Mai's "Jean Claude Proposed!" face. XDAlso, first page of Love and Rock and Roll, for someone stumbling in here unawares and wondering why this is appropriate.
Showing posts with label pairings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pairings. Show all posts
Saturday, January 21, 2012
In light of Love and Rock and Roll starting...
Mai's "Jean Claude Proposed!" face. XDAlso, first page of Love and Rock and Roll, for someone stumbling in here unawares and wondering why this is appropriate.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Little Voices: Pages 28-37
Geez, I let this one go too long. Updating the blog has been a little more difficult lately, due to work.
I had all sorts of issues with the last panel of Page 28-- mostly, I didn't know what I wanted to do with it. Early lines included Joey talking about his father (out of character) and Yugi and Joey teasing Kaiba about having been adopted again (addressed in a later scene.) I only hit on the "talking nonsense" line after doing the bonus art mentioned in the last commentary. Kaiba muttering deliriously fixes everything in fanfic.
No, really, it does. Next time you can't figure out where your story's going, just get the man drunk. He will show you the way.
Page 29 is basically just a wrap up of the scene, but it still amuses me horribly. I love those little Calvin and Hobbes style chases, and I don't get to do them often in enough in serious storylines. (Also I got to draw Kaiba snoozing some more, echoing the first page in the sequence. I was pretty happy with that.)
As mentioned on the page, the random bystander lady belongs to My-Oh-Mai, one of our longtime readers who contributed to the open invite I keep mentioning.
I've mentioned in the original comments for page 30 that I love Duke. I say that about a lot of Yu-Gi-Oh characters. This is because it's true. XD
Duke is one of those characters that I draw consistently off-model, mainly because his hair didn't make much sense in the series (Hah, hair making sense in this fandom. Right.) When I talk about a character's hair not making sense, mostly I mean things like the fact that Duke's headband doesn't seem to circle around his head, instead terminating behind his bangs (without even a string to hold it up) and the fact that you really just can't tell where Téa's bangs start or where the part of her hair begins.
Other than that, I like drawing Duke because he dresses in a semi-girlish way-- not unlike the way that I dress, to be honest. (Although I seem to trend toward Atem's jewelry tastes.) This makes him easy for me to dress while keeping his outfits interesting, so drawing him is actually pretty relaxing. (It helps that he has a pretty ponytail. I love drawing hair.)
Tristan's nephew right there appeared in the manga. I like the fact that Tristan has a nephew, and that he gets pressed into watching the kid; it adds a dimension of harrassed younger brother to him that I identify with and am entertained greatly by. I gave Johji some aging up for the simple fact that time has passed and babies grow quickly; Johji will probably make more appearances, and he will look different every time.
Also I totally drew a picture of freaky baby Johji when I was prepping for that page. It makes me feel mildly dirty. XD
As noted pretty much everywhere I've mentioned her so far, Amber, making her introduction on page 31, belongs to SK Dark Dragon, who I asked for permission to use the character some time ago. We used to hang out in the same Yugioh forum back when TV.com was TVTome, and she hosted some of my early fanart on her website before I was allowed to have a DeviantArt account. I became very fond of Amber after reading several stories that featured the character, and asked if I could write a version of her into the future story I was concocting. Obviously, she said yes. (But I asked her again a year or two ago, because we hadn't talked in a while. XD SK still said yes.) (SK now has a blog on BlogSpot, and as she says herself, usually calls herself Little Scarf Girl now.)
Anyway, I liked Amber enough to let Duke chase her around in Game of Dreams. There is some amount of canon that indicates that Duke isn't entirely straight, but anybody who's read The Law of Purple knows I don't give half a damn about that kind of thing. XD Not being entirely straight doesn't disprove any hetero tendencies. (Incedentally, the LOP character Lette was very mildly inspired by SK, although they're absolutely nothing like each other and Lette isn't actually based on her. It's complex.)
Sometimes, YnY being a slightly disjointed online comic requires a scene to wrap quickly. I usually go for humor when this happens.
Also, I was very gratified by the positive response to Amber. Often when you introduce a recurring non-canon character into fanfic, a lot of acid is spat. (And let's be frank, a full-body shot is like the equivilant to a Mary-Sue description page in comics sometimes.) I'm sure it helps that she's not actually mine. XD
Some people were a little confused by Bakura's soul room on page 32. At least one person who was confused by it seemed to have never read the manga; this is where I got a lot of my ideas on what a proper soul room should look like. Téa's, for example, used a dance studio as a starting point, with lots of mirrors to indicate a confident personality, and an open ceiling to indicate an open personality. There was a cute little love seat and a tree in the middle of the floor, and a framed picture of a superhero without a face, which represented Atem (she didn't know who he was at the time.) There was also a portrait of the Statue of Liberty holding a ballet shoe and a soft drink cup. XD Another character, who spent a lot of time with himself and concentrating on ancient knowledge, had a dark soul room which used a library as a starting point.
