more journey's into fanfiction.net...

[meganbmoore]

dangermousie I blame my eternal scarring on you.

After surviving my first real foray into anime/manga fanfic, I decided to check out another series: Wolf's Rain.

It...I...I have no words...

For those not familiar with it, Wolf's Rain is an excellent 30 episode anime that's essentially a post-apocalyptic fairy tale set in a world where wolves have been believed to be extinct for years, but have in fact actually learned to pass themselves off as human.  The central cast is several stray wolves who reluctantly form their own pack and go on a search for paradise, which supposedly can only be found by wolves.  This is an absurdly simplistic explanation, but this isn't a rec-post...

The cast is predominantly male, but there are four m/f romantic relationships(all pretty interesting) with varying degrees of importance to the series.  There's 1 other main female character in the second half, but she's a villain.  Until a week or so ago, I'd always assumed it was something of a yaoi fangirl's dream(so many good looking guys, several of whom were on a long, long journey together with nary a female in sight for a while...) but I've been informed that that was a false assumption.

So, what did I find looking at the first page @ fanfiction.net?  Well, aside from one genderswap Toboe/Tsume story(which would be twitchworthy already even without one being a child and the other his-very gruff and reluctant-guardian/paternal figure) it was Mary Sue central.  Seriously.  Every description I read.  And they were all girls(female wolfs or otherwise)  meeting Kiba's pack, usually with "special knowledge"

I'd so be halfway through a HUGE post of this, except that I'm headed out soon, so I'll save it for later.

Disclaimer:  Again, my opinion on fanfic summaries is based on neither the author or the fanfic itself, just the impression the summaries give me(though I doubt anything could ever sway me over to pedophilic or incestfic, or cheatingfic) and I'm well aware that there are good fanfic writers(a few of whom are on my flist, or at least, their descriptions sound like things I'd read if I read much fanfic and didn't have a huge backlog of stuff to read that made too much extra something not even a consideration)

Comments

[surgingshark.livejournal.com]

Wolf's Rain had Yoko Kanno music ^_^ The Manga only lasted two volumes, as far as I know...

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Wolf's Rain has one of the best anime soundtracks ever. I tend to go around with the opening them going through my head at the oddest times. The manga was OK.

[grey-fuzzy.livejournal.com]

See, now I've been avoiding FF.net since my days in the Harry Potter fandom, but I love reading about other people being scarred from it! I think magical wolves are a big thing with pre-teens, so I'm not surprised to hear this ;P.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Se, about 50% of the Mary Sue wolves and non-Cheza flower maidens I could just shrug off, but the Tsume/Toboe genderswap is just...it...I mean, is it just ONE of them, or both so it'd be yuri instead of yaoi? And if it's one, then which? (Actually, I assume Toboe, since he's the kid...)

[aoimidori.livejournal.com]

I'd always assumed it was something of a yaoi fangirl's dream(so many good looking guys, several of whom were on a long, long journey together with nary a female in sight for a while...)
I must confess, I originally thought this too, so I wasn't really all that excited about watching it. (I'm not against yaoi, I just don't go around looking for it. If I see a good slash pair, then I'm okay with it.)

But I'm really glad I gave it a chance, because I fell in love with it. To be honest, once I hit my sophomore year in college, I hardly finished any anime series. This was one of those titles I marathoned, just to get to the end.

Anyway yeah. I never bother looking through FFN for fic of series I adore. Too disappointing :p

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I'm fine if it's canon, and can like it if the pair is interesting, but have never seen the appeal of changing a character's orientation. I generally adopt a "to each their own" philosophy with "don't bash my canon and i won't bash your fantasies" tacked on.

I watched Wolf's Rain long before I knew about yaoi or fannish slash tendencies in anime and manga, otherwise, I would have been hesitant about it(or I would have if the main person who recced it to me wasn't a guy who essentially goes "lalalalala...happy other place" in regards to yaoi...or would if he were the sort to go "lalalalala")

[aoimidori.livejournal.com]

Haha, all the people I knew who saw the series before me were yaoi fans, which is why I was hesitant.

As for fiction, I never really thought to find myself WR fanfic after I finished it. Well, for a while, I looked for good Blue/Hige ones, so I just stopped. It had an open ending, but I thought it was perfect enough.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I don't think I've ever finished an anime or manga and gone "I want fanfic" I guess I was too scarred before I ever heard of anime and manga.

[southerndave.livejournal.com]

I have managed to keep my brain reasonably intact by only reading fan fiction that is (1) recommended to me by people I know have good taste, and (2) actually looks promising from the summary. I do not have enough time to read anything else, even if I don't think I am at great risk of brain breakage.

Otherwise... I find the fan fiction I most enjoy covers things that the comics / TV show / whatever hasn't been able to cover due to various reasons (cancellation, corporate bastardry, copyright problems etc.) A few years ago I read some very good Doctor Who stuff (before the show was brought back). That's a show that's tailor-made for one of my guilty pleasures: totally inappropriate crossovers.

The problem is that I don't see the point of fan fiction if there isn't room for it in the story. There certainly is in Doctor Who - the Doctor has aged several hundred years in the 400 or so hours of footage of the show, so there are heaps of gaps - but with Wolf's Rain there simply aren't any gaps in the story that fan fiction can fill.

(Incidentally, did I ever actually get around to typing out my theory as to how the ending of Wolf's Rain actually made perfect logical sense? I thought I had but can't quite remember...)

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Nope, don't think you ever got around to posting that theory.