Spangel Ficcish/fanon trope/Buffy comics navel gazing.

[shapinglight]

This sort of post (ie. where people talked about their own fics) were quite common back in the day, now not so much. But whatever. I was bored at work yesterday and this was the result. Also, I'm procrastinating about starting the next story in my Spike/Giles season 7 series.

Recently, someone was kind enough to read my 2006 fic (boy, that long ago!) Vampire Winter, and leave feedback. When answering their comment, I got sucked into re-reading the story myself.



I've been meaning to re-read it for a while, actually, because I think I should try to put some of my better fics up on Ao3, and at the time people seemed to like Vampire Winter so it's a possible candidate.

I held off the re-read, though, because I was sure I would find the story highly embarrassing now -badly written, full of amateurish mistakes, telling rather than showing, etc, etc. My writing style has changed a little since then, I think (hopefully got better, but who knows? I am still an amateur, after all). In actual fact, the re-read wasn't too painful. The word 'however' was overused (as it is in a lot of my early fics), but not to the point where it was driving me crazy.

The character voices were all right too, in particular Angel and Spike. It was my first ever attempt to write from Buffy's POV, and - yes, I can see my Buffy's not show Buffy. On the other hand, I don't think she's an impossible extrapolation of show Buffy.

What did strike me very forcibly, though, is that I wrote a Bangel fic. At the time, I didn't intend to. I meant to write a Spuffel fic (to use the convenient shorthand), without the threesome sex (which I could never imagine happening). In other words, Buffy was meant to be in love with both vampires. But I can see I failed to produce that. Buffy in the story loves both vampires, but is only in love with Angel. In the story, that doesn't actually matter too much because Spike and Angel are also in love with each other, though neither of them would ever admit it.

Where was I going with this? Oh yes.

A lot of time - and a lot of very bad comics - have passed since then. The very bad comics have led me to think that my description of Buffy's feelings for Spike in Vampire Winter were over generous, and my description of Spike's and Angel's feelings for each other downright risible.

Fine, it's fanfic. It doesn't have to pay any attention to the stupid comics and can, if it wants, stick with the long-established Spangel fic fanon tropes, which mostly involve seeing a familial connection of some variety or other between Angel and Spike, which leads at some point to some serious shagging. When AtS ended, for me at least, those tropes still worked pretty well. Okay, I knew that wasn't quite what I was seeing on screen, but again, it wasn't an impossible extrapolation.

Now, though, it kind of is? Leaving aside the IDW Angel comics, which are closer in feel to AtS, I think (please note I'm not saying they're better comics, just that - perhaps because Joss wasn't really involved with them - they stuck closely to established models), it's clear from what little interaction Spike and Angel have had up to now in the Buffy comics, and despite that Joss-penned Always Darkest web comic - which now I think of it, takes a similar premise to Vampire Winter (Angel and Spike are more interested in each other than they are in Buffy) and turns it into a nightmare - Joss sees them as mainly love-rivals for Buffy and the only real connection between them is that they're both vampires with souls.

They aren't family at all.

So anyway, to get back to Vampire Winter, I found the bits of it I didn't like weren't that it was badly written (it was fine, really), or that it was a Bangel fic (I haven't read much Bangel fic, but I think I wrote the 'ship okay), but more that it expects you to believe something about Spike and Angel that I just don't believe any more myself.

A pity.

Could explain, though, how when I wrote something for rekindlespangel recently, I had to set it one thousand years in the future.

Thoughts? And not specifically about Vampire Winter or the rotten old comics, and how they can spoil perfectly good fanfic tropes for some people (ie. me), but more along the lines of, are there any fanfic tropes you used to love, but which now tend to make you cringe when you come across them in other people's work? And if so, why the change?

Comments

[kikimay]

I think it's pretty normal to change opinions and I also went through the same process with my fanfics. I also started with a very close-family like relationship between Angel and Spike and, rewatching all the series and re-analyzing things, I just think it was mostly fanon-influenced than actually canon. Funny enough, I think I'm more Spuffy now than years ago, when the Spuffy was a "main ship" in the Buffyverse. I guess it's understandable.

[sueworld2003.livejournal.com]

I haven't got much original to say about this except can I say I adored Vampire Winter. The last few lines always makes me tear up.

[beer-good-foamy.livejournal.com]

I get what you're saying. I found myself unable to write Angel for years after the comics started going off the rails bigtime - not necessarily because I thought his character[assassin]isation there made sense, but more because I knew my readers would be aware of it, and would be aware that I would be aware of it, which meant I was aware that they were aware that I was aware etc and there's no way to write fic that wouldn't in some way be read in light of the comics. And that is tricky.

That said, I want to think that happens in the comics stays in the comics. Whatever Joss' (or, by this point, Scott Allie's) opinion of the characters is now, almost 10 years after the series ended, shouldn't have any bearing on what happened in the series and how one reads it. Though it is hard to ignore the elephant in the room.

