Hello everyone, I am OrangeMacawWorld, otherwise known as Orange or OMW. Simply put, I am a male, and as of June of 2019, I am also a convinced Catholic. My ancestry stems from a wide variety of European nations, including Italy, the UK, Ireland, France, Spain, and Germany. The action that I enjoy most is the expression of ideas, actions, objects, emotions, and events by literary means while keeping true to my personal writing motto, "quality over quantity." I have been writing since October of 2009, and have worked on projects concerning fan fiction, original fiction, and nonfiction, though I only began writing draft stories for this site in July of 2016, and did not join as a member until January of 2018.

For those who are wondering, my username is a reference to the extinct Cuban macaw, (because of its orange plumage) which some of you might have already assumed as my avatar depicts one of these lost majestic birds. The concluding word "world" in the name is much more symbolic in nature, representing the occurrence of a fantastical event in which the Cuban macaw returned to the world and bestowed upon it a gift in the form of well-crafted writing. Before anyone asks, I chose the Cuban macaw as my writing persona because it is perhaps the most well-known macaw species that is confirmed to be extinct (Spix's Macaws are not extinct, contrary to popular belief.) I have no relation whatsoever to Cuba, if anyone at all is wondering.

In case it was not apparent when judging by the fact that all of my stories focus on Rio, I am a massive fan of Rio all around, so much so that the first film is my personal favorite film of all time and that about a third of my sleeping quarters is occupied by Rio merchandise of nearly all varieties. Though I do see all of The Lord of the Rings films as objectively better, I will not deny at all that the first Rio left an impact on me that no other film ever managed. To say that it shifted my perceptions of romance, chemistry, character development, and the importance of both musical and visual artistry is nothing short of an understatement. It was the first film my eyes were ever set upon that taught me that there is simply more to the art of entertainment than the spontaneous appearance of explosions. Even today when I have seen the film 134 times as of 5/13/2019 after remaining a fan for eight years, there are hardly any flaws I can point out in the film. Though it is not particularly original in its storytelling, its execution is what truly makes the film great.

Concerning Rio 2, there are very few aspects of it that I enjoyed: the score, most of the lyrical soundtrack, the animation, some of the voice acting, and the fact that its existence resulted in what I consider to be the greatest Rio fan fiction ever conceived. Other than that, I also have a good laugh at the second film because of how incompetently-crafted almost everything else is, from the seven-lane plot to the undeveloped new characters to the horrid plot holes and unresolved conflicts... In all, I only like it because without it as I mentioned before, the likes of The Estrella would certainly not exist.

OrangeMacawWorld Trivia

I - aside from Rio, other film franchises that I enjoy are Jurassic Park, (except for films 3 and 5, which are absolutely terrible) The Lord of the Rings, the first six Star Wars films, (I would rather watch Attack of the Clones five times than watch any part of the sequel trilogy ever again) and Madagascar (excluding Penguins of Madagascar: The Movie, which simply paled in comparison to the television show in nearly every way possible.) There are several stand-alone films that I like as well, including Sea Monsters: A Prehistoric Adventure, The Dark Knight, a few of the Marvel films, and the original 1981 Das Boot (not the atrocious television remake.)

II - my favorite television programs primarily consist of wildlife documentaries, including The Life of Birds, Walking with Dinosaurs, Walking with Monsters, Chased by Dinosaurs, River Monsters, Monsters Resurrected, and Prehistoric Park. Occasionally, I will also watch The Penguins of Madagascar and The Walking Dead. For those of you wondering, I do not like Game of Thrones, as it is in my opinion a collection of convenience-ridden tripe beset with promiscuity and unoriginal fantasy elements that were executed far better in the works of Tolkien.

III - my favorite video games include Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons, Angry Birds Rio, Angry Birds Space, Angry Birds 2, Angry Birds Stella, and virtually any Rio video game.

IV - regarding my favorite books, they are The Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park, the first Hunger Games, and Die Deutsche Kriegsschiffe (1815 - 1945). I also somewhat like the first four Harry Potter novels, but I did not enjoy the last three.

V - out of all the characters in Rio, Blu is by far my favorite because of how much I can relate to him as a character.

VI - Real in Rio is my favorite song in the entire lyrical soundtrack of the Rio franchise, though I cannot chose my favorite song from either score, as there are simply too many excellent pieces of music from them.

VII - I sometimes interact with exotic birds (mostly parrots) and have been studying them for almost as long as I have been a fan of Rio. There have been several occasions where strangers have given me the title "The Bird Man" because of the birds' attraction which is often focused upon me due to my enticing feeding techniques. In addition, I have also traveled to zoos and aviaries across the US in search of interesting birds. I was even offered a volunteer job at a privately-owned parrot sanctuary, though I turned down the offer due to the extensive distance from the sanctuary and my residence.

VIII - my favorite musical genres include classical music, Samba, jazz, tango, and opera. The only musical genre that I dislike as a whole is dubstep, as it has held responsibility for rendering several celebrations that I have attended utterly void of excitement.

IX - regarding food, I enjoy most Italian dishes. I also enjoy eating other heterotrophs borne from aquatic biomes, a very nerdy way of saying that I love seafood, whether it be crab, lobster, shrimp, or scallops. I love most fruits as well, especially exotic ones. It is rare when I can handle vegetables that are absent of seasoning.

X - I am not bilingual at the moment, though I am learning both German and Portuguese at a relatively slow pace. In all honesty, I gave up on learning Finnish after the first week or so of online instruction.

XI - in my opinion, the greatest Rio stories ever written are All of My Heart and The Estrella, which were both written by Sorrelwing (though only the latter is still extant.) All of My Heart succeeded in quite literally everything that it attempted to do, and holds the position today as being the only tragedy I have ever read that had me nearly shed a tear. The Estrella, though not quite as good was still a masterpiece, and its action scenes are possibly the most heart-racing and intense that I have ever seen in fan fiction. It was also the story that inspired me to join this community in the first place.

