Meta Links 2014/05/15 - 2014/05/21
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.
General Fandom
Fandom As an Alternative to Expensive Magic: Eleanor Musgrove (blog) - "Wanderers, I’d like to talk about Disneyland. "
topic:fandom
Should Fandoms Have an Age Limit?: Roxanne Williams (blog) - "Or, perhaps a more fitting question - can you be too old to be a fan of something?"
topic:fandom
Franchises, Fandom and Protecting The Brand Message: fangirlblog.com by Fangirl (blog) - "In the two weeks since the Episode VII cast reveal, the topic of women in Star Wars hasn’t gone away. "
fandom:starwars, topic:gender
Magical Mondays: Ghosts in Geek Culture: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Saika(blog) - "Ghosts are a common feature in many speculative fiction stories, from Harry Potter to Supernatural to Saga and a million things in between. They can be scary, or silly, or solemn, but they tend to have one thing in common: ghosts cling to the mortal plane because of some sort of unfinished business in our realm."
topic:ghosts
Oh, My Pop Culture Witchcraft: When is a Witch Not a Wiccan? (Quite Often, It Turns Out): Lady Geek Girl and Friends by polyglotpisces (blog) - "Witches only finally started to reach some level of acceptance (still a work in progress, that’s for sure) largely thanks to the enormous expansion of the religion of Wicca in the past fifty years or so. This led to a curious occurrence: witches weren’t just in fairytales and fantasy books anymore, they were bookstore clerks and nurses and teachers too."
topic:witches
Sexualized Saturdays: Polyamory in the Media: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Geek Girl (blog) - " In Christianity, marriage is only seen as licit when it is between one man and one woman, so the idea of being with multiple people is seen as sinful. Now, obviously this wasn’t always the case."
topic:polyamory
Role Playing and Sexism: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Tsunderin (blog) - "First of all, Mary Sues are fantastic and should be protected at all costs. That aside, one of the largest problems to plague the role playing community, at least from a forum-based standpoint, is the manner in which male characters are held in higher respect than female characters."
topic:roleplaying, topic:gender
Nostalgia as a Driving Force: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by brothadom (blog) - "In recent years, nostalgia has been a driving force in the geek industry. Reboots, remakes, and old properties have dominated sales to a considerable degree. This is interesting, but a lot has already been said about why we feel nostalgia (and here, via Science Friday). I want to focus more on how this effect is important."
topic:nostalgia
Economics in Fantasy Literature, Or, Why Nerds Really Like Stuff: The Hooded Utilitarian by Sarah Shoker (blog) - "Pre-industrialization, by its very definition, eschews mass production and growth. Even in urban fantasy, the modes of production that sustain the magical world don’t usually involve factory processes. There are notable exceptions, of course, like Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series, but I think this description is a fair representation of the genre."
topic:economics, topic:fantasy
World’s Most Obvious Meta: Naraht (DW) - "Every once in a while I still - still! - have to remind myself that number of hits/kudos/comments very rarely correlates directly to the quality of a story"
topic:writing, topic:fandom, topic:feedback
Specific Fandoms
Agents of SHIELD
Everyone Hates Grant Ward: Strung Up By Your Own Bootstraps: Sam Keeper (blog) - "There's a fascinating contrast in episode 21 of Marvel's Agents of SHIELD between big bad John Garrett and big... good Agent Coulson that effectively conveys the basic messages of SHIELD and Hydra."
fandom:mcu
ACD Sherlock Holmes
Do you love Sherlock Holmes? Okay, which one? : Alistair Duncan (blog) - "Even if you don't care for the written Holmes you have to accept that an incarnation that drifts too far from him is merely a new character with the same name - a name which has effectively been hijacked in order to guarantee audience interest. "
fandom:acdsherlock
A Song of Ice and Fire
Feudalism in Westeros I: The Commoners : yuyurana (tumblr) - "So reading the Arya VIII chapter in ACoK made me think about the feudal system in Westeros and how is works."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding<
Feudalism in Westeros II: Lords and Kings : yuyurana(tumblr) - "As promised here is the second part of my post about feudalism in Westeros.