As for your question... hmmm. When I look back at my earliest fics, I don't think there's any tropes that I've completely abandoned, but I'm more aware that they are tropes by now, for better or worse. There's some early stuff that makes me cringe because of how seriously it takes itself - not that I have a problem with serious fic, but if you (general you) are going to use a standard plot, you need to justify why the story falls into a standard plot. Otherwise it just feels a bit lazy and dishonest - "This is my hurt/comfort fic", "This is my wish fulfillment fic", "This is my And Then They Had Sex fic", "This is my grief fic", etc. If people have already read that particular trope 5,000 times already, you need to bring something slightly fresh to the table if you're going to ask them to take it seriously.

[infinitewhale.livejournal.com]

but more that it expects you to believe something about Spike and Angel that I just don't believe any more myself.

For me, I think it's not so much that it isn't there (though I do think it got exaggerated by fandom), but that it's one of many things the writers of the comics just disregarded because it didn't fit the story they were ass-pulling. It's not even confined to ships. I really can't take the Angel-Connor storyline seriously if I take the comics into it. Same with Buffy-Dawn and the characterizations there-in.

I suppose that's why my desire to read fic and meta died with the comics. I lost the ability to believe the things I loved were as important to the author as they were to me.

[shapinglight]

Funny enough, I think I'm more Spuffy now than years ago, when the Spuffy was a "main ship" in the Buffyverse. I guess it's understandable.

I am too, and that, I'm afraid, is as a reaction to the comics. When the show ended, I was actually more of a Spangel 'shipper and found it much easier to face up to the fact that Buffy probably felt about the two vampires more the way she does in Vampire Winter than she does in exclusively Spuffy fics. I still don't believe she meant what she said in Chosen. Never have. On the other hand, I'm way more willing to pretend I do believe it and write fic that takes it as a given.

Hmm. The comics really have had a profound effect on me as a fic writer, haven't they? They've skewed my reading of the 'verse completely.

[shapinglight]

Thanks, Sue. It's certainly better on re-reading than I was expecting.

[shapinglight]

I found myself unable to write Angel for years after the comics started going off the rails bigtime -

Whereas I could only write him as a huge dick (or dickhead). But then you're a much better person than me. ;)

Whatever Joss' (or, by this point, Scott Allie's) opinion of the characters is now, almost 10 years after the series ended, shouldn't have any bearing on what happened in the series and how one reads it. Though it is hard to ignore the elephant in the room.

Yes, it's tricky - though of course always worth remembering that at this point, it is more Allie's opinion, (though, unlike us, his opinions are influenced by direct contact with Joss. Yeah, that's a big sticking point. I find myself thinking, is this really what Joss thought about so-and-so all the time? But it's so lame!)

To get back to my point, I find it easier to ignore the comics in terms of situations/events. Less easy to ignore when it comes to the relationships (not just romantic ones).

I don't think there's any tropes that I've completely abandoned, but I'm more aware that they are tropes by now, for better or worse.

I suppose I should say the same, since I still do occasionally write Spangel. But it's different to the way I used to write it. I struggle to make it believable even to myself.

If people have already read that particular trope 5,000 times already, you need to bring something slightly fresh to the table if you're going to ask them to take it seriously.

Yes, very well put.

[shapinglight]

For me, I think it's not so much that it isn't there (though I do think it got exaggerated by fandom), but that it's one of many things the writers of the comics just disregarded because it didn't fit the story they were ass-pulling.

Yes. As I say, I think writing Spangel the way a lot of fans used to write it was a stretch when the show was on, but it was a stretch you could cope with if you squinted a bit. Post-season 8 (I don't count season 9 because Joss just isn't involved any more), it's next to impossible. Basically, for it still to fly, you have to pretend the comics don't exist.

I'm sorry the comics ruined things for you that much. There are still some great fics and meta around. A lot of them do rely on ignorance of the comics, though.

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

Reading your post and the comments, it does sound like I was wise to avoid the comics completely. For me, canon ended with the end of AtS series 5 and I am happy with that.

[beer-good-foamy.livejournal.com]

Whereas I could only write him as a huge dick (or dickhead).

In fairness, I was already writing him like that a lot of the time. :) There's a reason I have a tag called "messwithangel". But there's a difference between "A guy who's a bit of a dick and takes himself too seriously, but honestly tries to do good" and "A moron who, at the slightest provocation, will commit mass murder in order to drive someone he loves to suicidal desperation and end the world". And it's hard to argue that the latter is out of character and then continue to write the former.

[shapinglight]

Yes, you're probably better off.

But not reading the comics doesn't mean you might not have changed your mind about some fanon tropes over the years. Any thoughts on that?

