Collected Thoughts

I've been trying to articulate why I'm a fan of non happy endings. Not necessarily hurt comfort, becuase those usually end up happily but stories that end up with the couple broken up. Or gen stories with darker psychological ramifications. Death stories.

On the basic level they just turn my crank and much the same way I like purple. I dunno how to be analytical about why I like purple, it makes me happy, gives me a thrill when I see things that are "my color". It's not like it was in my baby crib or someone I idolaized liked purple I just like purple.


But I can analyze why I like darker stories. No necessarily what gets labelled darkfic, but stories that are...more realistic in some ways, stories where couples don't get together because they aren't suited for each other. Stories where characters are fucked up and flawed and do fucked up and flawed things and pay the price.Any other type of story, even death stories in some cases, the endings are up for grabs. The couple could end up together and miserable. The character could end up getting what he wants and hate it. Nothing happens. Everyone dies. Everyone lives and life goes on just like it did. The monster isn't who you thought, the monster is inside, the monster is defeated at a price. So many different endings, so many different things to happen and go wrong. I like that. I like the possiblities. I'm not however into those unrelentingly dark stories where bad horrible things keep happening to just torture a character. I want a story with a plot and character development and a reason. Oh, and a dark story with humor...even more fun.

All I can say is this in my make up. It's not something I just like in fan ficiton and the rest of the time I'm all about the happy endings and romantic comedies, because I'm not. I've always been bent towards the type of stories I like in fan fiction. In middle school, we read this great book, Dorp Dead, or maybe we just read some of it, I'm fuzzy on that. What I do know is that it's a great book, one that blew my mind completely. It was amazing, darker themed, gripping. And we had to write a short story type thing from one of the character's POV, and I picked the dog and wrote from the dog's POV about what happened to the boy through the dog's eyes until the dog left the story. I wish I still had that. We also read To Build a Fire at some point and I would read it over and over and over again. I loved that story to pieces. I loved the ending, I loved reading the foreshadowing because I knew how it was going to end.

Then I found a book of Charles Addams drawings. I had loved The Addams Family for so long and to see...pictures that were even better, funnier, more macbre than The Addams Family. That someone had this wicked sense of humor and I wasn't alone. I always loved the really twisted cartoons, the odd stuff on tv.

And then, I saw Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. My aunt rented it for me and my cousin, not knowing about the Demon Barber thing, just seeing it as a musical, a play. It's culuture. My aunt was horrified. I was transfixed. It just kept getting better and better. I was thrilled, it was fun.

When I start looking at my favorite shows and why I like them so much--Homicide, incredible writing but a show that pulled no punches. Bayliss gets his first big case. There's Three Men and Adena. The entire hour in The Box. This case haunts Bayliss forever. The show was constantly like that, there was humorous shows but then there was Doll's Eyes. Which, the last time I saw it, had me in tears...not from anything the regular actors were doing, but from the guest actors. Emotionally wrenching, but emotionally satisifying as well. At least to me. Oh, Homicide would rip my guts out and laugh while I bled but I happily paid for the pleasure.

Deep Space Nine. God, this was what I'd craved in TNG. Characters that develooped. Characters that conflicted. Inner conflict and outer conflict. This is what I always wanted Star Trek to be. I wanted to know what happened to Pichard after he was tortured by the Cardasians, but they never really showed that. He got over it, barely mentioned him being assimliated. Here on Deep Space Nine there were ramifications of Worf's upbringng, to Miles marriage. Nog, basically a third teir character developed as a character.

Buffy. Buffy had me when Darla turned around in vamp face and killed that guy. Buffy had me and I slipped away briefly but I must have been insane. Buffy, again, offers humor with the darkness. The choices that are made, the deaths, the Gentlemen. Even though I say I hated the last season there are still episodes that I love and even though I take issue with alot of things about about the finale. Damn.

Angel. I watched City of again. Squealed with glee to hear "Can you fly?" Angel was a much more adult tone than Buffy. When Angel went beige? Um. And Lilah, she left her conscious behind and doesn't want it back. Wes, oh Wes. He's bled on the show, literally and figuratively.


Again these things rock my world. It's what I look for in entertainment, in fan fiction. I love reading stories that take a part characters to find out how they tick. I've read that some people want to read happy stories in fan ficiton because fan fiction is an escape, a divergance from daily life. I think of fan fiction the same way. It's an escape, it's a diversion, it's a supplement to the show or movie I love.

I guess this is a really long winded way of saying I read what I do because it's how I get my kicks. It thrills me and excites me. I do like happy endings, but the variety that's in all other possiblities. I don't know when I go in what's going to happen and in a happily ever after story I always know the ending even if I don't know how they get to there. Put all the elements together--the not knowing and the possiblities and all the books and movies and tv shows that shaped me as a child and this is what comes out. You probably don't want to know how my parents directly influenced me.