Meta Links 5-8-14 through 5-14-14
Notices
If you have meta to submit or rec, please comment to this post or to the screened Submissions Post. If you'd like to give us blanket permission to link your meta please comment to the Blanket Permissions Post. If you have feedback or questions, check out our FAQ, Contact the Mods, or PM/email. If you'd like to volunteer to link-find or mod, please comment to the Volunteers Post.
Links
General Fandom
Gender-Swapping Characters: Does That Work?: Jennifer Crusie (blog) - "So you gender-switch, and that can produce a lot of great stories, but those stories are not like the originals because gender has a huge impact on character. You can do the Sensitive Guy and the Tough Girl, but they’re never going be exactly like the original Sensitive Girl and the Tough Guy that inspired them. Gender matters."
topic:writing, topic:genderswap
Magical Mondays: Alternate Realities are Hard: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Geek Girl (blog) - "These types of stories are extremely interesting and explore different concepts within the main narrative without necessarily destroying the original canon storyline.The problem is that many of these alternate realities are poorly done and don’t follow any sort of logic. So while alternate realities can be really creative, they are also really easy to screw up."
topic:alternaterealities
Oh, My Pop Culture Deities: Religious Diversity and Game of Thrones: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by stinekey (blog) - "There are plenty of things storytellers do to make a world convincing: use science or magic to explain (or enhance) strangeness, compose detailed descriptions of food or foreign landscapes, or even base it on our own. When most storytellers create worlds, unfortunately, they usually do a poor job of including any kind of religion."
topic:religion
Sexualized Saturdays: The Myth of Virgin Rape in Fanfiction: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by MadameAce (blog) - "Rape themes are in our musicals, our TV, our video games, and our books. In many ways, they’re treated as a joke and rarely are they ever presented in a realistic light. More often than not, rape is used for shock value. Of course none of us should be surprised that we find the same thing in fanfiction."
topic:fanfic, warning:rape
Questioning Masculinity in Geek Culture: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by brothadom (blog) - "Some time ago, a friend asked me a question: how do you define masculinity? I paused, as this wasn’t something I ever put much thought into, and then responded that I didn’t actually know."
topic:fandom, topic:gender
If Aggression Is the New Pink, Does That Mean We All Have to Hit Things?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Noah Berlatsky (blog) - "The lean in movement is empowerment feminism, and so (as Chris shows) is the enthusiasm for female superhero movies and the desire to see Hawkgirl bash in some baddie with her mace. America is really into power (we’re a superpower, after all) and so it’s not a surprise that empowerment feminism is generally speaking the most popular manifestation of feminism."
fandom:comics, topic:violence
Silence Is Not Synonymous With Uproar: A Response To John C. Wright: fozmeadows (blog) - "You cannot state, as your opening premise, that SFF fandom is being handicapped by silence and an unwillingness to speak out, and then support that premise by stating the exact polar opposite: that there has, in your own words, been vocal uproar."
topic:fandom, topic:race, topic:gender
A Brief History of Fandom: Slash Report by Rageprufrock & Mklutz (podcast) - "We're talking Zines, APAs, Usenet, BBS, LJ, the Pit, the Great Purge, and a million other things you'll have to look up on Fanlore afterwards. We even get Flourish to make the sound of a 14.4 dial up modem."
topic:fandom
Specific Fandoms
A Song of Ice and Fire
House Stark Family Tree Analysis : nobodysuspectsthebutterfly(tumblr) - "Via the newly revealed House Stark family tree, some analysis, commentary, and speculation:"
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
A-Viking We Will Go : justadram(tumblr) - "Today’s topic is the raiders of the Iron Islands, the ironborn, and their counterparts, the Vikings."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding
If I see you spewing hate about Shae, I am going to haunt your dreams.: boniferhasty(tumblr) - "First of all: let’s be clear that this makes no sense for her character."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Man that episode was actually good if not for that Theon and Asha scene. It seems like D&D is just determined to ruin every close sibling bond in the show.: samwinchester (tumblr) - "TLDR that scene did a shitty service to the Greyjoy siblings, but particularly undermined Asha Greyjoy as a character."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Does Catelyn Stark Really Love All Her Children?: dknc3(tumblr) - "I don’t have time to grab my Kindle and look up specific quotes about Catelyn’s love for all her children right now (of which there are MANY), but I feel compelled to give just a brief example of the evidence on how she not only loves, but intimately knows and appreciates the individuality of each of her babes."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
I was thinking about how one of the running themes in asoiaf is the futile search for vengeance.: lyannastarkk(tumblr) - "That somehow led to me thinking about Catelyn."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Several of the concepts employed in Oberyn’s characterization are deeply troubling not only from a bisexual visibility standpoint, but also from a racial one.: asoiafuniversity(tumblr) - "While PoC diversity on television is great, it becomes problematic when that diversity reinforces harmful stereotypes."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:race
Captain America
On Steve Rogers & his kindness: krusca (tumblr) - "There’s a Chris Evans quote in one of his interviews that really got to me, when he described Steve and Sam as wounded warriors who don’t bleed on other people."
