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mark_asphodelI changed my mind. This is another installment of Part Two, When Pairings Eat a Fandom. It does not focus on Fire Emblem.
I’ve said it before, but there is no fandom pairing on earth that I’d be interesting in sustaining over the course of a “30 Kisses” challenge or an A-Z challenge. I’m just not into ‘shipping that much. Yeah, I like some pairings because I’m interested in characters and want to explore relationships that would be good for them (Alm/Cellica)... or bad for them (Marth/Nyna). Some go both ways (Innes/Vanessa and Innes/Eirika have their debatable points). The romance angle, or the power angle, or the sex angle, is a means of exploring the characters. If all I wanted was a rush of cute, I’d dig up some fan art.
Besides, IMO overemphasis on ‘shipping kills a fandom dead. At least it sure kills my interest.
A long time ago, in another era, there was a little corner of the ‘Net dedicated to a show about crime-fighting rodents. Disney rodents. The show in question was Chip and Dale’s Rescue Rangers, which for some reason had a remarkable mature fandom flourishing in the late 1990s-- a real case of “light canon, dark fandom,” which peaked in the multi-part epics of John Nowak and Jeff Wikstrom.
Part of the reason was that Gadget Hackwrench, the blonde mouse inventor in the purple jumpsuit and goggles, was a revelatory character for young fans in the early 1990s. Gadget was pretty and cute and smart and nice and wasn’t there just to be The Chick, and a lot of fans either crushed on her or wanted to be her. And I’m pretty sure those desires crossed gender lines. Also-- key thing here-- Gadget wasn’t a love interest. Sure, it was apparent that Chip and Dale both had a crush on her, and Gadget used this to her advantage at least once that I recall, but romance wasn’t a focus and Gadget never chose between them. She was a brainy girl without being a “nerdy” one, an attractive girl without being a sex object... damn, she was just about perfect.
So, when fandom took off, a lot of people couldn’t resist going where canon feared to tread. It was the great dividing line of the CNDRR fandom-- did you ship Gadget with Chip or with Dale? With the sharp and aggressive-- but arguably better-looking-- leader/hero, or with the dippy, amiable, and rather less violence-prone sidekick? I supported Chip/Gadget (I’ll take “smart and ambitious” over “lazy slacker” any day, thanks), but I’d read the Dale/Gadget stuff now and again, and to be honest I wasn’t even bothered when people paired Gadget with Sparky the Lab Rat. (I drew the line with OCs and with escapees from NIHM, though.) And I was absolutely happy with tales that stayed within the bounds of canon and didn’t pair Gadget with anyone.
But the issue didn’t go away. Most of the “serious” writers, like the above-mentioned Messrs. Nowak and Wikstrom (and Matt Plotecher, and Michael Demcio) skewed towards Chip/Gadget. On the opposite side was this female writer who hated Chip and constructed this whole ‘fic universe where Gadget was into theatre and everyone was vaguely Wiccan and eventually Gadget hooked up with this female OC and they were arty lesbians together. I’m dead serious... some of the ‘fics in that series were really excellent but eventually the whole project broke my suspension of disbelief so hard--
*Cough*
Moving on.
I don’t know when or where it happened, but at some point, someone wrote a story involving a one-shot character named Foxglove, a little pink bat who had a crush on Dale in one episode. One. And somehow, the concept that Foxglove was “just right” for Dale caught on. Chip/Gadget fans were happy to embrace it as an easy way of solving the ‘shipping issue-- if Dale was happy with his Foxy, there wasn’t any need for hard feelings about Gadget. And most Dale fans took up the pink banner. First you had genfic with Foxglove in the background, then Chip/Gadget stories with Dale/Foxglove in the background, and then suddenly all this Dale/Foxglove stuff standing by itself. Epics dedicated to it. Websites dedicated to it. When Deborah Walley, Foxglove’s VA, fell ill, there was a letter-writing campaign or some other show of fan support for her.