Ryou's soul room started as a combination between a medieval courtyard and a Japanese garden, to represent, among other things, his love of the fantastic (as manga readers and those familiar with Series 0 will know, he likes to make his own tabletop RPGs.) On the wall directly opposite the viewer is a window hidden by a curtain and obscured by willow trees; behind this shroud is a portrait of his mother and sister, who died prior to the series. Though I doubt we'll ever see the portrait, his sister is slightly more prominent in the image, because he wrote letters to her in the manga, which indicates to me that he took her loss harder than that of his mother.
To the left of the portrait, from our viewpoint, is another arch. In this arch, which is uncovered, you can see a portrait of Yugi, Téa, Tristan and Joey, although the distance involved makes it a smallish picture and therefore obscures exactly who is represented there. These four people are the only friends that Ryou has had that have not abandoned him or rejected him outright when they learned that he was possessed, and who went to great lengths to help him even when they didn't know him that well. Therefore he holds them in a place of great importance, and they get to have a picture in his soul room.
Even more prominent is the statue to the left of that, whose feet can be seen in the side of the panel. This is Atem, who he's given a Theban style monument in his head. I refuse to go very deeply into that, aside from the fact that it started in the same place as the portrait of Yugi-tachi. (I did mention elsewhere that there were going to be undertones of this.)
Somewhere in the soul room, where we cannot see, there is probably a smaller image of his father, whom he doesn't seem to be especially close to. This is understandable, because Ryou's father would appear to be out of the country a lot. On the opposite wall from the viewer, there is another window, but it looks "out."
The pool in the floor handles several jobs. First of all, it represents a deeper emotional and spiritual side to Ryou that he keeps private. Secondly, it divides his soul room into two parts: the "lighter" side, with Atem, his friends, and his father (and his sister and mother hovering in between) and the "darker" side, which features more trees, some ivy on the wall....
And a screen door, which leads us into page 33, and Ryou into a blank room. The screen door was Invid's idea. As anyone who is into this fandom knows, when Atem and Yugi's soul rooms were depicted, we never saw inside Yugi's (except for a few toys scattered on the floor), but there was a hallway dividing the two rooms, and the hallway itself resembled Atem's room more than it did Yugi's (Although Yugi's door had something that looked like metal plating and circuitry on it. Which is awesome.) Invid postulated that this hallway represented the fact that Atem's soul room actually existed within the Millenium Puzzle, and thus if Atem had actually fully inhabited Yugi's body, it would have looked different.
Hence the screen door. Yami Bakura's blank soul room is actually directly a part of Ryou's room, but their souls remain distinct; Yami B is just hiding out in Ryou's head. Since it's a single vessel containing two souls, there's only one soul room, but it's been divided into two by a screen door so as to represent the separation of the actual personalities.
Yami Bakura is currently in a very bad way, as the blankness of his side should indicate. Consider: if everything in Ryou's room means something, and the Escheresque maze in Atem's soul room represented hidden secrets, what does blankness mean? Marik will get to show up later and explain a bit of this to us, and to Ryou.
I was aware that having Yami Bakura turn out to be alive might put certain readers off. I can only say that I had several good reasons for doing it; which can be summed up like so: There is a starting point from the series for this that makes it possible (the fact that several times he shunted part of his own soul into objects other than the Ring.) I like him and want to see him heal. And he plays an important role in later stories, a role that only Yami Bakura can play. (Also Yukai likes him a great deal. I'm not sure why, because Yukai actually has to have a human relationship with him, and I don't, but there you go. They have some weird things in common with each other, and they're both snarky. Maybe that's enough.)
Ryou maybe loses some of those manly points he's been racking up on page 34. I have to admit I kind of giggle when he drops Yami B, even though it's horrible. Mostly he didn't expect Yami B to flop like that, but he's also startled that Yami B doesn't seem to be a figment of his imagination. I dressed Yami B in darker clothes than Ryou to make it simpler to tell them apart. As time goes by, I'll be using varied methods, like shadow scars, actual scars, shadows over the eyes, mascara, and context. I try to draw Yami B's little hair horns that started to show up in Battle City, but somehow that doesn't make them look different enough when I'm the one drawing them.
