An Unranty Rant
May. 31st, 2007 12:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sevendeadlyfunIn all the ballyhoo and wankery, I forgot I wanted to actually talk about something. Fic related, possibly kerfuffle related, but hopefully unrantish...
After doing some reading, here and there, hither and yon, so on and so forth, I found a few con/crit posts that made me do some thinking. Several of these were impassioned pleas or snarkfests, depending on the author, about many Buffy fandom writers making their characters extremely OOC. I know, I'm like a week and a half behind. Give me a little slack, please? I had to go out of town...
Anyways, what I want to know is who, beyond personal opinion, determines if, say, Xander is OOC? I know I have my own personal fic peeves, generally centered around American characters speaking The Queen's English. I lurrve my British authors/friends. I do. I heart them with all my shriveled Grinch-like heart, but Xander doesn't talk about his "Mum", retrieve his "jumper" from the "boot", or order "takeaway". He just doesn't. I read that and I get all confused and feverish and I have to lie down for awhile.
But, I got the sense that this was about more than grammar or word choice. Perhaps I'm wrong and everyone was in an uproar over an "okay" versus "M'kay" situation. But, it seems that there are certain readers/authors/lurkers/random squid out there who have invaded The Mind of Joss™ and know precisely what each character will do or say in a given situation. This isn't a "fandom police" rant, but a serious inquiry into why some fandom members are so determined that they "know" the characters.
Is it OOC for Buffy to act like a ditz or a hardened cynic? Is it OOC for Willow to be a scary control freak or shy but sweet friend? Is Giles permitted to be all Ripper all the time or is that OOC? Spike crying is apparently verboten, though he has indeed cried on the show. Hell, I have to wonder if there's anything that could be considered OOC for Spike, honestly. There's a character that changes directions seasonally.
I would have to say that yes, there are sometimes that I read a story where I perceive the characters are being less than genuinely portrayed. Some characters are difficult to capture. Drusilla is, I think, one of the hardest characters to do authentically. I won't say "right" because the only author that gets Drusilla "right" is Joss Whedon. In fact, he's really the only author to get any of the characters "right". But, that's besides the point and not what I'm talking about.
Is Human AU, no matter how well done, OOC? By definition, I suppose it would have to be as you can't get more OOC than Spike as a human teen-ager in Sunnydale. Well, barring a "we've all been taken over by a spell" plots and even that could go horribly wrong on you. I'm not sure I could do it, though now that I think on it, I intend to try just to see if it turns into a train wreck.
Isn't part of the joy of this show that the characters are multi-faceted and complex? So, sure I can see how only showing one or two sides of such complex characters could frustrate. But, they didn't become multi-faceted and complex in one episode. So, in a one-shot or ficlet or even in a multi-chaptered fic, how can you expect any author to show all sides of each and every character? It took Joss Whedon up to 12 seasons (7 for BtVS and 5 for AtS) to fully explore all these characters, and obviously he left a lot undone. If he hadn't, we wouldn't feel the need to write these "missing pieces".
In the end, this solves precisely nothing because I'm sitting here and hollering into the wind. People can and do get up on soapboxes and high horses about things. People can and do form definite opinions about what is "correct" and what isn't. I'll write what I write and if it seems OOC, well...in a sense, no matter how carefully you craft your story, yours is OOC too. Only Joss Whedon can write these characters "correctly" or "authentically" or "right". The rest of us are just poor substitutes...many of us talented, driven, and fabulous, but substitutes nonetheless...
After doing some reading, here and there, hither and yon, so on and so forth, I found a few con/crit posts that made me do some thinking. Several of these were impassioned pleas or snarkfests, depending on the author, about many Buffy fandom writers making their characters extremely OOC. I know, I'm like a week and a half behind. Give me a little slack, please? I had to go out of town...
Anyways, what I want to know is who, beyond personal opinion, determines if, say, Xander is OOC? I know I have my own personal fic peeves, generally centered around American characters speaking The Queen's English. I lurrve my British authors/friends. I do. I heart them with all my shriveled Grinch-like heart, but Xander doesn't talk about his "Mum", retrieve his "jumper" from the "boot", or order "takeaway". He just doesn't. I read that and I get all confused and feverish and I have to lie down for awhile.
