Reply to Nightwind
Oct. 5th, 2007 06:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dunmurderinPosted here because once again, I rambled. Will make more sense if you read Nightwind's Yay rant. first.
People write and read fanfic because they care enough about a book, movie, show, etc., to seek out More! And when that More doesn't mesh up with the original product -- or, probably more accurately, doesn't mesh up with their perceptions of the original, they get disappointed. And when people get disappointed, they rant and complain about it.
Yes, a lot of fanfic writers are novices and there is probably a significant population of fanfic writers who don't care about improving, but that doesn't mean that people can't want to see people improve. Or that they can't want to see something different from the same old same old. Granted, some folks don't care about getting better as a writer; they want to write that crazy little story that's in their head and that's fine. They've got every right to do so...but I'm not going to tell them that their crack!fic is wonderful. And I'm not going to jump up and down in excitement when they turn out Yet Another Fic featuring Overexposed Popular Characters I'm Tired of Seeing.
Fanfic is like fast food. When I go to my local fast food restaurant, I'm not expecting haute cusine. I know the food I'm eating has been prepared following a corporate blueprint and that the food at one McBurger Hut is going to be pretty much the same as the food at any other McBurger Hut in the country.
However, when I go into McBurger Hut and order my BigWhopper, plain without cheese and I get home to find out that my BigWhopper is neither plain nor without cheese, I'm irked. My order is wrong, my food is screwed up and I'm ticked. I don't expect the people working there to be master chefs, but I do expect them to be able to remember to not put cheese on my hamburger.
Admittedly, if I'm in the restaurant and my sandwich is wrong, I'll take it back and ask for a correctio, politely. I don't rant and rave at the cooks since a) that's rude and b) I consider it a matter of personal policy not to piss off people who handle my food. I've worked fast food and I know that it can be hard to break a trained habit, particularly when the restaurant is busy.
If I'm home before I discover the mistake, I'll bitch and moan about it, salvage as much as I can and move on. But I'll still be ticked the next time it happens and the time after that and the time after that because I have certain expectations and if they're not met, I'm going to be annoyed.
I agree; fanfic is wish-fulfillment -- hell, writing is wish-fulfillment. And there's nothing wrong with fantasies and wish-fulfillment and playing around with goofy ideas in and of itself. I do it. But because I also have a horror of making a public fool of myself, I also try to make sure that what I put out for public consumption is something that will make sense to other people. So I restrain some of my goofiness or at least try to rationalize it within the context of the story so that it will, hopefully, make sense to people who are not me. If people dont' get my stories, the fault lies with me for not making what I wanted to say clear enough for them to understand.
And I also agree that good fanfics can be few and far between, but while on the one hand people can be so hypersensitive to errors that it's a wonder they can get out of bed in the morning, on the other hand a lot of writers churn out fics that are crap. They have every right to do so, but I also have every right to ignore their work in favor of the smaller handful of writers who don't suck.
I write fanfic for fun too -- but for me part of the fun is actually turning out something that meets my particular standards for good writing. I approach writing fanfic exactly the same way I approach writing original fiction because to me that's how you do things. For me, fun is having a story that makes sense, that fits with the characters' established personalities (or close enough at least) and that's the kind of fanfic I'd want to read.
For me, researching the American memorial at Guadalcanal was half the fun of writing "Skyline Ridge." Getting the details right makes the story better to me and, hopefully, to my readers.
People can write whatever they like; nobody is forcing anyone to listen to the criticisms on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
fanficrants or GAFF or tfiwts or any other place. But honestly, I'm still going to complain about the things I'm tired of seeing or that I think are badly done because for those authors who DO want to improve, such criticisms can be useful.
Let me say that again: criticism is useful. It helps avoid stagnation and can help spark new ideas. It allows people who may have minority opinions to find out that they're not alone. Part of the reason I founded TFIWTS was to give people a place to politely vent about things that bugged them as well as a place to praise the things that they liked.
I don't want art. I want fics that are readable by my standards of what makes a fic readable -- I want words spelled correctly, I want grammatical sentences, I want characters who act like they do in canon and I want plots that make sense. I'd like to see characters who aren't the Usual Suspects.
Do I expect these things to happen? No, not particularly. People will write what they want and they have every right to do so -- and I have just as much right to ignore what I don't like. And I've got every right to rant about stuff I don't like and they can ignore me right back.
People write and read fanfic because they care enough about a book, movie, show, etc., to seek out More! And when that More doesn't mesh up with the original product -- or, probably more accurately, doesn't mesh up with their perceptions of the original, they get disappointed. And when people get disappointed, they rant and complain about it.