Do notice that on Yami B's side of the soul room, the screen door appears to be just floating there. XD Aside from that, I am very pleased with Yami B's hair, and the way he looks as Ryou is dropping him. The dropping pose came about in a very natural way and I'm not sure how I did it.
Yami Bakura wants you to help him, Roooo! He is bleeding spiritually! Augghhh!
I don't really have anything else to say about page 35, because I said most of it in the comments. XD
Page 36 features that nice statue of Atem. I'm very pleased with how it turned out, although it seemed to confuse at least one person into thinking Atem was alive in Ryou's head too. O_o He's not. That would be weird. And also he'd be like "Bakura, I don't want that half dead guy on my feet, put him back." Other than that, I'm happy with the progression of the page, and stuff.
On page 37, Ryou once again references time. I may as well mention here that the next storyline is another half a year later, but that it takes three months, and that the next two storylines coexist over a time period of about a year. I'm mildly shaky on exact time within the actual series, but have chosen to assume it covers a time period of maybe a year to a year and a half. The end of the last story will be about seven years after the Ceremonial Duel. :P
Ryou moves Yami B from the "dark" side of his room to the "light" side of his room and puts him at Atem's feet. Make of that what you will.
Let it be known that I have no intention of reviving Atem in the same way. He's conclusively dead. He has every reason to rest in peace. Bringing him back would destroy the point of the series ending, which is "death must be accepted." Yami B's problem is partly an inability to take the moral to heart.
(Despite this, Atem manages to be very present throughout Game of Dreams, as the statue itself indicates.)
This page was the result of a lot of last minute editing, and it was mostly because I suddenly realized I had never made it clear, anywhere in the storyline, that Yami B has amnesia. I'm not sure how that happened, but I like the page.
This situation is not permanent, but won't be changed during Game of Dreams, because it's partly thanks to Yukai that the change happens. There, ya'll have your spoiler for the day. XD
Next up, Ryou goes looking for answers!
I had all sorts of issues with the last panel of Page 28-- mostly, I didn't know what I wanted to do with it. Early lines included Joey talking about his father (out of character) and Yugi and Joey teasing Kaiba about having been adopted again (addressed in a later scene.) I only hit on the "talking nonsense" line after doing the bonus art mentioned in the last commentary. Kaiba muttering deliriously fixes everything in fanfic.
No, really, it does. Next time you can't figure out where your story's going, just get the man drunk. He will show you the way.
Page 29 is basically just a wrap up of the scene, but it still amuses me horribly. I love those little Calvin and Hobbes style chases, and I don't get to do them often in enough in serious storylines. (Also I got to draw Kaiba snoozing some more, echoing the first page in the sequence. I was pretty happy with that.)
As mentioned on the page, the random bystander lady belongs to My-Oh-Mai, one of our longtime readers who contributed to the open invite I keep mentioning.
I've mentioned in the original comments for page 30 that I love Duke. I say that about a lot of Yu-Gi-Oh characters. This is because it's true. XD
Duke is one of those characters that I draw consistently off-model, mainly because his hair didn't make much sense in the series (Hah, hair making sense in this fandom. Right.) When I talk about a character's hair not making sense, mostly I mean things like the fact that Duke's headband doesn't seem to circle around his head, instead terminating behind his bangs (without even a string to hold it up) and the fact that you really just can't tell where Téa's bangs start or where the part of her hair begins.
Other than that, I like drawing Duke because he dresses in a semi-girlish way-- not unlike the way that I dress, to be honest. (Although I seem to trend toward Atem's jewelry tastes.) This makes him easy for me to dress while keeping his outfits interesting, so drawing him is actually pretty relaxing. (It helps that he has a pretty ponytail. I love drawing hair.)
Tristan's nephew right there appeared in the manga. I like the fact that Tristan has a nephew, and that he gets pressed into watching the kid; it adds a dimension of harrassed younger brother to him that I identify with and am entertained greatly by. I gave Johji some aging up for the simple fact that time has passed and babies grow quickly; Johji will probably make more appearances, and he will look different every time.
Also I totally drew a picture of freaky baby Johji when I was prepping for that page. It makes me feel mildly dirty. XD
As noted pretty much everywhere I've mentioned her so far, Amber, making her introduction on page 31, belongs to SK Dark Dragon, who I asked for permission to use the character some time ago. We used to hang out in the same Yugioh forum back when TV.com was TVTome, and she hosted some of my early fanart on her website before I was allowed to have a DeviantArt account. I became very fond of Amber after reading several stories that featured the character, and asked if I could write a version of her into the future story I was concocting. Obviously, she said yes. (But I asked her again a year or two ago, because we hadn't talked in a while. XD SK still said yes.) (SK now has a blog on BlogSpot, and as she says herself, usually calls herself Little Scarf Girl now.)
