[.....this may or may not sound bitter. *cough*]

[reenka]

It just occurred to me that it's not that I don't like enthusiastic recs, obviously-- 'cause I do that all the time-- and it's not that I'm not 'naturally fannish' in the omg-squee sense, because I totally get obsessive and excitable about things I read or watch-- but what really turns me off is when something's recced or pimped by just saying 'I like it, SO YOU SHOULD TOO!' ^^;;; I mean, I'm okay with the reccing-'cause-liking part, but that's just not a good reason to peer pressure anyone. And yes, it always feels like peer pressure to me. >.>;;;

It's like... the difference between sharing hobbies and 'creating a phenomenon' or marketing a story or a fandom or whatever.
    There are a lot of books (and movies & comics, etc) that mean a lot to me, that are personal to me. But they are personal to me, and therefore it would be disingenuous to defend them or 'sell' them, so when I want people to get into them too (and I do! I tell all my friends to read 'Sandman'), I'm constantly walking the line between assuring them they'll like it and why it's actually awesome and just describing what -I- like about it and such. Some things really are very well-done and worth reading/seeing... but to a person like me, if you over-stress how 'need to see' or 'have to read' something is, it makes me feel like a sucker. :/
    I hate the popularity game-- I mean, I really feel like the more popular or famous something gets, the more its own fans will ignore its real merits (and flaws) and just coast along on the 'obvious' awesomeness of it all and how clearly omg-genius & hot it is.

I guess what I mean is, I hate it when something I initially cared about for partly quirky subjective reasons becomes 'cool' and 'the thing to like'. :/ At a certain point of popularity, it's not okay to critique something as much, to geek out and just talk about all the little things that appeal to you, because rabid fans get uber-defensive, y'know? Of course once it's popular, it's FLAWLESS & GODLIKE. -.-; Like, if someone tells you they don't like something about Tolstoy's work, people would assume that person is an idiot, right? Either that or they'd get pissy you're harshing their buzz. Somehow the story/show/etc becomes an identity or status symbol for people once it reaches a certain level of popularity.
    Of course all larger communities have their good & bad side; on the one hand, you lose the intimate feeling & greater understanding between those first few fans, but on the other hand, more people are being exposed to the material (if you care about that sort of thing) and you get vindicated about how awesome it is. Mer.
~~

Btw, I really liked this post on purposeful misidentification in stories by fictualities, 'cause that's pretty much what makes me feel most uncomfortable while reading (and alienates me in some more critical meta fandom circles). Fighting the narrative is hard work with little reward, and ohhh, I like my rewards, precious. :> Though I'd never feel I'd 'have' to fight the narrative just to identify with the 'missing' main girl-- I mean, um, having that degree of an agenda is hard work too :>
    However, I can like 'bad' characters naturally merely based on the ambiguously-positive cues in the text, while still liking the good characters, simply 'cause I generally don't care who's good & who's bad :D Unless they annoy me & seem stupid. Then it's really on :/ But I totally never felt I was 'supposed' to dislike Draco, not the way I was 'supposed' to dislike the Dursleys, so yeah, it's obvious he's not entirely unsympathetic (so who cares). Seriously. He's always been just so cute!! *___* Man, who wants to be an intellectual -.-

EDIT - I just found fairestcat's year-old post explaining Watsonian vs. Doylist approaches to a given canon (one justifying various events from the author-pov so they'd make sense & one from a character's), and maaaan, that explains a LOT about fandom conflicts :D Needless to say, I'm definitely a faithful Watsonian :> I tend to consider Doylist-style explanations cute and enlightening (ie, author intent & attendant issues are interesting), but ultimately it pulls me out of the flow of a show/story so I tend to compartmentalize it, I guess. Like, if the only way to explain something is to point to the writers' "smoking crack" or having whatever agenda, then I'm just plain disappointed in the show & don't bother with further analysis voluntarily. I guess I'd say it's useful to add some Doylist flavor but not satisfying emotionally to me as a fan ^^;;;; And in some ways, I do think there might be a rational vs. intuitive/emotional-style analysis divide between the two approaches....

Comments

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure whether I'm neither Doylist nor Watsonian or both.

