Rebecca Hb. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
beckyh2112) wrote2010-06-14 06:53 pm
beckyh2112) wrote2010-06-14 06:53 pm
Entry tags:
(no subject)
Ganked from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
artoni
Ask me one fandom-related question in the comments. This can be fandom specific, general, or about fandom/lj stuff/fic writing/etc. in general.
Just one question, please, but it can (and perhaps should) have sub-parts.
Question can be as wacky as you want. Ask me about tv shows, characters, fanfic in general, fandom issues/meta, anything about any of my stories specifically. Whatever you want.
It is helpful to ask about fandoms I know about. If you don't, I will be forced to make things up. Which may be entertaining. And involve tentacle-sex.
artoniAsk me one fandom-related question in the comments. This can be fandom specific, general, or about fandom/lj stuff/fic writing/etc. in general.
Just one question, please, but it can (and perhaps should) have sub-parts.
Question can be as wacky as you want. Ask me about tv shows, characters, fanfic in general, fandom issues/meta, anything about any of my stories specifically. Whatever you want.
It is helpful to ask about fandoms I know about. If you don't, I will be forced to make things up. Which may be entertaining. And involve tentacle-sex.
no subject
What, you want specifics, Fine. How many of your fandoms would be made totally awesome by the addition of tentacles? How many make tentacles kind of redundant? And why am I plagued by the thought that JCA Jackie Chan vs. ravening tentacle beast would be kind of adorable?
no subject
Most of my fandoms would be totally awesome with the addition of tentacles. I feel many of them can be easily fit into the canons, too. Transformers, Avatar: the Last Airbender ('bending! You can 'bend tentacles! Especially waterbenders!), Stargate of any flavor, Green Lantern, Jackie Chan Adventures, the Matrix...
I am not sure what you mean by "redundant" when applied to tentacles.
Because it would be. "Bad day, bad day, bad day!"
no subject
Transformers already has tentacles. Though not nearly enough, I will grant. And hey, Jackie fights demons all the time! Tentacles are practically a given.
"I'm an archaeologist! Not a Japanese porn star!"
no subject
I think I
saw a pornoread a fanfic like this once.no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
DegSep is also fine, if the ramble goes that way. If not, trilogy!
The Matrix 1/2
It's been over ten years since the original movie came out now. I still think it's very awesome, but for way different reasons now.
The various cinematic techniques used in The Matrix were well done. The green tint they gave the Matrix was an excellent choice - I never noticed it before it was pointed out in a commentary, but once I started looking for it, it's very much there. It also provides a real hard contrast to scenes in the Matrix and scenes in the real.
'Bullet time' was a great invention. It was overused as hell shortly after the Matrix came out, but I think it's finally matured enough that people are using it when it adds to the movie rather than whenever they can cram it in there.
The philosophical ideas behind The Matrix are amazing and brain-breaking. What is reality, how do you know that this is reality? Or my personal favorite, which would bug me late at night for years and years before I ever saw the Matrix, how do we know we weren't created just a moment before with false memories to give us a sense of having existed for longer? It's because of these ideas and because the Matrix is all about layers of reality, from the mundane Matrix of the coppertops to the extraordinary Matrix of the Exiles, to the reality of the darkened world, that I can easily believe the fan-theory that the "real world" of The Matrix is simply another layer to hold people in. Especially when you throw in some of the weirder things Neo was doing in the third movie.
The first movie was arranged very nicely so it didn't need the second two movies in order to tell a complete story. Consequently, it's the one I rewatch the most often.
The Oracle tells Neo that he's not the One. Maybe in another life, she says.
Then Smith shoots Neo and Neo dies. ^__^
Another life, indeed.
Agent Smith as the primary antagonist was a wonderful choice. Hugo Weaving is a skilled actor, and where Neo mostly needs to be alternately wondering, determined, and confused, Smith needed to show a lot more. Anger, yes, but he needed to show the degrees of that anger.
Also, Hugo Weaving has a massively sexy voice. As does Laurence Fishburne.
The Matrix 2/2
Of course, Morpheus's pitch gives you no idea what you're getting into. It's just "here, take this and find out, or take this and never know" which is a hell of a thing to hand the kind of curious people who would get in this position in the first place. On the other hand, how do you convince someone of the reality of the Matrix without taking them out of it?