Anyway, I liked Amber enough to let Duke chase her around in Game of Dreams. There is some amount of canon that indicates that Duke isn't entirely straight, but anybody who's read The Law of Purple knows I don't give half a damn about that kind of thing. XD Not being entirely straight doesn't disprove any hetero tendencies. (Incedentally, the LOP character Lette was very mildly inspired by SK, although they're absolutely nothing like each other and Lette isn't actually based on her. It's complex.)
Sometimes, YnY being a slightly disjointed online comic requires a scene to wrap quickly. I usually go for humor when this happens.
Also, I was very gratified by the positive response to Amber. Often when you introduce a recurring non-canon character into fanfic, a lot of acid is spat. (And let's be frank, a full-body shot is like the equivilant to a Mary-Sue description page in comics sometimes.) I'm sure it helps that she's not actually mine. XD
Some people were a little confused by Bakura's soul room on page 32. At least one person who was confused by it seemed to have never read the manga; this is where I got a lot of my ideas on what a proper soul room should look like. Téa's, for example, used a dance studio as a starting point, with lots of mirrors to indicate a confident personality, and an open ceiling to indicate an open personality. There was a cute little love seat and a tree in the middle of the floor, and a framed picture of a superhero without a face, which represented Atem (she didn't know who he was at the time.) There was also a portrait of the Statue of Liberty holding a ballet shoe and a soft drink cup. XD Another character, who spent a lot of time with himself and concentrating on ancient knowledge, had a dark soul room which used a library as a starting point.
Ryou's soul room started as a combination between a medieval courtyard and a Japanese garden, to represent, among other things, his love of the fantastic (as manga readers and those familiar with Series 0 will know, he likes to make his own tabletop RPGs.) On the wall directly opposite the viewer is a window hidden by a curtain and obscured by willow trees; behind this shroud is a portrait of his mother and sister, who died prior to the series. Though I doubt we'll ever see the portrait, his sister is slightly more prominent in the image, because he wrote letters to her in the manga, which indicates to me that he took her loss harder than that of his mother.
To the left of the portrait, from our viewpoint, is another arch. In this arch, which is uncovered, you can see a portrait of Yugi, Téa, Tristan and Joey, although the distance involved makes it a smallish picture and therefore obscures exactly who is represented there. These four people are the only friends that Ryou has had that have not abandoned him or rejected him outright when they learned that he was possessed, and who went to great lengths to help him even when they didn't know him that well. Therefore he holds them in a place of great importance, and they get to have a picture in his soul room.
Even more prominent is the statue to the left of that, whose feet can be seen in the side of the panel. This is Atem, who he's given a Theban style monument in his head. I refuse to go very deeply into that, aside from the fact that it started in the same place as the portrait of Yugi-tachi. (I did mention elsewhere that there were going to be undertones of this.)
Somewhere in the soul room, where we cannot see, there is probably a smaller image of his father, whom he doesn't seem to be especially close to. This is understandable, because Ryou's father would appear to be out of the country a lot. On the opposite wall from the viewer, there is another window, but it looks "out."
The pool in the floor handles several jobs. First of all, it represents a deeper emotional and spiritual side to Ryou that he keeps private. Secondly, it divides his soul room into two parts: the "lighter" side, with Atem, his friends, and his father (and his sister and mother hovering in between) and the "darker" side, which features more trees, some ivy on the wall....
And a screen door, which leads us into page 33, and Ryou into a blank room. The screen door was Invid's idea. As anyone who is into this fandom knows, when Atem and Yugi's soul rooms were depicted, we never saw inside Yugi's (except for a few toys scattered on the floor), but there was a hallway dividing the two rooms, and the hallway itself resembled Atem's room more than it did Yugi's (Although Yugi's door had something that looked like metal plating and circuitry on it. Which is awesome.) Invid postulated that this hallway represented the fact that Atem's soul room actually existed within the Millenium Puzzle, and thus if Atem had actually fully inhabited Yugi's body, it would have looked different.
Hence the screen door. Yami Bakura's blank soul room is actually directly a part of Ryou's room, but their souls remain distinct; Yami B is just hiding out in Ryou's head. Since it's a single vessel containing two souls, there's only one soul room, but it's been divided into two by a screen door so as to represent the separation of the actual personalities.
