About my Remixes this year
I wrote 3 remixes this year, and I feel like my approach was a little different with each one.
The first, the one I was actually assigned for the main Remix/Redux fest, is Imaginary Circumstances (the Living Truthfully Method). I was assigned to caramelsilver, who was a match for me because she'd written in both Glee and HP, two fandoms I'd offered in. My first idea was to remix one of her Draco/Ginny stories, because I have a major soft spot for that pairing, but then her Glee fic The Dice Was Loaded from the Start caught my eye.
The original fic is a shippy Rachel/Jesse fic that explores the ways that Jesse deceived Rachel -- and in the end of the fic, asserts that he only time he really lied to her was when he told her he didn't love her anymore. There was a quick reference in the beginning to Jesse's deception as an acting exercise, and I immediately thought that it would be interesting to tell the same story -- Jesse's deception of Rachel while at McKinley -- by looking at it as Jesse looks at it: as an acting exercise. (He also refers to it this way in canon, a line that I used as the summary for the fic.)
Changing the fic from a shippy romance to a cynical portrait of a liar gave it a totally different tone, but I tried to keep as much of the structure of the original as possible -- starting with Jesse's arrival at McKinley, then showing him impressing Rachel, and ending with the egg scene. I also added a scene where Jesse and Rachel watch musicals together, which was referred to in the original fic but not depicted. In the end, I'm really happy with how it came out -- it gave a totally different spin to the fic, but it ended on much the same note, calling the truth of Jesse's last words to Rachel into question.
-----
Then, for Remix Madness, I wrote Footlights (the Understudy Exception), a remix of cinaed's Glee/High School Musical crossover fic Bright Lights, Big City. It's just a simple little crossover where Kurt Hummel and Ryan Evans meet at an audition and hook up, but I have to confess, I LOVE that fic. I'm kind of obsessed with it. Basically I just think these two characters really need to meet. So, I saw cinaed's name in the Madness thread and jumped at the chance to remix the fic.
I knew I wanted to write it from Ryan's point of view, but I didn't know what angle to take with it. In the original fic, it takes Kurt two weeks to make a move, so at first I thought -- maybe Ryan thinks he's not interested. I tried to write that and it wasn't working for me. Three-quarters of the way through the fic, I had Sharpay and Ryan on the phone and she's telling him to make a move, and it occurred to me that Ryan had a reason for holding back -- because Kurt was his costar. And then I had my story. :)
I lovelovelove writing crossovers, and it was so fun to play with Ryan and Sharpay, who are completely fabulous characters. Add Kurt in the mix and this was a real joy to write. I want to write more of this pairing over the hiatus. <333.
---
And last but not least, I seized the opportunity of Remix Madness to write Queer as Folk fic, which I've been wanting to tackle since I watched all the episodes a couple months ago. I wrote Revolutions (the Orbital Overdub), a remix of simplystars's fic Better Living Through Geometry. I knew I wanted to write QaF, so I kind of trolled the Madness thread to find some, and jumped on this awesome fic as soon as I saw it.
The original fic uses a really cool metaphor of geometry, with lines and angles. Just as with my Jesse/Rachel remix, there was one line in the original fic that inspired my take on the remix -- in this case, a reference near the beginning to Justin orbiting Brian in ever-tightening circles.
Brian and Justin have very distinct personalities, so it was kind of scary to write them for the first time... and I know almost nothing about planetary physics, either, but I kept very close to the structure of the original fic, and used that and the orbital theme to guide me. In the end I'm really happy with how this came out... and I think the original author was too, since she left me what is quite possibly the BEST REVIEW EVER in the entire history of reviews.
---
So, sum total: three remixes written, three pairings I've never attempted before, three stories I'm very happy with. None of my stories were big runaway hits and none got a huge ton of attention, but I'm calling it a win, because I'm personally feeling really satisfied with the end result.
And the cherry on top of the sundae was escritoireazul's awesome Arpeggio (the Broken Chord Remix), a remix of my Kurt/Blaine story Right Now.
