Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2014-04-18 07:35 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2014-04-18 07:35 pm
[ SECRET POST #2663 ]
⌈ Secret Post #2663 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
01.
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02.
[Stardust]
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03. [posted twice]
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04.
[Elementary]
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05.
[El Goonish Shive]
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06.
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07. http://i62.tinypic.com/29cxt2a.jpg
[Hadaka Shitsuji, censored porn]
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08. http://i.imgur.com/XGwxaCR.jpg
[cosplay; no sex but definitely nsfw]
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09.
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10.
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11.
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12. [ns]
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13.
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14.
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15.
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16.
[Art by: http://www.deviantart.com/art/Lets-Sing-Together-338248375]
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17. [SPOILERS for Soul Eater]
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18. [SPOILERS for captain america: the winter soldier]
[WARNING for rape]
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19. [WARNING for suicide]
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20. [WARNING for incest, possible non-con]
Notes:
Late at work again, sorry. Should be back to normal by next week!
Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 000 secrets from Secret Submission Post #380.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
Re: Fridging, and how not to do it
No, not if that's the only reason why you're doing it, IMO. All your comments in the thread so far suggest that the sole point of her death is to drive this guy crazy; you talk about his character and his feelings and his thoughts, and just sort of vaguely mention the wife and the best way to use her or someone in her place. Like, is there anything more to it than that? Why does she die? What does she die of? Does she die for a reason - to save someone's life, because she was silenced for interfering with someone else's plans, because she was driven to madness herself and committed suicide? Is there anything about her death that is about her, what she felt, things she did, mistakes she made?
As a reader, I wonder about these things. This kind of stuff is not really about gender so much as characterization, but the reason fridging is associated with women more is because the lack of personality and motivation is much more common with female characters than male. It can happen with male characters, too - the protag of Avatar's twin brother is killed as a plot device and he is literally never mentioned again, it was so stupid - so just changing the gender or relation of the person you kill to make the protagonist nuts won't help if the characterization isn't there.
Just my two...okay, twenty cents.
Re: Fridging, and how not to do it
About a third of the way through the book, there is...an explosion, for lack of a better term (it's magical in nature; there's a group experimenting with combinations of Powers, and something goes very wrong). Elareyn's business was to have been in one of the impacted buildings.
Prior to the explosion, she and Kija were going to have been having problems. He has a job that is central to the community, but it requires a good deal of secrecy, and its nature is also such that it leaves him open to the sort of madness that ultimately takes him. Elareyn knows from the start there are things that he won't be able to tell or share with her, but it proves much harder to deal with than she'd thought it would be. She watches him retreat into himself and can do nothing about it, because he doesn't know how to go about talking to her without revealing information that he's bound to keep secret. She is at the point where she's wondering whether it's still worth it to try; she's given what she's able, and she hasn't gotten much of anything in return.
I still want to develop their relationship in that way. But after getting everyone's feedback and thinking through things a bit more, I think that it might be better for me to use the explosion as the catalyst for Kija's descent without actually killing someone close to him. Originally, he was going to have a terrible moment where he wanted to tempt the dead individual into becoming neislo, a spirit that has refused to pass on. It's this thought that leaves him "open" to being broken. I think I can convey something similar without having to kill either Elareyn or any other named character.
And if Elareyn lives, then I can use my alternate plan: after Kija loses it, she winds up helping and working alongside Davera (who is my other principal protagonist. Her story is honestly the more tragic one to me; while she doesn't lose her mind, she's forced to do something terrible toward the end of the story, and her entire worldview is shattered). That way, I can expand and further explore her story.
I appreciate your feedback like you wouldn't believe. It was really helpful to go through the questions that you asked and make sure that I had answers for them. So, thank you very much!
Re: Fridging, and how not to do it