Then there's people like Tank, which is just awesome. Though I wonder how they handle it, seeing people go into things they can never ever touch.
The aesthetics are wonderful. I love how Zion and everything real in it and associated with it is grimy and dirty and looks to be held together by duct tape and hope. I love the contrast of the simulations. I love how the Matrix specifically tries for a certain time-period and is as true to that as possible. I love how alien-creepy the Machines look in the real. They scuttle, they swim, they hulk. They're nightmarish. It's so well done.
I have less to say about the second and third movie, really. It's been a while since I watched them, and they never stuck in my head quite as well as the first one did. On the other hand, I love the entire concept of the Exiled Programs. It's fascinating to see this entire class of people, this third side in the war between Zion and the System.
I love the designs of the Exiles, the implied history in the Merovingian's ghosts, vampires, and werewolves. I love the idea of there being past iterations of the Matrix, that Neo isn't the first One. The world is bigger than people think it is, older, stranger.
The Architect is a dick who really doesn't understand people very well.
I like the entire concept of the interstate being a deathtrap for rebels. It makes total and complete sense - there's too many people, not enough room to maneuver, lots of high-moving weapons for the Agents to grab, and little access to the phone-lines. Perfect extrapolation of everything set up in the world.
Re: The Matrix 2/2
I think that some weekend, I'm going to sit down with my also-film-major-and-video-editor brother and we're going to either watch just the first Matrix or marathon the three. I think that it'd be fascinating to watch from an editor's perspective, especially with regards to the tinting and the bullet time.
Ahhh, bullet time. I still need to beat into heads that that is a camera trick, not an editing one.
I think it was that very brain-breaky that led me to love it the way I did. I remember the first time I watched it, and falling in love at the way the story and the reality unfolded.
....of all the things for me to miss in that movie. D:
I honestly cannot imagine Hugo Weaving as anything other than Agent Smith. The Matrix was my first encounter with him as an actor and dear Christ, he blew me away.
The scene when he takes out his earpiece and talks directly to Morpheus as a man -- he isn't the Agent there, he's already coming undone -- is, quite frankly, one of the more terrifying things I've ever seen. He was so calm on the surface, but so utterly intense as he described the human race and his own feelings of being trapped that it felt as though he was on the edge of insanity.
The whole Cypher subplot was astounding, especially because it showed just how much you had to trust in the rest of your crew. His betrayal reduced the crew from eight to three (since we are left to assume Tank died of his injuries).
...if I start going on about the sequals I will never stop. <3
Re: The Matrix 2/2
There's actually an episode of the new Matt Smith Doctor Who, called The Beast Below, that sort of deals with that question, actually... I don't want to say anymore, in case you haven't seen it(I really wouldn't want to spoil it, as it's a lot of fun).
no subject
no subject
no subject
- It's necessary, in that time and place, to have children to inherit things. Not having children is either bad misfortune if it happens as an accident or it's a deliberate avoidance of one's duty.
- The Fire Nation is quite open about homosexuality. The Fire Nation is also conquering the Earth Kingdom. So even if it was something that was simply frowned upon before the War, the fact that the enemies are doing it likely leads to all sorts of unpleasantness.
I don't think there's any codified laws. Though that could be my ignorance showing. (When I get my to-be-read hoard down to something more manageable, there are some books on the traditional Japanese and Chinese homosexual experiences that I want to pick up so bad.)
Attitudes... There's the overlying assumption that this is Not Done. Male homosexuality is a wrong thing in the Earth Kingdom; someone who does that is perverse at best, downright insane at worst. Or maybe they have Fire-blood. Firefolk, of course, are naturally perverse and horrible; they'll fuck anything. Male homosexuality isn't wrong to them, so incest likely isn't. And everyone knows about soldiers and where war-children come from.
Even the fantasy of male homosexuality, such as the Ba Sing Se doujinshi, is alternately baffling, embarrassing, sick and wrong, or funny. To men. Women, by contrast, may feel what men do about it, but they also can and do find it arousing and enthralling.
Certain things are womanly arts, so a man who shows skill or interest in them must be womanly in some way. The most obvious way is, of course, being the 'woman' in a sexual encounter. I tend not to do any type of earthbending as womanly, though some places may be a bit wary of male gembenders. If anything, though, it's more likely for people to view women earthbenders as very butch and masculine.
