subdee

1. Is Silver Diamond some kind of weird band AU? ( Read more... )

2. Caught up on Full Metal Alchemist and Kekkaishi. FMA would be better if it stopped following shounen fight conventions. (Not that this happens often, but when it does, it's really jarring.) And Kekkaishi would be better if it didn't insist on a shounen personality for the protagonist. (Or if it had the shounen personality minus the stupidity, like in Jojo or Hunter x Hunter.) But they're still pretty awesome. ^^; FMA manga has been worth following just for the destruction of Xerxes.

3. Also caught up on Naruto, Bleach, xxxHolic, Tsubasa.

Naruto: The leader of the Akatsuki does have a grandiose-yet-nihilistic goal! I knew the money-making scheme couldn't be it.
Bleach: Wake me up when it's over.
xxxHolic: Watanuki is nice to Doumeki, Doumeki asks Are You Feeling Okay?
Tsubasa: OH GAWD NO COMMENT.

( ...a small comment )

4. Read what's been translated of Historie. It's so obvious what the author is doing here, I know what he's doing, and yet I have still fallen for it, BECAUSE I'M EASY. Just make the protagonist intelligent, resourceful, and a little bit spacey/odd/distant, and you've got me. ^^; Historie is the untold childhood of Eumenides, Alexander the Great's personal secretary. It's solidly researched, but nothing to write home about -- mostly literature and geography references so far -- but there is some pretty good Greek/non-Greek tension going on, as well as constant reminders of the ubiquity of slavery. I also really liked that there was more justice and happiness (as we'd perceive it) in the "barbarian" village than in the Greek town.

5. Where's the internet quiz that will assess the relative weight each of us places on the five spheres of morality?

Of the boy --> girl variety, if only because no one ever writes it the other way around. XD I love genderswitch. Ranma ½ was my first fandom. These two things are not unrelated.[1]

1. Naruto, Oh Baby, Oh Baby by The Badifc Fairy.

Parody, but the sort of parody that’s still good if you’re completely serious about it (where by “completely serious” I mean “willing to read mpreg”). This story wins on three levels:
a. There are canonical, sensible, plot-related reasons for turning Naruto into an OOC pregnant girl!
b. The story is fun enough to hold the reader’s interest until those reasons are revealed.
c. The author enjoys making fun of Sasuke’s pain. (Who doesn’t?)

2. Full Metal Alchemist, Eliza AU, nekokoban and harukami.
I like this one because if you make Ed a girl in disguise and then move her in with Roy, you are well on your way to But She’s my Ward! I’d be Taking Advantage! awkwardness. Which line is crossed by the third fic in series XD. It’s also a mostly serious -- but also very funny -- look at exactly which things would change if Ed were a girl. If you like FMA and like genderswitch you’ll probably have already heard of this one, but the series is disconnected and not archived anywhere that I’ve found so here is an (incomplete) index: ( cut for length )


3. Yami no Matsuei, bookverse story by mistressrenet

Not technically genderswitch, or even focusing on gendeswitched characters. But I thought I’d include this one because 1) I like it and 2) Yami no Matsuei does canon genderswitch AU, how cool is that? Also, because the mangaka had the good sense to make Tsuzuki the girl and not Hisoka. (The problem with making Hisoka the girl – what most people writing Yami genderswitch do -- is that it’s a fundamental part of his character that he looks like a girl, is treated like a girl, and has a girl’s name, but IS NOT A GIRL. That and YnM reverses traditional top/bottom roles but anyway moving on.)

4. Sayuki, Ranma ½ fusion by emungere

Aaaaand finally a Ranma-esque fic. Uses the premise and not the characters, so you do not need to know anything about Ranma ½ to read it. Hakkai/Gojyo, smutty. Very, very smutty.

This completes the genderswitch AU cycle, gagfic --> serious exploration of gender boundaries --> he is practically a girl anyway --> pr0n. Because pr0n is the fanfic equilivent of Rome, all roads lead to it.