fandom:mcu
Comics
How Censors Killed The Weird, Experimental, Progressive Golden Age Of Comics: Saladin Ahmed - BuzzFeed (blog) - "For a weird, wild, 15-year span beginning in the late 1930s, the comic book racks of America’s newsstands were bursting with four-color contradictions. Images of half-naked, subjugated women appeared side by side with comics featuring independent heroines, like Women Outlaws."
fandom:comics, topic:censorship
Doctor Who
The Changing Style of Doctor Who Part V: Exile: daniel-saunders (LJ) - "As well as replacing almost all the key figures before and behind the cameras in the space of a few stories, the start of season seven sees important changes in production methods. Most obviously, the programme was now made in colour, although, as we shall see, the ramifications of this were not always apparent."
fandom:doctorwho, topic:television
Game Of Thrones
To Hell With Your Realism: Overthinking It by Shana Mlawski(blog) - "Express even a modicum of distaste for the extra-rapiness of HBO’s Game of Thrones and you’ll inevitably hear this kind of comment: “But there was plenty of rape in the Middle Ages! It’s realistic! Deal with it!”"
fandom:asoiaf, fandom:gameofthrones, topic:race, warning:rape
Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: ACOK, Bran I: Race for the Iron Throne by stevenattewell (blog) - "On Tower of the Hand’s rankings of A Clash of Kings chapters, Bran’s storyline is one up from dead last, which I find interesting because I’d say his Clash of Kings material is a noted improvement from his plot in A Game of Thrones."
fandom:asoiaf, fandom:gameofthrones
Hannibal
No, 'Hannibal' isn't queerbaiting-that's just gay subtext: Gavia Baker-Whitelaw - Daily Dot (blog) - "Thanks to a growing awareness of LGBT representation (or lack thereof) on TV, more people are familiar with the concept of queerbaiting. However, not all cases of gay subtext are queerbaiting."
fandom:hannibal, topic:queer
Marvel Cinematic Universe
Discussing Villains: dammit mcu (tumblr) - "When we’re discussing villains, anti-heroes, and/or a complicated character who has done bad things, but has an in-universe reason for doing them, you cannot take race out of it, okay? "
fandom:mcu, topic:race, topic:anti-hero, topic:villains
Ms. Marvel
Ms. Marvel: Deliciously Halal?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Ng Suat Tong (blog) - "In many ways Ms Marvel is a return to the more gentle pleasures of the comics of yore; dialing back the myth of a violent America propagated by TV shows like CSI, Criminal Minds, NCIS et al.-where murderous psychopaths reside on every corner and corpses are to be found on every other doorstep and school dormitory. "
fandom:marvelcomics, topic:religion
Orphan Black
Gender, Orphan Black & the Meta of Meta: fozmeadows (blog ) - "The reviewer noted that, although the protagonist, Sarah, is an unlikeable character, her grifter skills make her perfectly suited to unravelling the mystery in which she finds herself. ... I kept that quote in mind when we started watching, sort of by way of prewarning myself: you maybe won’t like Sarah, but that’s OK."
fandom:orphanblack, topic:character
Shameless
About Mickey’s Coming Out: Angela (tumblr) - "We need to stop acting like Terry is the biggest and only threat to Mickey and Ian. We need to acknowledge the homophobic and heterosexist environment that they live in and understand that whether statements and actions are meant to be a threat or not, they act as one."
