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shapinglightto misquote Joyce from School Hard, and with further mention of various thoughts I've had during my BtVS rewatch.
And I would've put all of that in the title of my post, but LJ wouldn't let me.
Anyway, yes. I'm supposed to be writing something for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
seasonal_spuffy at the beginning of May, but have no ideas whatsoever. I suppose I should ask for prompts. Prompts, anyone?
I'm wondering when it was I became primarily a Spuffy writer (which has sort of happened by default, must admit, because even before the Buffy comics stomped all over the very idea, I didn't think Buffy meant the ILY in Chosen - not that she has to have meant it for people to be able to write Spuffy, but still...).
I think it must be down tosb_fag_ends as much as anything. I try (though I failed miserably last year) to produce at least one drabble or ficlet for the comm every month, and my fic ideas are so thin on the ground now that I don't have any left over for seasonal_spuffy.
:Gloom:
It's not just something forseasonal_spuffy I'm struggling with writing either. I had every intention of getting on with my abandoned Spangel story while S was away last weekend, but ended up writing a measly 1500 words that didn't advance the plot much at all.
I started the story in 2007 (I think). The part I'd already written had some bits and pieces of slashy stuff in it. I think I'm probably going to have to remove them wholesale.
This is because I'm finding it very difficult to even entertain the idea of Spangel these days, thanks to the comics showing the relationship between Spike and Angel as nine parts raging hatred and one part gay panic (on both their parts, but especially Spike's), not to mention when re-watching the Spike/Angel interaction in BtVS season 2 I couldn't for the life of me see where the dynamic between them, as so often written in old slash fics, ever came from in the first place.
There aren't many of the old slash writers around these days, and the ones that are're probably not on my flist, but if anyone has an opinion on the subject I would be quite interested to know what they think that dynamic was based on back in the day (you know, the sire/childe stuff, which I freely admit to enjoying a lot at one time, not to mention writing it myself). Was it based solely on the fact that Spike originally said Angel was his sire and people just took that and ran with it, and then people read their stories and a huge body of fanon developed which lots of people confused with canon, or what?
Returning to the subject of me not being able to write anything, sadly, much though I'd like to put it down to disillusionment with fanon tropes, I'm afraid it's far more down to me just being out of ideas. I can't work out how the plot of this Spangel fic should go forward to the end I envisaged for it (at least I do have an end envisaged), and generally writing is just all hard and stuff and makes my brain hurt. :(
:More gloom:
And I would've put all of that in the title of my post, but LJ wouldn't let me.
Anyway, yes. I'm supposed to be writing something for
seasonal_spuffy at the beginning of May, but have no ideas whatsoever. I suppose I should ask for prompts. Prompts, anyone?I'm wondering when it was I became primarily a Spuffy writer (which has sort of happened by default, must admit, because even before the Buffy comics stomped all over the very idea, I didn't think Buffy meant the ILY in Chosen - not that she has to have meant it for people to be able to write Spuffy, but still...).
I think it must be down to
sb_fag_ends as much as anything. I try (though I failed miserably last year) to produce at least one drabble or ficlet for the comm every month, and my fic ideas are so thin on the ground now that I don't have any left over for seasonal_spuffy. :Gloom:
It's not just something for
seasonal_spuffy I'm struggling with writing either. I had every intention of getting on with my abandoned Spangel story while S was away last weekend, but ended up writing a measly 1500 words that didn't advance the plot much at all. I started the story in 2007 (I think). The part I'd already written had some bits and pieces of slashy stuff in it. I think I'm probably going to have to remove them wholesale.
This is because I'm finding it very difficult to even entertain the idea of Spangel these days, thanks to the comics showing the relationship between Spike and Angel as nine parts raging hatred and one part gay panic (on both their parts, but especially Spike's), not to mention when re-watching the Spike/Angel interaction in BtVS season 2 I couldn't for the life of me see where the dynamic between them, as so often written in old slash fics, ever came from in the first place.
There aren't many of the old slash writers around these days, and the ones that are're probably not on my flist, but if anyone has an opinion on the subject I would be quite interested to know what they think that dynamic was based on back in the day (you know, the sire/childe stuff, which I freely admit to enjoying a lot at one time, not to mention writing it myself). Was it based solely on the fact that Spike originally said Angel was his sire and people just took that and ran with it, and then people read their stories and a huge body of fanon developed which lots of people confused with canon, or what?
Returning to the subject of me not being able to write anything, sadly, much though I'd like to put it down to disillusionment with fanon tropes, I'm afraid it's far more down to me just being out of ideas. I can't work out how the plot of this Spangel fic should go forward to the end I envisaged for it (at least I do have an end envisaged), and generally writing is just all hard and stuff and makes my brain hurt. :(
:More gloom:
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Re: The Spangel Bit
Date: 2015-03-30 09:06 pm (UTC)I absolutely agree with this assessment. I mean, Angel is very paternalistic, in general, but his relationship with Spike seems more fraternal, for better or worse.
FWIW, one of the things I find so fascinating about Spike/Dru is the way their relationship blurs the usual categories: they are playmates, brother and sister, mother and son, caretaker and infirm delicate flower, high priestess and her interpreter, AND twisted chivalric knight and lady. I think vampiric families can be interpreted to have all sorts of permutations, and part of what makes them interesting is that they don't have to be any one thing. Angel and Spike can have a relationship that includes whatever elements suit them: comrades at arms, squabbling brothers, romantic rivals, uneasy relatives, or — which works best for me — the only two of their kind.
Darla and Angelus put up with William because he kept Dru occupied
Yes, this is a fun way of looking at the dynamic. BUT. If Dru is such a pain, why keep her around, either? Seems to me that both Spike and Dru are relatively expendable from the viewpoint of Angelus and Darla. We never see them making good use of Dru's psychic abilities in the flashbacks, for instance. Spike's pugnaciousness and Dru's disconnection from reality have got to create problems for them. And we've seen both Darla and Angelus be dismissive of other vampires and gleeful about staking them. So why don't they just cut their losses with Spike and Dru? Without fanfic, we'll never know. ;-)
Re: The Spangel Bit
Date: 2015-03-31 02:31 pm (UTC)But I'm sure there were other reasons too. I guessed at some of them in this very old post, which I still mainly agree with. They are a family of sorts, to be sure, but a very dysfunctional one where the members get as much pleasure out of tormenting/annoying each other as they do out of...well, pleasure.