Silly Ass Banners

Banners are pictures that are seriously photoshopped until they are just too silly for words. People create them to make their characters seem important, show their icky love for a canon, show what relationships they want canons to have, or a lot of other generally icky things that you probably don't even want to think about. Banners usually appear in the signature line of an author's posts and they often are like neon signs that point out who the attention whores are. Often forums like proboards, ezboards and so on allow this sort of pretententious jackassery.

Here are a few that I found that are so silly that I laughed really hard at first. Then that laugh turned into long, awkward, pitiful sob for all humanity:

Ooh! Spike sucked on Angel's no-no place. Slashy! I hope Angel has more "Spike wos 'ere" related clothing besides the cute, little wifebeater in this banner. It would be a damn shame if the back of Angel's pants didn't read, "Spike wos 'ere too."

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Wouldn't it be awesome if Spike was a samarai warrior with Tom Cruise's body and Buffy was a sexy geisha and teens wrote angsty poetry about it all?

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"I'm just misunderstood, is all. And I could use some Visine too."

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When I saw this I thought maybe someone was quoting Britney Spears' song "Toxic" and this is for a fanfic about Snape shagging Britney raw. Then I thought, "And that is why Snape rocks!"
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Speaking of Britneys, here's a Britnay who spelled her banner wrong. Do you get that she's a bad ass Slytherin and her avatar is everyone's favorite little slut, Michelle Trachtenberg? I do care that Michelle's 'sexy face' looks like she's about to puke all over your shoes.

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I hope to provide more banners so we can all weep for the future of our children together. If you find one, send me a link so I can post it and we can all share each other's misery.

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Want to make your own silly ass banner? Try these links:

http://www.mybannermaker.com/

http://www.coder.com/creations/banner/banner-form.pl.cgi

http://www.bannercreator.nu/banner-maker.html

http://www.abcbanners.com/cgi-bin/b2/b2.pl?action=Browse&CatID=1

http://www.puresilva.com/banner_maker.asp

Gary Stoics

Annoyed by Ambivalence

Okay. I'm not good with puns but here's a role player type that always pisses me off. I call them a 'Gary Stoic' because they are Gary Stus who usually describe themselves as stoic, indifferent or emotionless. If you see someone using an avatar that looks like Inuyasha, you're probably dealing with a Gary Stoic and it's time to walk away.

However, if you're not so lucky to be given Inuyasha as a clue, here are other ways to spot a Gary Stoic:

The Gary Stoic Attitude

Gary Stoics, as I said, are always stoic. They don't usually get mad or sad or angry or nervous or ever even really show any emotion whatsoever. They are always calm because they always have a plan and supernatural gifts beyond belief. They always know what the bad guy is up to and they always appear to know what the girl wants. This is because the author reads ahead and knows what others are thinking and feeling and they keep their characters smugly prepared for everything. A Gary Stoic never sweats because they know they are always better, faster, smarter and just more damn awesome than you are but in a stoic sort of way.

I have wanted on several occasions to wring the neck of a Gary Stoic because they are impossible to role play with. They often describe themselves as having mysterious powers. That word, mysterious, should not be allowed to describe a valid rpg character because that implies they don't have to tell you what they can do. They won't have any weaknesses. Althought they never say in their profiles that they can become invisible, read thoughts, fly or anything else they just randomly pull out of their ass whenever needed, to them this is fine because it all fits nicely into their claim they are "mysterious.

The Gary Stoic Childhood

Well, most likely they've studied at a dojo or some shit like that. Maybe they have been a student of the Grand Master Fuckyoushi. Whatever their background is, surely it's made them greater than everyone else. They have acquired, throughout their lifetime, all sorts of 'mysterious knowledge' that allows them to basically be an omnipotent pain in the ass. Gary Stoics have mad sword skills, hand to hand combat skills, know all about the supernatural and are magical powerhouses. They are most likely immortal and have cat ears. Whatev. Some seem to have amnesia too which is by far the most annoying variation. Call me crazy but I've seen way too many Gary Stus that have no idea who they are or where they come from but if you play a bad guy, they will use powers they never knew they had to beat you down like a bitch without an ounce of effort.

The Gary Stoic Storyline

A Gary Stoic is naturally the hero of his own story. The authors of Gary Stoics have some noble cause like finding the vampires who killed their parents. They are waiting for that moment to defeat the bad guy but in the meantime, Gary Stoics will latch onto other stories. I can guarantee that while a Gary Stoic is kind enough to talk to others and join their stories, it is only to crush the story by solving it so that character has to now join the Gary Stoic in his blood quest.

Why Do I Hate Gary Stoics?

If you haven't guessed, I find Gary Stoics to be pretentious and selfish. They do not believe in any true give and take between characters because it's all about them. It's all about their silent, brooding, noble, emotionless disposition. Gary Stoics have all the answers and have superhuman wisdom that ruins every storyline in their path. Being a Gary Stoic is a subtle way of being a Mary Sue because a Gary Stoic doesn't appear at all to be taking over and dominating a role playing game but they slowly cripple everything they touch. They crush all sorts of conflict you throw at them but it's sometimes hard to see this right away because they are silent but deadly.