"
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding
Arya’s Mental Strength and Wits : donewithwoodenteeth(tumblr) - "A quick reminder that Arya’s journey of survival has been far more a test of the mind than a test of any sort of physical prowess and to deem her “brawny” and less challenged on a mental level is wrong."
fandom:asoiaf, topic: character
Cersei Lannister and Ann Boleyn: asprettyasyourown(tumblr) - "Recently, I’ve seen some metas linking Margaery Tyrell to Anne Boleyn. While the similarities are undeniable (though Margaery isn’t a clone of Anne, they do have differences), I found some of them could also be applied to another character. Who ? Well, Cersei Lannister."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Book!Shae vs Show!Shae : nososilentsister (tumblr) - "Book!Shae was a fairly single-minded, materialistic character who only ever saw Tyrion as her ticket to high society and was never particularly subtle about it."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Sansa Stark and Lady Ashford: parallels : how-much-farther-to-go(tumblr) - "There is a strange and exact parallel between Lady Ashford’s champions at the Tourney of Ashford and the various men to whom Sansa is betrothed, or planning to marry."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Batman
The Dark Knight Confounds: Why is Frank Miller’s Batman so alienating?: Overthinking It by Richard Rosenbaum (blog) - "While Year One and The Dark Knight Returns are nearly universally loved and praised, All-Star Batman & Robin and The Dark Knight Strikes Again are almost universally reviled and are even offered as evidence that Frank Miller has himself lost his mind."
fandom:dccomics
Captain America
Untitled: septembriseur (tumblr) - "I feel like one thing that’s been under-discussed in Cap 2 meta ... is the privilege of Alexander Pierce, a privilege that is very deliberately communicated onscreen."
fandom:mcu
Fantastic Four
Is Tong Transgender?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Roy T. Cook (blog) - "While struggling to figure out how to defeat Dr. Doom, save the world, etc., Tong discovers that she is, in fact, a girl. After donning a dress, she makes this announcement to her ‘brother’s’ (explanation for scare quotes below), and throughout the rest of the series she is identified as female."
fandom:marvelcomics, topic:transgender
Fledgling
Free Will and Wanton Lust: The Hooded Utilitarian by Isaac Butler (blog) - "Octavia E. Butler’s Fledgling is two books in one. Like a pre-fab house with the world’s most fascinating basement, everything above ground feels thin and standard issue, but lurking beneath is a troubling look at slavery from the point of view of a sympathetic slave master, who never quite realizes what she is."
fandom:octaviabutler
Leverage
Leverage Sunday: The Inside Job: Integrating Back Story: Jennifer Crusie (blog) - "One of the drawbacks to writing a community story is that there are so many people that the focus gets diffused: everybody gets a little bit of time but nobody gets real development. Leverage worked around this by emphasizing different characters in their episodes so that by the end of the series, all five had achieved significant character growth. "
fandom:leverage, topic:characterization
Sherlock BBC
Q: What is your take on the portrayal of PTSD in the show? J: loudest-subtest-in-television (tumblr) - "All I can say, based on what I’ve watched and read, is that the idea that civilian life feels meaningless once you’ve been in life or death situations, and the idea that some vets crave the camaraderie they once had,is actually one manifestation of PTSD.
"
fandom:BBCsherlock, warning:ptsd
Supernatural
Why fans have high hopes (but low expectations) for 'Supernatural': Aja Romano - Daily Dot (blog) - "During this season of Supernatural, the weary travels of Team Free Will resembled nothing so much as True Detective: Time was a very flat circle."