Yes, a lot of fanfic writers are novices and there is probably a significant population of fanfic writers who don't care about improving, but that doesn't mean that people can't want to see people improve. Or that they can't want to see something different from the same old same old. Granted, some folks don't care about getting better as a writer; they want to write that crazy little story that's in their head and that's fine. They've got every right to do so...but I'm not going to tell them that their crack!fic is wonderful. And I'm not going to jump up and down in excitement when they turn out Yet Another Fic featuring Overexposed Popular Characters I'm Tired of Seeing.
Fanfic is like fast food. When I go to my local fast food restaurant, I'm not expecting haute cusine. I know the food I'm eating has been prepared following a corporate blueprint and that the food at one McBurger Hut is going to be pretty much the same as the food at any other McBurger Hut in the country.
However, when I go into McBurger Hut and order my BigWhopper, plain without cheese and I get home to find out that my BigWhopper is neither plain nor without cheese, I'm irked. My order is wrong, my food is screwed up and I'm ticked. I don't expect the people working there to be master chefs, but I do expect them to be able to remember to not put cheese on my hamburger.
Admittedly, if I'm in the restaurant and my sandwich is wrong, I'll take it back and ask for a correctio, politely. I don't rant and rave at the cooks since a) that's rude and b) I consider it a matter of personal policy not to piss off people who handle my food. I've worked fast food and I know that it can be hard to break a trained habit, particularly when the restaurant is busy.
If I'm home before I discover the mistake, I'll bitch and moan about it, salvage as much as I can and move on. But I'll still be ticked the next time it happens and the time after that and the time after that because I have certain expectations and if they're not met, I'm going to be annoyed.
I agree; fanfic is wish-fulfillment -- hell, writing is wish-fulfillment. And there's nothing wrong with fantasies and wish-fulfillment and playing around with goofy ideas in and of itself. I do it. But because I also have a horror of making a public fool of myself, I also try to make sure that what I put out for public consumption is something that will make sense to other people. So I restrain some of my goofiness or at least try to rationalize it within the context of the story so that it will, hopefully, make sense to people who are not me. If people dont' get my stories, the fault lies with me for not making what I wanted to say clear enough for them to understand.
And I also agree that good fanfics can be few and far between, but while on the one hand people can be so hypersensitive to errors that it's a wonder they can get out of bed in the morning, on the other hand a lot of writers churn out fics that are crap. They have every right to do so, but I also have every right to ignore their work in favor of the smaller handful of writers who don't suck.
I write fanfic for fun too -- but for me part of the fun is actually turning out something that meets my particular standards for good writing. I approach writing fanfic exactly the same way I approach writing original fiction because to me that's how you do things. For me, fun is having a story that makes sense, that fits with the characters' established personalities (or close enough at least) and that's the kind of fanfic I'd want to read.
For me, researching the American memorial at Guadalcanal was half the fun of writing "Skyline Ridge." Getting the details right makes the story better to me and, hopefully, to my readers.
People can write whatever they like; nobody is forcing anyone to listen to the criticisms on
fanficrants or GAFF or tfiwts or any other place. But honestly, I'm still going to complain about the things I'm tired of seeing or that I think are badly done because for those authors who DO want to improve, such criticisms can be useful. Let me say that again: criticism is useful. It helps avoid stagnation and can help spark new ideas. It allows people who may have minority opinions to find out that they're not alone. Part of the reason I founded TFIWTS was to give people a place to politely vent about things that bugged them as well as a place to praise the things that they liked.
I don't want art. I want fics that are readable by my standards of what makes a fic readable -- I want words spelled correctly, I want grammatical sentences, I want characters who act like they do in canon and I want plots that make sense. I'd like to see characters who aren't the Usual Suspects.
Do I expect these things to happen? No, not particularly. People will write what they want and they have every right to do so -- and I have just as much right to ignore what I don't like. And I've got every right to rant about stuff I don't like and they can ignore me right back.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-05 10:57 pm (UTC)However, when I go into McBurger Hut and order my BigWhopper, plain without cheese and I get home to find out that my BigWhopper is neither plain nor without cheese, I'm irked.
This is why in fanfiction we give warnings. We tell the reader at least the gist of the story (boldly label "P/J", "slash", "WTF" or "OC") so that she doesn't have to invest any more time reading the story if it obviously contains something she doesn't like or isn't in the mood to see.
I may serve you fast food, but I don't want to send you home with the wrong order, 'cause then you won't come back.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-06 10:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-05 11:36 pm (UTC)I've gotten to the point I stick to a few writers in every fandom I read in (which is quite a lot, actually) and reading recs from friends. Took me six years to get there reading everything from Harry Potter to InuYasha to now Transformers.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-06 02:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-06 10:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-06 02:48 am (UTC)But I do agree with you about standards. There should be some. Wish-fulfillment doesnt mean you write crap and expect everyone to go "Yay! So good!!" (though this is what happens at ffnet...whaaa?). At some point, someone's gonna find that fic and call it crap.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-10-06 10:43 pm (UTC)