random ranting

[burntcopper]

Am avoiding the tv. We have used the twitter tag #activatethequeen. I'll stop wincing in a minute and prepare to sacrifice the weatherman for electoral reform and another election in six months.

In the meantime, to calm my nerves, I'll rant about fanfic tropes instead.

Have discovered that the one that pisses me off the most? It's not rape. It's not ultra-violence. It's not really bad h/c. It's not 'I have read about cancer so i will make character x suffer through the whole experience in full medical detail'. Nope. Turns out to be eating disorders.

Seriously. WHY? Is it that you want them to suffer delicately and prettily without the blood and pain of violence? It's the new h/c, it must be. with added route to salvation if everyone around them loves them enough and they *finally learn to love themselves. :smacks the authors doing this: If this was the 19th century, you'd be bloody writing the characters with TB, only that's got no way out. But they can survive for years coughing delicately...

I have read decent mental disorder fic. I have seen really damn plausible mental disorder fic. Often written as horror story. The really good ones leave a gaping hole in you. I have yet to see a fucking plausible eating disorder (which yes, is a mental disorder too) fic. And stunningly, the characters they *give* eating disorders aren't even the ones you could handwave as having an eating disorder since the actors now look like skeletons - or are stated to starve themselves in canon.

ARRRRRGH.

Second, unrelated: 'reel_insertfandomhere' challenges are rather popular, where you adapt a film and create a poster or fic. Some have been really, really fucking good. Take beloved characters, insert into beloved screwball comedy/action helmer/horror story. What's not to like, seeing how, say, the crew of Serenity would turn out if you'd chucked them into Pirates of the Caribbean? It's an AU with set rules. Star Trek loved doing it on the show.

Sometimes they just take the world - there was an amazing Bladerunner adaptation (WITH TRAILER, HOMG) which took fandom x's characters, chucked them into the world, and then went to infinity and beyond with the plot.

Sometimes they pretty faithfully follow the plot of the film but keep the fandom characters intact. Admittedly it helps if the original fandom is sci-fi/historical so there's a grand tradition of modern-day/this world AUs. There's a good Merlin version of The Proposal. it's even funnier when you see which characters they've decided to use for the cameos.

What you *don't* do, under any circumstances, is have the characters extensively quote the film lines. You might as well have just done a search/replace with the names. in fact, I've seen one I could have sworn just did with Some Like it Hot in reel_torchwood.

I'm now going to hide from reality and watch more SCC.

Comments

[sheldrake.livejournal.com]

I have yet to see a fucking plausible eating disorder

I have, but I'd sit through three days of non-stop David Cameron footage before I'd willingly revisit that or indeed any other eating disorder fic. Personal preference.

Just depressed myself with that fictional choice.

[peterjevans.livejournal.com]

Am avoiding the tv.

You and me both. I’m afraid that if I catch a glimpse of the news, it will be just in time to see David Cameron’s shiny pink face split apart from within as a chittering, skeletal Thatcher-thing rips free and hauls its horrible way out into the light…

As for the anorexfic, I’m not even going to look. One abyss too many.

[jovieve.livejournal.com]

How are you liking SCC? And where are you in the series at this point?

[eggblue.livejournal.com]

I recently wrote a film-based AU fic of my own and I haven't posted it yet, but you mentioned quoting lines from the film and this very issue has been on my mind for a few days. So I wanted to take advantage of your rant, if I could :)

I decided to use several lines from the film 'A.I.' and in some places mini-speeches that to me are very striking and famous. The rest of the fic is all mine, but in the moment it seemed reasonable to include quotes from the screenplay where I did. To anyone who has seen the film, the quotes would be very obvious. But to anyone who has not seen the film, the quotes would seem as if they were mine, perhaps. Which is unfortunate. It's definitely not a cut-and-paste, but it's there. Do you think it is alright to include famous lines from a film? Or do you think it's all in danger of being a case of plagiarism? I guess what I'm asking is, what do you consider "extensive" quoting? (I couldn't find the exact fic you were talking about.)

I'm just asking for your opinion, if you're willing to rant more :) I don't know of any fan consensus on this topic. Thanks!