fandom:supernatural
okay also really emotional about how the last few episodes dean’s tied his well-being and functionality to his ability to do his job.: veneredirimmel (tumblr) - " the underlying trauma is what i’m interested in addressing if this storyline continues,
"
fandom:supernatural
This is What You’re Gonna Become 7 : amonitrate (tumblr) - "This is What You’re Gonna Become: season 9 as the culmination of Dean Winchester’s thematic roles of identity in SPN"
warning:sexualassault, warning:abuse, warning:ptsd, warning:incest, fandom:supernatural
This Is What You’re Gonna Become 6 : 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, warning:abuse
Teen Wolf
De-pigeonholing Derek Hale: InsaneOrange(AO3) - "Evolution of Derek Hale as a character."
fandom:teenwolf, topic:character
Oh, What a Difference Half a Season Makes: Katherine Keller (blog) - "Season 3b of Teen Wolf had everything that 3a lacked: a coherent storyline, excellent plotting and pacing, well-thought-out incorporation of culturally sensitive material, and more consistent characterization. "
fandom:teenwolf
The Good Wife
All the ways Kalinda’s storyline could have been improved if they had focused on her relationship with Will in season 5: gretamaya (tumblr) - "When Will and Kalinda decided to team up and go after everyone after Alicia and Cary left, I was excited because I thought we’d get some focus on an interesting relationship. Instead, the writers did nothing with it until 5x15, which was a huge waste in potential."
fandom:thegoodwife
World of Warcraft
Why I think the character of Prince Wrathion from World of Warcraft could be considered Autistic, and what that would mean for his story: OtterMcKilbourne (AO3) - "Many of the typical symptoms of autism are seen in Wrathion’s emotional and physical responses to the world around him, as well as hisown self-initiated behaviour."
fandom:warcraft
X-Men
Touch and the X-Adolescent: The Hooded Utilitarian by Jones, one of the Jones boys (blog) - "The X-Men were, by my count, the third group of heroes Jack Kirby created or co-created that all wore the same costume - first the Challengers of the Unknown in 1958, then the Fantastic Four in 1961, and the X-Men in 1963. It’s an interesting design decision, and it tends to occur only in groups that are created (as it were) whole cloth."
fandom:marvelcomics
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.
General Fandom
Fandom As an Alternative to Expensive Magic: Eleanor Musgrove (blog) - "Wanderers, I’d like to talk about Disneyland. "
topic:fandom
Should Fandoms Have an Age Limit?: Roxanne Williams (blog) - "Or, perhaps a more fitting question - can you be too old to be a fan of something?"
topic:fandom
Franchises, Fandom and Protecting The Brand Message: fangirlblog.com by Fangirl (blog) - "In the two weeks since the Episode VII cast reveal, the topic of women in Star Wars hasn’t gone away. "
fandom:starwars, topic:gender
Magical Mondays: Ghosts in Geek Culture: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Saika(blog) - "Ghosts are a common feature in many speculative fiction stories, from Harry Potter to Supernatural to Saga and a million things in between. They can be scary, or silly, or solemn, but they tend to have one thing in common: ghosts cling to the mortal plane because of some sort of unfinished business in our realm."
topic:ghosts
Oh, My Pop Culture Witchcraft: When is a Witch Not a Wiccan? (Quite Often, It Turns Out): Lady Geek Girl and Friends by polyglotpisces (blog) - "Witches only finally started to reach some level of acceptance (still a work in progress, that’s for sure) largely thanks to the enormous expansion of the religion of Wicca in the past fifty years or so. This led to a curious occurrence: witches weren’t just in fairytales and fantasy books anymore, they were bookstore clerks and nurses and teachers too."
topic:witches
Sexualized Saturdays: Polyamory in the Media: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Lady Geek Girl (blog) - " In Christianity, marriage is only seen as licit when it is between one man and one woman, so the idea of being with multiple people is seen as sinful. Now, obviously this wasn’t always the case."
topic:polyamory
Role Playing and Sexism: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by Tsunderin (blog) - "First of all, Mary Sues are fantastic and should be protected at all costs. That aside, one of the largest problems to plague the role playing community, at least from a forum-based standpoint, is the manner in which male characters are held in higher respect than female characters."
