fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2706 ]

[ SECRET POST #2706 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2706 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 079 secrets from Secret Submission Post #387.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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That's some great, in-depth analysis, I really enjoyed reading it.

To make it concise, I have three points:

1) I honestly still don't know whether it's just me wishing for it to be so because I really became invested in these characters, but I still don't consider the Final Descent the only realistic route. Yeah, Will Henry does fall off the precipice so to speak once he kills those two men before Socotra (and cannot bring himself to tell Warthrop), but that still doesn't mean there wasn't a way back for him. Because though the message of the books is, as you said, that the worst monsters are men, there is also the thread of love being the monster and I feel like there was still potential there for Will and Warthrop to save themselves.

In my opinion Yancey took the most pessimistic way and did a formidable job in showing the worst side of the characters while still keeping them in-character in The Final Descent. I'm not saying that's wrong, but still there were moments that I found jarring compared to their characterization before. Will Henry is just downright hostile throughout most of the book and Warthrop also behaves worse than ever before (which is saying something), lying to Will for no reason, etc.

2) I found the parallel between Will and Kearns (the tipota part) to be a bit too heavy-handed. Because Kearns is a psychopath without conscience or feelings, but Will Henry never becomes that. Yeah, he develops sociopathic tendencies due to the circumstances he's in, but damn, does he still have feelings; he never fully turns into a mini-Kearns.

And I noticed that as well - that Will Henry writes all of the books after Warthrop is dead, so the deviation of The Final Descent doesn't actually make much sense to me.

3)So did you like the portrayal of Conan Doyle? I personally thought it was really awkward. The whole asylum scene was ridiculous, but at least it was funny, but then those insinuations Warthrop is inspiration for Sherlock Holmes, dun dun dun, well, I didn't care for them, again, too heavy-handed.

And there is a number of references to other works, I caught the ones to Moby Dick which I had just freshly read for school. Yancey is unashamedly derivative while still being potently original and I like that.

and last point 4) Hey, I also had a damaging relationship with a parent, so it figures why I'm really drawn to this sort of dynamic :)

Aww, thanks! I'm glad you like it. I was afraid I was rambling by the end of the thing, since I'm still not in the best shape for writing literary analyses (but I simply had to do this one).

1) Mmm I'm not sure. In favour of your hypothesis, though, there are the facts that the doctor never physically assaulted his charge and that prior to TFD, Will Henry doesn't seem to have a single moment when he'd be inclined to harm Warthrop - which in my experience speaks of a relationship that has the potential to be healthier and more stable. The destructive tendencies are still absent after Socotra, which is remarkable. It is only in TFD that violent fantasies/neglect start to appear.

And it is true that WH never became the second Kearns - I mean, as I mentioned, he seems to be writing the fist folios long after TFD. And they sound like the story of someone who still feels love and grief and empathy and other human emotions. Plus, the ending of TFD shows clearly that he never quite succeeded in becoming indifferent towards Warthrop.

The three big problems seem to be a) WH's lack of enthusiasm about monstrumology, which contributes constantly to his destruction, b) Warthrop's being emotionally manipulative (abusive, really, if we are talking strict definitions), and c) the necessity to kill a kajillion people. I guess Yancey specifically thought that WH would never get over the last-named, which I do sort of disagree with him about. He could go back after Socotra. In fact, he's shown to still be the Will Henry we know (if with more issues than ever), and his rapid descent into Kearns-ish insanity is a bit nonplussing.

So I'm thinking now you may be right. Yancey is too much of a classic moralist to give them a chance. American literature and all that. His permitting WH to recover would screw the whole message up, which he couldn't do, but this doesn't mean it wouldn't be realistic.

2) >And I noticed that as well - that Will Henry writes all of the books after Warthrop is dead, so the deviation of The Final Descent doesn't actually make much sense to me.

Yeahh precisely. I suppose Yancey's point was that WH, too, wanted to convey the main message of the series, but the first folios never struck me as something that could be written by TFD!Will Henry. Which makes me hopeful, if this term is at all applicable, at least in regards to the final version of Will Henry and his attitude towards Warthrop. And Yancey says it himself - "she hated him and loved him, longed for him and loathed him... and cursed herself for feeling anything at all".

