Today's Post is About Femslash
Dec. 12th, 2013 09:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
netgirl_y2kSpecifically, what I go for in a femslash pairing.
According to the AO3 I have both written and bookmarked the most femslash in the Merlin fandom. Which is interesting, if only for the fact that that you have to really hate yourself to be a Merlin femslasher.
I think Gwen/Morgana is the pairing I have written the most of in any fandom, and although I am slightly loath to admit it, in that case it was a one true character thing. As we discussed a couple of days ago, I am a mite obsessed with Morgana; I loved Morgana, I thought she was gay and wanted to ship her, and Gwen was the only other woman on the show. I would have argued there was a little more to it at the time, but in retrospect-- that was a good eighty-five percent of it. Especially as my interest in Merlin femslash (well, all Merlin fic, really) drops like a stone as soon as Morgana isn't involved. And that I subsequently shipped Morgana with every woman who came into her general vicinity; including Morgause, who may or may not have been her sister depending on your headcanon, the degree of AU, and assorted writing inconsistencies.
But my favourite, favourite was Morgana/Vivian. So, Vivian was a one episode guest star in series... two? And she and Arthur are cursed to obsessively love each other, and by the end of the episode Arthur's been saved, and Vivian's left under the spell (forever, I guess), and I hated that. I became fascinated by the idea that Morgana could somehow be the one to lift the spell from Vivian. I have this recurring theme in all my fics and fandoms about women somehow reclaiming agency that's been taken from them; but, you know, with humour and occasional dragons. Anyway, Morgana/Vivian, which I sort of have to take the blame for, because by virtue of my writing a few fics and never shutting the fuck up about them, they briefly became a thing in fandom, someone even wrote a really awesome big bang fic about them. That aside, Morgana/Vivian is a pretty good example of my fondness for super-rare femslash pairings that don't really exist outside my head. I actually still have a lot of fond feelings and nostalgia for that pairing, and I keep thinking I should revisit them once more; I think they'd be good in a modern AU, I have this image of them making out in the limo at Arthur and Gwen's wedding, partly because it's the only way to lift the spell from Vivian, but mostly because if Arthur's going to marry Gwen, Morgana is damn well going to make out with a pretty girl in something expensive that he's already paid for.
A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones is a fandom where I want more femslash. I mean, there's actually a pretty decent amount, and so much female character centric het and gen that I'm actually a pretty happy bunny, but I want more, and in the spirit of being the change you want to see, I endeavour to write a fair bit of it. I also do a lot of exchanges in that fandom, and I always put "any femslash, basically" in my sign-ups; which is how I come to write some slightly off the wall pairings like Arianne/Dany and Sansa/Myrcella. I actually enjoy writing those types of pairings because there's sometimes a moment when your brain just goes oh, something clicks, and it all makes sense; I had that when I wrote Sansa/Myrcella recently.
Speaking of Sansa, she's probably the closest thing I have to a one true character in ASOIAF, so I write and read about her a lot. There was an amazing prompt on the kink meme a while ago, for a canon era fic where Sansa was a lesbian, but because of her upbringing and the world she lives in, she has no word for it, no frame of reference; and hot damn if I could figure out a way to do it properly I'd write it in a heartbeat. I do read a fair bit of Sansa/Margaery, which is probably the biggest f/f pairing in the fandom, interestingly enough I didn't ship them at all in the books, where I found it pretty evident that Margaery was using Sansa. Then came S3 of the show and brought with it Natalie Dormer and the impression, at least to me, that Margaery does genuinely want to help, and care for, and flirt with Sansa, just so long as it doesn't interfere with her own ambitions or the advancement of House Tyrell, and that's way more interesting to me. The scene with the rose and "some women like pretty girls" didn't hurt either.
Although the pairing I'm most desperate for, that fandom seems determined to deny me, is Sansa/Brienne; it's a the lady and her knight thing, bulletproof kink of mine, but only if the knight in question is a woman.
Now with Once Upon a Time I finally seem to have found myself in a fandom with a major femslash presence, which is nice, but also-- You know how I said when I was in Buffy fandom I didn't care for Buffy/Faith or Willow/Tara, going for the basically nonexistent Tara/Anya? I'm a bit like that with OUaT. I didn't get into Emma/Regina in S1 when everyone else did because I don't generally like adversary shipping, and now I can see it, I can so see it, and although it doesn't take much for a vid or a graphic to convince me of them, I am ridiculously fussy about fics. Like, I backbutton out of nine out of ten fics I try to read about them, but I keep trying because one day I'll find one that does them right, and that fic will be spectacular. I don't even know what "doing them right" is; but I have a feeling it would involve a lot less woobiefying of Regina, and framing of Snow as the enemy.
