fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2926 ]

[ SECRET POST #2926 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2926 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 036 secrets from Secret Submission Post #418.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 1 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

AUs. I don't get why people don't just write original fiction.

I'll admit, I LOVE AUs that utilize "For Want of a Nail" where a single detail is changed and then the author spends the rest of the time teasing apart how this would affect the universe and characters.

I don't particularly mind canon deviations, but i mean like coffee shop AUs and the like. Plus half the time the characters are different enough from their canon counterparts that it might as well be original fic anyway.

DA I agree with this. Coffee shop AUs are effing ridiculous.

This. They're also just so boring

-anon who complained about coffee shop AUs upthread

You know, I was concerned that coffeeshop fics weren't a thing anymore, because one of the series I write is about the NPC girl who actually WORKS in the coffeehouse in all of those fics.

I'm glad to know this cliche is still in full force.

(Though seriously, why is it always COFFEESHOPS? Or bakeries, apparently that's a thing now. But seriously, you'd think there'd be more Retail Hell AUs, since that's what most teenagers I knew had experience in.)

even fanfic couldn't make retail compelling or cutesy

DA

Challenge accepted. I can't promise cutesy, but I'll aim straight for compelling.

Re: Fandom/fic trends that annoy you

lb_lee - 2015-01-08 02:47 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Fandom/fic trends that annoy you

diet_poison - 2015-01-08 06:13 (UTC) - Expand

Though seriously, why is it always COFFEESHOPS?

Tumblr Hipsters.

But it can be really interesting to try to recreate the complicated circumstances that made characters how they are in a mundane setting!

Because for some people it's more about the characters than about the setting.

But the setting has a strong effect on creating a certain character. An alternate, idk, Buffy who lives in a non-magical world is not the same as Buffy who has to worry about being the Slayer: even if she's in a highly critical role in mundane-land, she still won't have the fate of the world riding on her shoulders constantly, she won't be in that position as a young adult... very different! A Vegeta who hasn't seen his entire species destroyed isn't the same Vegeta. Any given character from The Hunger Games will be different by being shoved over to a universe that doesn't have Hunger Games and Panem and so forth.

Which is not to say that's true for all characters or all situations, but *shrug*. Environment matters.

SA

Now that I hit 'post' on that, it occurs to me to add that I can totally see how translating characters into other situations and exploring what might be nature vs nurture in their personalities is interesting... but most AUs are silly high school/boarding school/coffeeshop things that don't seem as robust. Which is fine for those who like that, but it just seems a little...bizarre? to celebrate a set of characters and storyline by...making them totally different characters living in a totally different story.

Basically everything you said. Experience changes *so much* for a person, and that's something I don't think a lot of AU writers understand.

A Vegeta who hasn't seen his entire species destroyed isn't the same Vegeta

Out of curiosity, have you read Vejiitasei Ascendant? Amazing fanfic that tackles just this premise.

But that's a huge part of the point to me - seeing how characters change when put in different settings!

So few authors address that though. Mostly it's characters shoehorned in to a new setting.

Well, just because a lot of people do a thing poorly *points to Sturgeon's Law* doesn't mean it can't be done well.

yeah, but in a lot of coffeshop/etc. AUs the characterization is horrendous, and of the "they have the same name, therefore they are the same character" variety

Well, 90% of everything is shit...

Because then people would have to build their own characters and universe from scratch, and they wouldn't have an established audience to read their writing when it's done. If I wrote a story about two medieval investigators in southern France who solved crimes and developed a bromance, it wouldn't get even a fraction of the readers that a Johnlock AU would.

I'd read it :(

I would be really happy to read original slash fiction. I mean, I love BL manga, and all of that is original. :)

It depends on the AU for me. I used to hate AU's as well, but some of them have been really enjoyable.

As others have mentioned in this thread, I write AUs because I like seeing how the characters react to a change in setting or history. Or putting them in situations that could never come up in canon. I know many people take characters OOC in an AU, but I do my best to keep the core of the character, no matter what happens to them in my greedy little mitts.

I have no interest in writing original fiction because although I like any OCs that pop up, I don't want to write about them. I want to write about my OTP in a way that isn't limited by their original setting and circumstances.

I know, this is a nature versus nurture argument, but it's a fun concept to play with, at least, for me.

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