HEY, I HAVE A THEORY. Maybe Will Henry exaggerated The Final Descent in order to teach everyone a lesson? In order to make his story make sense? Maybe he wanted everyone to believe he hated Warthrop's guts (in fact, we know he did!) so that others would be saved from a fate similar to his and would not have to wrestle with their demons? :D THIS MAKES SENSE WOW

3) I thought it was hilariously awkward and I was chagrined that Yancey thought it necessary to take the title of the SH prototype away from Bell (really? You just take this brilliant guy and replace him with your Warthropian nonsense? And if you labour under the illusion that Warthrop resembles the classic Sherlock Holmes, you are horribly wrong and you should reread the Canon >.<), but I lol'd so much that I forgave him for it. This Conan Doyle joke is so terrible it's amazing. And so amazing it's terrible.

The Rimbaud cameo was less irritating and more humane - possibly because I'm no Rimbaud specialist.

So I'm thinking now you may be right. Yancey is too much of a classic moralist to give them a chance. American literature and all that. His permitting WH to recover would screw the whole message up, which he couldn't do, but this doesn't mean it wouldn't be realistic.

Yeah, and it would also screw up the poetic message of Warthrop basically turning into his own father.

The scenes between Will and Warthrop in TFD lack all the warmth that was sometimes there in the previous books and it's all about manipulation, misunderstanding and hostility ... so yeah, let's agree that part of it is exaggerated because of Will Henry growing up and rebelling against authority and also by his later self who writes the books in order to get across a moral message ;)

(And personally, I also labored under the delusion that Warthrop is a similar character to Sherlock Holmes, like ... the emphasis on rationality? No? ;)

Truuue. But I'm debating the hell out of it with myself and cannot come to any kind of conclusion. Is it actually plausible that their relationship would get healthier after all the shit they'd gone through? I'll have to think about it. It is certainly a possibility that WH would not become Kearns-ish, but as to his relationship with Warthrop, I'm not entirely convinced. What would it be like, the healthier version of the Warthrop&Will Henry dynamic?

I'm torn. IDK. ~~Could you maybe try to convince me so that I would have hope?~~

>(And personally, I also labored under the delusion that Warthrop is a similar character to Sherlock Holmes, like ... the emphasis on rationality? No? ;)

PXW does resemble Holmes in certain regards. The emphasis on rationality, his mysterious dark moods, his appearance, his love for his work. But his personality is more like the common misconception of what Holmes is like than like the actual character. I confess this misconception - a socially awkward narcissistic guy with issues in the empathy department - may be just as much of my pet peeve as the Nigel Bruce/Mary Russell Watson figure. (And don't even get me started on that, this reading of Watson's personality makes me froth at the mouth).

In the canon, Holmes is brilliant at understanding other people and communicating with them (cue The Veiled Lodger; The Hound&Laura Lyons; The Three Students; etc). He's anything but "flummoxed by normal conversation". He's polite (oh snap!), apologizes to others for fucking things up, tries to avoid intentionally endangering people for the sake of anything other than other people's lives (the only notable exception is Sir Henry Baskerville, in whose case SH hardly had any choice). And in contrast to the Warthropian toxic self-doubt/self-loathing, he assesses his experiences, acknowledges his mistakes, and moves on.

It's not that I'm comparing them to decide in someone's favour. I love them both and they both are good characters, each in his own way. I just wish people stopped thinking that the ACD version of Holmes is basically like Warthrop.

- And on a somewhat unrelated note, I like the style Yancey got when he crossed Gothic with realistic moralist. I think these books sound a bit like they are on drugs, because the contrast between the gore (and especially the lengthy descriptions of its morbid beauty) and the -normal- life is so staggering. The resulting text is pretty theatrical. With a fairy tale flavour, even - deliberately and somewhat crudely exaggerated (and I mean this in strictly stylistic terms).

In the canon, Holmes is brilliant at understanding other people and communicating with them (cue The Veiled Lodger; The Hound&Laura Lyons; The Three Students; etc). He's anything but "flummoxed by normal conversation". He's polite (oh snap!), apologizes to others for fucking things up, tries to avoid intentionally endangering people for the sake of anything other than other people's lives (the only notable exception is Sir Henry Baskerville, in whose case SH hardly had any choice). And in contrast to the Warthropian toxic self-doubt/self-loathing, he assesses his experiences, acknowledges his mistakes, and moves on.