I mean basically what I do is I look at both and integrate them. My first step is to interpret in-text, but if for whatever reason i run into authorial intent (whether I'm interested enough to seek it out, or I just run into it, or something is ambiguous/unclear and I want it clarified or WHATEVER) then i reinterpret the text through the lens of what the author was doing. Basically, I say, okay given that the author says Character X feels this way/did that because of this, how does that ripple outward and affect everything else? So I reinterpret but still from within-text. I'm not even sure this is properly explained.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

I think it depends on whether I -want- to integrate them, maybe? If the 'thing to be explained' is a curiosity and doesn't matter to me emotionally one way or the other that much, then I'll just do whatever it takes to 'smooth it over'; if it pisses me off or bothers me somehow to add the authorial/outside-meta explanation-- ie, if I have to do the work just to have a bad show make sense-- then it's just like, 'feh'. I'd prefer the acrobatics to be Watsonian, if that would 'fix it'. I dunno. In the case of plot-holes or characterization errors/missteps, at least, I feel unforgiving if they need to be explained by deux ex machina of sorts, basically, y'know? But I think it's analytically most elegant to combine them, outside a particular context (and most people seem to comment saying they use both depending on the circumstances) :D

I just don't like to... have to. I'm probably not made for TV/episodic fandoms? I don't like having my nose rubbed in inconsistencies & the way authors changed their minds over time or whatever, 'cause it affects my view of the integrity of the universe. Like, take The Sandman-- as is, it works in my head. If I had to for some reason say 'well, Neil made a compromise here, pandered to the fans there, forgot his own canon over here', it would erode my respect & enjoyment. But I do like to know what Neil was thinking & would integrate it if I knew, sure :>

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

Well if you're talking about the typical "the author's on crack, that's why the show sucks" type explanation then, yeah if a show sucks I'm just not going to watch it. unless it sucks in a way i find entertaining anyway, LOL!

But if we're talking about a thing where... see, I'm so trying to avoid the QAF thing because I'M TIRED OF TALKING ABOUT IT AHAHAH! But in a nutshell, if you have a situation where, if you look at this thing from one angle you see X and if you look from another angle you see Y, and I initially see X and then find out the author was going for Y, then I'm going to switch to their angle and then start re-extrapolating based on that. Whereas if Y is just NOT PRESENT AT ALL and the author is claiming Y out of the blue, that's just the author being incompetant and why am I watching/reading to begin with. Know what I mean? So for me a key question is, is the author's intent something that's present but I just missed it, or is it just coming out of the blue.

And of course, being me, I'm just deeply troubled by the idea of disregarding it just because you don't like it. Which is different than disregarding it because it's NOT THERE, but I'm not sure how many people can tell the difference, and I'm pretty sure no one can tell the difference ALL the time.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Oh, well, I think we're talking/focusing on somewhat different things-- like, you're not so much talking about patching holes/issues that shouldn't be there & more reconciling things that seem confusing at first glance or require further analysis or whatever. Then, yeah, it's not as if I'd ignore an explanation just because I didn't like it. I more don't want to be stuck with an extra-source explanation unless something's confusing in a thinky way, not a 'oops, we messed up/were pandering/changed writers/had an outside agenda/had a bad day' way. This doesn't necessarily mean it just -sucks-, but I guess I'd prefer not to dwell on something extra-textual that's going to add to the suckage that would otherwise not have been there-- not 'cause I don't like it but just 'cause it's disappointing in terms of quality or my respect for the integrity of the source.

Liiiike, for instance, all the gaffes in Smallville. :/ I mean, that comes close to 'they're just on crack', but it's just not quite there, and it's one case where I'd rather not think about what the writers are thinking :/ Mooostly it's the same with Buffy; hearing about their opinions on Spike just interferes with my ideas on Spike and how I see the show. I listened to it enough and now I'm just like, 'to hell with it', since like, they disagree anyway. :/ Marti Noxon thinks one thing, the Great Whedon thinks another thing, Anony!fanboy-writer Y thinks a third thing.... :/ For me, Spike works as a character best if you just say 'okay, how do you explain his arc within canon'; Doylist!Spike meta tends to be trotted out by people who have issues with his characterization and want to add -more- issues or justify ignoring Season 6-7 souled!Spike or whatever. God, it's just a huge mess. :/