Yami Bakura is currently in a very bad way, as the blankness of his side should indicate. Consider: if everything in Ryou's room means something, and the Escheresque maze in Atem's soul room represented hidden secrets, what does blankness mean? Marik will get to show up later and explain a bit of this to us, and to Ryou.
I was aware that having Yami Bakura turn out to be alive might put certain readers off. I can only say that I had several good reasons for doing it; which can be summed up like so: There is a starting point from the series for this that makes it possible (the fact that several times he shunted part of his own soul into objects other than the Ring.) I like him and want to see him heal. And he plays an important role in later stories, a role that only Yami Bakura can play. (Also Yukai likes him a great deal. I'm not sure why, because Yukai actually has to have a human relationship with him, and I don't, but there you go. They have some weird things in common with each other, and they're both snarky. Maybe that's enough.)
Ryou maybe loses some of those manly points he's been racking up on page 34. I have to admit I kind of giggle when he drops Yami B, even though it's horrible. Mostly he didn't expect Yami B to flop like that, but he's also startled that Yami B doesn't seem to be a figment of his imagination. I dressed Yami B in darker clothes than Ryou to make it simpler to tell them apart. As time goes by, I'll be using varied methods, like shadow scars, actual scars, shadows over the eyes, mascara, and context. I try to draw Yami B's little hair horns that started to show up in Battle City, but somehow that doesn't make them look different enough when I'm the one drawing them.
Do notice that on Yami B's side of the soul room, the screen door appears to be just floating there. XD Aside from that, I am very pleased with Yami B's hair, and the way he looks as Ryou is dropping him. The dropping pose came about in a very natural way and I'm not sure how I did it.
Yami Bakura wants you to help him, Roooo! He is bleeding spiritually! Augghhh!
I don't really have anything else to say about page 35, because I said most of it in the comments. XD
Page 36 features that nice statue of Atem. I'm very pleased with how it turned out, although it seemed to confuse at least one person into thinking Atem was alive in Ryou's head too. O_o He's not. That would be weird. And also he'd be like "Bakura, I don't want that half dead guy on my feet, put him back." Other than that, I'm happy with the progression of the page, and stuff.
On page 37, Ryou once again references time. I may as well mention here that the next storyline is another half a year later, but that it takes three months, and that the next two storylines coexist over a time period of about a year. I'm mildly shaky on exact time within the actual series, but have chosen to assume it covers a time period of maybe a year to a year and a half. The end of the last story will be about seven years after the Ceremonial Duel. :P
Ryou moves Yami B from the "dark" side of his room to the "light" side of his room and puts him at Atem's feet. Make of that what you will.
Let it be known that I have no intention of reviving Atem in the same way. He's conclusively dead. He has every reason to rest in peace. Bringing him back would destroy the point of the series ending, which is "death must be accepted." Yami B's problem is partly an inability to take the moral to heart.
(Despite this, Atem manages to be very present throughout Game of Dreams, as the statue itself indicates.)
This page was the result of a lot of last minute editing, and it was mostly because I suddenly realized I had never made it clear, anywhere in the storyline, that Yami B has amnesia. I'm not sure how that happened, but I like the page.
This situation is not permanent, but won't be changed during Game of Dreams, because it's partly thanks to Yukai that the change happens. There, ya'll have your spoiler for the day. XD
Next up, Ryou goes looking for answers!
Saturday, May 22, 2010
The Science of Pairings
(Note: Feel free to go find "She Blinded Me With Science" on YuuTube or whatever and listen to it while reading. I don't think it'll add any flavor or anything to it, but you never know.)
Nobody knows for sure what makes any particular fan fall in love with a particular pairing, be it canon or otherwise. Maybe a glance passes between two favorite characters, and a surge of emotion swells in the chest of the fan in question. Maybe one stumbles across a pairing on a fanart hunt, and cannot help but think, "You know, there's something about that which just feels right." Or maybe one comes across a fanfiction or comic that just handles the pairing, and the characters, so well that it fixates in the mind.
I could tell all about how I fell in love with Kaiba/Serenity first because of fanart, then because of watching the characters myself. I could also tell how it happened that I fell in love with any of my Téa pairings, with Joey/Kaiba, with Joey/Mai, with Ishizu and Pegasus. I can tell the exact story of how I arrived at every single conclusive pairing in YnY, too. But each of them would take at least as long as a character study to explain properly.