Haha, yes, I'm glad you wrote that, this is something that I suspected (I read a couple of the original ACD stories a long while back, so my view of these characters has since become skewed by the various popular interpretations). And it's also probably the reason I instictively hate BBC Sherlock ... I've ranted about this on F!S before, but nothing riles me more than hearing the "highly functioning sociopath" phrase. It's just so infinitely stupid, there's nothing admirable or enviable about lacking any complex emotion and a sociopath wouldn't care about helping people by solving crimes, duh.

Well, I don't know what a healthier relationship between Will and Warthrop would look like, but I can tell you that even after reading Isle, I was convinced that it was heading in that direction. There's a two-year gap between Isle and TFD and I wish Yancey didn't have to skip it due to the series being cancelled and all because it would've been interesting to see the immediate aftermath of what happens in Isle rather than skip into the future to see these characters firmly set out on a path to destruction.

But even in TFD there are glimpses of a reconciliation between them, except they are not written out explicitly as the text prefers to focus on the more negative aspects. I'm gonna be lazy here and post a link to tumblr because I've posted about one such moment before.

I do think that the BBC Sherlock flaunts the "sociopath" label in order to convince others that he doesn't experience complex emotions, but... yes. This series certainly has bugger all to do with the ACD Holmes, who is a waaay better (and more interesting, may I add) person than Sherlock. Plus, its plots are ludicrous nonsense of an astounding degree.

TBH I never thought there would be a happy ending. My working hypothesis during Isle was that Warthrop would get himself killed or that he'd go mad/turn into a monster (physically, that is). That would explain a lot about WH's being epically hung up on his love-hate for Warthrop and the man himself.

I just thought that the dealbreaker for me would be the source of the affection Will Henry displays towards the doctor - whether it is born of pure codependency more than anything else, or whether the healthier factors (i.e. the normal human mechanism of emotional bonding) prevail. Right now I'm trying to compare The Monstrumologist to Purple Hibiscus (which is a novel with a textbook depiction of a child-guardian relationship that is codependency first and everything else second), and I find the odds are in favour of the healthier factors. Because even as a child WH seems to manifest considerable emotional awareness that isn't really compatible with his being completely unable to understand his own feelings for PXW; because, in part, of the point you made in regards to TFD, where he is more or less an adult and still chooses to go back even despite his not being childishly enamoured with his mentor; and because the warmth of the friendship he describes isn't anything like the "affection" between the protagonist of Purple Hibiscus and her guardian (or any similar dynamics, for that matter).

I guess I'd vote for Warthrop unintentionally screwing up their chances of a more normal life. The changes in Will Henry that took place after Socotra scared him, and I think he, having the world's worst social skills, simply failed to do the necessary things to try and bring WH back. Which led to more estrangement on Will Henry's part and consequently to his becoming royally fucked in the head. Warthrop promised to never leave and to try and prevent WH from "drowning", and he tried, but he didn't understand the kind of attention and warmth WH would need.

Which must also have contributed to WH's exaggeration of the events, because he must've been extraordinarily bitter about this estrangement.

Actually, yes, I'm going to go ahead and headcanon TFD as being an epic exaggeration. And WH and the doctor totally had a heartfelt conversation before the doctor died, complete with crying and cursing and all that :')

I'm kind of satisfied there are two valid interpretations of the events. Maybe I should write a huge fix-it thing.

But either way, we can safely say that TFD!Will Henry wasn't actually a Kearns figure and that the book can be considered WH's attempt at scaring people away from the kind of life he led. Partially, I'm guessing, due to his post-Socotra fall-out with Warthrop. This leaves the TFD message intact (the worst monsters are still men) as well as gives us hope.

I guess I'd vote for Warthrop unintentionally screwing up their chances of a more normal life. The changes in Will Henry that took place after Socotra scared him, and I think he, having the world's worst social skills, simply failed to do the necessary things to try and bring WH back. Which led to more estrangement on Will Henry's part and consequently to his becoming royally fucked in the head. Warthrop promised to never leave and to try and prevent WH from "drowning", and he tried, but he didn't understand the kind of attention and warmth WH would need.

Yeah, but this is the part that gets unfortunately skipped over, so I concur with your conclusion that TFD is an exaggeration - I mean, how more unreliable can you get as a narrator than Will Henry who isn't even Will Henry - and the fact that no reconciliation was described doesn't mean that it couldn't happen.

TFD is the kind of book that is begging for a fix-it fic ;)

Yeah. Not!Will Henry has the reliability of a talking potato.