XII - though I am not athletic by any stretch of the imagination (I only surpassed the weight of 100 pounds some three years ago despite my height and I earned the nickname "Toucan Legs" in high school) I often engage in swimming and archery according to Medieval techniques (I cannot stand official archery ranges, which always seem to shut out Medieval archery.) I have also played baseball at times as well, and I have also gone on long hikes down the length of a trail or up the height of a mountain.

XIII - unless you are a good friend of mine who I can entrust will not take advantage of this information, I will never discuss my political or social views, as alienating my audience is one of the last things I want to do. However, I will publicly state that I am not affiliated with either of the major parties in the US and in all likelihood never will be.

XIV - concerning genres that I enjoy, my favorite would have to be romantic tragedy by far. I also like the fantasy genre when done well, and to an extent, science fiction on top of that (but when discerning sci-fi, I am more a less a Jurassic Park type of person and not a Star Trek type of person.)

XV - for several years, gathering historical knowledge has been one of my favorite activities in life, but I do not work with history professionally, nor do I intend to as a full-time job. In particular, my area of "expertise" is in the field of studying German U-boats from both World Wars. To say the least, the subject is far more interesting to read about when going beyond the highly simplistic information that Wikipedia provides.

XVI - because I spend a great amount of time focusing on my own work, I cannot work on this site as an actual beta reader. However, I am open to provide a critique of anyone's story.

XVII - when regarding the fan fiction that makes it onto this site in particular, I publish content based on films and other forms of entertainment that I thoroughly enjoy. Privately, I also write small fan fiction stories based off shows and films which are absolutely terrible. Why? Well, this is a great way to test my creative writing skills, and to see how effective I can be at transforming something bad into something highly entertaining and worth reading.

XVIII - for several of my early years, I not only wrote, I also made short films. These films were absolutely void of editing and sound effects (all of the audio was done on my part by some method in the raw footage of each short film that I produced) and my line delivery was hilariously awful.

Update: 7/12/2019 - Biographies for my OC's

César Torres - overall the 19th Patriarch of the Spix's Macaw Tribe, César began his reign in 1978 upon the death of Almir the Great, his father. After he married Eduarda Alto in 1980, the latter bore him a daughter (Mimi) in 1982 and subsequently a son (Eduardo) in 1983. By the time of Don't Go, the Patriarch was not particularly popular with anyone outside of the circles of merchants whose trade syndicates had received much support from the Patriarch. He was not all that favored by the military commanders of the Spix's Macaw Army as he focused on trade and cared little about defense, while at the same time not being liked very much by the general populace either, due to his bombastic and often arrogant attitude. Thus, the majority of the Tribe's Great Council in 1989 voted to implement a regency in the Tribe with Eduarda as ruler, but this decision was overturned almost immediately, as the Matriarch held a very sparse amount of experience in dealing with serious matters.

Eduarda Torres - spending much of her early childhood as a storyteller and a mercantile assistant, the 21st Matriarch of the Spix's Macaw Tribe was at the time of her 1980 marriage to César, a member of the aristocratic Alto family, which at that point had held a great amount of influence in the Tribe's policies relating to efforts intended to discover more about the human world to the north. In the eleven years she held her title as Matriarch before the events of Don't Go, she was known to intervene in public affairs to only a limited extent, as she felt that her mate was far more experienced in the role of exercising authority in the Tribe. Though often much more open than her mate to dissenting opinions from the Great Council and the general public on certain issues, she was known to exhibit considerably less charisma than the Patriarch and was at times, very hot-headed and simultaneously overly-sensitive.

ANCIENT MACAW MYTHOLOGY

In spite of how divided the six Macaw Tribes in the Amazon (as well as those that lied outside it) could become given the right set of circumstances, there were two uniting prospects of the Tribes that they all had in common; those two factors were language (Birdish) and their ancient religion, often referred to by its adherents as "Tradição divina neotropical," though it is best described as parrot polytheism. But what is this ancient faith that these birds all practice?

Simply put, the ancient mythology of the original macaws claim that eleven gods and goddesses belonging to the Realm of the Sky (with Selva being the king of the gods whose power peaks at sunset, while the other ten have their power divided evenly between the time of night and daylight) rule the world and control all of its aspects by some degree. Parrot polytheism also taught that Selva created a giant ball of mud in the Night Sky Realm, which was complemented by oceans and seas by the goddess of water Astuta, as well as with more land and the jungles by Selva, resulting in the birth of the world. Moral teachings were stated to be sourced from both Selva and Astuta, and were passed on verbally. Often times, followers of this religion would set out to kill dangerous beasts or even go so far as to mutilate if they violated their sacred codes. This practice eventually ended however by the early 1500's, as too many macaws were being eaten by sharks and crocodiles for the tradition to be considered efficient. As mentioned before, there were eleven gods and goddesses in macaw mythology, as listed below:

I - Selva; considered the king of the gods, as well as the god of the jungle, birds, pleasant weather, valiance, and morality.

II - Astuta; traditionally stated to be the sister of Selva, and considered the goddess of water, reptiles, aquatic creatures, and stormy weather. In most mythological stories depicting her, she was usually portrayed as being the most honest, yet wrathful of the eleven gods and goddesses. This is due to the macaws' mostly-stigmatized view of water, (as they cannot swim, adding onto the fact that the Amazon River contained piranhas, stingrays, bull sharks, and crocodiles) and because of this, they thought of the rivers, seas, and ocean as a realm of judgement for the living. For quite a while in macaw societies, funerals were not held for individuals who died by drowning or were killed by an aquatic predator, as it was thought that their demise meant that they were being delivered fair punishment from Astuta.