topic:roleplaying, topic:gender
Nostalgia as a Driving Force: Lady Geek Girl and Friends by brothadom (blog) - "In recent years, nostalgia has been a driving force in the geek industry. Reboots, remakes, and old properties have dominated sales to a considerable degree. This is interesting, but a lot has already been said about why we feel nostalgia (and here, via Science Friday). I want to focus more on how this effect is important."
topic:nostalgia
Economics in Fantasy Literature, Or, Why Nerds Really Like Stuff: The Hooded Utilitarian by Sarah Shoker (blog) - "Pre-industrialization, by its very definition, eschews mass production and growth. Even in urban fantasy, the modes of production that sustain the magical world don’t usually involve factory processes. There are notable exceptions, of course, like Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series, but I think this description is a fair representation of the genre."
topic:economics, topic:fantasy
World’s Most Obvious Meta: Naraht (DW) - "Every once in a while I still - still! - have to remind myself that number of hits/kudos/comments very rarely correlates directly to the quality of a story"
topic:writing, topic:fandom, topic:feedback
Specific Fandoms
Agents of SHIELD
Everyone Hates Grant Ward: Strung Up By Your Own Bootstraps: Sam Keeper (blog) - "There's a fascinating contrast in episode 21 of Marvel's Agents of SHIELD between big bad John Garrett and big... good Agent Coulson that effectively conveys the basic messages of SHIELD and Hydra."
fandom:mcu
ACD Sherlock Holmes
Do you love Sherlock Holmes? Okay, which one? : Alistair Duncan (blog) - "Even if you don't care for the written Holmes you have to accept that an incarnation that drifts too far from him is merely a new character with the same name - a name which has effectively been hijacked in order to guarantee audience interest. "
fandom:acdsherlock
A Song of Ice and Fire
Feudalism in Westeros I: The Commoners : yuyurana (tumblr) - "So reading the Arya VIII chapter in ACoK made me think about the feudal system in Westeros and how is works."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding<
Feudalism in Westeros II: Lords and Kings : yuyurana(tumblr) - "As promised here is the second part of my post about feudalism in Westeros.
"
fandom:asoiaf, topic:worldbuilding
Arya’s Mental Strength and Wits : donewithwoodenteeth(tumblr) - "A quick reminder that Arya’s journey of survival has been far more a test of the mind than a test of any sort of physical prowess and to deem her “brawny” and less challenged on a mental level is wrong."
fandom:asoiaf, topic: character
Cersei Lannister and Ann Boleyn: asprettyasyourown(tumblr) - "Recently, I’ve seen some metas linking Margaery Tyrell to Anne Boleyn. While the similarities are undeniable (though Margaery isn’t a clone of Anne, they do have differences), I found some of them could also be applied to another character. Who ? Well, Cersei Lannister."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Book!Shae vs Show!Shae : nososilentsister (tumblr) - "Book!Shae was a fairly single-minded, materialistic character who only ever saw Tyrion as her ticket to high society and was never particularly subtle about it."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Sansa Stark and Lady Ashford: parallels : how-much-farther-to-go(tumblr) - "There is a strange and exact parallel between Lady Ashford’s champions at the Tourney of Ashford and the various men to whom Sansa is betrothed, or planning to marry."
fandom:asoiaf, topic:character
Batman
The Dark Knight Confounds: Why is Frank Miller’s Batman so alienating?: Overthinking It by Richard Rosenbaum (blog) - "While Year One and The Dark Knight Returns are nearly universally loved and praised, All-Star Batman & Robin and The Dark Knight Strikes Again are almost universally reviled and are even offered as evidence that Frank Miller has himself lost his mind."
fandom:dccomics
Captain America
Untitled: septembriseur (tumblr) - "I feel like one thing that’s been under-discussed in Cap 2 meta ... is the privilege of Alexander Pierce, a privilege that is very deliberately communicated onscreen."
