Hell's Half Acre

And now for something completely different...

Over the course of the past week, claudiapriscus and I have been having a discussion on tumblr. When we had come to a satisfiable end, claudiapriscus thought it might be nice to document the discussion and post it on LJ and see what other people thought.

The discussion started off with us complaining about the tendency in some fandoms to "woobie-fy" the villains, rather than be disgusted with their evilness... but it then moved into us discussing other fandom trends, like using queer relationships to double-down on heteronomativity, or the trend towards associating yourself with being an activist for queer representation when really you just want to see pretty boys kiss.

We also briefly discuss LJ vs. AO3.

This isn't usually the sort of thing I would post, because I do get really critical of a large portion of the fandom here... but, on the other hand, because I usually don't talk about it, I AM interested to see what happens if I do.

(Spoiler warning for Thor, Avengers, and, especially, Thor 2.)


( fanon-trends, heteronormativity, slacktivism, and LJ vs Ao3 )

You know what annoys me about this fandom: The constant throwing around of the word "retcon" where it DOES NOT APPLY.

I'm not saying that Supernatural has never retconned something - actually, I recall a discussion recently (with claudiapriscus?) where someone finally was able to point out something to me that was ACTUALLY a retcon. But most of what people are calling retcons ARE NOT RETCONS.

There is a HUGE difference between CHANGING previously established canon, and ADDING to the canon that we ASSUMED we knew.

Brady is not a retcon. Did Sam ever give us a list of his college friends? Did we ever hear the story of how he met Jess? No...therefore, writing Brady into the show in S5 isn't a retcon, it it GIVING US INFORMATION WE DIDN'T HAVE BEFORE!

The Amulet as God-EMF is also not a retcon: Did we ever learn why Bobby told Sam that the amulet was "real special"? No. Now we know though!

The Trickster actually being the arch-angel Gabriel is not a retcon. It is the arch-angel Gabriel being damn good at pretending to be a Trickster!

Sometimes I think our knowledge of the way the writers work is detrimental to the way people interpret the show. Because we KNOW that Kripke didn't set out to have angels in the show - we know that when the Trickster was first introduced they didn't plan to make him Gabriel. But that doesn't make the the Gabester a retcon. It just means that the writers decided to add in the information after his initial introduction, and were able to do it in a way where it actually made a little bit of sense (because, seriously, what was it to the Trickster that the Winchesters kept sacrificing themselves for each other?)

Now if there had been a line where Sam and Dean did some sort of crazy Angel-test on the Trickster for no reason back in S2, and Dean announced that the Trickster was definitely not secretly an arch-angel, then Gabriel would be a retcon.

Right now, the only "retcon" I'll give lea-way on is Chuck=God (which is heavily implied but not specifically stated)...and that's JUST because they met him in S4 when Dean still had the God-EMF Amulet and it never "grew hot" - at least not to the extent that Dean noticed. 

Sigh...sorry, I get so annoyed at inconsequential things sometimes.

Also, if any of you are following the twitpics of Asylum Europe Con this weekend: I like Jim's shirt, but the grammar is incorrect and it's driving me crazy.

I took spn_heavymeta off my friends list. Even not clicking on any of the links, I couldn't escape the negativity.

So, if anyone wants to recommend me some meta sites, with, you know, ACTUAL meta and not just complainy-episode reviews...please do.

In the meantime, I'm going to go listen to reggae and drink.

Alright, I'm going to rant about something. This is just personal taste, so I apologize if I offend anyone out there - that's not my intent. I certainly am not ranting about anyone particular on my flist or anything, so if you are an LJ friend of mine, don't worry, it's not you that I'm mad at.

Ok, so, I guess it's my own fault for liking meta - the problem is my definition of meta seems to be different than a lot of people's. To me, meta is analysis of the show, whether it be character motivations, explorations of themes, or notes on cinematographic storytelling. To others, it appears meta equals "personal review".

Fine, you know, that's all well and good. My Quick Reaction posts are not meta in my opinion. Sometimes, I'll touch on a thought and mention how I SHOULD turn it into a meta, or how I wish it was already a meta, but my Quick Reactions are too bogged down in whether or not I personally thought of the episode for me to post them on any meta-communities...because to me, meta shouldn't be about whether or not you personally liked the episode. Meta on an episode should be about what that episode adds to understanding character motivations, or how it adds to or changes the underlying theme of the show, etc...

The reason I'm saying all this, is just to say that USUALLY I DO NOT READ PERSONAL REVIEWS OF EPISODES. I make an exception for those people on my flist whose opinions I enjoy hearing (even when they differ with my own), because they are well thought out, or come from a place of positivity (and yes, it is possible to come from a place of positivity even when you don't like the episode...I will get into this.)