III - Alvorada; depicted to be the goddess of love, parenthood, fertility, beauty, family, and hierarchy. In most macaw Tribes, (this was never practiced by parakeets, conures, or parrotlets, however) it was once a common practice for a porcupine to be sacrificed to Alvorada (by being thrown in the Amazon River, in the hopes that it would be eaten by piranhas) on the "mate bonding ceremony" between a Patriarch and a Matriarch. One quill though would be dipped in water borne from a waterfall purported to carry the aquatic blessing of Astuta and the terrestrial blessing of Selva (due to the water running off a cliff) and then be stabbed by only an inch into the Matriarch's abdomen, a ritual that was considered necessary in order for the ruling family of a Tribe to have healthy offspring. This practice fell out of use in the 1740's after the Matriarch of the Red-bellied Macaw Tribe was accidentally killed during this ritual, as the porcupine quill punctured far too deep.

The Early History of the Macaw Tribes

Throughout my prequel story Don't Go, much is explained directly to the audience via mostly narration, regarding the histories, cultures, traditions, customs, and spiritual beliefs of the many Macaw Tribes. However, as I would prefer not to give too much exposition concerning them while still maintaining a proper narrative, I will detail the history of macaw society in this very long section of my bio:

To begin, before the Gregorian Calendar year of 1498, parrots lived together in many small communities within the jungle that were typically comprised of a dozen or so families each. These families sometimes communicated with one another, but not one group of macaws ever called for a unification of their respective species as a single tribe. Their language, Birdish (that is what it is called, according to Rodrigo Santoro in an interview) is of its own origin with no discernible roots, though parrots' given names were generally of Old Tupi origin (one of the primary indigenous languages of Brazil at the time.) From the very beginning of living in any sort of civilization, macaws, parakeets, conures, and parrotlets all despised mankind, as they were the only creatures roaming South America whose languages were not passed on to them by the birds themselves; for thousands of years, the parrots had spread their language all across the continent and beyond, until eventually, all non-human animals capable of speaking spoke no language of their own, but the one of the parrots.

Despite never having truly unified, these small communities of parrots often attacked not only humans, but other parrots as well. By the early 1400's, macaws and conures entered a war competing for dominance over the continent, and the war continued for another century. Along with the wars that took place between other families of parrots, different species of macaws constantly fought each other, due to divisions concerning values, traditions, cultural rectitude, morality, etcetera. In short, the only characteristics that unified all parrots at the time was the language they used to communicate, the religion that they had practiced for many centuries, and the fact that they were all birds.

In 1496, a single Hyacinth Macaw originally named Pira that lived in what would be named Para by the Portuguese during the Age of Discovery decided that he had enough conflict within his life; most of his family had been killed at the behest of two conure communities, and as revenge, he sought to unify all Hyacinth Macaws across Brazil as one tribe, in order to finally end the Endless War. This macaw then spread his sentiment, expressing his desires for the unification of all Hyacinth Macaws. He was almost immediately met with admiration and praise, and one by one, communities composed of members of the same species as Pira joined his cause. His goal was finally accomplished on April 27th, 1498, when the Tribe of Blue Macaws was formed in present-day Mato Grosso, consisting mostly of Hyacinth Macaws. However, a sizable minority of Glaucous, Lear's, and Spix's Macaws all made their presence within this new Tribe. With its territory spanning from eastern Bolivia to Para, and from Bahia to northern Argentina, the Tribe finally turned the tide of the Endless War in the macaws' favor. This is why April 27th is considered New Years Day in virtually all macaw tribes located in the north of Brazil, rather than January 1st.

In 1500, Pira explored the areas that were being settled by the Portuguese and renamed himself Joao. Thenceforth, he further developed the civilization that he had created, then moving his massive Tribe's influence to the north, spreading much of his influence into the Amazon Basin. There, the Tribe quickly defeated the small Scarlet Macaw families that lived there, taking over what would eventually become the Spix's Macaw Tribal Territory. The Blue Macaws' way of life was then spread to the Scarlets. One after another, more and more tribes of macaws were formed, until all macaw species were unified by some measure by 1530. However, the unification attempts were not as successful for the Scarlet Macaws, which was still divided after much conflict. As a result, the species divided itself into multiple different tribes located all across South and Central America, as well as southern Mexico, in order to ease tensions. Suddenly, Joao died in 1532 at the age of 50, and the Blue Macaw Tribe disintegrated, plunging the four species of the former Tribe into conflict. By 1534, the Hyacinth, Lear's, Glaucous, and Spix's Macaws had all divided themselves into their own Tribes. Joao II came to rule the Hyacinth Macaws, Herberto I came to rule the Lear's Macaws, Leonardo I came to rule the Glaucous Macaws, and Jacinto I came to rule the Spix's Macaws. Out of the four, the Spix's Macaws held the largest geographical advantage of being positioned with the Amazon, while the other Tribes lived mostly in more open climates, making their populations easier to attack in the event of war.

Update: 6/13/2019 - My Enormous Rio Collection

Although some of you may already be aware of this fact, on top of writing fan fiction for Rio, I also own quite possibly one of the largest collections of Rio merchandise in the world. It includes almost every variety of product imaginable with the Rio franchise' name to support it, ranging anywhere from childish books to theater cups and from gift cards to snow globes. Still growing even today, the entire collection costed well... Let's just say more than the amount of money required to go on a couple of trips to the city of Rio de Janeiro itself. As well as the extremely diverse array of collectible pieces in my collection, they come from various countries across the world, including the US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Germany, the UK, China, Thailand, Chile, France, Italy, Austria, Israel, and Australia. With that, I will list the items in my collection below, and for the first few days that this update is on the site, I will add new categories on a daily basis. Bear in mind before reading that the collection welcomes new acquisitions quite often, and that even the list of countries that I just provided may be expanded upon in a short while.