And I do like, more than like, Aurora/Mulan ; it's the princess and her knight thing again, and I really want to write fic for them, which I'm not writing for the same reason I think lots of other people aren't-- where do you even go after the aborted declaration of love|pregnancy scene?
But the pairing I fell super hard for was Ruby/Belle which was basically sunk by Ruby's actress not being on the show anymore, and the decision to retcon Rumple/Belle into something cotton candy sweet and fluffy. It's frustrating; Rumple/Belle could have been super-interesting, if not my shipping bag of chips, but the more they deny that there's anything dark or creepy about them, the more I want Belle far away from him. I always wanted a fic where Ruby was Belle's beast instead. Of course I did; bring me all the lesbian fairytales! They played into my friends to lovers kink as well. Speaking of, somebody's going to tell me when Regina/Tink becomes a thing, right?
According to the AO3 I have both written and bookmarked the most femslash in the Merlin fandom. Which is interesting, if only for the fact that that you have to really hate yourself to be a Merlin femslasher.
I think Gwen/Morgana is the pairing I have written the most of in any fandom, and although I am slightly loath to admit it, in that case it was a one true character thing. As we discussed a couple of days ago, I am a mite obsessed with Morgana; I loved Morgana, I thought she was gay and wanted to ship her, and Gwen was the only other woman on the show. I would have argued there was a little more to it at the time, but in retrospect-- that was a good eighty-five percent of it. Especially as my interest in Merlin femslash (well, all Merlin fic, really) drops like a stone as soon as Morgana isn't involved. And that I subsequently shipped Morgana with every woman who came into her general vicinity; including Morgause, who may or may not have been her sister depending on your headcanon, the degree of AU, and assorted writing inconsistencies.
But my favourite, favourite was Morgana/Vivian. So, Vivian was a one episode guest star in series... two? And she and Arthur are cursed to obsessively love each other, and by the end of the episode Arthur's been saved, and Vivian's left under the spell (forever, I guess), and I hated that. I became fascinated by the idea that Morgana could somehow be the one to lift the spell from Vivian. I have this recurring theme in all my fics and fandoms about women somehow reclaiming agency that's been taken from them; but, you know, with humour and occasional dragons. Anyway, Morgana/Vivian, which I sort of have to take the blame for, because by virtue of my writing a few fics and never shutting the fuck up about them, they briefly became a thing in fandom, someone even wrote a really awesome big bang fic about them. That aside, Morgana/Vivian is a pretty good example of my fondness for super-rare femslash pairings that don't really exist outside my head. I actually still have a lot of fond feelings and nostalgia for that pairing, and I keep thinking I should revisit them once more; I think they'd be good in a modern AU, I have this image of them making out in the limo at Arthur and Gwen's wedding, partly because it's the only way to lift the spell from Vivian, but mostly because if Arthur's going to marry Gwen, Morgana is damn well going to make out with a pretty girl in something expensive that he's already paid for.
A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones is a fandom where I want more femslash. I mean, there's actually a pretty decent amount, and so much female character centric het and gen that I'm actually a pretty happy bunny, but I want more, and in the spirit of being the change you want to see, I endeavour to write a fair bit of it. I also do a lot of exchanges in that fandom, and I always put "any femslash, basically" in my sign-ups; which is how I come to write some slightly off the wall pairings like Arianne/Dany and Sansa/Myrcella. I actually enjoy writing those types of pairings because there's sometimes a moment when your brain just goes oh, something clicks, and it all makes sense; I had that when I wrote Sansa/Myrcella recently.
Speaking of Sansa, she's probably the closest thing I have to a one true character in ASOIAF, so I write and read about her a lot. There was an amazing prompt on the kink meme a while ago, for a canon era fic where Sansa was a lesbian, but because of her upbringing and the world she lives in, she has no word for it, no frame of reference; and hot damn if I could figure out a way to do it properly I'd write it in a heartbeat. I do read a fair bit of Sansa/Margaery, which is probably the biggest f/f pairing in the fandom, interestingly enough I didn't ship them at all in the books, where I found it pretty evident that Margaery was using Sansa. Then came S3 of the show and brought with it Natalie Dormer and the impression, at least to me, that Margaery does genuinely want to help, and care for, and flirt with Sansa, just so long as it doesn't interfere with her own ambitions or the advancement of House Tyrell, and that's way more interesting to me. The scene with the rose and "some women like pretty girls" didn't hurt either.
Although the pairing I'm most desperate for, that fandom seems determined to deny me, is Sansa/Brienne; it's a the lady and her knight thing, bulletproof kink of mine, but only if the knight in question is a woman.