I picture it as a spectrum of understandings, with notable interpretations being "WH snapped under the pressure and everything went to shit" (pure TFD&probably what Yancey originally meant), "bad things happened and WH wrote TFD to give the impression that everything went to shit in order for others to avoid shit" (the most text-compatible interpretation, in my opinion), and "the whole of TFD is just a fake".

The second option certainly does imply the possibility of recovery they missed after Socotra. So, yes, there could be a healthier WH&PXW 'verse.

>TFD is the kind of book that is begging for a fix-it fic ;)

so it is. I may or may not end up being the first gen AO3 writer for TM.

You did reassure me a great deal.

Do feel free to talk to me whenever. If you want to discuss TM or anything else. You can ask me for my twitter username if you like, too (seeing as f!s and twitter are probably way better for fannish discussions than tumblr).

I don't have Twitter, but also feel free to talk to me anytime and anywhere ;) Even if you just want to check a canon fact, I've read the three books twice. Yeah, Tumblr has its drawbacks, but I've gotten used to it.

Anyway, I'm really glad that you enjoyed the books. And I'm glad your perception of TFD went from "this terrible inevitable doom" to basically "nah" :)

It's funny how the way to deal with TFD seems to be to try and find leeway for the characters not to end up quite so terribly rather than take it at face value, and yeah, this may be against Rick Yancey's original intention --- but, let's not forget he also wrote himself into the books as Will Henry's editor, thereby making the final authority on canon within canon his unreliable narrator, so ... there.

I've written a tiny gen fic for TM too, but I've also been working on a "fix-it" off and on for months now and I made that into Willinore, hopefully, I'll actually finish sometime.

Well, tbf I accept Yancey's original idea and I still think it was a very logical outcome. And if we are talking serious literary analysis, I would be considering the series from Yancey's point of view (thanks to the fact that my hang-ups about authorial intent are the size of California).

But as pure text compatibility goes, I do believe our headcanon is just as valid (if not more).

He could choose between treating his characters as living people and treating them as a means to his end, and he chose the former; and, though in so doing he enforced his message, he also sort of derailed it at the same time. Which was bound to happen, really. Living, well-developed characters have too many specifics to be a part of a universal philosophical idea. I mean, nobody tries (...I presume) to write a fix-it Metamorphosis thing. Samsa is a tool and all he does is serve his purpose. But WH&PXW aren't tools and they do more than convey a message; it is a weakness and simultaneously a strength of Yancey's work.

I wonder if anyone asked Yancey as to whether he thinks WH&PXW had any hope prior to TFD. Maybe I should.

>I've written a tiny gen fic for TM too, but I've also been working on a "fix-it" off and on for months now and I made that into Willinore, hopefully, I'll actually finish sometime.

did you, now?? Is it posted anywhere?

I'm not a shipper (which, considering this fandom's specifics, may just make me a sad outsider) and I've no interest in romance tropes, but I'll read shippy stuff as long as it has good characterizations. And I'll certainly read a fix-it.

I mean, nobody tries (...I presume) to write a fix-it Metamorphosis thing.

Lol, you know I think someone somewhere may have at least fantasized about Gregor's sister or whoever being nice to him and him turning slowly back to a human :D

But yeah, Will and the doctor are certainly the sort of characters that come alive and that's probably why readers have such an emotional response to them (rather than to just what their story represents).

Don't worry, I actually think the majority of TM fans don't ship the main characters, for what are probably obvious reasons, except that they haven't produced any fics - so you might be the first ;)

My fic is here. It's short and kind of meta-ish, but I'll put it on AO3 too, if just for the sake of motivating myself to finish the longer one.

Oh my God, this is brilliant. I laughed way too hard. I can imagine Warthrop being pretty good at writing but lolariously awful at giving writing advice. Or maybe he didn't even try - maybe the point of the whole exercise was to see how Will Henry would describe him in different ways. Because Warthrop is secretly dying of happiness that WH is writing about him :D

We'll see! I'm okay with being a forever-alone fan, anyway - it's virtually the story of my life, fannish and otherwise.

Yeah, well, The Monstrumologist fandom is all about laboring in darkness and obscurity, so welcome :)

Ah, and re:point 4, I'm in the same place. I love student-mentor friendships so much it's not even funny.

I hope you're no longer suffering because of this.

No, even as a kid, I was lucky to find good mentors outside of home. A good teacher or a sports coach can really change your life.

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