fandom:shameless, topic:queer
Abuse and Crime: Angela (tumblr) - "One thing that I do appreciate too, on Shameless, is that the Milkovich family survives on crime and it isn’t portrayed in a glorified or romanticized manner."
fandom:shameless, topic:crime, topic:family
BBC Sherlock
Number 29 in BBC Sherlock and ACD canon and Numerology : obviously-my-division(tumblr) - "It is kind of an inside joke but pretty meaningful in a spooky way."
fandom:bbcsherlock, topic:numerology
Proof We’re Supposed to Read John as Suicidal : loudest-subtext-in-television(tumblr) - "Sometimes I get comments about my write-up of A Study in Pink saying it’s “reading too much” into the gun-or-laptop shot to say that John is suicidal."
fandom:bbcsherlock, warning:suicide
In series 1 they kept the subtext more subtle. It was harder to notice if you didn’t know what you were looking for, or you hadn’t been trained to see past the heteronormative lens.: loudest-subtext-in-television (tumblr) - "In series two the subtext was not so subtle anymore"
fandom:bbcsherlock, topic:sexuality
Spider-Man
Race + Spider-Man: Sony Confirms A Glass Ceiling For Miles Morales: Arturo R. García, Racialicious (blog) - "But the company should be concerned about the arrogance exhibited by executive producers Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach late last week, as they effectively rejecting the possibility of seeing a Spider-Man who is not cis-white het male Peter Parker inhabit Sony’s Spider-film realm."
fandom:spiderman, topic:race
Star Trek:TNG
an ineffable quality to memory: Raven (DW) - "I mean, spoilers, Trek isn’t very good on race! Most of the time - but what it is great at is ideas. And nothing mainstream, for me, has ever done anything like it on cultural assimilation."
fandom:startrek, topic:race
Supernatural
This is What You’re Gonna Become: amonitrate(tumblr) - "This is What You’re Gonna Become: season 9 as the culmination of Dean Winchester’s thematic roles of identity in SPN"
fandom:supernatural, topic:character
I will not set fire to myself to keep you warm: amonitrate(tumblr) - "I’m really uncomfortable with the idea that Sam needs to learn to acknowledge and appreciate “sacrifices” made for him that are rooted in child abuse"
fandom:supernatural, warning:childabuse, topic:character
If you have meta to submit or rec, please comment to this post or to the screened Submissions Post. If you'd like to give us blanket permission to link your meta please comment to the Blanket Permissions Post. If you have feedback or questions, check out our FAQ, Contact the Mods, or PM/email. If you'd like to volunteer to link-find or mod, please comment to the Volunteers Post.
Links
General Fandom
Gender-Swapping Characters: Does That Work?: Jennifer Crusie (blog) - "So you gender-switch, and that can produce a lot of great stories, but those stories are not like the originals because gender has a huge impact on character. You can do the Sensitive Guy and the Tough Girl, but they’re never going be exactly like the original Sensitive Girl and the Tough Guy that inspired them. Gender matters."
topic:writing, topic:genderswap
Magical Mondays: Alternate Realities are Hard: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Geek Girl (blog) - "These types of stories are extremely interesting and explore different concepts within the main narrative without necessarily destroying the original canon storyline.The problem is that many of these alternate realities are poorly done and don’t follow any sort of logic. So while alternate realities can be really creative, they are also really easy to screw up."
topic:alternaterealities
Oh, My Pop Culture Deities: Religious Diversity and Game of Thrones: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by stinekey (blog) - "There are plenty of things storytellers do to make a world convincing: use science or magic to explain (or enhance) strangeness, compose detailed descriptions of food or foreign landscapes, or even base it on our own. When most storytellers create worlds, unfortunately, they usually do a poor job of including any kind of religion."
topic:religion
Sexualized Saturdays: The Myth of Virgin Rape in Fanfiction: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by MadameAce (blog) - "Rape themes are in our musicals, our TV, our video games, and our books. In many ways, they’re treated as a joke and rarely are they ever presented in a realistic light. More often than not, rape is used for shock value. Of course none of us should be surprised that we find the same thing in fanfiction."
topic:fanfic, warning:rape
Questioning Masculinity in Geek Culture: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by brothadom (blog) - "Some time ago, a friend asked me a question: how do you define masculinity? I paused, as this wasn’t something I ever put much thought into, and then responded that I didn’t actually know."
