said_scarlett: (Naomi)
Faye ([personal profile] said_scarlett) wrote2008-08-10 11:43 am
Entry tags:

Why Do I Subject Myself To These Things?

Oy, I haven't even been up an hour and already I have a headache.

So, D sent me an email, letting me know there were a bunch of new Death Note fics on ff.net that revolved around/were inspired by Another Note. Since I don't really read DN fic unless it's written by someone I know or revolves around Naomi, I decided I'd wander over and check them out.

I'm not sure why I did this, because a vast majority of DN fic makes me want to hit the authors over the head with a good psychology book.



It bothers me enough when Light and Misa are turned into stereotypical bloodthirsty, murder, raping types, but since I rarely read fic about them, I generally can avoid the whole issue altogether and not freak out and want to shake people and scream 'MISSION BASED KILLER! LOOK IT UP!!!!!'. But with Another Note centric fic....

Argh. B. I love B's character, and I love his psychological makeup. And yet....every fic I've read has turned him into a blood thirsty killer who slashes apart anyone who looks at him wrong and can't stop himself from killing/takes delight in murdering people.

Did people even pay attention to why he killed the people he did? Did they not notice the insane specifics of his victims? Did they completely miss the entire scenario in which he killed? Did they somehow manage to overlook it was not a compulsion, but rather a carefully laid out plan with a very specific goal in mind? He's not your garden variety serial killer, people!

Sometimes I seriously wonder what the hell people are watching/reading when it comes to Death Note. It also makes me wonder why the hell anyone would try and write these characters without doing research and understanding all the different subtleties between various abnormal criminal disorders. And makes me cling to the [livejournal.com profile] damned Light and Misa like a lifeline, even though it's not fic.



Whew, I feel better!

I had really bizarre Death Note/Venture Bros dreams last night. L was some sort of....super hero/genius thingy, and Light was his arch, and he went by the name Death God, and there was all sorts of bizarre stuff going on.

I'm also once more severely confused as to days, because when I turned on AS at 11:30 last night to watch Shin Chan, Venture Bros were on instead, making me panic and wonder how the hell it got to be Sunday so quickly. Oh, AS, you never fail to give me a moment's confusion when I forget to check your scheduling ahead of time.

[livejournal.com profile] talia_speaks linked me to the UPS site where I can get free boxes! So I put in an order, and within a week, should have plenty of boxes for packing. I'm thinking today it's time for my stuffed things and plushies to go into a large bag. SPEAKING OF! I found my Munich Ed plushie. He'd been stuffed into an obscure compartment of my duffel bag, not killed by plushie!Light as we had assumed. And plushie!Near is doing a very good job of keeping Light in line, so Ed should be perfectly safe.

Plushie!L has missed his husband!

[identity profile] speaky-bean.livejournal.com 2008-08-10 08:10 pm (UTC)(link)
Really? I've never once read B-fic like that, but I suppose it must exist somewhere...most of the B-fic I've read is rather excellent. I guess I haven't been on ff.net in a while, that could explain it. I tend to stick to LJ for my fanfic needs these days.

[identity profile] theladyfeylene.livejournal.com 2008-08-10 08:14 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah, I'm pretty much talking about ff.net. :D Which, as my subject line indicates, I don't know why I bother with. I generally don't read much fic on LJ, because I can't help myself from commenting, and far too often it's gotten me more trouble than it's worth. (Which is something else I've ranted about often, the whole 'con crit =/= flame' issue.)

I really do need to just stick to my Flist, since I know they can write. But most of my Flist doesn't generally write the sort of fic I like to read. And all the recs of good DN fic I've gotten have been for pairings and characters I just...don't want to read about.

[identity profile] speaky-bean.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 12:44 am (UTC)(link)
I think it just depends on how you phrase things...sometimes you'll come across idiots who flat out won't understand the difference, but I've only come across the 'oh my god you're flaming me' thing when I've given concrit maybe three or four times, and that's just been on ff.net. Never had that problem on LJ. How do you normally go about giving your concrit, if you don't mind my asking?

Right, it can be hard to find exactly what you're looking for. I have it easy, because [livejournal.com profile] dn_contest does contain a lot of fics that make me rather happy--not all the prompts are tailored to my interests, since that would be selfish, but some are. (The upcoming one really will be.) Also, I have a couple people on my f-list who write things I really, really like. I guess I'm more flexible with pairings and characters...I mean there are some I'm not interested in, and some I flat-out won't read unless I have to, but I have a pretty wide range when it comes to what I do like. You said really just want to read Naomi fic, right? That can be hard, since not a lot of people write about her...if I find any good Naomi fic I'll be sure to link you! :D

[identity profile] theladyfeylene.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 07:05 pm (UTC)(link)
I've come across it a lot, on both. I give con crit the same way I like to take it. Honest and in depth, trying to find at least one thing to compliment, and offering suggestions for improvement. I don't believe in being mean to get a point across, but I don't go out of my way to make sure feelings don't get hurt. But I do have very, very high standards - and that goes for my own work, as well as others, which is why only a fraction of my fic gets posted anywhere but my own LJ, and there are only five of my...um...over a thousand fics that I can look at and say 'yeah, this is good, I'm happy with this'.