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

We totally are talking about slightly different things which I noticed about halfway through my reply but I posted it anyway because what the hell, I already wrote it. ;)

The Spike-in-Buffy thing is kinda apeshit, it's true. I think that's, yeah, kind of a tv-show/media fandom problem, especially with shows where the showrunners weren't as tyrannical as, say, CowLip. Because like with QAF, Cowen and Lipman were so controlling that the writers were unhappy and the cast was unhappy and everyone was stifled and miserable and the writers said their scripts were pretty much just rewritten practically from the ground up, and that's all horrible working conditions but at least you know who to listen to when you're looking for clarification.

Whereas with buffy it's more difficult because Joss was pretty loose, especially in S6 and 7, so writers were going all kinds of odd places and I suspect if James Marsters weren't such a good actor, Spike wouldn't hold together as a character at all.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Sometimes, also, there's the JKR (in regards to her comments about saaay Ginny or Draco) thing, where it works one way if you pay attention and another way if you don't; and also there are obviously lots of math-related plot-holes and inconsistencies in the basic world-building and such. And I'm guessing from the Doylist vs Watsonian thing, Doyle also had this issue with writing the Holmes stories in some way (though I read them as a child and that all just passed me by). Of course, I don't feel compelled to like a direction the show went-- things could appeal to me at first & then not so much later, and this happens a lot with TV shows and long-running books (like, hello X-Files), and sometimes knowing the intent makes it worse, so if I can explain it otherwise, I would, because basically it's still something I'd prefer to enjoy if I can.

It's odd for me with Spike 'cause I actually think the plot details were often 'meh', but Spike's bigger decisions totally make sense to me considering his history-- like attempting to rape Buffy, going to get a soul for her sake, being emo and emotionally subby-- all that works in theory, if you just think about the outlines of what happened; in practice, it didn't come across that well, though James Marsters was always fun to watch (esp. with Sarah).

With QaF, it's less what happened (to me) than what didn't; certain things just didn't develop in a way I'd prefer but yeah, it makes sense... I'm not sure if you need the writers to explain it to make it fit. I'd prefer you didn't, because I think a good work stands on its own merits in the end. I don't need the writers to justify/explain things if they're just open-ended-- it's not that I want to believe falsely, but ambiguity can be nice, and having potentialities sawed off that existed purely in-text is not-so-nice. Sometimes it's obvious (to me) that those potentialities aren't likely (the way Sirius/Remus is, let's face it, unlikely), but I'd prefer not to listen if JKR ever said 'oh yah, you S/R people are on TOTAL CRACK'. In that sense, I prefer writers like Lois McMaster Bujold, who leave little loopholes open and accept alternative readings-- I like roomy texts. In my head, H/D can coexist with H/G because I see HBP as supporting both possibilities in different ways. And I don't need the writers to say 'this is what I meant' unless I really have a hard time with something, and even then, my respect for the show or whatever goes down if it needs to be broken down.

So basically it's a convoluted relationship, so overall I have no issue just saying I'm Watsonian by preference :> I like the text most. I'm curious/interested/fascinated by the behind-the-scenes stuff, but don't mess with my text!! D: heh I get a bit possessive about 'verses I really like, maybe....

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

I think I'm a lot more concerned about character consistency than, say, plot holes or math stuff although some of the really bad ones kind of irritate me. Like how GoF was entirely predicated on getting harry to touch a cup when Barty Jr. could have just like, asked Harry to get him a pen or something.

Ummm, I don't feel compelled to like the way a show went either, but usually I do just because I dont really care about plot direction so I usually don't have a preference at all. There are exceptions though - like, I loved Xena and then I didn't anymore. I think sometimes a show goes on for so long that the writers have nothing else to say but they keep pumping it out anyway and that's when you get high quality dramas that turn into bad soaps.