That little pink bat sucked the life right out of fandom, I’ll tell you. I didn’t even much like or remember the one episode she was in, and suddenly she’s the Sixth Ranger and living at Ranger HQ and all the rest of it. And since it was a nicey-nicey fandom, telling someone who'd just published a 32-chapter bilingual Dale/Foxglove epic complete with art and musical numbers that they were off-base just wasn't cricket.
[I am not making this up. The story in question was "The Death of a Comedian" by The J.A.M.]
Apparently the irony of foxglove being a lethal poison was lost on everyone. If I'd been older, bolder, and more confrontational, I'd have retaliated with some stories about Chip and Tammy the Squirrel, but as it was... I just moved on. There just wasn't much left for a fan unwilling to drink the pink Kool-Aid.
Whew. That was good to get off my chest after ten long years. Next time we'll cover Part III: Canon, What Canon?
I’ve said it before, but there is no fandom pairing on earth that I’d be interesting in sustaining over the course of a “30 Kisses” challenge or an A-Z challenge. I’m just not into ‘shipping that much. Yeah, I like some pairings because I’m interested in characters and want to explore relationships that would be good for them (Alm/Cellica)... or bad for them (Marth/Nyna). Some go both ways (Innes/Vanessa and Innes/Eirika have their debatable points). The romance angle, or the power angle, or the sex angle, is a means of exploring the characters. If all I wanted was a rush of cute, I’d dig up some fan art.
Besides, IMO overemphasis on ‘shipping kills a fandom dead. At least it sure kills my interest.
A long time ago, in another era, there was a little corner of the ‘Net dedicated to a show about crime-fighting rodents. Disney rodents. The show in question was Chip and Dale’s Rescue Rangers, which for some reason had a remarkable mature fandom flourishing in the late 1990s-- a real case of “light canon, dark fandom,” which peaked in the multi-part epics of John Nowak and Jeff Wikstrom.
Part of the reason was that Gadget Hackwrench, the blonde mouse inventor in the purple jumpsuit and goggles, was a revelatory character for young fans in the early 1990s. Gadget was pretty and cute and smart and nice and wasn’t there just to be The Chick, and a lot of fans either crushed on her or wanted to be her. And I’m pretty sure those desires crossed gender lines. Also-- key thing here-- Gadget wasn’t a love interest. Sure, it was apparent that Chip and Dale both had a crush on her, and Gadget used this to her advantage at least once that I recall, but romance wasn’t a focus and Gadget never chose between them. She was a brainy girl without being a “nerdy” one, an attractive girl without being a sex object... damn, she was just about perfect.
So, when fandom took off, a lot of people couldn’t resist going where canon feared to tread. It was the great dividing line of the CNDRR fandom-- did you ship Gadget with Chip or with Dale? With the sharp and aggressive-- but arguably better-looking-- leader/hero, or with the dippy, amiable, and rather less violence-prone sidekick? I supported Chip/Gadget (I’ll take “smart and ambitious” over “lazy slacker” any day, thanks), but I’d read the Dale/Gadget stuff now and again, and to be honest I wasn’t even bothered when people paired Gadget with Sparky the Lab Rat. (I drew the line with OCs and with escapees from NIHM, though.) And I was absolutely happy with tales that stayed within the bounds of canon and didn’t pair Gadget with anyone.
But the issue didn’t go away. Most of the “serious” writers, like the above-mentioned Messrs. Nowak and Wikstrom (and Matt Plotecher, and Michael Demcio) skewed towards Chip/Gadget. On the opposite side was this female writer who hated Chip and constructed this whole ‘fic universe where Gadget was into theatre and everyone was vaguely Wiccan and eventually Gadget hooked up with this female OC and they were arty lesbians together. I’m dead serious... some of the ‘fics in that series were really excellent but eventually the whole project broke my suspension of disbelief so hard--
*Cough*
Moving on.
