on death-fic

[xparrot]

So I accidentally-on-purpose read (well, skimmed) a MUNCLE death-fic today - well-written, clever, heart-wrenching. It wasn't angst-ridden; the opposite, really. (It was azdak's "Divided Halves" if you're curious.) And it broke me, as they usually do, and not in the good way, but in the makes-me-mopey and -flaily and -writing-essays-instead-of-my-sga_genficathon-story-which-is-due-Thursday way. I love black comedy, and death-badfic just cracks me up; it's the good ones that kill me and my fragile OTPer heart.

And I know they do this to me, and I should know better - it's not that I want to read them, I just can't help myself. For some reason when I see a major character death warning (or something that sounds like a death-fic; I've got an instinct for them) I can't help but click. And then I get broken and have to do my best to forget the fic exists, lest I re-shatter. And end up wishing the fic had never been written, so I don't see it recced everywhere and keep getting reminding of it ("Freedom's Just Another Word..." I'm looking at you!)

Which is ridiculous, of course, because plenty of fans love death-fic, or at least love some death-fic - it seems like folks get different things out of them. Some people enjoy that broken feeling - well, it is intense. And then, some people like moving-on stories, about characters recovering and life going on. The most popular death-fic seem to be those stories which hit both emotional chords - like "Freedom's...", which on the one hand is really more about Rodney's new life, about what he's got rather than what he's lost; but at the same time, what he had with John is irreplaceable. (Which is the only reason I could bear it at all. The way my MIPs* work, completely happily moving on after the loss of a MIP is more painful to me than if they both died...)

* MIP = Most Important Person, gnine and my new word for all those relationships we love that might or might not be "true" OTPs, in that they're not necessarily romantic, but the characters are each other's Number One. E.g. "They might or might not be lovers, but Napoleon and Illya are so totally mippish, no?"

But the truth is - I've never read a true, permanent, non-comedic death-fic I've actually liked. Appreciated, yes; admired, certainly, and if anyone questioned me about the literary merit of fanfic, "Freedom's..." would be one of the first things I'd offer as counter-evidence. But I don't like them; I don't usually save them, I don't want to reread them, and they're never my favorite stories. (This is in fanfic; original fiction is a different matter. What I want from fanfic is not what I want from other fiction.)

The ironic thing is that I love the presumed-dead trope; pseudo-death, where the dead one comes back somehow or other, is about my biggest bulletproof kink. (And I like a broad range of "pseudo" - death-fics where the MIP comes back and sticks around as a ghost? Yeah, all over that, no problem!) It's the ultimate device for showing how important characters are to one another - but it needs the satisfaction of the chars being able to do something with those realized feelings to work for me. This is especially ironic because I know some fans feel cheated by pseudo-death stories, and probably find my enjoyment of them as baffling as I find their enjoyment of death-fic...

The other irony is that I've written death-fic, including long-term ten-years-later death-fic for Psych, of all shows...and that story would probably have killed me reading it, but I just had fun writing it. Maybe because when I'm writing it, it's just an intriguing scenario to explore. A "what if," not "what really happens." Odd that I have so much more trouble reading fic in that light...



In other news, watched the Twilight movie with the MST3K fangirl squad of gnine, naye, and acchikocchi, and vaguely horrified myself by not hating it. Edward & Bella are as stalkerifically wrong a young love as Romeo & Juliet, but since they are teenagers (sort of) it doesn't bother me overly much, and oh! the emo! The director was so, hmm, sincere about the prettiness - so very shoujo, I could almost see the bubbles. And the sparkling was almost as hysterical as promised.

But the Cullen family was just so freakin' adorable I couldn't even laugh at them. A big happy vampire family! That plays baseball together! And cooks Italian! I've seen plenty of vampires trying to get on/stay on the wagon, but never a whole vampire family. Edward can actually depend on his vampire sire, and listens to him about the saving of his favorite hamburger true love...so much trust! Awww~!