The QAF thing - in fairness, none of the writers have ever like, posted a huge explanation on a website or anything. What happens is that the fans ask them questions and send them emails and they get private responses and then post the emails/transcribe the Q&A sessions or report on the meetings. The writers themselves, in an official way, did leave it open-ended, yeah. And I do think it stands alone, but I kind of think that the fanbase's emotional investment in one particular interpretation makes it difficult for a lot of people to put it in perspective, because in order to see how it stands alone (I'm not even talking about the Michael stuff, btw, I'm talking about the Justin stuff separately), they'd have to be willing to let go of assumptions that they don't want to let go of, and start over. It's one of those things where... you know, a novel develops and you have expectations and then the ending comes and, often, the expectations were a mislead, or formed based on insufficient info so they turn out to be wrong? And the you didn't really expect the ending that does come, but looking back you can see how it all leads to this place. Except with QAF, because it played out over years instead of a few days or weeks or whatever (however long it takes to read a book) people had been forming those expectations and becoming attachedd to them for so long that when the ending came they weren't able to get that distance and look back and see the threads that lead from the first page to the last.

And I love ambiguity - actually, the main complaint I always get from people who read my fic is that the endings aren't traditional/closed enough/don't wrap everything up, which I do on purpose because I hate that tidy "closed with a bow" feeling. That said, going back to the no preferences thing, since I don't really care about what could/will happen, I don't mind having potentialities sawed off and I think I like it more as an external than as an internal, which is possibly weird. By which I mean, I like when the text itself is somewhat open-ended, because looking at the source as a story, I dont like tidy stories.

But there's still a part of me that wants to KNOW, and so I like when the author tells me, externally, what he or she figures would happen? DOES THAT MAKE ANY SENSE WHATSOEVER? It's kind of weird that way, because I like roomy stories, because aesthetically I prefer them as they feel more "real" but that preference only extends to the story itself, not to what i know about the story externally.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Hmm... sometimes when things seem really suspenseful or I really care about a particular character's development & life, then I do want to know. Depends what there is to know, I guess-- in one sense I just dislike being in suspence. But then the possibilities I'm talking about aren't really necessarily even realistic or concrete-- and it's rare I 'live' in a universe to think of them that much (I pretty much have to be reading fic for it usually, before I think on it that far). Most times I just go with what seems most likely and assume that's it, and most times that's enough. With the ending of Buffy, for instance (minus Angel especially), it's a lot differently open-ended than the ending of QaF-- like, I REALLY wouldn't like to hear that 'oh, so Buffy didn't really love Spike & she was lying', for instance. There's a delicate point between too much suspense & just open-endedness, and while I understand the differentiation between external and internal open-endedness, I guess it's rare for me to need a wrap-up. If I do, I'd prefer another novel or to write/read a number of fics-- like, the cure for my dissatisfaction with Buffy S7 was to read a bunch of good post-series fics. And a number of good, interesting shows end teasingly but in a way that invites satisfying fanfic. Nothing told/known could be nearly as satisfying as a story. Like, compared to reading my favorite post-series fic-- imagine if Whedon said the same thing, but like, 'this is actually what happened'; I think I'd prefer the fic 'cause it was more fun to read :>

So I guess this is just a matter of preference. Still, QaF is different 'cause of the issues being with the fans rather than with the canon so much. At the same time, I dunno if I would've seen more B/M in it or whether I would've decided Brian didn't 'work' for Justin except as a growing experience-- in some ways, that's a personal call based on what a viewer believes about the nature of love/relationships in general. At the same time, I think the degree to which I'd want to 'know' would depend on how much I cared about the show/text. If I care more, I'm more of a canon-whore than if I care less, in which case I need to know less :>

Hmm, it occurs to me a lot of people claimed characterization inconsistencies with JKR, too-- like, with Ginny in book 5-6, with Hermione in book 6 (which I found reeeally annoying), and of course there were always people saying Draco never had a 'real' consistent personality and were totally taken aback by HBP. The truth is, often it seems her characters do things to serve the plot rather than the plot revolving around the characters, so some of that is inevitable. A lot of times the best explanation for their behavior is probably 'this had to happen for this plot point to occur'. I suppose in that case, knowing this is external-- I don't mix the meta with my understanding of how the characters actually work when I'm thinking of them for fic or something, y'know? :>

I'm actually really complacent about plot development most of the time, unless you get me all riled up about a character and that's tied to plot development. It just seems 'wrong' for some things to happen; I guess the way people thought souled!Spoke was Just Wrong (though he wasn't in theory). When that wrongness -does- happen to me, I prefer to inch my way to understanding by a Watsonian in-text technique if I can, that's all. Otherwise it'll always feel like a slapped on band-aid and the 'verse integrity can never quite retain its former elasticity.