***

[1]Yes, let's talk about fandom origins! Ranma 1/2 was gignatic, but I don't think that's the biggest reason I was in it. GWing and Sailor Moon and DBZ and CCS and Rurouni Kenshin were equally huge, at the time. Access to sources -- ie CCS and Ruroken not having domestic releases -- wasn't the issue either, because ahaha I never did read Ranma or watch the anime. I think it really was the genderswitch. (That, and the crossovers and AUs and fusions. XD)

Claiming Ranma 1/2 as first fandom dates me older than I actually am. That's because what I mean by "fandom" is really more like "read lots of fanfic on nearly-defunct personal websites". There weren't many people still writing at the time that I was reading. I did join two Yahoo!groups -- one for an author who rarely updated (beckytailweaver) and one for an author who'd stopped posting publically (team7) -- but I never replied to or posted anything and that was the extent of my participation. XD So there was no interaction, either online or off, for maybe three years.

Which really explains a lot.

P.S. I have this bizzare desire to finish an impossibly long RPG over break. It's bizzare because I haven't played videogames for two and a half years (since starting college), and because I was never a big RPG fan in the first place. I mostly played platformers and racing games. I wasn't into anime when I was into video games, right, and I've always seen RPGs as an extention of anime fandom.

( Here're my RPG stats )

Luc Court's Something New Challenge:

I write a sizable portion of mine before I realize that this not new: the tense, concept, POV, mood, none of them are new. I decide to submit anyway because no one but me ever has to know that.

Wait, did I just post that out loud? XD. What I really ought to do is humor. Or yaoi ahaha, no. People I know IRL read this journal.

Ok, and I'm giving this one a proper heading (for once):

Series: Fullmetal Alchemist.
Wordcount: 697 *giggles gleefully* *is glad chain_of_fics isn't really a drabble community*
Rating: PG for language
Notes: First FMA fic, takes place post-anime series and has SPOILERS for same. Note that I said anime and not manga.

It's a Start

Annnd there's no elegant way to put this so I'm just going to come right out and say it: this will be the last post I make as a teenager. Ever. Wah my wasted youth Happy Birthday, tommorow's self!

♥ ♣ &diamonds; ♠ HA HA HA VICTOLY EXCEPT FOR THE DIAMONDS!

( On FMA Anime 49-50 )

God, I hate Karma. Like, I really, really despise it and everything it stands for. Bunch of smug self-righteous bastards telling everyone else they have stuff because they deserve it and if you don't it's because you don't. In a more general sense I guess I dislike Equivalent Exchange as well since it's basically the same thing, only all within one lifetime so you can prove it's wrong.

( On Naruto Manga 232 )

And now that FMA is winding down, anyone know where I can download Matantei Loki Ragnarok? Anime or manga (but preferably manga). Figured since I've got that much more free time, I might as well give it a shot. Or Bleach, Bleach is coming out soon. (Obviously shonen owns my soul right now. Should I be frightened?)

And! I (briefly) got into a discussion with a just-published author here about the "Defense of Fanficiton" post here which was, yes, in response to stevekelner whom everyone seems to be talking about these days. Here's my contribution to the argument, with no explanations or qualifications or anything so you'll just have to work through what I meant, if you're bored interested enough:

( Yet Another Take on the Whole Fanfiction vs. Published Fiction Debate )

Man, that atimson really sounds like he knows what he's talking about, doesn't he? But he is just a struggling and un-published sophmore college student, like me except that he actually does want to write proffessionally some day. So, remember that you are under no obligation to take him seriously. (I kid, Andrew, really I do. You are one smart cookie.)

Specifically, this fanart is dedicated to FMA episode 43. You can only beat a good metaphor for so long before it dies a painful death.

( Stray Dog )

I'm headed back to high school for the last day of band camp tomorrow. Senior skits. And then I have to contact V or else risk being out of town for the shindig. When is it, V? Am I good or evil? Did you know F didn't know about O? Poor, poor F, so chronically out of the loop.