Also saw the Who Easter Special. "I love you! I love you!" AHAHAHAH <333

Comments

[sholio]

I'm constantly having to revise my own assessment of my fanning style as new evidence comes to light. *g* Every canon really is different for me, and the way that I react to canon, and to changes in canon, is highly variable. My interest waxes and wanes, and I drift from one fannish touchstone to another. SG-1 is really a great example of that, because I was positively obsessed with Jack and Daniel in the first couple of seasons, to the point where I was thisclose to being one of those hyper-annoying "There is TEAM in my OTP!" fangirls (... okay, maybe not that bad, but I used to get annoyed at episodes like "Solitudes" or "Message in a Bottle" because I wanted all Jack-and-Daniel onscreen all the time -- I resented having it pointed out that Jack had other important people in his life besides Daniel). But I drifted out of love with the show, and by the time Daniel died, it didn't really bother me all that much -- I wasn't happy about it, and I stopped watching in season six partly because of the lack of Daniel, but knowing about Daniel's return was not enough to get me to watch the show again. However, when I started watching again in early season ten, it was really a totally different thing for me -- I was all over Teal'c and Vala, and loved the team vibe, and wasn't nearly as focused on a particular character or relationship to the exclusion of all else.

If Daniel had been killed in season two, his death would have snapped my fangirl heart like a twig. Daniel's death in season five hurt, but I actually was more annoyed with the viciousness of Daniel fangirls towards TPTB for killing him off than I was annoyed with them for killing him! His death was still the final nail in the coffin of my love of the show, but by the time that season ten rolled around, I think they could have killed Daniel again for reals without really bothering me all that much -- actually, I really didn't mind the episodes in S10 where he was evil, because it was really interesting to see how the team dynamic worked in his absence.

I think I've kinda drifted into a similar place with SGA. John and Rodney are still my focus in fanfic and for the show, but I was actually musing the other day that, had the series continued, I think the most interesting thing they could have done for the show's sake was to kill off Rodney ...! I know it sounds awful, but I really think they've explored the character about as far as they can without turning him into a self-parody or "reforming" him to the point where he's unrecognizable. It was interesting to realize that I'm actually more interested in seeing what happens to the team dynamic in his absence than I am in seeing the further adventures of John and Rodney onscreen ... while I know that Rodney's death in season three would have turned me into a gibbering puddle.

I have sometimes waffled over the fact that, while it is almost always a particular character relationship that pulls me into a fandom, I don't really seem to OTP them in a permanent kind of way. I might for a while, but then I get interested in seeing what else can be done with them, separately or in combination with other people. It really has something to do with whether I can get a good supply of my happy-place OTP fic for them, enough to sate me and make me think, "Hmm, what else is out there?" When I think about the major platonic "OTPs" that I've drifted away from while still being more or less into the show -- that is, the waning of my interest in the character relationship hasn't kept pace with the decline of my interest in the show -- they're basically the ones where both the show and the fic provided an abundant supply of character development, h/c, angsting and interaction for them: Jack/Daniel, Sam/Dean, John/Rodney to a somewhat lesser extent. The ones that have held my fascination are the ones that haven't really been explored -- maybe canon gave a lot to work with, but there wasn't any fic (Alfred/Haplo, Vinnie/Frank, Manji/Rin), or canon only gave tantalizing hints and I could never find much fic either (Ranma/Ryoga, Lister/Rimmer...).

[xparrot.livejournal.com]

Ahhh - what's interesting here is that I tend to work similarly, except that when I lose interest in an OTP, that pretty much always means I've lost interest in the series/fandom. I keep my OTPs, usually (actually I don't know if there's any exceptions to that? Once I OTP, I'm awfully, umm, consistent...) But I only stay "active" with an OTP - reading/writing/watching - for a limited time. After I've moved on to a new fandom, I'll remember my previous OTPs happily, and will still enjoy them in canon, but I only rarely will return to actively "shipping" them. But I don't want them broken up; I'd rather the canon remain how I remember it.