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

That's entering into an area that I just can't even begin to relate to. Because fanfic could never do anything for me on a canon satisfaction level because it's not canon. Also I don't like fanfic very much. For me, it's really all about knowledge rather than speculation, which... I am pretty sure you know - Joss saying THIS IS SO means something to me, whereas fanfic writer #45246 writing a story where this is so is just another fanfic writer fantasizing in his/her word processor. And that's not meant to be an insult? It's just a perspective - I'm one of the fantasizing fangirls, myself. But when I was writing post-series B/J fic, for example, people would tell me I was helping them deal with the ending, and I really don't understand that because if I write a fic where Brian moves to New York or whatever, that doesn't really have anything to do with the 'real' Brian, who existed only at CowLip's whim and whose life experiences were entirely defined by their vision.

If it made sense to me, I'd probably better understand people freaking out about me writing B/M fic, because I suspect it's linked to the idea that fic is somehow more connected to canon/more real to them than it is to me, so they put a lot more weight on what people are putting in their fic than I do. It's a little funny, because I'm the world's biggest canon!whore, but at the same time fic is totally disconnected from canon, for me.

The QAF thing - that's why I specified that I was talking about the Justin thing, at that point. I mean, basically I think people became so invested in the idea that Brian and Justin were this huge high romance epic love thing and meant to be together that when the end came and that didn't pan out, they labeled it wrong/OOC/inconsistent instead of re-examining their assumptions. And I think sometimes writers do venture off randomly, change their minds in the middle of things, whatever, but I don't think that should be a person's first thought when things don't turn out as they'd like. With QAF, putting the Michael thing aside because I do think that's more complicated, looking at it as a whole instead of as a 5 year WIP, I do see the foreshadowing and the threads that lead to the end. I think a lot of people just label things that contribute to things they dislike as inconsistent or OOC, and everything ends up kind of patchwork.

As for the Michael thing, that really is left ambiguous within the show itself - getting an explanation does require external investigation. But I think that... in a lot of ways whether one defines Brian's feelings for Michael as platonic or romantic is beside the point? Because I think the important thing being communicated was that whatever FLAVOR of love Brian had for Michael, it was the strongest/most important thing in his life. And I think that message DOES come across even without external commentary... but only to people who are willing to hear it, you know what I mean?

By the way, at this point I'm not even sure what we're talking about anymore. So if I sound like I'm arguing with you, um, I don't mean to? LOL!

With JKR, I think part of it is that she's a plot-driven writer more than a character-writer, and I think a lot of times JKR (And CowLip too, to be honest) will have a vision of what the character is like but isn't necessarily very good at getting that across. With CowLip, they neglected Justin's character out of irritation with Randy and also because they were just more interested in Brian and Michael's characters than Justin's. With JKR I think she's sort of distracted by theme and plot - also she tends to leave plot-like cues for things that should be handled in a character-manner. Like she mentioned that Ginny was outgoing a few times in early books, but she never SHOWED US THAT until OotP, which is why it came off as random to a lot of people even though she had, technically, set up for it.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

I guess the thing is that I wasn't talking about overwriting canon or fic being 'on the level' with canon, just expanding and filling in where canon refuses to tread-- and me simultaneously liking that airiness and presence, that half-life of fanfic reality at the end of Buffy, say. I think it can help one deal with canon the way dreams can help one deal with life-- playing out different (positive) scenarios lets you really work through some issues, I think, be at peace with yourself and the possibilities being there moreso than if it was only half-formed ideas on your head.

