A Rant of Writing Expectations

[jaune_chat]

So, in December I posted what I had intended to be the final chapter of a series I had started waaaaaaay back in 2006. I got some good comments on it, some great responses from people who'd been with me during the main writing of the long story of the series for two years. And then I got some other responses.

Comments

[game_byrd]

As time has passed, I've come to understand why some authors don't allow comments at all. Not that I'm suggesting that or that I plan to implement it myself, but I've come to realize how destructive one or two bad comments can be.

Sky High was a cool movie and 25,000 words is easily enough to tell a really rocking story. It's also pretty fricking long by just about anyone's standards. Sure, it's not the epic you'd written before, but it's ridiculous to think everything you write will be the same length!

[jaune_chat]

The thing is, the last three transition stories I wrote for that series were much shorter, like in the 2-6k range, but no one complained about them.

I've had a few bad comments on other stories before, and they can be incredibly destructive. A single bad one can not only negate every nice thing other people say, but also the entire story. And even if I agreed that the story was not my best work, some people can be incredibly douchy about it. There are ways to leave concrit that don't involve making someone's day terrible, but alas some people don't get that (or don't care). If don't write something perfect that fulfills their unspoken specifications, you suck. And if you do? You get a "Moar plz!" which is almost more annoying than no comment at all.

Common courtesy - not so common!

[game_byrd]

I'm ashamed to have left my share of less-than-constructive comments early in my fanfic-reading career. I wish there was a guide - something more specific than 'be nice'. I picked up a lot of input on what's allowed and not-allowed for comments by lurking on fanfic rants. Someone ought to compile a list of do's and don't's.

[jaune_chat]

Ya know, that would be a really good idea. I wrote a rather short post about commenting a while ago, talking about a few different kinds of comments that really ground my gears, but a more comprehensive one would be, well, more comprehensive! I'm actually working on it now, and I'd really like it if we could get other people's takes on commenting netiquette. ('Cause it's unlikely I'll be able to come up with all the situations that can arise.)

[perdiccas]

*hugs*

It sucks when people are destructive with their negativity. I know these kinds of comments are hard to shrug off but I hope they don't taint the awesome accomplishment of what you wrote! Honestly, getting a sequel done after so long seems like a huge triumph to me! I'm sorry people were raining on your parade. :(

[jaune_chat]

It won't deter me from being proud that I did the sequel, I just now know what to expect from certain people. And also to never lock myself into a date for a sequel when I'm not on something like a big bang schedule. People can't feel owed if they don't know anything's coming! :D

[aurilly]

The "awesome first chapter" comments on a story that is labeled complete just cracks me up. People are ridiculous. 25K is definitely long and juicy enough, and I'm impressed that you were even able to return to such an old fandom a all! And no, no one owes anyone anything. People write fanfic for the love of it; it's part of the territory that if that love of a fandom ends or real life gets in the way, stories may remain unfinished or sequel-free. It's life.

It sort of frightens me that now that ff.net started cracking down on the types of content allowed there, more and more of those immature teenagers have migrated over to AO3. The Once Upon a Time fics (and quite a lot of Avengers, especially about Loki) are largely unreadable...

[jaune_chat]

It's like they weren't even reading all the headers before commenting. Peeps, just because the first story was long, doesn't mean the second one will be. RTFM, ya?

I know ff.net wants to see themselves as being some pure playground for teenage writers to spread their wings (despite the fact that there's a lot of fanfic written for very violent movies, the Saw franchine, anyone?), but they aren't doing the rest of us any favors. I'd rather the young 'uns cut their teeth over on FF.net than Ao3 and LJ.

Lord... don't get me started about Loki. Some people have turned him into the "poor understood outcast, just like me!" It's frightening. :-O

[aurilly]

Loki is simply the new Sylar. Bad guy played by a very compelling and attractive actor. Same haughty snarky personality, same daddy and "I wanna be special" issues, same "daddy thinks this other guy is more special than me so I'm going to go on a poorly-thought-out murderous rampage". Thor/Loki is totally Mylar. And the same thing happened in Heroes fandom. For every well-written, semi-remembering he's a villain Sylar story, there was a horrible woobified outcast travesty. And sometimes those can be really fun! Sometimes I like to read about a snarky asshole whose badness is somewhat toned down so that writers can explore what his relationships with the other characters would be like if only everyone's first instinct wasn't to shoot. But there's a difference between that and turning the character into a poor little woobie to glamorize your own feelings of misunderstandedness

[jaune_chat]

Hee! Oh, that's some good comparisons between Loki and Sylar. At least with Sylar there was some backstory portrayed before he went entirely off the rails that one could extrapolate about, whereas by the time we meet Loki he's already planning his brother's exile and father's death. Not that that ever stops a determined fangirl!

Rumple/Belle kids? ...eek. That is an astoundingly strange relationship (interesting, but strange and very weird with the power dynamics), but not normal. Not at all.

I guess this means we can only have uncompelling plain guys playing villains from now on! :D

[dizzykj]

As someone who reads, but doesn't write fanfic - thank you for everything you and others write.

As for the "you should write more of x" brigade, I'm reminded of Neil Gaiman's comment to about GoT fans being impatient and annoyed about GRRM's other projects: "George RR Martin is not your bitch". This also now has a delightful song and YouTube vid created by someone (can't remember who, sorry).

[jaune_chat]

LOL, nice comeback from Mr. Gaiman! And even if Mr. Martin is getting paid for his work, that still doesn't entitle the fans to crawl into his brain and dictate what he does.

(And thank you, we appreciate it.)

[brighteyed_jill]

Promising start to this rant. Can't wait to read more!

[jaune_chat]

*dopeslaps*

:D