I don’t know when or where it happened, but at some point, someone wrote a story involving a one-shot character named Foxglove, a little pink bat who had a crush on Dale in one episode. One. And somehow, the concept that Foxglove was “just right” for Dale caught on. Chip/Gadget fans were happy to embrace it as an easy way of solving the ‘shipping issue-- if Dale was happy with his Foxy, there wasn’t any need for hard feelings about Gadget. And most Dale fans took up the pink banner. First you had genfic with Foxglove in the background, then Chip/Gadget stories with Dale/Foxglove in the background, and then suddenly all this Dale/Foxglove stuff standing by itself. Epics dedicated to it. Websites dedicated to it. When Deborah Walley, Foxglove’s VA, fell ill, there was a letter-writing campaign or some other show of fan support for her.
That little pink bat sucked the life right out of fandom, I’ll tell you. I didn’t even much like or remember the one episode she was in, and suddenly she’s the Sixth Ranger and living at Ranger HQ and all the rest of it. And since it was a nicey-nicey fandom, telling someone who'd just published a 32-chapter bilingual Dale/Foxglove epic complete with art and musical numbers that they were off-base just wasn't cricket.
[I am not making this up. The story in question was "The Death of a Comedian" by The J.A.M.]
Apparently the irony of foxglove being a lethal poison was lost on everyone. If I'd been older, bolder, and more confrontational, I'd have retaliated with some stories about Chip and Tammy the Squirrel, but as it was... I just moved on. There just wasn't much left for a fan unwilling to drink the pink Kool-Aid.
Whew. That was good to get off my chest after ten long years. Next time we'll cover Part III: Canon, What Canon?
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no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 10:54 pm (UTC)Double you. Tee. Eff.
(Yay for a rant about Rescue Rangers! Childhood fandoms represent. ♥)
The thing about shipping is...in the right hands it's just another aspect of fandom, but in the wrong hands it's a bomb waiting to go off and make a mess of things. And unfortunately, fandoms tend to have more wrong hands than right hands. I firmly believe that Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom would be at least 50% less explosive if there was no shipping involved at all, in fanon OR canon.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:07 pm (UTC)But the way the fans tear each other's heads off about who-gets-with-who is just stupid. It's always stupid. Maybe I OTP A/B, but I don't give a shit if someone else OTPs A/C, A/D, or whatever strikes their fancy. You know, the ol' leave me to my devices, I'll leave you to yours? Live and let live? Et cetera?
I never understood why there were those big ship wars, even in FE fandom. Like, why would anyone stand up and say [pairing here] is stupid, or less canon than another pairing, or better than another pairing? What does that get anybody? :/
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:18 pm (UTC)But the way the fans tear each other's heads off about who-gets-with-who is just stupid. It's always stupid. Maybe I OTP A/B, but I don't give a shit if someone else OTPs A/C, A/D, or whatever strikes their fancy. You know, the ol' leave me to my devices, I'll leave you to yours? Live and let live? Et cetera?
That just seems to be too hard a concept for most of fandom to grasp. :( I wish it wasn't so.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:09 pm (UTC)The "Mooncrystal" series by Meghan Brunner. Good writer, good artist, but MAN did she ever have an axe to grind.
Yay for a rant about Rescue Rangers
Yeah, I bet nobody saw that one coming. :)
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:17 pm (UTC)I admit to having a soft spot for femslash about some childhood cartoons, but not if it involves character bashing.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:39 pm (UTC)To her credit, she mostly kept the Chip hate out of the actual stories up until...uh, "Rainbow's Gold," I think it was. But she was very frank about it on the message boards and I found her extremely weird. I mean, wanting to write stories where Gadget gets physically disfigured to "prove" Chip's interest in her is entirely shallow? Uh...
She also used the term "seawater" when describing tears, which annoyed the piss out of me.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:48 pm (UTC)I don't see "seawater", but "saltwater" which is just as facepalmy. Reminds me of how GoldAngel 2 continually describes tears as "rivulets" being squeezed through "inky lashes".
And I just read her thoughts on her fic series. Boy, she certainly sounds bitter. :/
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:59 pm (UTC)Existed, was male, wore a leather jacket that exposed the manly tuft of fluff on his chest, hit Dale... of COURSE he's a shallow, sociopathic batterer.
Psycho!Chip was a very popular fanon thing toward the end of my sojourn in that fandom. Jeff Wikstrom did it well-- I LOVED his take on Chip even though it was so very not canon (kinda like Samu and his Psycho!Marth). Other did it a lot less well.
Boy, she certainly sounds bitter. :/
Well, I'm bitter, too, but she was part of the problem. Though the Acorn Cafe was the very place where I did not feel free to call people out on their Foxglove worship. It wouldn't be nice.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 12:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 01:08 am (UTC)I take that back. Meghan Brunner wasn't exceptionally nice to Chip, but Julie Bihn was the anti-Chip ringleader. I was looking through the Mooncrystal site trying to reconcile Happy Pagan Faerie Lady with Nasty Messageboard Lady, and then it hit me that I'd conflated Meghan and Julie.
Mea culpa, Meghan Brunner.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 02:46 am (UTC)Julie, huh. You know, there was someone named Julie Fallner in the Pokemon fandom who hated on Misty's sisters and cried SEXISM!!! over anything bad that ever happened to Misty. Only two so far, but I wonder if Julie is a common name for batshit fans.
Too bad if it is. It's such a pretty name.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 10:55 pm (UTC)Also. I had no idea there was a fandom around that show. It, and Darkwing Duck=my childhood, man.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:05 pm (UTC)I'd offer some 'fic recs, but somehow I doubt the stories I treasured a decade ago are up to my standards and yours these days.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:16 pm (UTC)The only thing I know of the Rescue Rangers fandom is that there's one crazy guy who has a very strange fetish for Gadget. And uh. Do not want.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:36 pm (UTC)We had a little online org called Rangerphiles Against Gadget Erotica to counter him and his ilk.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:25 pm (UTC)Awesomesauce for writing a post on CNDRR, by the way.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:04 pm (UTC)I like shipping as much as ...MOST shippers out there. (Don't want to say all or any, because those terms are too broad, and I'm not a nutcase who never writes gen at all.)
But! I hate "pair the spares". I hate it so much that it's not even funny. I used to do it in fandoms with significantly-fewer characters, yes. I think I had OCs for some characters who had no canon interests? I can't remember. They were in the background anyway.
In any fandom, though, when everyone pairs the spares? It's enough to make me want to kick bowling balls. It's semi-insulting (everyone doesn't need someone else to be happy/content) and also just plain silly (it cheapens a story).
Obviously I'm not saying background pairings aren't useful. Sometimes they are. Especially (in FE fandom) pairings like Eliwood/Ninian, or Hector/anyonehere. But I will admit I have seen a lot of stories that "focused" on [insert pairing here] but for some reason had like, 12 other pairings that just *HAD* to at least be mentioned also-- but they never served any purpose at all.
Anyway, this was a good read. ...Musical numbers, by the way? We need some of those in FE fandom right now. Just for the lulz.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:14 pm (UTC)Pair the spares except for the unsexy old people. Nobody engaged in flame wars over Monterey Jack, after all.
But I will admit I have seen a lot of stories that "focused" on [insert pairing here] but for some reason had like, 12 other pairings that just *HAD* to at least be mentioned also-- but they never served any purpose at all.
I have a rant gestating in the back of my brain around that one, but it's not very coherent right now.
Anyway, this was a good read.
Thanks. It felt good to get it all out on paper after so many years.
We need some of those in FE fandom right now. Just for the lulz.
No. We do not need any recitations of the entire lyrics of "Total Eclipse of the Heart," after which the heart-broken heroine totters offscreen and dies, only to be shortly revived through the Powar of Luv. We do NOT need this, Manna.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 12:05 am (UTC)Finally, I know how to end "Through These Nights!" 8D!
