sex, rape/noncon, major embarrasment/humiliation
