Self Promo Meme Day 4
Jul. 26th, 2014 05:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
netgirl_y2kMeme was interrupted by the unusually clement weather, and the suspension of all activity that was not sitting in the sunshine, drinking variously flavoured ciders, and reading. Apricot cider is awesome; berry cider tastes like alcoholic ribena, and not in the good way. The Goblin Emperor was excellent; The Republic of Thieves less so.
I have not been keeping up with the news coming out of comic-con, because tumblr is the best source for it, and there's only so much infinite scroll that my ageing laptop can cope with. On the plus side, this is a marvellous mechanism for preventing tumblr from becoming too much of a time-suck. But I did see the casting news for S5 of Game of Thrones. Alexander Siddig as Doran Martell is awesome, and a thousand fancasts come to life. I am bummed, but somehow not surprised, that we don't seem to be getting an Arianne. On the one hand, I like Arianne, and I think that she's important to the narrative, but I know there are people who think Victarion Greyjoy is an interesting and narratively important character, and I think those people are wrong. But it feels churlish to bitch just because it's a character I happen to like that's being omitted this time. On the other hand, I suspect that with Arianne we'll also lose any hint that things are different for women in Dorne, and that actually disappoints me more.
Day 4. Something you made just for yourself
Here Be Dragons (Merlin/Temeraire; Morgana, Aithusa)
This is quite possibly the most self-indulgent thing I have ever written, with an intended audience of... well, me. And on that level, at least, it works.
Temeraire, I love the set-up and the world-building; I could live without the slightly forced world travel, and from book to book the plots do very little for me... but that's more than made up for by: holy cow, regency dragons! Merlin, the world building would have had to work a bit harder to be considered half-arsed, and I could have cheerfully lived without Merlin himself; but for lizard brain reasons I adored Morgana. And I was fascinated by Aithusa -- I mean, this wee baby dragon that was supposed to be a good omen for Merlin and Arthur saved Morgana's life, and became the only thing in the world that Morgana openly cared for. On a Doylist level I get that it was because the showrunners didn't know what to do with Aithusa after introducing it, and the CGI cost more than they'd thought; but on a Watsonian level-- it was fascinating.
One of the things that I wished got more time in the Temeraire novels is that there are certain dragons that will only accept female companions, and I made use of that in order to write a scene where Merlin tries to harness Aithusa, and she's just clinging to Morgana's leg going not enough nope in the world, which I justified by saying, well, that's more or less what happened in canon. Merlin's not a bad guy in this fic (although he and Morgana take against each other at once) and he ends up as Kilgaarah's captain; because there's a difference between I don't like this character and don't want to waste words on him, or even I have issues with this character that I would like to see explored more in fic, and character bashing. On the rare occasions I write Merlin I go out of my way to be fair to him, because christ on a cracker I hate that guy!
Aside from dragons, my other favourite thing are lesbians. So, yeah, Morgana is gay here. Partly because I don't think that she was straight in canon. And partly because as incoherent as Morgana's characterisation was a lot of the time, one of the defining things about her is that she has a secret, and she's afraid of the consequences should it come out. And in a world without magic - lesbianism, then.
Morgana develops a crush on Elena. Usually when I want Morgana to have a female love interest I use Vivian (there's too much baggage with Gwen, and I have rarely wanted to reach through my television and fix something so much as I did the end of Sweet Dreams.) Nothing happens between them. When I was writing this I was on a kick of wanting stories about gay characters who don't end up in relationships. Not the tragic queer cliche, no. But sometimes you're gay, and it's an important part of your identity, and you notice women's attractiveness; but you've also recently been conscripted into the dragon arm of the regency era armed forces (or, y'know, whatever...) and priorities.
Anyway, writing shamless self-indulgent id-fic is good for the soul, I think.