PLUSH TOYS

Blu -

Rio Toy Quest Small Blu (2 examples), Rio Toy Quest Large Blu, Rio Toy Quest Talking Blu, Rio Toy Quest Chained Blu & Jewel, Rio Australian Hunter Ltd. Blu (variant #1), Rio Australian Union Blu, Rio Promotional RDP Creative Blu, Rio Chinese Xintai Toys Large Blu, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Blu (2 examples), Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Talking Blu, Rio 2 Toy Factory Blu (light variant), Rio 2 Toy Factory Blu (dark variant), Rio 2 Kohl's Cares Blu (2 examples), Rio 2 Walmart DVD Blu (2 examples), Angry Birds Rio Small Talking Blu

Jewel -

Rio Toy Quest Small Jewel (2 examples), Rio Toy Quest Large Jewel (2 examples), Rio Australian Hunter Ltd. Jewel (variant #1), Rio Australian Hunter Ltd. Jewel (variant #2), Rio Chinese Xintai Toys Large Jewel, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Jewel (2 examples), Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Talking Jewel (2 examples), Rio 2 Toy Factory Jewel (light variant, (2 examples)), Rio 2 Toy Factory Jewel (dark variant), Rio 2 Toys-R-Us Jewel (together with Carla, Bia, and Tiago), Angry Birds Small Talking Jewel

Miscellaneous Characters -

Rio Chilean Italtoys Spa Rafael, Rio 2 Toy Factory Rafael, Rio Toy Quest Small Nico, Rio Toy Quest Large Nico (2 examples), Rio Australian Hunter Ltd. Nico, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Nico, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Talking Nico, Rio 2 Toy Factory Nico, Angry Birds Rio Small Non-talking Nico, Angry Birds Rio Extra Large Nico, Rio Toy Quest Small Pedro (2 examples), Rio Toy Quest Large Pedro (2 examples), Rio Australian Hunter Ltd. Pedro, Rio British Whitehouse Leisure LLP Pedro, Angry Birds Rio Small Talking Pedro, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Pedro, Rio Toy Quest Small Luiz (2 examples), Rio Toy Quest Large Luiz, Rio Toy Quest Talking Luiz, Angry Birds Rio Small Non-talking Nigel, Rio Toy Quest Small Marmoset (2 examples), Angry Birds Rio Small Talking Marmoset, Rio 2 Jakks Pacific Gabi, Rio 2 Kohl's Cares Gabi, Rio 2 Toy Factory Carla, Rio 2 Toy Factory Bia, Rio 2 Hunter Leisure Bia, Rio 2 Toy Factory Tiago, Angry Birds Rio Small Talking Purple Caged Bird, Angry Birds Rio Small Non-talking Yellow Caged Bird, Angry Birds Rio Small Non-talking Green Caged Bird, Angry Birds Rio Large Talking Pink Caged Bird, Angry Birds Rio Large Talking Blue Caged Bird

NOVELS AND CHILDREN'S BOOKS

Rio: The Junior Novel, Rio 2: The Junior Novel, Rio: Snakes Alive!, Rio: Blu and Jewel, Rio: Learning to Fly, Rio: Blu and Friends, Rio: Birds of a Feather, Rio: Greetings from Rio!, Rio: Take Flight!, Rio: Rockin' in the Rainforest, Rio Movie Guide (Portuguese version), Rio: Music From the Motion Picture Soundtrack (piano book), Rio 2: Coloring and Activity Book (variant #1), Rio 2: Coloring and Activity Book (variant #2), Rio 2: Jumbo Coloring and Activity Book (variant #1), Rio 2: Jumbo Coloring and Activity Book (variant #2), Rio 2: Vacation in the Wild, Rio 2: One Big Blue Family, Rio 2: Off and Flying, Rio 2: Untamed Talent, Rio 2: My Busy Books (including figurines and diorama), Rio 2: Blu's Wild Journey, Rio 2: My First Puzzle Book, The Art of Rio and Rio 2, The Art of Rio and Rio 2: Limited Edition

VIDEO GAMES

Rio: Multiplayer Party Game (Wii), Rio: Multiplayer Party Game, (Xbox 360), Rio (DS), Angry Birds Rio (iOS), Angry Birds Rio: Free (iOS), Rio the Movie: Coloring with Blu (iOS), Rio: The Movie App (iOS), Rio 2: The Movie App (iOS), Rio 2: Sky Soccer (iOS), The Angry Birds Trilogy (Wii)

DVDs

Rio , Rio: Party Edition, Rio 3D (rare Canadian foil cover variant), Rio (Costco variant), Rio 2, Rio 2: Deluxe Edition,

BLU-RAYS

Rio (Junior Novel cover), Rio 2: Sing-along, Rio 2: Dschengelfieber (Austrian variant, included with UHU glue stick), Rio 2 (2015 variant), Rio 2: Special Edition (with wristband), Rio 2: Special Edition (with Blu plush), Rio 2: Special Edition (with soccer ball)

Update: 4/7/2019 - How NOT to Write a Rio Fanfiction Story

Although I am young and not a professional writer, I have nonetheless been writing for almost ten years and have received praise from multiple professional authors for my work. Because of not only that but also because I see many other writers (most of whom are young) make these mistakes, I will list them so that you know exactly what NOT to do when writing a fan fiction story for the Rio Archive.

1 - Capitalizing every single solitary noun as if you are writing in German; bear in mind, folks, proper nouns are meant to be capitalized, not every noun. Also, do not capitalize adjectives for that matter and please capitalize the opening letter of a sentence.

2 - Not knowing what a full stop / period is and using commas for literally every function in punctuation; although I am definitely guilty of using commas too much, I at least use periods. If the only form of punctuation you know is the comma, then please look to the key immediately to its right.

3 - Not taking the time to consult native speakers of whatever language you are writing in if you are learning said language; okay, I will admit that if I tried to write a story in German, Estonian, Portuguese, or Spanish, it would probably be utter garbage. That said, I would at least take the time to study whichever language's grammar, consult a native speaker, and possibly find a beta-reader who speaks it. If your description reads as "thiz best story ever you see, me gud reiter 4 lif3," (and trust me, that's hardly an exaggeration) please do not publish a single sentence until you find a beta-reader.

