fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #6310 ]

[ SECRET POST #6310 ]

⌈ Secret Post #6310 ⌋

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

01.

__________________________________________________

02.

__________________________________________________

03.

__________________________________________________

04.

__________________________________________________

05.

__________________________________________________

06.

__________________________________________________

07.

[The Left/Right Game]

__________________________________________________

08.

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 36 secrets from Secret Submission Post #902.
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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

03. https://i.imgur.com/mM5MvwN.png

More for me, mwahaha.

...I'm sorry not everything is like. People just tolerate each other?

This comment feels like two separate thought fragments. What are you trying to express, fellow anon?

"I'm sorry that not all media has people apparently just barely tolerating each other" is the entire thought, because I can't understand what they find mushy about "people become as close as family."

As others have pointed out, what else would you call a particularly close-knit group? Friends doesn't feel weighty enough for "would throw down my life for you without a moment's notice." There's no real roles in that kinda dynamic, just... Really tight, unbreakable bonds, which is gonna be most media where people don't just barely tolerate each other.

Yeah, I see that in The Losers, which I love.

I really love this trope but rarely refer to it as "found family."

ayrt
Thanks for explaining. The original comment makes more sense in my brain now.

And yeah, I agree.

I find non familial platonic relationships much more interesting than familial ones. I don't know what specific name I would use, depends on the canon and characters, but I dislike the term found family personally.

I guess I don't understand the difference.

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2024-04-16 01:59 (UTC) - Expand

Yeah, I'm thinking of stuff like One Piece or Persona 5 or Final Fantasy VII and I'm not sure how else you would describe the main casts there.

Friends can love each other (platonically) without being ~~~found family~~~

I consider found family just a bunch of friends who love each other (platonic and otherwise).

It can get really sappy, sure. But "found family" feels like the best, most natural way to describe a particularly close-knit group of unrelated people. I'm not sure how you'd go about portraying that without the concept, unless the issue is with close-knit groups themselves.

Oh that would be rough, because you're right it is the majority of gen fic. I love it, so I am fully aware of how prevalent it is (in the happiest way, for me).

Do you prefer just more plot heavy gen fic? Or maybe individual focus rather than friend group focus?

I love it when it’s well done! But I think that in terms of tropes, “well done” is more subjective. I can usually tell by tags, word count, and summary if a found family fic is likely to hit my buttons or not. But eventually I still read the ones I initially pass over because I love the trope so much and love seeing my faves live out my fantasies.

I played this mediocre RPG called The Book of Shadows where the MCs work together mostly because they all want the villain defeated. One couple forms, but by the time I got bored and quit playing, the rest didn’t really become friends or even care about each other that much. It felt almost subversive.

I just wanted to find friendship fic for two characters with an age gap without the older one literally adopting the teen as a daughter or niece. I had to give up.

I feel this. I can see why people want that dynamic but it does nothing for me when it comes to my gen fic interests.

It makes even less sense to me when the characters are just acquaintances and the kid already has perfectly decent canon parents/family.

I like found family in theory, but in practice I feel like too many things get labeled as “found family” these days, the way too many pairings get labeled as grumpy x sunshine or whatever. Sometimes something is just a group of coworkers with good chemistry, or a friend group! These too are valid relationships and fun ensemble dynamics!

(I say this as someone who’s put in hundreds of thousands of words writing a found family fic on AO3.)

OT but: “grumpy x sunshine” I have never seen that before but that is a perfect description of my two favorite ships! Both of which happen to feature a grumpy supernaturally old man and a sunshiney teenage girl.

+100000

I feel that the trope is often written poorly, and unearned, so to speak— I don't really buy that the characters are found family or see why they specifically have a familial dynamic. Sometimes it's less literal, like the idea of a community of friends whose dynamic isn't necessarily familial, but calling it found family in that case just kinda grates on me. I can get into it when it's actually done well and makes sense for the characters. I think a lot of fandom characterization of the trope takes shortcuts and doesn't really establish how or why the characters are found family. On top of that the trope is just not my favorite. Idk, totally see why it's popular, it's just not for me.

I feel like sometimes it's too literal? Like you can be a family without neatly slotting characters into the Mom, Dad, kid roles and exaggerating their traits so they're more stereotypical. That's boring, IMO.

I gotta admit people talk about "found family" a lot but I don't really grasp what that... is? I mean. Found. Family. I know what those two words mean and what it implies to put them together. But I couldn't tell you any works that do or don't have it.

For me it is just the concept of "finding your people" or your "village" or whatever. You have found a group of people that you love and they love you, through thick and thin. They are there for you and you are there for them. For different people that manifests in different ways.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only