This essay is about how I think about pairings in general, what I think makes them appealing, and how two characters can bubble together in a way that makes a story worthwhile. Please be aware that much of this is based solely on my own opinions and my own observations of real relationships-- most especially on what I observed of my own parents, my father and his first wife, my aunts and uncles, my siblings and their respective exes and current mates (I don't feel that examining my own romantic relationships would be very helpful, as I can't exactly be less than passionate about them. XD There will be a few observations as handed to me by other people, however.)
Obviously, the differences between two people in a pairing tend to give it a lot of its conflict, and therefore, its fire. But similarities can do the same, and in any event a couple with the wrong mix of similarity and difference, or characters too similar or too different, cannot work if you want the characters involved to feel real or be interesting as a couple. Too, tailor-making a character to fit with another usually backfires without the right kind of interplay. (Making a character, for example, who has an uncanny understanding of Kaiba's tics and issues, is exactly what he wants in a woman (or man!), is infinitely patient with him all the time, is great with Mokuba, etcetera, would probably find that Kaiba was about ready to launch her from a cannon off the roof of KaibaCorp in a fiction that handled him realistically. Kaiba can't stand perfection in other people-- and really, who can?)
I tend to find that the most important differences and similarities lie in temperament-- likes and dislikes, while important, mean nothing with incompatible temperaments. These characters might be friends, but that doesn't mean they could stand each other for more than a few hours. Yet the cocktail will be different between any two people: I like both Seto/Wheeler pairings but for totally different reasons. Serenity is calm and patient yet quietly strong, Seto is abrasively stubborn and dramatic, yet often gives in to patience with time and is terribly vulnerable under a veneer of arrogance. Joey and Kaiba are like two sides of one coin, yet Joey is an extrovert and good with people, while Kaiba is not. These are both mixtures that appeal to me, and it's also the real reason why I think both pairings are so popular, although plenty of fans on both sides don't seem to have any idea what really drew them to the couple interplay.
Some differences or similarities in temperament are more forgivable than others. Two fiery personalities with short tempers are going to have a harder time meshing than two calm ones. (Although as many foe-shippers will tell you, sometimes that's half the fun!) I have a lot of such pairings that I like quite well, but not as long term relationships. Other differences and similarities don't really matter much at all; I see a lot of Kaiba/Rebecca on the basis that they're both "geniuses" and therefore would have an easier time keeping up with one another, but I tend to see being able to understand the other person's work as more of a bonus than as a necessity. (Kaiba and Rebecca are practically a male and female version of each other and are both temperamental, stubborn, and oversensitive. While I understand how this draws other people to the pairing, it reminds me way too much of the relationship I have with my father. No thanks.)
Often, a pairing will work less when you toss the characters together as they are, and more if you let one or both of them grow up a little. With Kaiba and Serenity, for example, both of them need to work on their social skills, while Tristan would be much more successful at any romantic relationship if he could just garner a little more confidence.
In some cases, we can see that certain characters clearly have "types," based on the characters they go after within the canon. Rebecca's "type," at least at the moment, is a calm, kind, gentle sort of person (obviously there'd have to be a lot of patience there, too.) Joey seems to go for the tall, well-built and forceful type (although he values their vulnerable sides. XD) Téa likes them stoic and enigmatic. Tristan prefers quiet, shy, "princess" types (and he's easier to pin down, because he's had more girls he's crushed on.) This can certainly tell a writer what kind of characters a character will chase after, but it says nothing about who a character will actually end up with-- sometimes a person picks a "type" that turns out to lead them into destructive relationships no matter how often they try. (Tristan, in my opinion, definitely needs to go against type: he comes on too strong and tends to scare the shy ones off.)
When I consider a pairing, I not only take into account whatever interaction the characters might have had (including any assessments they may have made of each other) nor do I merely consider temperaments (although that's a large part of it), but I also think about the relationships they have outside of the pairing. All Seto Kaiba pairings absolutely MUST consider Mokuba's feelings in the equation: since Mokuba trusts Yugi, the closer someone is to Yugi the more likely Mokuba is to approve. The more stable and level-headed the potential mate is, the more likely Mokuba is to approve. The older the brothers are at the time of story (like, if Mokuba is in his twenties) the less likely Seto is to care about Mokuba's opinion, and he's also less likely to care about Mokuba's opinion pre-Mind Crush. The way she/he treats Mokuba when Seto's not around is a huge factor, and so is the way Mokuba treats him or her when Seto IS around. I can easily see Seto sneaking around with a relationship just because he's strongly suspicious that his little brother wouldn't like it. Similarly, I can see Mokuba trying to set Seto up with people.