4 - Having characters speak in completely different dialects and accents for absolutely no reason; if you are going to have your characters speak differently from the source material, provide a reason that actually makes sense. If you have Blu using double-negatives in his sentences in your story for no reason, then you should obviously watch Rio again and pay further attention to the dialogue.

5 - Using completely superfluous detail; and yes, I am guilty of this mistake as well. Intricate detail is describing the nature of an event, object, action, or idea so that the audience can picture everything mentally as they read. Superfluous detail on the other hand is description that adds nothing and is already stated by the first descriptive word rather than the fifth. An example would be "ascending upward," (which I am definitely guilty of) "bleeding blood," or stating that a tree has bark -- as if every tree in the world does not inherently possess bark.

6 - Forcibly shoving political opinions into your story's plot; now in case you are wondering, do I mind if a story simply contains political messages? No, not necessarily, as long as your message is passive and is carried out by means that will not anger your fan base. However, if you center your entire story around a political message, it is almost guaranteed to fail. Audiences will become alienated at best and absolutely furious at worst. Just please, do not make your story pure propaganda is all that I am asking.

7 - Giving characters names that do not at all correspond to the setting of the story; sure, it is fine to give your Brazilian characters a name every once and awhile that is not Portuguese in origin, (such as Jewel) but if you cannot be bothered to Google "Portuguese names" and end up giving every one of your Brazilian characters an English name, I will take it that you are just lazy.

8 - Writing OC characters that are superior to the original characters in every way and have no faults; if there is any reason why fanfiction has earned a bad reputation from many people, (besides the excessive amount of lemons) it is because of the abundance of Gary Stews and Mary Sues. If you are going to write an OC who is not a paragon-type character, do not make them as bland and boring as possible by making them perfect at everything. Characters actually need to grow or reflect on the events occurring around them in order for your audience to care for them at all.

9 - Writing action scenes with little to no buildup; with the correct application, this is actually not a mistake in general. However, if you are going to write an action scene with no buildup, it is generally necessary to open the story depicting it using indirect exposition and cut to why the action took place later on (unless you are recreating an action scene from either of the films, where the buildup has already been established.) If you just open the story with a pitiful amount of direct exposition with barely any detail and then cut to the action without any time for suspense, tension, and emotion to occur, your action scene will most likely be a confusing mess that will leave your audience utterly perplexed.

10 - Attempting to build emotion without actually describing the emotion itself; similar to action scenes, scenes that convey a great amount of emotion need buildup or explanation of some kind (and the same exceptions in the last entry on this list apply to this entry as well.) Also, if you have characters crying or characters that are practically screaming at one another, please do not just say that they screamed or they cried. Actually take the time to observe the look on a person's face when they become instilled with fury, or observe how a person is eventually brought to tears so that you can really describe an emotional event playing out.

11 - Completely forgetting about detail; it's well-known that I am an author that emphasizes an extremely intricate amount of detail in my own work, and I advocate for the implementation of cohesive detail in other authors' stories as a result. Keep in mind that when I mean detail, you don't have to write like Michael Crichton or J.R.R. Tolkien in order for me to like your story. That being said, if you simply establish the setting and the characters in a chapter while also using direct exposition without actually accomplishing what direct exposition is supposed to do to begin with, there is a very likely chance that I will not be able to comprehend your barren story. Please, at least attempt to write enough detail to where I can get a general idea of what's going on.

12 - Writing stories that are only done to capitalize off of a holiday or the release of a movie; in case you're wondering, no, I do not think all stories centered around holidays or the release of a movie are poorly-done. Some of them are actually amazing. But if you are planning on writing a story that fits into one of these two categories, (or possibly both) only do so if you actually have a passion for that holiday or that movie. If your only goal is to rake in more views or get a larger following, don't even bother. In the world of fan fiction, passion is everything.

13 - Shoving in songs that are completely unrelated to Rio and have no effect on anything; seriously, if you are going to put a song in your story, write down somewhere an actual reason for why you want to use the song in particular, other than the fact you like it. For example, using a Bruno Mars pop song during a dance scene featuring Roberto makes actual sense due to the singer playing the part of Roberto in the series. Also, if you want to use an unrelated song, make sure that it at least fits with the events in the story itself or contributes to the plot by some measure. On the other hand, please don't throw in a completely unrelated rap song that has nothing to do with the characters, the world, or the events that go on in the plot.

14 - Passing off recycled Internet memes and vines with Rio characters thrown in as "comedy"; though this one is more of a matter of personal opinion, if you are going to write a comedy, actually try to write a story with your own jokes. Simply taking Internet videos and making everyone Rio characters while adding on absolutely nothing else isn't comedy, it's lazy recycling. If you are going to write a parody of an online video, please make the characters authentic to who they actually are so that your parody is not completely pointless. The same thing applies to recreations of historical events or movies with Rio characters. If you want to write a story with Rio characters in the Battle of the Bulge or whatever else, actually make Blu act like Blu instead of a generic soldier so that your plot is worth my time. If you are going to write a historical fiction book about generic soldiers, don't try and pass it off as Rio fan fiction, pass it off as Hollywood war film tripe instead.

15 - Giving everyone a love interest because that's apparently some kind of literary law nowadays; look, I love romance, (in fact, romantic tragedy is my favorite genre by far) but please do not give every single character a love interest for the heck of it. Take the time to actually develop your romance and put all of your passion into it, don't just shove it in. Also, if you cannot write romantic dialogue already, either watch the movies again or get a love interest yourself so that you know how people talk when they fall in love. One last thing for this entry, try to refrain from using the "love at first sight" cliche unless you are very skilled in writing romance already. Most of the time, this trope does not work, however.

16 - Breaching community guidelines; this one is a given rule for pretty much any fan fiction archive, and the Rio archive is no exception. Actually take the time to read the guidelines before publishing a story. Don't put Q&A's, rants, reviews, polls, award ceremonies, or lone author's notes in the story section, put them in the forums for Heaven's sake. Don't post chapters as separate stories. If you have trouble with that, send me a private message and I will assist you. Don't write a lemon and slap a K or T rating on it. In fact, if its graphic enough, don't put it on this site at all, put it on another site that allows that sort of material.

