Snowflake Challenge, days 13-15, and not-my-fanwork for day 12

[hamsterwoman]

Day 12: In your own space, create a fanwork. Make a podfic, an icon, a sketch, a meta, or a rec list. Arts and crafts. Cross stitch. Draft an essay about a particular medium. Put together a picspam or a fanmix. Write a review of book you love, a ship manifesto, a you-should-be-listening-to-this-band essay. Create something.I'm going to have to take

Comments

In Other Lands

[hamsterwoman]

Favorite character:
I like both Luke and Elliot a lot, but have to go with Elliot for this one. He is just so vivid.

Least Favorite character:
Dale. Both as a person (because he's a shallow bigot, and none-too bright) and because his role in the narrative is annoying and, IMO, a weak point of the book. Elliot sleeping with him was probably the one thing that made the least sense to me.

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon):
Luke/Elliot obviously, and I like Serene/Golden. I'm intrigued by the possibility of Adara Cornripe/Natalie Lowlands. I don't really ship anyone else romantically, but of Elliot's flaily hook-ups, I enjoyed Elliot/Adara, and I could also (pre-Luke, obviously!) find Elliot/Louise Sunborn interesting.

Character I find most attractive:
Not sure, none of them are especially my type... Serene, maybe? Luke is supposed to be irresistible, but the big blond type generally is not my thing... nor are wings.

Character I would marry:
Personality-wise, definitely Luke... Although the harpy thing is a bit concerning as far as having children...

Character I would be best friends with:
Inasmuch as Elliot is capable of having additional friends, him. He's entertaining, and I'm thick-skinned enough not to mind him being, well, Elliot.

a random thought:
Apparently someone's writing a Hogwarts AU XD (I found it while googling Adara's last name for the question above)

An unpopular opinion:
I have no idea what's popular/unpopular in the broader fandom, but I will say that the Elven misandry deconstruction stuff got tedious after about year 2, and I wish less time had been spent on that.

my canon OTP:
Luke/Elliot -- I do find it a very cute pairing. Also, Elliot/penpals.

Non-canon OTP:
Adara/Natalie is not canon, I think, but I definitely got the sense that it was on its way to being.

most badass character:
Tie between Luke and Serene. No, the combination of Luke and Serene, working together as sword-sisters. (Although Elliot would point out that this is a stupid question because the value of a person does not depend on how good they are at hurting others.)

pairing I am not a fan of:
Luke/Dale, Elliot/Dale, Elliot/general fumbling about trying to find people who would choose him by kissing them

character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another):
I wouldn't say "screwed up", but I would have liked to see more depth and growth from Serene. And would have liked to understand Elliot's mother's motivations a bit more; I'm OK that they didn't reconcile, but I would've liked to know why she did what she did, because it didn't make sense to me, and I wasn't sure it made sense to the character, either.

favourite friendship:
Both Luke and Serene and Elliot and Serene. For the former, I really like platonic m-f siblings-in-arms pairs. For the latter, I was glad to see that their friendship was able to survive Elliot's crush on her, the misunderstanding of them dating/fooling around under different sets of expectations, and everything else (I almost put down Elliot/Serene as one of my five ships, but it's not that I liked them romantically -- it's that I liked that they were able to get past that and still be friends.)

character I want to adopt or be adopted by:
Adopt: I think I could handle a younger Elliot, like from when his mom first walked out... but at this point wouldn't sign up for it, and anyway, he's got the Sunborns for that. Luke is adorable, though, and if he needed adopting, I'd be cool with that.

Adopted by: Commander Woodsinger, probably. Alternately, I definitely don't share their values, but they don't seem to have a problem with that, so Rachel Sunborn et al are probably not bad people to be adopted by.

Re: In Other Lands

[sysann]

Hmmmm. We're in a quite surprising amount of agreement on these guys. I mean I'm not that keen on Elliot/Luke, but I'm not against them either. I just don't feel comfortable with the way Elliot's been treating Luke growing up and still worry a bit that he might slip back into that as they grow older together. But hey, I'll keep my fingers crossed for them. ---
I've been wondering about Elliot's parents, too. I mean it's not set in the 50s or something. They could've used protection if they had that little interest in having a child. But I guess maybe they thought they could make it work to begin with.

Re: In Other Lands

[hamsterwoman]

Oh interesting! -- I was expecting more disagreement because I know you don't like the way Elliot treat Luke. (I mean, I also don't think it's the greatest. But Elliot does back off when Luke tells him he needs Elliot not to be mean to him, and I do think "loser" can work as a pet name as well as anything else, so long as both people realize that's what it is :P But I actually think that once Elliot finds what he's been looking for -- someone who chooses him -- he is likely to mellow a bit. Not in terms of his belief or even sharp words, but just, like, serious meanness.)