The few fics I've read on there I've enjoyed - it's just another case of not many people writing about the characters and situations I want to read about. I'm not terribly into reading about pairings at all in Death Note - it took me a good year to warm up to any of them, and even now I really only like two or three - and the characters/situations I want to read about just aren't written that often. I like the professional side of Death Note. I like fics about solving cases and hunting down the bad guy and solving puzzles and sifting through evidence....

[identity profile] speaky-bean.livejournal.com 2008-08-14 02:00 am (UTC)(link)
I see. Well I suppose you're just coming across overly sensitive people then? I suppose I don't come across this because I myself was extremely oversensitive for a while, and I remember what that was like, and I just...don't want to make anyone feel terrible, because there were times when what people said about my writing did that to me. I don't know what kind of emotional situation the writers are in, so I tend to err on the side of caution--I do try to make sure no feelings get hurt. People tend to take my points into account when I do that, and I've frequently seen people change the way they write as a result. I'm not saying this is the right way to do it or anything, but I just...haven't really run into that problem, I guess, though I definitely give criticism when I see something wrong. And wow, you've really written 1,000 fics? That's pretty impressive.

Right, that makes sense--Death Note isn't really a series that lends itself easily to pairings. Personally I like genfic much better than pairing-fic, though I'm not terribly interested in the professional side. I get enough of that in the series itself. What I'm interested in is the character's psychology, and that can be hard to find too. Pairing-fic is abundant in almost every fandom, so if you're not into that, you're kind of screwed. It's hard to find good things, sadly, especially when you have defined interests.

[identity profile] nijiirono.livejournal.com 2008-08-10 10:04 pm (UTC)(link)
Hey! I've been re-reading FMA and I saw this (http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/scan0019.jpg) picture and thought of you. So I made this:
Image (http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/?action=view&current=lustsmoke.png)

Which could...be better, sorry. But yeah. Lust smoking.

[identity profile] nijiirono.livejournal.com 2008-08-10 10:17 pm (UTC)(link)
Ok. I fiddled.

Image (http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/?action=view&current=lustsmoke1.png) Image (http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/?action=view&current=lustsmoke3.png) Image (http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/?action=view&current=lustsmoke4.png) Image (http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e164/Bexifer/?action=view&current=lustsmoke5.png)

[identity profile] theladyfeylene.livejournal.com 2008-08-10 10:25 pm (UTC)(link)
AW, THANK YOU!

[identity profile] snowpatrol89.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 12:37 am (UTC)(link)
hello there! Just found this entry interesting, so sorry if I sound like a stalker :P

I'm glad you made that point with B. I get pissed too when writers or artists splatter him wih blood and make it seem like he enjoys it. He's really a pitiful character, not even valuing his own life compared to his goal...so why can't people create works that don't portray him as a total monster?

I don't know. Fans of Death Note vary and some don't even pay attention to anything but the yaoi doujinishi ( being a little critical here). I guess it's a bit tiring because DN does have fascinating, layered characters and people tend to overlook or cheapen their personalities. That's why I look hard to find a good DN fanfic.

[identity profile] theladyfeylene.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 07:00 pm (UTC)(link)
Not at all! :D

Yes! That's exactly what I'm talking about! In a lot of ways, he falls under the header of Mission Based Killer, too. He's not killing for the joy, or because of a compulsion, but to reach a very specific goal. Actually, I think he'd be more along the lines of Politically Motivated Killer.

Yeah, those are...mostly the ones that bug the hell out of me. Because of the subject matter, I sort of expected the fandom to be....well, less into pairings and kink and whatnot, and more into psychology and criminology and the epic layers. Then I remembered it's anime with very pretty character designs and began to despair.

Criminal Minds fandom is the same, and it pisses me the hell off.

[identity profile] brightredosca.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 04:15 am (UTC)(link)
Your Death Note/Venture Bros. dream is roughly 100 times better than any dream I've ever had! The only fandom related dream I've ever had is one in which the DN characters were malignant ghouls. Wanna trade brains?

[identity profile] theladyfeylene.livejournal.com 2008-08-11 06:58 pm (UTC)(link)
My brain sort of takes the idea that dreams are a random mishmash of recent things all put into a blender and spit up as a goulash relatively seriously. :D

And half of me thinks it'd be kind of an awesome AU/crossover, but the canons aren't really compatible. No matter how damn hot Brock/Naomi would be.