But, I got the sense that this was about more than grammar or word choice. Perhaps I'm wrong and everyone was in an uproar over an "okay" versus "M'kay" situation. But, it seems that there are certain readers/authors/lurkers/random squid out there who have invaded The Mind of Joss™ and know precisely what each character will do or say in a given situation. This isn't a "fandom police" rant, but a serious inquiry into why some fandom members are so determined that they "know" the characters.
Is it OOC for Buffy to act like a ditz or a hardened cynic? Is it OOC for Willow to be a scary control freak or shy but sweet friend? Is Giles permitted to be all Ripper all the time or is that OOC? Spike crying is apparently verboten, though he has indeed cried on the show. Hell, I have to wonder if there's anything that could be considered OOC for Spike, honestly. There's a character that changes directions seasonally.
I would have to say that yes, there are sometimes that I read a story where I perceive the characters are being less than genuinely portrayed. Some characters are difficult to capture. Drusilla is, I think, one of the hardest characters to do authentically. I won't say "right" because the only author that gets Drusilla "right" is Joss Whedon. In fact, he's really the only author to get any of the characters "right". But, that's besides the point and not what I'm talking about.
Is Human AU, no matter how well done, OOC? By definition, I suppose it would have to be as you can't get more OOC than Spike as a human teen-ager in Sunnydale. Well, barring a "we've all been taken over by a spell" plots and even that could go horribly wrong on you. I'm not sure I could do it, though now that I think on it, I intend to try just to see if it turns into a train wreck.
Isn't part of the joy of this show that the characters are multi-faceted and complex? So, sure I can see how only showing one or two sides of such complex characters could frustrate. But, they didn't become multi-faceted and complex in one episode. So, in a one-shot or ficlet or even in a multi-chaptered fic, how can you expect any author to show all sides of each and every character? It took Joss Whedon up to 12 seasons (7 for BtVS and 5 for AtS) to fully explore all these characters, and obviously he left a lot undone. If he hadn't, we wouldn't feel the need to write these "missing pieces".
In the end, this solves precisely nothing because I'm sitting here and hollering into the wind. People can and do get up on soapboxes and high horses about things. People can and do form definite opinions about what is "correct" and what isn't. I'll write what I write and if it seems OOC, well...in a sense, no matter how carefully you craft your story, yours is OOC too. Only Joss Whedon can write these characters "correctly" or "authentically" or "right". The rest of us are just poor substitutes...many of us talented, driven, and fabulous, but substitutes nonetheless...
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no subject
on 2007-05-31 05:00 am (UTC)no subject
on 2007-05-31 05:39 pm (UTC)It won't do any good, but I felt better...
Also saying Amen
on 2007-05-31 05:33 am (UTC)Re: Also saying Amen
on 2007-05-31 05:39 pm (UTC)Re: Also saying Amen
on 2007-06-01 12:21 am (UTC)Re: Also saying Amen
on 2007-06-01 12:25 am (UTC)no subject
on 2007-05-31 05:47 am (UTC)no subject
on 2007-05-31 05:40 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2007-06-01 05:50 am (UTC)I absolutely couldn't have said it better myself. Why some people can't simply hit the "back" button and STOP READING when they don't like a piece of fic is beyond me.
no subject
on 2007-06-04 08:21 pm (UTC)I'm all for con/crit, I really am. But, just because you (in the general sense, not the specific) believe the author has written your favorite character OOC doesn't meant that it's so. Some of these people have, in my opinion, waaaay too much invested in this. It's fanfic about TV show, not world peace. Everyone calm down and enjoy the stories...or don't, as the case may be.
And wow, didn't mean to turn that into an ancillary rant...Sorry :)
no subject
on 2007-06-05 05:42 am (UTC)Precisely! Everybody take a step back, have a glass of wine, and remember that we're all here to share our love of this show, and enjoy ourselves.
didn't mean to turn that into an ancillary rant...Sorry
No problem, hun! Great minds think alike ;-)