topic:fandom, topic:gender
If Aggression Is the New Pink, Does That Mean We All Have to Hit Things?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Noah Berlatsky (blog) - "The lean in movement is empowerment feminism, and so (as Chris shows) is the enthusiasm for female superhero movies and the desire to see Hawkgirl bash in some baddie with her mace. America is really into power (we’re a superpower, after all) and so it’s not a surprise that empowerment feminism is generally speaking the most popular manifestation of feminism."
fandom:comics, topic:violence
Silence Is Not Synonymous With Uproar: A Response To John C. Wright: fozmeadows (blog) - "You cannot state, as your opening premise, that SFF fandom is being handicapped by silence and an unwillingness to speak out, and then support that premise by stating the exact polar opposite: that there has, in your own words, been vocal uproar."
topic:fandom, topic:race, topic:gender
A Brief History of Fandom: Slash Report by Rageprufrock & Mklutz (podcast) - "We're talking Zines, APAs, Usenet, BBS, LJ, the Pit, the Great Purge, and a million other things you'll have to look up on Fanlore afterwards. We even get Flourish to make the sound of a 14.4 dial up modem."
topic:fandom
Specific Fandoms
A Song of Ice and Fire
House Stark Family Tree Analysis : nobodysuspectsthebutterfly(tumblr) - "Via the newly revealed House Stark family tree, some analysis, commentary, and speculation:"
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
A-Viking We Will Go : justadram(tumblr) - "Today’s topic is the raiders of the Iron Islands, the ironborn, and their counterparts, the Vikings."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding
If I see you spewing hate about Shae, I am going to haunt your dreams.: boniferhasty(tumblr) - "First of all: let’s be clear that this makes no sense for her character."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Man that episode was actually good if not for that Theon and Asha scene. It seems like D&D is just determined to ruin every close sibling bond in the show.: samwinchester (tumblr) - "TLDR that scene did a shitty service to the Greyjoy siblings, but particularly undermined Asha Greyjoy as a character."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Does Catelyn Stark Really Love All Her Children?: dknc3(tumblr) - "I don’t have time to grab my Kindle and look up specific quotes about Catelyn’s love for all her children right now (of which there are MANY), but I feel compelled to give just a brief example of the evidence on how she not only loves, but intimately knows and appreciates the individuality of each of her babes."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
I was thinking about how one of the running themes in asoiaf is the futile search for vengeance.: lyannastarkk(tumblr) - "That somehow led to me thinking about Catelyn."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Several of the concepts employed in Oberyn’s characterization are deeply troubling not only from a bisexual visibility standpoint, but also from a racial one.: asoiafuniversity(tumblr) - "While PoC diversity on television is great, it becomes problematic when that diversity reinforces harmful stereotypes."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:race
Captain America
On Steve Rogers & his kindness: krusca (tumblr) - "There’s a Chris Evans quote in one of his interviews that really got to me, when he described Steve and Sam as wounded warriors who don’t bleed on other people."
fandom:mcu
Comics
How Censors Killed The Weird, Experimental, Progressive Golden Age Of Comics: Saladin Ahmed - BuzzFeed (blog) - "For a weird, wild, 15-year span beginning in the late 1930s, the comic book racks of America’s newsstands were bursting with four-color contradictions. Images of half-naked, subjugated women appeared side by side with comics featuring independent heroines, like Women Outlaws."
fandom:comics, topic:censorship
Doctor Who
The Changing Style of Doctor Who Part V: Exile: daniel-saunders (LJ) - "As well as replacing almost all the key figures before and behind the cameras in the space of a few stories, the start of season seven sees important changes in production methods. Most obviously, the programme was now made in colour, although, as we shall see, the ramifications of this were not always apparent."
fandom:doctorwho, topic:television
Game Of Thrones
To Hell With Your Realism: Overthinking It by Shana Mlawski(blog) - "Express even a modicum of distaste for the extra-rapiness of HBO’s Game of Thrones and you’ll inevitably hear this kind of comment: “But there was plenty of rape in the Middle Ages! It’s realistic! Deal with it!”"
fandom:asoiaf, fandom:gameofthrones, topic:race, warning:rape
Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: ACOK, Bran I: Race for the Iron Throne by stevenattewell (blog) - "On Tower of the Hand’s rankings of A Clash of Kings chapters, Bran’s storyline is one up from dead last, which I find interesting because I’d say his Clash of Kings material is a noted improvement from his plot in A Game of Thrones."