fandom:mcu
Fantastic Four
Is Tong Transgender?: The Hooded Utilitarian by Roy T. Cook (blog) - "While struggling to figure out how to defeat Dr. Doom, save the world, etc., Tong discovers that she is, in fact, a girl. After donning a dress, she makes this announcement to her ‘brother’s’ (explanation for scare quotes below), and throughout the rest of the series she is identified as female."
fandom:marvelcomics, topic:transgender
Fledgling
Free Will and Wanton Lust: The Hooded Utilitarian by Isaac Butler (blog) - "Octavia E. Butler’s Fledgling is two books in one. Like a pre-fab house with the world’s most fascinating basement, everything above ground feels thin and standard issue, but lurking beneath is a troubling look at slavery from the point of view of a sympathetic slave master, who never quite realizes what she is."
fandom:octaviabutler
Leverage
Leverage Sunday: The Inside Job: Integrating Back Story: Jennifer Crusie (blog) - "One of the drawbacks to writing a community story is that there are so many people that the focus gets diffused: everybody gets a little bit of time but nobody gets real development. Leverage worked around this by emphasizing different characters in their episodes so that by the end of the series, all five had achieved significant character growth. "
fandom:leverage, topic:characterization
Sherlock BBC
Q: What is your take on the portrayal of PTSD in the show? J: loudest-subtest-in-television (tumblr) - "All I can say, based on what I’ve watched and read, is that the idea that civilian life feels meaningless once you’ve been in life or death situations, and the idea that some vets crave the camaraderie they once had,is actually one manifestation of PTSD.
"
fandom:BBCsherlock, warning:ptsd
Supernatural
Why fans have high hopes (but low expectations) for 'Supernatural': Aja Romano - Daily Dot (blog) - "During this season of Supernatural, the weary travels of Team Free Will resembled nothing so much as True Detective: Time was a very flat circle."
fandom:supernatural
okay also really emotional about how the last few episodes dean’s tied his well-being and functionality to his ability to do his job.: veneredirimmel (tumblr) - " the underlying trauma is what i’m interested in addressing if this storyline continues,
"
fandom:supernatural
This is What You’re Gonna Become 7 : amonitrate (tumblr) - "This is What You’re Gonna Become: season 9 as the culmination of Dean Winchester’s thematic roles of identity in SPN"
warning:sexualassault, warning:abuse, warning:ptsd, warning:incest, fandom:supernatural
This Is What You’re Gonna Become 6 : 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, warning:abuse
Teen Wolf
De-pigeonholing Derek Hale: InsaneOrange(AO3) - "Evolution of Derek Hale as a character."
fandom:teenwolf, topic:character
Oh, What a Difference Half a Season Makes: Katherine Keller (blog) - "Season 3b of Teen Wolf had everything that 3a lacked: a coherent storyline, excellent plotting and pacing, well-thought-out incorporation of culturally sensitive material, and more consistent characterization. "
fandom:teenwolf
The Good Wife
All the ways Kalinda’s storyline could have been improved if they had focused on her relationship with Will in season 5: gretamaya (tumblr) - "When Will and Kalinda decided to team up and go after everyone after Alicia and Cary left, I was excited because I thought we’d get some focus on an interesting relationship. Instead, the writers did nothing with it until 5x15, which was a huge waste in potential."
fandom:thegoodwife
World of Warcraft
Why I think the character of Prince Wrathion from World of Warcraft could be considered Autistic, and what that would mean for his story: OtterMcKilbourne (AO3) - "Many of the typical symptoms of autism are seen in Wrathion’s emotional and physical responses to the world around him, as well as hisown self-initiated behaviour."
fandom:warcraft
X-Men
Touch and the X-Adolescent: The Hooded Utilitarian by Jones, one of the Jones boys (blog) - "The X-Men were, by my count, the third group of heroes Jack Kirby created or co-created that all wore the same costume - first the Challengers of the Unknown in 1958, then the Fantastic Four in 1961, and the X-Men in 1963. It’s an interesting design decision, and it tends to occur only in groups that are created (as it were) whole cloth."
fandom:marvelcomics