17 - Treating critics as "haters" or "trolls" regardless of whether they are being honest or dishonest in their criticism; don't attack anyone who criticizes your work unless you want your efforts to backfire on you. As a word of advice, only consider a critic a "hater" if they give you criticism that has nothing to with the story (example would be an accusation of writing Star Wars material, and yes, I have received that one) or if they just spam curses in the review section. If a respected author simply tells you that you need to improve or even if they tell you that you have no talent whatsoever, I hate to burst your bubble, but they're probably right. If you are met with the latter, seek a profession that you're actually talented at.

18 - Giving your villains no motivation whatsoever besides acting evil for the sake of being evil; last time I checked, the villains of Rio actually have motivations for their actions. If you are trying to write avian villains that express a boiling hatred for birds of another genus or species, actually take the time to explain why this is the case instead of just saying "Oh, I'm way too lazy to actually make my villain act like an actual person, so I'll just write him as a fairy tale villain." Seriously, villains are an extremely important component in stories, and if you want to write a villain that is worth my time, listen to my aforementioned advice.

19 - Writing lemons in general; although this entry onto the list is much more of a matter of personal opinion, I am putting it here because of the simple fact that you cannot get me to enjoy a lemon story, period. If you attempt to persuade me into writing a lemon, tough luck, it is against my religious values to write something even akin to one. However, if you disagree with my opinions regarding the subject and decide to write a lemon, please... At the very least, take the time to study parrot anatomy and gynecology beforehand so that your story is less disturbing than it probably already is.

20 - Not naming your chapters; though this issue is really not all that major in comparison to some of the others on this list of mine, it is always a good idea to provide your chapters a title so that in-story navigation is easier for your audience, especially those that are looking for specific scenes in the story for whatever reason.

21 - Not writing any sort of plan for your story and making things up as you go along; though it is fine to include new elements every once and awhile into your story in the midst of writing it, actually plan how your story will proceed from beginning to end so that your plot is not a completely incomprehensible mess. Only add on elements if they are necessary to fill in plot holes, fix pacing issues, or actually complement the plot or the characters in some way. If it is complete filler, don't add it in. Again, if you can only tell a story by making up everything on the fly, stick to writing one-shots until you learn how to plan out a plot line.

22 - Writing crossovers with no faithfulness to either source material; part of the fun of crossover stories is that they combine two different universes with unique aspects, characters, and said characters' personalities. If you are going to throw Rio characters into a crossover, make both sets of characters from the universes act like themselves so that your characters do not feel as if they are completely interchangeable with those from another franchise.

23 - Having characters act like completely different people for no real reason; now, this does not mean that I think changing the Rio characters is necessarily a bad thing. However, if you are going to change the characters, expand them and give them new and interesting archs, plot lines, and relationships that bring change for the better. But please, do not make Blu a space alien from "Men In Black" all of the sudden. If you're going to write stories where the characters are entirely different people in all but name, you might as well just change the names and try and publish the story as a novel.

24 - Dragging along characters that have no effect on the plot; if you decide to throw in a ton of background characters into your story, there's nothing wrong with it; I do it myself. But please, do not drag along all of your characters into one location if they serve no actual purpose to the plot besides a few jokes. Doing so will make your story feel incredibly cluttered and sometimes even incomprehensible.

25 - Creating fictional languages that have no thought put into them; though constructed languages are not at all common in this fandom, I cared to point this out nonetheless. If you're going to create a fictional language, actually put in the effort required to actually build a language -- and no, I don't mean that you have to write a whole dictionary of your language. What do I mean by this then? For starters, don't be lazy and make all of your languages feature the same exact word order as English (unless these languages are all supposed to be part of one fictional language family.) Actually construct root words instead of making up complete gibberish, and lastly, don't put ten acute accents into every single word unless your language is supposed to be tonal.

26 - Thinking every "Rio" story is a good one; unfortunately if you're this kind of reader and or writer, I'm a person who believes in varying degrees of effort. If your story does not feature a single sentence that is absent of mistakes, I'm sorry, you did not do a wonderful job. If your story has no grammatical mistakes but is an incoherent mess with no substance in its plot, you did not do a wonderful job. Period.

27 - Using script-format writing; before I delve into why I do not recommend writing in this manner, (other than the fact that it's banned as per site rules, which many people seem to ignore willfully) I just want to state this first. If you want to write a movie, write a script. Don't write a script if you're trying to write a fan fiction story, write a story with actual narration and detailing of how characters speak. The reason scripts don't need to be so visually detailed in film is largely because of story boarding and plot synopses. Of course, fan fiction stories have neither of these things, and because of that, preparing a script in this context comes across as incredibly lazy as there is often times little detail to speak of. Again, if you want to write a movie, write a movie. Don't write a movie only to just dump your script onto FFN, which is again, a violation of site rules.

Cancelled Projects and Story Concepts

Have you ever wondered why I do not publish all that many stories on this site? Well, that is easy to explain; dozens and dozens of projects of mine never went beyond being a mere concept, and on only a few of these cancelled concepts and projects did writing actually begin, as again, I am dedicated to "quality over quantity" in all respects. As a matter of fact, almost every story I plan on publishing on this site has been planned from beginning to end across the span of several years. This is not a full list of the cancelled stories, as many of them relate to later elements and events in Don't Go that I would rather not reveal before its completion. Nearly all of the stories were cancelled largely due to the fact that I simply came up with these ideas out of nowhere, did not develop them into becoming anything acceptable by my standards, and thought that only stories in which I truly put passion and a regard for the source material into would be kept in consideration for publishing on this site. With that said, with each story listed, I will also cite any other reasons explaining why I did not go through with the particular story. Another thing of note is that all of these concepts and projects did in fact receive names. Well, here we are:

World War Rio - essentially a retelling of your typical World War I trench battle with Rio characters thrown in as an afterthought, only less than a page of the first chapter was completed before I abandoned the project in late March of 2017. It would have featured Blu as a Sergeant in the US Marine Corps landing at Cantigny, France, and Felipe would have portrayed Kaiser Wilhelm II in at least one scene. Reasons for abandoning this project included the inconsistency in tone between sentences, the lack of vision and ideas for the plot, as well as the bland concept that I felt did not fit into Rio fan fiction at all. I also felt that the planned character archetypes that I had in mind for characters other than Blu were too stereotypical and overdone. Overall, I can say now that the only reason I even thought of writing this is because of my fascination of military history, and I am truly grateful that I never published nor wasted my time trying to complete it.