But I guess maybe they thought they could make it work to begin with.

Presumably... Or it could've been an accident (protection does fail), and they don't believe in abortion. Or they thought having kids would be great and then ran into untreated post-partum depression for Elliot's mom, which made leaving seem like the best thing to do... There are a lot of possible answers, but I do wish we knew more.

Re: In Other Lands

[sysann]

You'll find that given time to stomach any given canon most of my views mellow at least somewhat. I mean not like I'll suddenly start to like Londo, or something. But y'know... Elliot isn't really a bad guy. He just happens to have a very sharp togue and be quite mean at times. But he did have a troublesome childhood and really didn't learn how to react to people in an appropriate way. It would be unrealistic if he could just shake that off completely in a year or two. And he tries to improve his behaviour somewhat.

---
True. In a way it works though, that his mother doesn't feel like discussing her reasons. It seems in character.

Re: In Other Lands

[hamsterwoman]

It does seem in character for his mother not to justify it, so I don't consider it a flaw of the book, necessarily. But I would've appreciated finding out some other way, maybe.

Re: In Other Lands

[sysann]

Oh I very much understand. :) Have I pointed out to you that questions you want answered should make you write a fanfic? (Of course I remember that I have. I'm just trying to make a point here. You're an excellent writer with a lot of interesting ideas on what you could be writing about. It's a shame that you don't.)

Re: In Other Lands

[hamsterwoman]

Have I pointed out to you that questions you want answered should make you write a fanfic

Even when I wrote fanfic, back in the days of yore, it wasn't to answer questions -- it was just because I wanted to see what happened next. So I'm afraid it wouldn't help in that regard :)

But, as you see, I do enjoy talking to other fans about the questions and hearing their opinions/suggestions. That's much more fulfilling :)

Re: In Other Lands

[sysann]

Yes, but you can always change what sort of stories you are writing. :D There's no rule to say that because once upon a time you wrote fanfic like that you can now only ever write fanfic like that. Writing styles change. Topics do, too. :)

Yes, I know. :) And I quite enjoy discussing fandoms (oh that does surprise you now, doesn't it? :P). But you do have really good ideas for things that you could write about. And I for one wished more people with interesting ideas and a very good command of the language would write fanfic.

But alas, that's gotta be up to you. And till such a time I'll definitely enjoy discussing the various possibilities of our fandoms with you. :)

Re: In Other Lands

[hamsterwoman]

Heh, it's not about rules, it's what moves one to tell stories -- which can certainly change over time (and doubtless has for me).

When I was making up fanfic, it was either to a) fix what happened in canon to my favorite characters, b) have fun hanging out with my favorite characters, c) find out what happened to the characters next, or d) "so what would happen if Gandalf met Ged from Earthsea?" It was never to fill in gaps in canon -- I may have that drive with meta, but that's not where stories come from for me.

Well, I've outgrown the need for (b) apparently; reading fanfic, now that I have access to it, is a much easier solution to (a) and (c) in most cases (the exceptions are canons that I love but that would require A LOT of work to do them justice, and the activation energy is just not there for me these days); and I can play around with (d) much more easily through the Character Roulette memes (it's not like there are too many people out there who would appreciate a six-fold crossover between obscure fandoms, anyway, even if it were written as fic).

I mean, I find your quest to get me to write fic both flattering and amusing! but it is probably doomed to failure. ;P

Re: In Other Lands

[sysann]

*smiles* Well I'll just continue to mention it once in a while if you don't mind. :) You can at all times tell me to quit it if it gets on your nerves, but I think I've mentioned that that's the general rule in interacting with me... I can get overenthusiastic, particularly when we talk at times when it's well past midnight for me. :) -A word to the wise: NEVER use the word probably in sentences like that. It motivates me.-

*grins* I'm glad you've outgrown b). That'd be worrying once you're past your teens (perhaps early twens).

--- I do agree that exploring through the character roulette is fun, too. (you might be aware that I quite like them, after all that's why we friended each other on lj, I'd originally created this lj solely to keep in touch with a handful of people I didn't want to miss antries by) But you know... there are only so many questions that are really fun to play often. - And there is a very distinct lack of writing for a lot of interesting things that could be explored.

But like I said... you can't be forced, but you can be reminded of the possibility, once in a while. *wanders off humming*