The origins of fanon!Eames (and fanon!Arthur too, come to think of it)
So I was watching Inception (again) because I wanted screencaps for a separate piece of meta on Arthur, and also because I wanted to compare my IRB fic's characterisations to canon. And as I was watching the scenes with Eames, I started wondering: where did fanon!Eames come from?I don't mean fanon!Eames v. 1.0 (illiterate, borderline dumb), but
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Yaaaaaay, more people coming into the discussion! :D Do not apologise for writing so much, I loved reading all of it. And, heh, we've all tangented out in this discussion on Eames (God I missed this about LJ). However, funnily enough, your entire third paragraph is probably the most on-topic of this whole discussion, and quite insightful to boot! I went to quote bits of it, and ended up trying to quote the whole paragraph, which is rather redundant. So instead I'll just say: let me lick your brain.
I can totally understand a lot of softening of Eames for the purposes of plot. And I don't exempt myself from this either - 'Retroactive Hitting' has a rather fluffy Eames, IMO. Eames as he is in 'Etymology', even though it's an AU built from a crack prompt, is closer to how I see him. To quote Tom Hardy, Eames is "a bit unscrupulous and off-the-radar ... parts of him you find questionable".
And I can see how an actor's personality/traits being conflated with the characters they play would lead to fanon characterisations. I can particularly see it with Tom Hardy. However, it doesn't seem to happen with JGL, unless people actually think dear Jiggles is cold and mean-spirited. lol, I kid, I kid, I do think you're onto something with the wish fulfillment aspect and the blending of actor/character.
You also make a really good point on how fanon characterisations evolve. People don't just transform the source material - they transform other people's fics, they incorporate meta discussions. And in doing so, they make that work their own. I love your analysis of how fanon!Barsad came about. My Barsad? Totally influenced by pagination's. Which is why I find it hilarious that she enjoys my Barsad, because without Pag's Barsad, he probably would've been a total non-entity in my fics.
Edit: I confused your post with another post and wrote a muddled reply to both. Gyah. Fixed now!
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I don't think that there's anything wrong with softening element of a character or showing a different side to them. The genre and nature of the story is always going to influence the portrayal of a character, people do behave differently in their homes than they do in public or their workplace.
The length and focus of a story will make a difference it's harder if you (general you) were writing a short story to fully sell your vision of the characters without like having whole chunks of basically telling people about it, which is not going to do anything good for the flow of your story. I like a long, action driven story so it can be easier for an author to sell me on their ideas because they can show not tell and it doesn't end up affecting the story flow.
In a lot of ways I guess a shared fanon perception is a useful short hand for authors to rely on, to let them tell the story they want without having to lay out all everything they feel about a character. Because there have been a number of military origin stories, people can just make a reference to A/E having met in the military and assume their reader will fill that backstory in a similar way to them. So they can get on with telling the story they want without having to go into more detail , unless they want to. And that can be handy, cause if the mood you are trying to evoke is say, a warm, cosy afternoon in a safe place then too much back story is going to blow the mood.
mmm. good point about JGL, people sometimes us his background for Arthur, but not his personality. I wonder why, it could be the odd couple archetype or that's the short hand for Arthur.
I love both your and Pag's Barsad, but that is a good example of how people spark ideas of off each other. I do love a grumpy put upon Barsad, I like really like Bait and switch for that.
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