Glory for Blu - this story would have been similar to the aforementioned cancelled story, except it would have been set during World War II during D-day. Felipe would have portrayed Erwin Rommel, and Blu would have been a US Marine Corps soldier. Reasons for cancelling this story were mostly the same as World War Rio, though another reason I abandoned the project was the unnecessary exposition and cliche dialogue. The two drafts of this story also bore quite a few historical inaccuracies, and not to mention, my basic motivation for even advancing the story was stopped after my opinion of Saving Private Ryan changed massively (I do not like Hollywood war films anymore, period.) Again, like World War Rio, I did away with this concept after realizing that combining Rio and the world's greatest conflict would result in not only a very uninteresting tone that did not feel like the source material whatsoever, but also a very awkwardly-executed plot line.

Rio FPS Parody - I honestly have no clue what I was thinking with this one; the story was essentially non-existent and bore no substance at all. As the name implies, it was supposed to have been a satirical work that poked fun at first person shooter video games. Hardly any material for this project was ever written, and after deciding there was nothing at all that could be expressed by this story other than poorly-executed satire with no relation to the franchise or even some fascinatingly wild alternate canon, I cancelled the project in September of 2016. The story would have been tone-deaf and the writing would have been far too mediocre for my standards. Another reason for the cancellation of this story was my lack of knowledge of the subject matter that I was parodying, as I rarely play video games for extended periods of time.

Bia's Time Machine - just from the title alone, you can probably assume why I scrapped this project almost immediately after I listed it as one of my possible stories in my private notes. The plot would have involved Bia building a time machine for (I am going to be brutally honest to myself) no particular reason, then getting her family stuck in the Jurassic on accident until she could construct a new machine. Besides the fact that nothing in the plot made any sense by any measure, I cancelled this project mainly due to the badly-planned surreal story line I was planning on giving this story. It was another story whose idea came about in my line of thinking, and as I took no care into planning it out or even further developing the core of the story, I recognized that it would stand as unacceptable compared to other works which I do invest hours upon hours of my spare time into. A third factor in the cancellation of this story was its lacking of a clear theme, carrying no discernible message besides "events of unexpected nature can occur upon the occurrence of mistakes." Although this message is indeed true, I thought that I lacked the passion to twist this overdone message into something compelling, and that marked the end of this utterly bizarre project.

Rio 2 vs Reality - this was a planned satirical story which would have involved Blu in a theater with Jewel, giving commentary on Rio 2 and making note of its many mistakes. I halted the project just before work began on the initial phases of writing. This was due to my inexperience in the field of satire, deciding my talents were better suited to tragedies, adventure and family stories, and thrillers. Other reasons that I cancelled this project included the fact that it was a borderline review, feeling that it was completely unnecessary to publish such a concept as a story, as well as believing that a lot of my opinions and gripes with Rio 2 (although I still watch the film on many occasions) would upset quite a few people. It is safe to say that the last thing I wanted to do was anger my fan base, and because I genuinely care about those who read my work, I ultimately did not write the project, as in the end, it would have inflicted a great deal of damage upon my reputation.

Red and Blu Sirens - besides the awful pun within the title, another reason I cancelled this planned story that would have parodied Cops was my inability to create comedy of any substance on paper, as well my feeling that the mere concept alone did not fit in with my planned library. The plot would have been very simple, involving Blu as an officer in the Miami Police Department catching criminals. As with many of the other stories mentioned here, I felt the story would have served as a complete waste of time to write, (as it adds nothing to the canon or to the universe established by the franchise) and felt the precious resource known as time could be spent on projects more worthy of being published.

Flying Lessons - unlike the rest of these stories that I have listed here, I actually put much thought and planning into the plot, despite its simplicity. The story would have involved Jewel essentially polishing Blu's flight skills upon recovery, taking place around six weeks after the first film. In spite of the passion I felt for writing a story such as this, I ended up cancelling it, feeling that the plot was too simple to be its own separate story, deciding instead to use this exact same concept as one or two chapters in A Blue Bride (which is currently still being worked on, though the first chapter has already been released.)

If you have any questions or commentary concerning these cancelled stories and concepts, please leave me a private message discussing the matter.

Update (12/16/2018) - The Making of Don't Go

DRAFTING

Hello, everyone! In this new segment of my bio, I will be sharing with you all the process of writing Don't Go. As I previously mentioned, I first began writing unpublished Rio fan fiction in July of 2016, after I had been reading it since October of the previous year. However, Don't Go was not the first story I came up with while not yet on this site. In fact, I made many drafts for different story concepts, the first of which was A Vacation in San Diego, a story about Blu and Jewel celebrating their anniversary in San Diego, California. However, I abandoned this work only three chapters in, and in late September, I finally began the first draft of Don't Go. My reasons for even beginning the story had to do with the fact that the archive (at least to my knowledge) was devoid of any material covering the backgrounds of Eduardo and Mimi.

The first draft continued until January of 2017, when I decided to take a break until the next month and started work on the overall plot line for a future "Don't" trilogy, I guess you could call it. The first draft varied substantially from the final product, and it was only 25 pages in length. Some of the more minor differences were that the confrontation between Cesar and Alberto was much shorter, Eduardo and Mimi were actually allowed to attend the meeting in the Great Mouth, and the characters were much more knowledgeable about human technology. It is also worth mentioning that the original draft had characters that were cut from the published version.

