30 Days of Fandom Meme: Days 7 and 8
Sep. 8th, 2011 02:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miramiraSorry for skipping yesterday; got a little distracted by Lev Grossman's The Magician King. (Also finally bought Dance with Dragons, but that's going to take longer to get through, and I promised I'd hold off on really delving in until the job search was going better.) I'll probably post a proper review in a bit, but I think I need to digest it a little first. Initial reaction: much like the first book, while I love several of the parts, they don't add up to a satisfying whole. Only this time, I have much more concrete reasons for finding the whole dissatisfying, and I really wish someone had warned me about one of them in particular.
In the meantime, onward with the meme!
7. Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
I think it's inevitable that exposure to fandom changes the way you look at certain characters. It's hard to single out particular fics, but one of the reasons![[insanejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/ij-community.gif)
hp_beholder is my favorite fest is that it specializes in taking characters who are easy to overlook or dismiss in canon and finding their hidden depths. Even Dolores Umbridge: while nobody's ever made her likable, you can see where there might possibly be recognizable if not downright relatable human impulses underneath the "hem hem"s and the red tape.
In terms of my attitude changing based on stuff I've written myself, I'm still not sure where I dredged up all the sympathy for Peter that came through in The Death of Rats, but I've never quite been able to get it to go away. Other than that, though, it's mostly served to solidify impressions that I already had.
8. Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
I'm not sure I like what this question seems to be implying. There are any number of reasons to use OCs that don't involve wish fulfillment or deus ex machina powers or the other destabilizing effects that a Mary Sue has on the story, and they're pretty much the exact same reasons that apply to any other character before deciding whether or not this is the best person for the story you're trying to tell. As I think I pointed out on Day 1, part of the advantage of writing fanfic is getting to explore parts of the world that are never fully developed in canon. You're bound to meet at least one or two new faces when you venture out there. Besides, it's not as though canonical existence automatically ensures that a writer won't get rid of all those pesky negative traits and limitations s/he doesn't like, or even that there's a template to follow. Harry Potter in particular is full of characters who might as well be OCs for all the detail the source material provides about them.
So, yes, I use OCs. Not too often, because there are all those underdeveloped names already floating out there, but I've never worried about whether someone else is going to have a problem with me creating someone like a supervisor for a department we've never seen before I do it. And even if I do something potentially Sue-ish like imply said supervisor is a lot older than he looks, I give him something else like a distinct lack of tact to make up for it.
*glances over last question* Wow, that came out more confrontational than I intended. Maybe I'm angrier about the book than I thought.
In the meantime, onward with the meme!
7. Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
I think it's inevitable that exposure to fandom changes the way you look at certain characters. It's hard to single out particular fics, but one of the reasons
hp_beholder is my favorite fest is that it specializes in taking characters who are easy to overlook or dismiss in canon and finding their hidden depths. Even Dolores Umbridge: while nobody's ever made her likable, you can see where there might possibly be recognizable if not downright relatable human impulses underneath the "hem hem"s and the red tape.In terms of my attitude changing based on stuff I've written myself, I'm still not sure where I dredged up all the sympathy for Peter that came through in The Death of Rats, but I've never quite been able to get it to go away. Other than that, though, it's mostly served to solidify impressions that I already had.
8. Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
I'm not sure I like what this question seems to be implying. There are any number of reasons to use OCs that don't involve wish fulfillment or deus ex machina powers or the other destabilizing effects that a Mary Sue has on the story, and they're pretty much the exact same reasons that apply to any other character before deciding whether or not this is the best person for the story you're trying to tell. As I think I pointed out on Day 1, part of the advantage of writing fanfic is getting to explore parts of the world that are never fully developed in canon. You're bound to meet at least one or two new faces when you venture out there. Besides, it's not as though canonical existence automatically ensures that a writer won't get rid of all those pesky negative traits and limitations s/he doesn't like, or even that there's a template to follow. Harry Potter in particular is full of characters who might as well be OCs for all the detail the source material provides about them.
So, yes, I use OCs. Not too often, because there are all those underdeveloped names already floating out there, but I've never worried about whether someone else is going to have a problem with me creating someone like a supervisor for a department we've never seen before I do it. And even if I do something potentially Sue-ish like imply said supervisor is a lot older than he looks, I give him something else like a distinct lack of tact to make up for it.
*glances over last question* Wow, that came out more confrontational than I intended. Maybe I'm angrier about the book than I thought.