fandom:asoiaf, fandom:gameofthrones
Hannibal
No, 'Hannibal' isn't queerbaiting-that's just gay subtext: Gavia Baker-Whitelaw - Daily Dot (blog) - "Thanks to a growing awareness of LGBT representation (or lack thereof) on TV, more people are familiar with the concept of queerbaiting. However, not all cases of gay subtext are queerbaiting."
fandom:hannibal, topic:queer
Marvel Cinematic Universe
Discussing Villains: dammit mcu (tumblr) - "When we’re discussing villains, anti-heroes, and/or a complicated character who has done bad things, but has an in-universe reason for doing them, you cannot take race out of it, okay? "
fandom:mcu, topic:race, topic:anti-hero, topic:villains
Ms. Marvel
Ms. Marvel: Deliciously Halal?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Ng Suat Tong (blog) - "In many ways Ms Marvel is a return to the more gentle pleasures of the comics of yore; dialing back the myth of a violent America propagated by TV shows like CSI, Criminal Minds, NCIS et al.-where murderous psychopaths reside on every corner and corpses are to be found on every other doorstep and school dormitory. "
fandom:marvelcomics, topic:religion
Orphan Black
Gender, Orphan Black & the Meta of Meta: fozmeadows (blog ) - "The reviewer noted that, although the protagonist, Sarah, is an unlikeable character, her grifter skills make her perfectly suited to unravelling the mystery in which she finds herself. ... I kept that quote in mind when we started watching, sort of by way of prewarning myself: you maybe won’t like Sarah, but that’s OK."
fandom:orphanblack, topic:character
Shameless
About Mickey’s Coming Out: Angela (tumblr) - "We need to stop acting like Terry is the biggest and only threat to Mickey and Ian. We need to acknowledge the homophobic and heterosexist environment that they live in and understand that whether statements and actions are meant to be a threat or not, they act as one."
fandom:shameless, topic:queer
Abuse and Crime: Angela (tumblr) - "One thing that I do appreciate too, on Shameless, is that the Milkovich family survives on crime and it isn’t portrayed in a glorified or romanticized manner."
fandom:shameless, topic:crime, topic:family
BBC Sherlock
Number 29 in BBC Sherlock and ACD canon and Numerology : obviously-my-division(tumblr) - "It is kind of an inside joke but pretty meaningful in a spooky way."
fandom:bbcsherlock, topic:numerology
Proof We’re Supposed to Read John as Suicidal : loudest-subtext-in-television(tumblr) - "Sometimes I get comments about my write-up of A Study in Pink saying it’s “reading too much” into the gun-or-laptop shot to say that John is suicidal."
fandom:bbcsherlock, warning:suicide
In series 1 they kept the subtext more subtle. It was harder to notice if you didn’t know what you were looking for, or you hadn’t been trained to see past the heteronormative lens.: loudest-subtext-in-television (tumblr) - "In series two the subtext was not so subtle anymore"
fandom:bbcsherlock, topic:sexuality
Spider-Man
Race + Spider-Man: Sony Confirms A Glass Ceiling For Miles Morales: Arturo R. García, Racialicious (blog) - "But the company should be concerned about the arrogance exhibited by executive producers Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach late last week, as they effectively rejecting the possibility of seeing a Spider-Man who is not cis-white het male Peter Parker inhabit Sony’s Spider-film realm."
fandom:spiderman, topic:race
Star Trek:TNG
an ineffable quality to memory: Raven (DW) - "I mean, spoilers, Trek isn’t very good on race! Most of the time - but what it is great at is ideas. And nothing mainstream, for me, has ever done anything like it on cultural assimilation."
fandom:startrek, topic:race
Supernatural
This is What You’re Gonna Become: amonitrate(tumblr) - "This is What You’re Gonna Become: season 9 as the culmination of Dean Winchester’s thematic roles of identity in SPN"
fandom:supernatural, topic:character
I will not set fire to myself to keep you warm: amonitrate(tumblr) - "I’m really uncomfortable with the idea that Sam needs to learn to acknowledge and appreciate “sacrifices” made for him that are rooted in child abuse"
fandom:supernatural, warning:childabuse, topic:character