I have not been keeping up with the news coming out of comic-con, because tumblr is the best source for it, and there's only so much infinite scroll that my ageing laptop can cope with. On the plus side, this is a marvellous mechanism for preventing tumblr from becoming too much of a time-suck. But I did see the casting news for S5 of Game of Thrones. Alexander Siddig as Doran Martell is awesome, and a thousand fancasts come to life. I am bummed, but somehow not surprised, that we don't seem to be getting an Arianne. On the one hand, I like Arianne, and I think that she's important to the narrative, but I know there are people who think Victarion Greyjoy is an interesting and narratively important character, and I think those people are wrong. But it feels churlish to bitch just because it's a character I happen to like that's being omitted this time. On the other hand, I suspect that with Arianne we'll also lose any hint that things are different for women in Dorne, and that actually disappoints me more.
Day 4. Something you made just for yourself
Here Be Dragons (Merlin/Temeraire; Morgana, Aithusa)
This is quite possibly the most self-indulgent thing I have ever written, with an intended audience of... well, me. And on that level, at least, it works.
Temeraire, I love the set-up and the world-building; I could live without the slightly forced world travel, and from book to book the plots do very little for me... but that's more than made up for by: holy cow, regency dragons! Merlin, the world building would have had to work a bit harder to be considered half-arsed, and I could have cheerfully lived without Merlin himself; but for lizard brain reasons I adored Morgana. And I was fascinated by Aithusa -- I mean, this wee baby dragon that was supposed to be a good omen for Merlin and Arthur saved Morgana's life, and became the only thing in the world that Morgana openly cared for. On a Doylist level I get that it was because the showrunners didn't know what to do with Aithusa after introducing it, and the CGI cost more than they'd thought; but on a Watsonian level-- it was fascinating.
One of the things that I wished got more time in the Temeraire novels is that there are certain dragons that will only accept female companions, and I made use of that in order to write a scene where Merlin tries to harness Aithusa, and she's just clinging to Morgana's leg going not enough nope in the world, which I justified by saying, well, that's more or less what happened in canon. Merlin's not a bad guy in this fic (although he and Morgana take against each other at once) and he ends up as Kilgaarah's captain; because there's a difference between I don't like this character and don't want to waste words on him, or even I have issues with this character that I would like to see explored more in fic, and character bashing. On the rare occasions I write Merlin I go out of my way to be fair to him, because christ on a cracker I hate that guy!
Aside from dragons, my other favourite thing are lesbians. So, yeah, Morgana is gay here. Partly because I don't think that she was straight in canon. And partly because as incoherent as Morgana's characterisation was a lot of the time, one of the defining things about her is that she has a secret, and she's afraid of the consequences should it come out. And in a world without magic - lesbianism, then.
Morgana develops a crush on Elena. Usually when I want Morgana to have a female love interest I use Vivian (there's too much baggage with Gwen, and I have rarely wanted to reach through my television and fix something so much as I did the end of Sweet Dreams.) Nothing happens between them. When I was writing this I was on a kick of wanting stories about gay characters who don't end up in relationships. Not the tragic queer cliche, no. But sometimes you're gay, and it's an important part of your identity, and you notice women's attractiveness; but you've also recently been conscripted into the dragon arm of the regency era armed forces (or, y'know, whatever...) and priorities.
Anyway, writing shamless self-indulgent id-fic is good for the soul, I think.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-27 05:37 pm (UTC)Honestly, I don't know how Doran's machinations work without Arianne and Quentyn. Unless Quentyn is just going to be offscreen to be introduced and baked to a crisp the following season.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-28 03:01 pm (UTC)I don't know, I feel like with the growing discontent about the show, we're talking about the books like they're better about things like female characters and sexual violence than they really are. So, I don't know.
Oh! Brief rant about Margaery! It sort of got lost in amongst all the other things about S4 that bugged me more, but I hated that they retconned Margaery knowing about the plot to kill Joffrey. Yes, she has ambition and sexual agency, but she had a brain too, dammit!
I wonder if perhaps they're rolling all the Martell children into Trystane? Like, if he'll have Arianne's role in the queenmaker plot, and then be shipped off to Essos to meet Dany in place of Quentyn? Although fuck knows what they'll do with Dany in the interim.