The first, the one I was actually assigned for the main Remix/Redux fest, is Imaginary Circumstances (the Living Truthfully Method). I was assigned to caramelsilver, who was a match for me because she'd written in both Glee and HP, two fandoms I'd offered in. My first idea was to remix one of her Draco/Ginny stories, because I have a major soft spot for that pairing, but then her Glee fic The Dice Was Loaded from the Start caught my eye.
The original fic is a shippy Rachel/Jesse fic that explores the ways that Jesse deceived Rachel -- and in the end of the fic, asserts that he only time he really lied to her was when he told her he didn't love her anymore. There was a quick reference in the beginning to Jesse's deception as an acting exercise, and I immediately thought that it would be interesting to tell the same story -- Jesse's deception of Rachel while at McKinley -- by looking at it as Jesse looks at it: as an acting exercise. (He also refers to it this way in canon, a line that I used as the summary for the fic.)
Changing the fic from a shippy romance to a cynical portrait of a liar gave it a totally different tone, but I tried to keep as much of the structure of the original as possible -- starting with Jesse's arrival at McKinley, then showing him impressing Rachel, and ending with the egg scene. I also added a scene where Jesse and Rachel watch musicals together, which was referred to in the original fic but not depicted. In the end, I'm really happy with how it came out -- it gave a totally different spin to the fic, but it ended on much the same note, calling the truth of Jesse's last words to Rachel into question.
-----
Then, for Remix Madness, I wrote Footlights (the Understudy Exception), a remix of cinaed's Glee/High School Musical crossover fic Bright Lights, Big City. It's just a simple little crossover where Kurt Hummel and Ryan Evans meet at an audition and hook up, but I have to confess, I LOVE that fic. I'm kind of obsessed with it. Basically I just think these two characters really need to meet. So, I saw cinaed's name in the Madness thread and jumped at the chance to remix the fic.
I knew I wanted to write it from Ryan's point of view, but I didn't know what angle to take with it. In the original fic, it takes Kurt two weeks to make a move, so at first I thought -- maybe Ryan thinks he's not interested. I tried to write that and it wasn't working for me. Three-quarters of the way through the fic, I had Sharpay and Ryan on the phone and she's telling him to make a move, and it occurred to me that Ryan had a reason for holding back -- because Kurt was his costar. And then I had my story. :)
I lovelovelove writing crossovers, and it was so fun to play with Ryan and Sharpay, who are completely fabulous characters. Add Kurt in the mix and this was a real joy to write. I want to write more of this pairing over the hiatus. <333.
---
And last but not least, I seized the opportunity of Remix Madness to write Queer as Folk fic, which I've been wanting to tackle since I watched all the episodes a couple months ago. I wrote Revolutions (the Orbital Overdub), a remix of simplystars's fic Better Living Through Geometry. I knew I wanted to write QaF, so I kind of trolled the Madness thread to find some, and jumped on this awesome fic as soon as I saw it.
The original fic uses a really cool metaphor of geometry, with lines and angles. Just as with my Jesse/Rachel remix, there was one line in the original fic that inspired my take on the remix -- in this case, a reference near the beginning to Justin orbiting Brian in ever-tightening circles.
Brian and Justin have very distinct personalities, so it was kind of scary to write them for the first time... and I know almost nothing about planetary physics, either, but I kept very close to the structure of the original fic, and used that and the orbital theme to guide me. In the end I'm really happy with how this came out... and I think the original author was too, since she left me what is quite possibly the BEST REVIEW EVER in the entire history of reviews.
---
So, sum total: three remixes written, three pairings I've never attempted before, three stories I'm very happy with. None of my stories were big runaway hits and none got a huge ton of attention, but I'm calling it a win, because I'm personally feeling really satisfied with the end result.
And the cherry on top of the sundae was escritoireazul's awesome Arpeggio (the Broken Chord Remix), a remix of my Kurt/Blaine story Right Now.