Sometimes the canon leaves the field ripe for the fic treatment and sometimes it doesn't-- like, it's too tied up or open-ended in the wrong way (see: Angel ending). I dunno about QaF... I think it's more of a finished/closed-off arc to me than Buffy&Spike were at the end of S7 because (ironically) more irrevocable things happened to Brian & Justin whereas Buffy & Spike had lots of potential they hadn't worked through yet by the time Spike 'died'. It's easy enough to bring Spike back to life (he did anyway, with Angel), disregarding Angel (the series) especially, but even then. If he -did- come back to life, there'd be lots of stuff that could happen with Buffy if/when they met again, and that stuff would best be told in a story rather than in a summary or a statement. It's not -canon-, but making it a story lets a reader deal with this internally-- given they've internalized the situation and it's emotionally relevant to them, it's like therapy, because at that point Buffy&Spike's issues are like their issues too. I imagine that's how your saner B/J-shipping readers might feel, though I still think B/S is more ripe for fic than B/J was.

It's not the same thing as equating canon with fic or confusing them. It's sort of how I'm glad the Marauders era is so open-- it works for me to see it from lots of different perspectives 'cause I think lots of different things could've happened and there's like, a garden's worth of fics there. With B/J, it's not a garden to me-- there seem to be a few main possibilities, but basically it's 'Brian goes after him' or 'Justin comes back' :>

Of course, one person's garden is another person's cut-and-dry concrete block :>

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

No, I didn't mean to say you were taking fanfic as canon or confusing them? It's just that fanfic literally cannot do anything for me in that area - I see what you mean about the internalizing/working through, and yet it doesn't have that effect on me at all. And part of it is that I don't tend to have the emotional investment/relevancy issue to begin with, but a lot of it is that... it just doesn't. I don't know.

I kind of think fanfic doesn't have any emotional weight for me beyond the length of the story itself? It's almost like, you have canon "reality" and fanfic is like, a daydream or a fantasy, I guess? And they can entertain me for a bit but when the fantasy ends I'm back to exactly where I was because it doesn't actually impact anything. ...I don't daydream, btw, but I don't have any other um, metaphors.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Heh, this gets into the possible roles of fantasy in one's everyday 'waking' life, which is an interesting subject in itself :> I think being the way you are, it makes sense-- just as me being the way I am, of course fantasy has a huge influence on my overall reality & it has a lot (too much? probably) emotional weight, given I'm already especially sensitive on an issue. I'm not -always- wide open or that invested that I need to 'work through' things afterwards; the B/S post-S7 thing was special. But if I do work through, I work through by reading/writing just naturally 'cause it's my... instinctive healing/native mode. :> Other people have other preferred native modes :D

The healing effect of that one fic was a unique occurence for me too, though. It just somehow managed to show me exactly what I could believe could happen with certain future tweaks and yet also wanted to believe. Sometimes I read a fic that just seems 'right' in a way that's beyond just it being well-characterized or well-plotted-- something about it has a strong emotional pull towards me, like it addresses my needs or pushes some button. It gives me that feeling of 'this is how it -should- happen', even though I know it didn't and wouldn't, but it reassures me; the same way a dream may linger afterwards, becoming fuzzy on the details and actually losing its coherency but having you retain that feeling of contenment for the rest of the day. That's what it's like for me. :>

[blacksatinrose.livejournal.com]

Yup yup, which is what I was thinking when I was saying um, that it's a mindset I can't begin to relate to. Which is to say, that it is a personality variable thing more than anything else. I'm really trying not to get into the Buffy/Spike thing, dude, I am Buffy/Angel till I die.

Sometimes I read a fic that just seems 'right' in a way that's beyond just it being well-characterized or well-plotted

This I have experienced... once. And it was because the fic was pretty much exactly what I had extrapolated to be the most likely future for the characters in question, so it was nice to see that vision shared by um, someone who wasn't me, HAHAHAA. It took a while to figure out why I was so impressed by it even though it wasn't the best written fic I'd seen even by that specific writer. But one day I was talking to Lara and I realized, as I was laying out my best guess as to their futures, that I was basically describing that fic on a tonal level (like, the EVENTS weren't identical, but the atmosphere/emotional place of the characters was?), and that this vision predated the fic, and then I understood why it worked for me so well.

Hahaha, predictably, it still didn't linger. Dreams don't linger on me, either though. Personality variables.