[shapinglight]

But there's a difference between "A guy who's a bit of a dick and takes himself too seriously, but honestly tries to do good" and "A moron who, at the slightest provocation, will commit mass murder in order to drive someone he loves to suicidal desperation and end the world".

This is absolutely rolling on the floor hysterically funny. Or it would be if it weren't true.

Poor old Angel. What a hatchet job.

It's even worse because it's an inept, unintentional hatchet job.

[infinitewhale.livejournal.com]

There are still some great fics and meta around. A lot of them do rely on ignorance of the comics, though.

I still occasionally read meta. As for fic, I think it's tied to my answer to your question on tropes. I've found I've come to dislike ship-specific fics and fics where the basic story is how X and Y got together. Not anti-ship by any means, but I guess I've come to want Gen with a side of ship. Gen fic was hard to come by even back then, I dont' know about now.

[kathyh]

I loved "Vampire Winter". Not just the relationships but the whole atmosphere of it really worked for me.

I'm afraid I'm like infinitewhale in that the comics twisted the characters so much that I no longer felt I knew them and the wish to read fic about them started to die. I stopped reading the comics, but now quite quickly enough.

[shapinglight]

As for fic, I think it's tied to my answer to your question on tropes. I've found I've come to dislike ship-specific fics and fics where the basic story is how X and Y got together. Not anti-ship by any means, but I guess I've come to want Gen with a side of ship. Gen fic was hard to come by even back then, I dont' know about now.

Very good comment.

I do feel somewhat the same way myself these days, in that I'm not much interested in how X and Y got together fics either. I like stories where the 'ships are part of something bigger.

That is, if we're talking long, plotty stories. The X loves Y stuff works fine for short things.

I think purely gen fic is still relatively rare. I suspect that's true in all fandoms.

[kikimay]

I never doubt about what she said in Chosen XD I really felt what the scene was supposed to show - according to Whedon, I guess. My Spangel side came from fandom and fanfic, and I still like it, it's just that now I'm really more for the Spuffy thing and I really wish to see an "happy ending" for them in the comics. Maybe it's just this stage of my life, I appreciate more the relationship between Spike and Buffy.

[shapinglight]

:(

That's so sad. I hadn't realised either of you felt that way.

Myself, I've had to hive off the having-read-the-comics part of me from the writes-fanfic part of me completely. Even then there's sometimes some cross contamination, which is usually when my evil twin writes something in which Angel is a massive dick (though has so far managed to resist writing anything in which Buffy is a blithering idiot).

[infinitewhale.livejournal.com]

My view is more that I knew the characters just fine, they're just not present in the comics. Some would argue that's an ego thing, but they've admitted to doing it even if it wasn't blatantly obvious.

[shapinglight]

I understand that POV. So it's not really the comics that have stopped you wanting to read fic, so much as the sorts of fics you want to read just aren't around.

[shapinglight]

I really felt what the scene was supposed to show - according to Whedon, I guess.

I wish I had. Even when it aired I didn't, though, and because of that I couldn't ever bring myself to listen to Joss's commentary.

With Spuffy in the comics, I'd settle for some sign that Spike really mattered to Buffy, or for some resonance of their history together. But I'm not getting any of that. Instead, we get the Scott Allie version of Spuffy, which is basically, Buffy never loved Spike (how could she after the AR, not that we're ever going to mention that because we have to pander to the fans), but instead treated him like cr*p, and he should find his balls and move on.

Oops! I really didn't mean this post to be more comics whinging. It's just when I start I can't seem to stop myself. ;)

[kikimay]

He, the comics make me upset. Personally I really felt the love in S7 and it's a pity all the interaction in the comics. Not mentioning that I loathe how they characterize Buffy and I don't like Jeanty for making her look like she's 14 or something ... ooops. Let's stop right here. I still have hope in a better future!

[infinitewhale.livejournal.com]

Yeah, kind of. It's like when Sue or someone polls whether the comics have affected your view of the shows. I always say no, but they've affected my view of Joss, which in turn affected my view of the shows. Too much banging around from the man behind the curtain, I guess.

Plus, yeah, the kind of fics that interest me now don't seem to be around and I lack talent to write my own. There's also the feeling that--at least around the time I quit, maybe things have changed--fics had more or less become fics of other fics instead of derivations of the show. The whole biting/claiming mini-kerfluffle, for instance.

[infinitewhale.livejournal.com]

Fics always seem to be one or the other.

[slaymesoftly.livejournal.com]

Not sure I can improve on your answer, so I may steal it quote you unless I come up with something better for me before I respond to the main post. :)

[felisblanco.livejournal.com]

The more I read about the comics the happier I am that I gave up on them on the first few issues. I don't care that they're Whedon approved, they feel less connected to the tv shows than badly written crack fic. I'd rather keep fond memories of the real thing.