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I definitely feel like worm, and the fanfics, are at their best when it's "worm the dark superhero story" and not "worm the superhero sci fi story".
Just sort of weakens the setting and world? And I hate how much of a sword of damocles Scion is for so many fics because if you don't change enough about the setting to where Gold Morning doesn't happen, then the plot might have to go there and that doesn't feel like it works for every fic. I admire a fic who states outright in the tags or authors notes that "Hey, Scion just fucked off to be depressed about his alien girlfriend, this story won't have a gold morning" because it lessens that narrative weight that works for canon worm, but not the plot of every fanfic.
Some of my favorite wormfics (Shamus, Postdiluvian Road) are concentrated cape stories about what being a small-time player in the world actually looks like.
Canon Worm is great for what it is, and it also has a narrow focus and pathway of escalation that I love, but I don't think the majority of fics need to follow in the footsteps of.
Haven't read Ward but every mention of stuff from Ward that I see in the wiki (Firmament, Shardspace, Titans, etc) makes me groan.
huge worm spoilers below the cut
honestly, despite the fact that it was baked into the story from the very beginning, i genuinely feel like worm and fanfiction thereof is served well by kind of ignoring the whole source behind the powers.
like obviously the Entities’ goals drive a lot of the conflict (both a storytelling term and literal fights) but frankly i feel like worm is best when it’s about the people living in a world that just kinda fuckin sucks.
‘what if everything was worse and also people had superpowers and do very human things with them’ is way better than the whole interdimensional space whales that have inserted a thing into a bunch of peoples brains that gives them superpowers but also makes them want to fight so that they can explode everything
and don’t get me started on everything in fucking ward