Now with Once Upon a Time I finally seem to have found myself in a fandom with a major femslash presence, which is nice, but also-- You know how I said when I was in Buffy fandom I didn't care for Buffy/Faith or Willow/Tara, going for the basically nonexistent Tara/Anya? I'm a bit like that with OUaT. I didn't get into Emma/Regina in S1 when everyone else did because I don't generally like adversary shipping, and now I can see it, I can so see it, and although it doesn't take much for a vid or a graphic to convince me of them, I am ridiculously fussy about fics. Like, I backbutton out of nine out of ten fics I try to read about them, but I keep trying because one day I'll find one that does them right, and that fic will be spectacular. I don't even know what "doing them right" is; but I have a feeling it would involve a lot less woobiefying of Regina, and framing of Snow as the enemy.
And I do like, more than like, Aurora/Mulan ; it's the princess and her knight thing again, and I really want to write fic for them, which I'm not writing for the same reason I think lots of other people aren't-- where do you even go after the aborted declaration of love|pregnancy scene?
But the pairing I fell super hard for was Ruby/Belle which was basically sunk by Ruby's actress not being on the show anymore, and the decision to retcon Rumple/Belle into something cotton candy sweet and fluffy. It's frustrating; Rumple/Belle could have been super-interesting, if not my shipping bag of chips, but the more they deny that there's anything dark or creepy about them, the more I want Belle far away from him. I always wanted a fic where Ruby was Belle's beast instead. Of course I did; bring me all the lesbian fairytales! They played into my friends to lovers kink as well. Speaking of, somebody's going to tell me when Regina/Tink becomes a thing, right?
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 04:17 am (UTC)This is how I ended up on the femex pinch hit list twice.I'm glad you found OUAT where the femslash flows freely.no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 08:07 pm (UTC)Still, OUAT now, where the femslash flows freely, if not always to my preferred pairings or kinks. Can't have everything, I guess.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 04:25 am (UTC)so aside from the lady/lady-knight kink, do you think you gravitate more toward a one true character and then femslash them with different women? or are you drawn to certain types of relationships? i mean, i think it's probably both for me.
as an aside, i was reading student research papers today and one of my students was writing about how this one female battlefield nurse discovered one of her soldier-patients was actually a woman. that gave me all the femslash feels. maybe next semester, i should just ask my students to write me historical real person femslash instead of research papers...
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 08:55 pm (UTC)Then-- and this is a horrible thing to say, I wonder if it isn't partly that Brienne isn't the femme, conventionally attractive character that we're usually presented with? You don't get a lot of butch-femme stuff in femslash that I've noticed, at least not unless it's soft soft butch.
so aside from the lady/lady-knight kink, do you think you gravitate more toward a one true character and then femslash them with different women? or are you drawn to certain types of relationships?
A bit of both, really, depending on the fandom. Like in Merlin, if doesn't involve Morgana I'm not interested. In Once Upon a Time my one true character is Regina, but most of the femslash pairs her with Emma, and so much of that does so little for me, and Ruby/Belle hits so many of my ship kinks (friends to lovers, I will go for this over adversary pairings every time; lesbian fairytales, beauty and the beast, ftw; escaping a slightly sketchy narrative into the arms of another woman; you can even get a little bit of my lady-knight stuff in there if you squint, what with pseudo mediaeval fairytale land, Belle's desire to be a hero, and Ruby's werewolf issues.)
ASOIAF is slightly different, because I do want to ship Sansa with all the ladies, of course; Margaery, Dany, Brienne, Asha, Mya... bring it on. But there are also loads of pairings that don't involve her at all that I want. Asha Greyjoy/Alysanne Mormont huddling for warmth in the northern winter, Dany/Melisande AUs where Mel thinks the prophecies apply to Dany, Lyanna Stark/Elia Martell because who even needed Rhaegar...
maybe next semester, i should just ask my students to write me historical real person femslash instead of research papers...
I think this is an excellent idea*.
*note: this does not mean that it is, in fact, an excellent idea.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-14 05:00 am (UTC)hmm, you may be onto something there. of course, one of the reasons i love Brienne in either het or femslash is because she's a masculine woman. it also makes you wonder who is writing femslash- because butch/femme and (actually more common) transman/femme is alive and well in the circles i run in.
a Dany/Melisandre AU...be still my heart. actually still holding out hope that Melisandre will swoon at the sight of Dany and her dragons. because as we've learned, Melisandre knows fuck all about prophecy.
well, i might assign a "creative project" option next semester instead of the traditional research paper. who knows what that might produce...
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 03:45 pm (UTC)Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I still think Belle/Rumple isn't intended to be fluffy.
Fingers crossed about Regina/Tink.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 09:07 pm (UTC)I would like to read more OUAT fic than I do-- some of the characterisations, I'm definitely not watching the same show as some of these writers. On the other hand, perseverance has dug out some total gems.
Fingers crossed about Regina/Tink.
Fingers and toes.