The Earth Kingdom homophobia as I write it is much more hung up on male homosexuality than female homosexuality. I'm not even sure female homosexuality registers with most people except in the same way lesbian pornos do with men in the real world. I think there would definitely be the attitude that a lesbian simply hasn't had the right cock, and once she does, she'll get over her silliness.
I've alluded to this in "The Long Game", but even rumors of male homosexuality have damaged the careers of Earth Kingdom soldiers. The Dai Li traditionally have the blessing of Avatar Kyoshi and their training techniques, so that people assume they would never choose a male homosexual for their ranks. However, in recent years with all the shit going down, there are a lot of rumors about their proclivities - it's intended as nastiness rather than a real assessment of the men involved.
Of course, the Earth Kingdom is also very big. I tend to write the Ba Sing Se attitudes towards homosexuality because most of my original Earth Kingdom characters are Dai Li. What's true of Ba Sing Se may not be true elsewhere and certainly isn't true everywhere. I tend to assume the entire Earth Kingdom is not pleased with the idea of male homosexuality, but different cultures will handle the matter differently.
Make no mistake, there are a lot of different cultures in the Earth Kingdom.
no subject
no subject
no subject
Two friends of mine gave me this (http://ra88.deviantart.com/art/Avatar-verse-Whiplash-165875420). I Blue-Screen-of-Deathed.
no subject
Hee. Yes- he makes a very nice upgrade to Sparky-Sparky-Boom Man.
no subject
no subject
Clearly this must be rectified, if only I could get some brain-juice flowing. I keep wondering if Eastern Promises might not be a good film to watch for same.
no subject
no subject
Love the movie, but when it comes to fic notions, it's all 'data data data, I cannot make bricks without clay!' in my head.
no subject
What sort of data is your headspace demanding?
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
I mean they are monks so that must indicate that they are supposed to stay virgins for the rest of their lives, but after the air temples were destroyed no more airbenders were found so that must have come from the temples and not from surrounding villages (unless they were destroyed to)
So what do you think?
no subject
However, it's not something they have to go into immediately on achieving adulthood. Heck, at least in Hinduism, going off to become a holy man is considered one of the later things one does with one's life, after one's children are adults and can take over the family farm/business.
Additionally, Buddhist monks and nuns can 'return' their vows three times during their life and return to take them up again later.
So there's no requirement at all, in my mind, for an Air Monk or Air Nun to be virginal. Heck, there's no requirement for Catholic nuns, at least in the Middle Ages, to have been virginal. (I do not know enough about monks to say.) A great many nuns came to the nunneries after failed marriages or to escape failing marriages.
From what I remember of the flashbacks to Aang's temple, we don't see anyone between the ages of child/youth and old dude. So the Air Temples in the show seem to be where one is raised to adulthood, then one leaves and doesn't return until one is ready to become a holy man. This fits with the Hindu idea that becoming a holy man is the stage in life after you live in the world and have children.
How Air Nomads handle heterosexuality/homosexuality/bisexuality/pansexuality/asexuality? Really not enough data to do more than make wild guesses. Like, even wilder than the ones I used for my Fire, Earth, and Water takes. (Fire had the basis in them being the wielders of the element of passion, Earth went in-line with the general subtle and pervasive sexism, and Water I borrowed from Spyri and Rin.) However, the Air Nomads generally seemed to be pretty hippy froods, so while individuals might frown on certain things, I expect that their general attitude was "as long as it's safe, sane, and consensual".
no subject
no subject
no subject
So, using that as a springboard... if a series gets adapted or relaunched, do you prefer it to be as close to the source material as possible, or do you like it to go in different directions? Do you prefer at least some touchpoints to the original character? (I keep thinking of the various versions of Shockwave versus, say, how Morgan was in the Dresden TV series compared to the books.)
no subject
Relaunches I do want to go in different directions. Using Transformers as the example, I've seen G1 Transformers. I've bought the toys. I want something new. If they just give me another retread of G1, I'm going to get bored. (This is one of the reasons I easily lose interest in the various Transformers comics. Both Dreamwave and IDW have dropped the plotlines I'm interested in [the Quint female Transformers and Sunhunter] for going out of business and that thing with Megatron, respectively.)