No matter who you pair Serenity with, Joey's going to be mad (unless it's Yugi. Or possibly a woman. Who isn't Vivian.) So the real question there is, how are Tristan and Duke going to respond, and does Serenity care about their opinion OR Joey's? Joey doesn't particularly care how his friends respond to his love interests, as long as they're not unkind to said interests, but it should still be taken into account that, for whatever reason, Tristan disapproves of most of them. XD (He probably cares more about what Serenity thinks, but less than Seto cares about Mokuba's thoughts-- partly because she's not dependent on him to support her.) Ishizu's brothers should be considered at the same time one considers any pairing involving her, not because their disapproval would keep her away from anyone but because it adds significantly to the story. Any pairing with Pegasus has to consider (unless it's Cecilia herself) how he might reconcile his widower status with his new relationship, and whether he'd be able (I dislike Mai/Pegasus as a pairing for the sole reason that the person who suggested it to me said "because she looks like his wife" and it really, REALLY put me off.) Mai pairings have to consider the fact that she's a sought-after woman-- who really knows for sure how many other Jean Claude Magnums there are in her past? (Certainly Valon can't be ignored, either, if you're going by anime continuity, and Joey can't ever be ignored here, even if you only consider him her close friend.) Téa is more likely to ask her friends directly what they think of a boyfriend or girlfriend, but not what they think of a crush.
Sometimes, after considering the out-of-pairing interplay, the potential conflict I see causes me to drop a pairing. I don't pair Téa with Joey more because Joey would be determined not to hurt Yugi than because they wouldn't make a good couple (and I don't like that kind of "we can't hurt him! SNOG" story. Personal taste.) Other times, the potential reaction sucks me in, and I just can't keep myself from rubbing my hands together and grinning from thinking about it. I love the idea of Ishizu marching her brothers into a family meeting and declaring, like a general heading into battle, "I am in love with Maximillion Pegasus!" I also love the mental picture of their faces after she's declared. XD (Sigh. Now I have to do a picture.)
Finally, how the two characters actually do treat each other, or how they might treat each other. This is wrapped up heavily in temperament-- Joey's going to be at least a little rough and playful with pretty much anyone. Yugi will be sweet and supportive even if he doesn't want the relationship. Most people who try to have a relationship with Kaiba are going to find themselves taking on a mildly parental role, and because of this, their probable parenting styles should also be considered. (I'm not saying Kaiba's an overgrown child. He just tends to need somebody who can handle his vulnerable side in a way that won't backfire and piss him off.) This is pretty important towards whether a relationship will work, yet at the same time, the way two characters treat one another will and should change within a story, especially one focused on a pairing.
Anyway, that's the bulk of it. Hope this got the gears working for at least a few of you (and if you can't figure out why someone likes a pairing? Ask me, I can probably come up with at least one reason.)
Nobody knows for sure what makes any particular fan fall in love with a particular pairing, be it canon or otherwise. Maybe a glance passes between two favorite characters, and a surge of emotion swells in the chest of the fan in question. Maybe one stumbles across a pairing on a fanart hunt, and cannot help but think, "You know, there's something about that which just feels right." Or maybe one comes across a fanfiction or comic that just handles the pairing, and the characters, so well that it fixates in the mind.
I could tell all about how I fell in love with Kaiba/Serenity first because of fanart, then because of watching the characters myself. I could also tell how it happened that I fell in love with any of my Téa pairings, with Joey/Kaiba, with Joey/Mai, with Ishizu and Pegasus. I can tell the exact story of how I arrived at every single conclusive pairing in YnY, too. But each of them would take at least as long as a character study to explain properly.
This essay is about how I think about pairings in general, what I think makes them appealing, and how two characters can bubble together in a way that makes a story worthwhile. Please be aware that much of this is based solely on my own opinions and my own observations of real relationships-- most especially on what I observed of my own parents, my father and his first wife, my aunts and uncles, my siblings and their respective exes and current mates (I don't feel that examining my own romantic relationships would be very helpful, as I can't exactly be less than passionate about them. XD There will be a few observations as handed to me by other people, however.)