The first problem is that my meta-communities are inundated with people who have a different definition of what constitutes meta than I do. In that, they are posting personal reviews under the guise and fancy titling of a meta...this means, that I read these posts, thinking that I'm going to get a well thought out meta on character or theme or underlying social statement, and instead what I get is a bitch-fest about why someone thought the episode was a crock of shit.

Fine, you know, people are entitled to their personal opinions, I just wish that they wouldn't claim them as meta.

Now, RANT SUBJECT NUMBER TWO: FANDOM TREATMENT OF PLOT-HOLES.

I KNOW there are plot holes on Supernatural people...there are plot-holes on every show. I also know that occasionally, Supernatural has to do a retcon - Kripke had a 5 season plan, sure, but it has been quite obvious for some time that he never had the details of it worked out beforehand. You have people referring to Lilith as "he" up until 3x12, and that's just one example.

It's FINE, if you want to point out when they are trying to fix something, or when there is a bit of a plot-hole in an explanation...what really bugs me though, and has especially bugged me about this last episode, is when people point out the plot-hole from a place of negativity.

"Why did they do it this way? Obviously, that can't be true, because of suchandsuch."

Why focus on why an explanation doesn't work? Why not focus on why it DOES work. Why assume it's an inadequate explanation, why not see how it COULD BE TRUE.

Let's go back to my lame Lilith example from S3, just to avoid talking about spoilers.

When they introduced the demon holding Dean's contract as a FEMALE demon, did everyone sit around saying "But that can't be true, because the CRD and Ruby and Whateverhernamewas all said it was a HE, so this is all a load of shit and the episode sucks."

Or maybe they went for the more correct negativity and said: "Well, obviously Kripke changed his mind and changed it into a female, and now all those former episodes are stupid because they have the wrong pronoun."

But you COULD be more positive about it. You COULD say, "Well, obviously the CRD, Ruby, and Whateverhernamewas were all trying to throw Sam and Dean off by providing them with the wrong pronoun."

I'm just saying, that maybe Jake did kill Sam, and maybe Dean and Sam took a very odd unconventional route, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they weren't following everything to plan...it STILL could have ALWAYS HAD TO BE THEM. There are plenty of ways to explain away the plot-holes if you just come at it from a place of WANTING to explain them away, instead of wanting to be all negative and disappointed in everything.

Personally, I prefer the positive approach. I have an explanation for everything. I don't care how crazy it all seems - the more complicated the explanation, the more cunning the YED, Angels, Lucifer, Winchesters, whatever, appear to be...the more complicated their world is.

So, in conclusion:

1. Please do not claim that your bitch-fests are meta.
2. Stop being so goddamn negative. You are harshing my buzz.

In return, I promise to stop reading personal reviews as soon as I realize that that's what they are - unless you are one fo the select few that can complain about something without being a complete douchebag.

In the meantime, if anyone wants to have a plot-hole explained away by yours truly, just leave it in the comments. It's actually a favorite activity of mine.

Something I've noticed in the fandom is that a lot of people identify with Dean. Which is good, of course, you are supposed to identify with Dean...but what I mean is that a lot of people say "I'm a lot like Dean" or "Dean's a lot like me". I feel this way too, but there seems to be a fundamental difference between their reasons for this and mine.

This is best illustrated through a conversation I had about it with my little sister:

Me: "People keep saying 'Dean is a lot like me' or 'I'm a lot like Dean', and then they go on to list all of Dean's good qualities.

Susie: "Huh. Really?"

Me: "Yeah, like 'He's so devoted to his family' and 'He has a clear concept of what is right and wrong'...but, you know, I think I'm like Dean, but not because of his good points..."

Susie: "Hm."

Me: "I think I'm like Dean because we have the same faults..."

Susie: "Yeah, like how he makes jokes as a...umm..."

Me: "Using humour as a defense mechanism? And not acknowledging that he has emotions other than happiness or anger..."

Susie: "Right." *starts ticking off faults on fingers* "Humour as a defence mechanism; denies emotions; avoids emotional situations at all costs; avoids talking about things that he should really talk about; sabotages all his relationships; doesn't think anyone loves him; not to mention all his self-worth issues. OH DEAN!" :'-(

Me: "Haha!"

Susie: "At least you didn't go to hell"

Me: "Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better."

Susie: "Ha! You don't have the self-worth issues."

Me: "True. I'm freakin' awesome."