Adaptations... Well, adapting from one medium to another is going to result in changes. However, I would prefer if the changes were made to fit in with the original spirit of what they're adapting from. Thus, the changes from the Lord of the Rings books to the movies produce only a minor bit of grumbling from me (I like the Barrow-wraiths and Tom Bombadil, dangit). However, a lot of the changes for The Last Airbender look like they're going to piss me off - it is one thing to alter the plot to produce something workable for a movie and adjust visuals so as to not look silly for a live-action show, but changing the way the characters' names are pronounced? What the HELL.
Of course, sometimes an adaptation improves on the original - Twilight, for instance. So I tend to think an adaptation is best off if they're willing to make changes but think about the changes they're making and the necessity of them.
no subject
Spiritually in fan fiction. Do you tend to go with what is presented in the canon, or do you find yourself inserting your own beliefs in your writing?
no subject
In my headspace, there is a sharpish divide between the characters and me. This is how I can write people like Ozai, Long Feng, Megatron, Valmont, Shendu, Agent Smith. These people are not me. Their lives are not mine. Their beliefs - spiritual, political, romantic, cultural - are not mine.
It helps a lot, I think, that religion and spirituality are intensely important to me. Not just mine, though obviously mine is the one that is the most important to me. However, I read widely about religion and spirituality, so I've passing knowledge of a number of religions. That makes it easier to get out of what I believe in and focus on what the characters believe in.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
You remember the general "cyberpunk" AU you did for this meme(http://beckyh2112.livejournal.com/433028.html). The one where the dangerous ladies had something happen to them and Azula was still out while Katara/Sokka were programs I found that really interesting, and I was wondering if I could find out more about it. Any world building that wasn't included in the original writing. Such as what was Aang, who made K4T4R4/S0KK4 any why, and any other things not shown.
no subject
As mentioned, S0KK4 and K4T4R4 were written by cyber-terrorists. Specifically anti-Fire Corp types of people. They're based off of an older and more unpleasant AI; the one S0KK4 thoughtlessly sends 'Lee' to talk to about breaking through Fire Corp's firewalls. The siblings are more human-compatible (able to interact with humans), which tend to means they can't break other programs the way something as alien-becoming as that one is can.
Ursa and the Freedom Fighters have their little downside bar with the human help. It's a bit of a dive, but it attracts customers. More importantly, it does not attract Corp-types, even non-Fire Corp types. Because Corp-types would recognize Ursa. She's... not exactly on the run, but she would prefer Ozai not know where she is. Or that, you know, she's sleeping with Jeong Jeong.
There's two different net systems. There's the standard net anyone can use and access, which all standard and black market equipment can handle and process. It's the place with the free-roaming AIs like S0KKA and K4T4R4, and the place most people will jack into. It's got its dangers, of course - don't go too deep, or the programs might eat you. Plus some of the other humans in it aren't too nice either.
Then there's Firenet. Needs special connections you can only get from Fire Corp. Each access is registered and tracked by Fire Corp; there's no way around this. People have tried and failed. Spectacularly. Sozin and his descendants play for keeps.
But Firenet is better, faster, safer. You can trust it. You just don't have any secrecy, and you pay a good deal of money for access. If you're okay with that... Well. It's a good investment.
Azula and them got into some sort of very bad wreck when they were thirteen. Something that would kill everyone today, but since their parents are very important to Fire Corp, they were sufficiently modded that they survived. Barely.
Ozai built them new bodies, as implied in his section. Ty Lee's was completely wrecked, but her mind was still alive and being trapped inside of a broken shell was driving her crazy. Mai and Azula were comatose - Mai only recently came out of her coma and moved into her new body. Azula is still comatose. Sort of. As mentioned, Ozai hooked her into the Fire Corp systems to make the transfer easier when she woke up. She's partly moved into the systems already.
Zuko ran away, but he tends to still be 'visible' as it were. At least to people who pay attention to the likely next president of Fire Corp. However, he's going by Lee and people like Aang and S0KK4 only know him as that.
HY0 actually lives inside of Long Feng's assorted cybernetic gear. Which is why Long Feng is only human-normal - the programming space that would cover all of the cool things his tech is capable of has been filled with AI programming.
Kuei has some very experimental cybernetic modifications. Most people don't quite realize how they all stack together. Long Feng probably does, but he's got half a dozen other things to be doing besides worrying over Kuei being able to see AIs' auras.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject