Consequences or whatnot

[wiseheart]

Well, posting my entire existing (so far) sci-fi work to otherworlds_lib had an interesting result. After having worked myself through my own writing again, I found that I can't read shipper fics anymore. Well, not at the moment, and perhaps not for a long while yet.

It's a bit surprising, actually, as I've written lots of romance myself and intend to keep on writing the stuff. But it seems romance and shipper fic are two different items.

At first, I just couldn't bear the pointless, inane and utterly boring (because needlessly detailed) McShep pr0n anymore. I reacted to it almost as violently as I used to react to Kirk/Spock stuff, and believe me, there are very few degrees beyond that. But now I have reached the point where I can't even read shipper stuff featuring characters that I actually like.

Perhaps the reason is the complete absence of plot and logic in a great deal of these pieces. The only goal seems to be to put Character A into bed with Character B and let them have teh HOTT Monkey Buttsexxx! Or the lesbian equivalent of it, although that's considerably less frequent.

Don't misunderstand me, I haven't converted to the Slash-Is-Evil camp. As you well know, I'm teh Ebol Slasher(TM) myself, and have long lost my reputation in every fandom I write in, especially the Tolkien one. Not that I care, but those are the facts.

However, the badly written, plotless, syrupy het shipper fics are just as horrible, reagardless of the persons involved in the badfic in question (although I can feel sorry for Zelenka who has to screw the Frigid Bitch of Hell, also known as Elizabeth Weir, but that's a personal peeve).

So I guess I'll stuck to genfic for the next time reading-wise. There's a lot of crap, too, in all my fandoms, but genfic at least has the advantage that the authors are forced to have at least some sort of plot.

Nothing against a short PWP every time and again. But stories are supposed to have a plot. PWPs should be the exception, the spice in the dish, not the dish itself.

Of course, I might be just jealous. As the Darkroom series proved, I couldn't write plotless smut if my life defended on it. *g*

Comments

[the-wild-iris.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean about shipper fics - or, at least, bad ones :). If there's Character A / Character B, who had no hint of a romantic pairing in the original source material and exist only as a fan 'ship, then you can have 1) a story in which A and B are both in character, in which they interact with each other (sexually or otherwise) in an interesting way, and in which you might learn something new about A by seeing how he/she reacts to B. Or you can have 2) a story in which A and B are thrown together through some really contrived plot device, get overtaken by a Magical Shipping Field and fall into each other's beds. 1) I like to read. 2) gets tedious, because the author can't hide the fact that A and B could be anyone, that it's all about the sex and not much about the characters.

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

Not to mention that in the 2nd case you can't even recognize the characters.

The most spectacular OOC-ness is when male characters - who've never shown similar indications in canon - start weeping with or without any sound reason. Chakotay from Voyager is a particularly horrific example for that. I don't know how familiar you are with the show; in any case, the guy is a Native American and a rebel leader, who's fought against impossible odds before the show started (and during the show sometimes, too), and that man should burst out in tears because his Twu Wub, Tom Paris (whom he could never bear in canon) is hurt? Oh, please!

Not to mention that the detailed descriptions of the act grow old after a while. After all, how many ways can you put tag A into slot B and not be boring and repetitive? Plus, I find it a bit unbelievable that the sex is always mind-blowing. Even for two guys. As if they could never have a bad day or performance problems.