For example, Cesar's military strategy in the first draft was thought up by a council member named Rameck, though I completely cut his character from the story; this was because I wanted to give Cesar a more important role in the story, though another reason was because of his name which was not at all Portuguese in origin, thus not making much sense at all. Major differences were the complete absence of the Cachoeira Cintilante and virtually all of the flying sequences, though one scene that was cut from the final product was one in which Cesar calms Eduardo down immediately after the council meeting.

However, there are plenty of characters in the final draft that were never in the original, such as Neto and Mateo for example. I added in Neto to serve as a great introductory character, though he does have importance later on, which has not been published yet. The reason that I created Mateo was to give the Great Mouth council meeting a great amount of tension. Also, besides the characters, it should be worth noting that there are hardly any similarities in dialogue between the original and final drafts, as in my opinion, the dialogue in the first draft was at times far too melodramatic, and many of the lines spoken by the characters made absolutely no sense.

Probably the biggest change in the story was its overall theme, and I'll be honest, the unpublished first draft was way too blatant with its political messaging to the point where it reached utter ridiculousness. In July of 2017, after finishing work on my plot outline for the planned "Don't" trilogy in which Don't Go would serve as the first installment, I finally began a second draft, which other from the length is mostly the same as the finished product, with all of the stupid political nonsense being scrapped. The only real difference in the story from the final version was that an entire chapter centered around the Scarlet Macaws and Caetano was present in the second draft. However, I did away with it, as I decided Caetano would be rendered a more intimidating villain if the audience kept having to guess who he is as a person for quite a while longer. The third and final draft is essentially, as mentioned before, a heavily modified and edited version of the second draft, and the first chapter was barely changed at all. Work on the final product began in November of 2017.

RESEARCH

It is safe to say that on no other writing project have I put in anywhere as close to the amount of attention to detail that Don't Go features. Not only did I spend countless hours researching the Amazon's geography, nearby cities, currents, fauna, fruits, vegetation, waterfalls, seasons, etcetera on the Internet, I also went so far as to "experience the story." What do I mean by this, exactly? Apart from traveling from coast to coast across the US in search of aviaries and zoos where I can appreciate the sight of these lovely birds, I also studied the manners in which they eat, walk, fly, and much more. As the closest authentic tropical rainforest to my residence is approximately 2,200 miles away, I visited the United States Botanic Garden in Washington, DC, which bears within it perhaps the most realistic artificial rainforest that I can easily access. I studied virtually every angle of the tropical rainforest itself, took pictures and notes, as well as other observations, in order to describe the Amazon as accurately as possible. Other than that, I have also gone out of my way to purchase any Brazilian fruits that I can possibly acquire, as to properly describe the texture, taste, and flavor of every fruit that is depicted in the story by those means.

Update: 2/4/2019 - Collaboration Policy

If you wish to collaborate with me or be friends with me on this archive, I will in all probability, be happy to work with you. If I am to collaborate with you, I will automatically grant you full permission to use any of my OC's. That being said, I may refuse to work on certain collaboration projects if they are either too similar to what I am writing, or if their plot line is one which I feel would be degraded by my involvement. Also, as a general rule, I will not work on any stories that feature blatant political messages, (as again, I seek to alienate not a single person in my audience) or if they are in any way a violation of community guidelines (this includes Q&A stories, interactive stories, etcetera.) I will also not work with authors who deliberately violate community guidelines either, even if the story itself does not meet the criteria to be against site rules.

Update: 3/9/2019 - Review Policy

Bear in mind that in initial reviews of an author's work, I will act as tactful and polite as I can, though I am not the kind of reviewer that gives nothing but praise to people. There are indeed good and bad stories folks, and if your story falls into the latter category, I will kindly explain why I did not enjoy your story and how you can turn yourself into a writer whose actual writing is worth reading and not utterly excruciating. If your story has good elements in it, I will mention them; if your story has no redeeming qualities at all, I will be honest about it. Also, if you write a story that violates community guidelines, I will mention the violation(s) in the review, and provided that you have a problem with following the basic rules, I will simply tell you to move your content to either the forums of this site or to the archive of another fan fiction site; in extreme cases of abuse of FFN's guidelines, I may even report a story, so please, just adhere to the rules so that I don't waste your time and so that you don't waste my time.

If you ask for assistance in your writing, I can certainly provide it, though I cannot work as a beta reader for now as I am quite busy with my own stories, as well as various other aspects of my life. Still, as long as you are polite and respectful to not only me but this whole community unless for a justifiable reason to be otherwise, I will definitely try to help you whenever I can. However, if you're the kind of person that exhibits a narcissistic attitude and cannot except constructive criticism, it is not very likely that I will assist you at all. If I ever leave you a review that states "misinformation," please contact me and provide me actual evidence that I am wrong instead of immediately blocking me, which will give other people the perception that you cannot handle criticism and that I am right.

One last thing, if you happen to be writer whose attitude is negative towards criticism, I urge you to realize that without criticism, there can be no such thing as improvement. It's the lesson that I learned when I began the activity of writing, and is arguably more important than fully comprehending the English language. There was indeed a time when my writing was absolute garbage, but I kept improving it after receiving criticism from friends and family until I got to where I am today.

Other than what I have already mentioned, there is not much else to say. However, I am still thoroughly looking forward to writing stories for this archive for quite a while. If there are any elements of my work you would like to criticize, please do not hesitate to speak to me of any issues in any of my written material on this website.

If you happen to find any errors at all within my writing, (whether pertaining to continuity or whatever else) please notify me, and I will immediately correct my mistakes accordingly. Provided that you have any further questions, comments, bits of advice or knowledge, or any other written phrase of note that you wish to present to me, please do not hesitate to PM me or review one of my stories. Thank you, to all readers and fans!

From, OrangeMacawWorld