The Losers fandom in podfic
I like long stories, probably a leftover from childhood when I could never find enough to read, and I see a long podfic as the equivalent of an enthusiastic fic recomendation. A reader has to really love a story to be willing to spend that much time with it. So when I saw Seussian's nine hour reading of Pistol's story, "We Know How It Works (The World is No Longer Mysterious)" I decided to check it out even though I'd never seen the movie or read the comics. I ended up falling in love with the story and then had to watch the film and read the comics and listen to all the other podfic I could. All within about 96 hours. (Yes, I can get obsessive, why do you ask?)
In case any of my readers share my initial state of ignorance, here is a very brief introduction to the characters and situation, complete with pictures because I love them. Just skip to the next paragraph if this is familiar ground.
Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Clay leads a special forces unit, 'The Losers,' attached to the CIA as part of the war on terror. His unit includes Captain William Roque, second in command and knife afficiando; Captain (comics) or Corporal (movie) Jake Jensen, talkative tech expert who prefers to hack in boxers and a pirate hat;
[Responding to Clay asking if he's hacking in his undies again, Jensen: "Undies? Me? No way, Jose! I'm wearing a hat!] Sergeant Carlos 'Cougar' Alvarez, laconic sniper and woman magnet; and Sergeant Linwood 'Pooch' Porteus, transport specialist and devoted husband and father. Sent in to destroy an enemy stronghold, the Losers try to save a group of children caught in the crossfire by giving them their seats on the evacuating helicopter. The helicopter is shot down, apparently to kill the Losers, and the children all die in the explosion.
[Cougar makes an offering for the lost children during the Mexican Day of the Dead.] The Losers are blamed for the incident and declared dead. Their only clue is the mysterious Max, the CIA agent who directed the mission. Clay leads them in an effort to find Max to gain their revenge and regain their lives. Aisha al-Fadhil is the beautiful, mysterious, and violent woman who offers to help the Losers and becomes Clay's lover.
[Aisha tells a would-be attacker: "I was born in a desert place. War was my only mother. As a child, I moved through the battlefield and slit the throats of screaming Russian boys. I firebombed my first tank when I was twelve years old and machine-gunned the crew as they fled, burning. And yet perhaps you expect me to be afraid of you. Tell me, what do you think?" I like Zoe Saldana but Aisha makes a lot more sense in the comics.] Most of the fanfic seems to be based on the movie which, despite its flaws, had a great cast including Chris Evans, Zoe Saldana, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan. You can find the complete 32 issue run of the comic collected in two paperback volumes or on Comixology.com if you prefer electronic formats. It's an interesting read built around an intense, maybe paranoid, critique of covert operations and agencies like the CIA -- and lots of violence, brotherly bonding, and betrayal. A lot of the movie's best lines came directly from the comics. It's also much more brutal, showing the blood left out of the movie version, and has a less happy ending.
The following are my recommendations of Loser podfic based on my recent orgy of listening. You'll notice that the list is skewed toward long stories (due to my preference) and Cougar/Jensen which seems to be the dominant fan pairing. One other detail: Cougar frequently speaks in Spanish. Both the comic and the movie leave the monolinguist to surmise the meaning from context and the podfics generally do the same.
My fall into obsession began with Seussian's podfics of Pistol's series: Team Dynamics, Family, and Other Things That Will Hurt You. The series takes place before the movie (or comics) begin. The first story, We Aspire to Be Reasonably Sane People, is a prequel, setting up Jake Jensen's background and character. Jake's a smart kid who tries so hard but just can't understand people. His painful isolation in the first story makes it all the more rewarding when he builds connections with the Losers in We Know How It Works (The World Is No Longer Mysterious). The central pairing is Cougar/Jensen but it's even more about the team becoming a family. Pistol also has one of the best ever portrayals of those few canonical (non-Aisha) female characters: Pooch's wife Jolene and Jensen's unnamed sister and niece. There's also a lot of humor along with all the emotions. Seussian's reading is understated but engaging, conveying the characters' emotions to the listener.
Niko's reading of stormy_petrel's reading of The Dashboard Melted (But We Still Have the Radio) is a lot of fun. The story is told from Jensen's point of view and she does a great job with his whimsy and humor. The story summary reads: "In 2009, Jensen got a new team, fell stupid in love, and learned about sharks, the great organizing principle of the universe and crushing chest injuries. Not necessarily in that order."
The First Eight Don't Count by Storm_Petrel is built off of Jensen's observation, "cats... not to be trusted." (Katemonkey does a great job of merging the clip into her reading.) The story asks the question how do tell your unit that "every full moon, or when I’m pissed, shit-scared or otherwise emotionally compromised, I turn into a common black house cat." It's an amusing listen with an elegant cover.
In Pollyrepeat's Mission: Dinosaurs Adventures, Lex Murphy (the little girl from Jurassic Park grown up) asks fellow hacker Jensen and his team to retrieve her brother Tim from the dinosaur island where he is pursuing his research. Despite the rampaging dinosaurs and sleeping in trees, Jensen is distracted by his sudden inability to read Cougar's facial expressions. I'm not sure if this counts as crack but it's a lot of fun.