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:30 pm (UTC)I was still really young when I used to watch CNDRR and similar shows obsessively, so I'm really glad I didn't get into the fandoms/even know about it until reading this. My childhood would've been ruined forever.
But. Shippers gonna ship, what can you do? It's when they all start going batshit insane that it gets out of hand.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:41 pm (UTC)I died inside when I discovered that Dinosaucers fandom consisted of "herpetophiles." Like... anthromorphic dinosaur PRON. Horrible stuff.
The CNDRR people were all really G-rated as far as teh sex went, though. It might get R-rated for teh violence, but definitely not for teh sex.
no subject
Date: 2011-01-31 11:48 pm (UTC)I... Oh my.
(Regardless, I don't think I'm ever going to come anywhere near the CNDRR fandom.)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 02:20 am (UTC)So 9 1/2 Chipmunks was a horrible exception rather than the norm? Phew!
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 02:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 03:14 am (UTC)I was never a big Rescue Rangers fan myself, so I never understood the fandom's obsession with Gadget... However, I was a big TaleSpin fan (hence my username), so it's nice to see someone else who liked the series. :) And you're right, the TaleSpin universe had much more potential for fanfic in general, yet I can't think of any really stand out stories off hand (even Thy Fearful Symmetry, which was considered one of the best TS fanfics in the day, had aspects about it that I didn't care for).
I am also reminded of the one major fanfic series that billed itself as the continuation of TaleSpin... High Flight, I believe it was called. (I also didn't care for that series, if only because I hated what they did with my favourite character; they made him "darker", yet completely unlike the character I loved.)
(I must admit, every now and then I kind of want to work on the Castle in the Sky-inspired TS story that I've put on hold indefinitely, even if it does have the fandom-cliche female air pirates in it... ;P)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 03:24 am (UTC)Nah, the gates are open around here. Thanks for dropping by!
However, I was a big TaleSpin fan (hence my username)
Oh, cool.
yet I can't think of any really stand out stories off hand
There weren't any! I know I read "Thy Fearful Symmetry," but I can't recall it, and I never got into High Flight either. The stories I remember most were some Kit Cloudkicker ones written by people who weren't native English speakers and had hilarious spelling mistakes in the middle of tense dramatic scenes. :/
But that was such a compelling and different kind of world (for a kids' cartoon) that I am sorry so few cared to explore it.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 02:37 pm (UTC)This is also a good description of Sailor Moon fandom in the '90s: a handful of top-shelf genners (e.g. John Biles, Doug Helm, Tim Nolan, etc.) that came to be supplanted by a whole generation of pairing 'ficcers (e.g. the entire Usa-Mamo army). Granted, pairing 'fics existed before then (Alicia Blade, Badgerman, Sexylyon, etc.), but they featured plot, characterization, all the bells and whistles. In other words, they had maturity. That disappeared early in the '00s.
(If one felt like taking a risk, one might contemplate how this shift occurred at the same time fandom flipped from being overwhelmingly male to overwhelmingly female, but that is for another time.)
The model I use for myself from Sailor Moon fandom is Troy "Silver" Stanton, a pairing 'ficcer who was – and is, since his story has been ongoing for almost two decades now – able to take all the pairings he wrote and roll them together in a single epic story that was all the better for featuring the emotional content on top of the meaty plot. Granted, he was never a part of the community the way the old genners were, but he never stopped writing, either.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 10:42 pm (UTC)Yeah. Though I was often in weirder corners of fandom-- Dark Kingdom fiction, Dead Moon Circus Fiction, Outer Senshi fiction. I recall a good many rabid Seiya/Usa fans and not so much the Usa/Mamo backlash.
If one felt like taking a risk, one might contemplate how this shift occurred at the same time fandom flipped from being overwhelmingly male to overwhelmingly female, but that is for another time.
I am not afraid of such speculation. It might not belong in this thread today, but I don't think gender trends in fan communities should be ignored simply because some might take offense.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-01 10:56 pm (UTC)Sup fellow DK-er. =)