Case in point, I'm basically out of SGA now (shhh, don't tell anyone ^^;) - I'm still reading a bit of fic, but not really much, and I'm not writing it anymore (save for my gen ficathon thing, and that doesn't really have a John-Rodney focus at all...) At the same time, I still can't take John-Rodney breakage...actually, having moved on, I think I'm even more sensitive; the only SGA fic I'd really want is fluffy super-happy-ending, because I wouldn't want to have to mentally "fix" it in my head, I'd just want to enjoy it. And my enjoyment pattern is pretty much fixed in the final place I left it, the TEAM+OTP setting...if that makes any sense? If they killed Rodney...it wouldn't bother me now like it would've before, but I wouldn't like it; it's possible I'd have kept watching, but I probably wouldn't fan on it. It would be a different show for me. And I'd have to full-on deny Rodney's death if ever I wanted to enjoy any fics I'd read or written before. (This is why I tend to prefer shows to end, rather than change too drastically; I like my old safe places to remain intact. After s5 SGA, I'm actually happy the show ended when it did; I think there's more that could be done with it, but not with those writers...)

The major exception to this is Type A fandoms - except it's not really an exception, because I don't tend to have OTPs in Type A. I'll have relationship I particularly like, but they won't be my absolute favorite part of the series, so they won't be a make-or-break issue. (In fact, in Type A fandoms I sometimes will be anti-OTP; I won't want to see any relationship placed above any other. The only OTP-type preferences I get in Type A fandoms will be canon relationships...)

(What is Manji/Rin from? It's the only pair I don't recognize!)

[sholio]

What is Manji/Rin from?

"Blade of the Immortal". One of the character relationship "types" that really does it to me is master/student of different genders -- I used to think it was just older guy/teenage girl (like Manji/Rin or Harry/Molly) but then I realized that Rukia/Ichigo in Bleach hits the kink just the same ... and is one of the reasons why the idea of Rukia/Ichigo as a pairing gets a big NOOOOOO!!!! from me, because it's very specifically a platonic kink. *g*

Case in point, I'm basically out of SGA now (shhh, don't tell anyone ^^;)

Awwww~! But I know you tend to wander on; I didn't expect you'd stick around very long. (Still. It was nice while it lasted!)

I'm actually very surprised that I'm still in SGA fandom. I'm not into it to the same extent that I was in the beginning, but I'm still very much in the fandom. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that it's not the characters specifically, it's the universe, and even though my interest in the characters has changed quite a bit from how it was in the beginning, I still have a lot of stories to tell in this setting, and a lot of interest in telling them.

I've really had to reassess my fan-self over the last few years, because a lot of what I'd thought was true of me as a fan is turning out not to be true of me in SGA fandom. It's possible that I've just changed, and rather than always running off to fall in love with new shiny things, I'd rather settle down and be fannishly monogamous for a while.

[xparrot.livejournal.com]

...Actually there might be an exception to my OTP rule, depending on how SPN works out - because for all I love Sam/Dean, in the show these days I'm more interested in Dean/Castiel, I think. Or maybe just Castiel, period. (mmmm, angel-kink...) Though I never really was "active" in OTPing Sam/Dean, never ficced...if I had, I suspect I would've abandoned the show for the sake of the OTP. (Maybe that's another reason I fan on lower-quality canons - because then I can abandon them without trouble, if they go places I don't want to follow, rather than wanting to know what happens, even if it's killing me...)

Ahh, fanning is such an emotionally complex activity!

[sholio]

Hee, I think I'm the only fangirl on the planet who doesn't really like Castiel. ^^;; I did in the very first episode that introduced him, but I think the fan reaction to him has actually pushed me away from him very strongly; I am contrary that way. XD

I want to think more on my reactions to various canons -- I know that I am much less likely to fan heavily on something that's really good all by itself, sort of my own version of your type A and B fandoms -- there just isn't much that I want to do to it. But this also includes shows that deliver what I would normally look for in fic; I think that's why I never really fanned on SPN very hard, even in the early seasons when it was delivering what I wanted. In just the first season, the show handed me pretty much everything I would have wanted from fic; my interest in it slid into a decline in part because there wasn't really anywhere else it could go, and there wasn't much that fic could give me that the show didn't already.

(The office worker AU episode -- hee! -- revitalized my interest in the show in a way that I haven't felt since the first season, and I think the big reason why is because it made it all fresh and new again -- we got to see Sam and Dean negotiating a whole different kind of relationship, where they didn't know the rules and didn't really know each other either. I've been vaguely tempted to write something for it ever since that episode, and I haven't felt that way about SPN in a long time ...!)