Obviously, the differences between two people in a pairing tend to give it a lot of its conflict, and therefore, its fire. But similarities can do the same, and in any event a couple with the wrong mix of similarity and difference, or characters too similar or too different, cannot work if you want the characters involved to feel real or be interesting as a couple. Too, tailor-making a character to fit with another usually backfires without the right kind of interplay. (Making a character, for example, who has an uncanny understanding of Kaiba's tics and issues, is exactly what he wants in a woman (or man!), is infinitely patient with him all the time, is great with Mokuba, etcetera, would probably find that Kaiba was about ready to launch her from a cannon off the roof of KaibaCorp in a fiction that handled him realistically. Kaiba can't stand perfection in other people-- and really, who can?)
I tend to find that the most important differences and similarities lie in temperament-- likes and dislikes, while important, mean nothing with incompatible temperaments. These characters might be friends, but that doesn't mean they could stand each other for more than a few hours. Yet the cocktail will be different between any two people: I like both Seto/Wheeler pairings but for totally different reasons. Serenity is calm and patient yet quietly strong, Seto is abrasively stubborn and dramatic, yet often gives in to patience with time and is terribly vulnerable under a veneer of arrogance. Joey and Kaiba are like two sides of one coin, yet Joey is an extrovert and good with people, while Kaiba is not. These are both mixtures that appeal to me, and it's also the real reason why I think both pairings are so popular, although plenty of fans on both sides don't seem to have any idea what really drew them to the couple interplay.
Some differences or similarities in temperament are more forgivable than others. Two fiery personalities with short tempers are going to have a harder time meshing than two calm ones. (Although as many foe-shippers will tell you, sometimes that's half the fun!) I have a lot of such pairings that I like quite well, but not as long term relationships. Other differences and similarities don't really matter much at all; I see a lot of Kaiba/Rebecca on the basis that they're both "geniuses" and therefore would have an easier time keeping up with one another, but I tend to see being able to understand the other person's work as more of a bonus than as a necessity. (Kaiba and Rebecca are practically a male and female version of each other and are both temperamental, stubborn, and oversensitive. While I understand how this draws other people to the pairing, it reminds me way too much of the relationship I have with my father. No thanks.)
Often, a pairing will work less when you toss the characters together as they are, and more if you let one or both of them grow up a little. With Kaiba and Serenity, for example, both of them need to work on their social skills, while Tristan would be much more successful at any romantic relationship if he could just garner a little more confidence.
In some cases, we can see that certain characters clearly have "types," based on the characters they go after within the canon. Rebecca's "type," at least at the moment, is a calm, kind, gentle sort of person (obviously there'd have to be a lot of patience there, too.) Joey seems to go for the tall, well-built and forceful type (although he values their vulnerable sides. XD) Téa likes them stoic and enigmatic. Tristan prefers quiet, shy, "princess" types (and he's easier to pin down, because he's had more girls he's crushed on.) This can certainly tell a writer what kind of characters a character will chase after, but it says nothing about who a character will actually end up with-- sometimes a person picks a "type" that turns out to lead them into destructive relationships no matter how often they try. (Tristan, in my opinion, definitely needs to go against type: he comes on too strong and tends to scare the shy ones off.)
When I consider a pairing, I not only take into account whatever interaction the characters might have had (including any assessments they may have made of each other) nor do I merely consider temperaments (although that's a large part of it), but I also think about the relationships they have outside of the pairing. All Seto Kaiba pairings absolutely MUST consider Mokuba's feelings in the equation: since Mokuba trusts Yugi, the closer someone is to Yugi the more likely Mokuba is to approve. The more stable and level-headed the potential mate is, the more likely Mokuba is to approve. The older the brothers are at the time of story (like, if Mokuba is in his twenties) the less likely Seto is to care about Mokuba's opinion, and he's also less likely to care about Mokuba's opinion pre-Mind Crush. The way she/he treats Mokuba when Seto's not around is a huge factor, and so is the way Mokuba treats him or her when Seto IS around. I can easily see Seto sneaking around with a relationship just because he's strongly suspicious that his little brother wouldn't like it. Similarly, I can see Mokuba trying to set Seto up with people.
No matter who you pair Serenity with, Joey's going to be mad (unless it's Yugi. Or possibly a woman. Who isn't Vivian.) So the real question there is, how are Tristan and Duke going to respond, and does Serenity care about their opinion OR Joey's? Joey doesn't particularly care how his friends respond to his love interests, as long as they're not unkind to said interests, but it should still be taken into account that, for whatever reason, Tristan disapproves of most of them. XD (He probably cares more about what Serenity thinks, but less than Seto cares about Mokuba's thoughts-- partly because she's not dependent on him to support her.) Ishizu's brothers should be considered at the same time one considers any pairing involving her, not because their disapproval would keep her away from anyone but because it adds significantly to the story. Any pairing with Pegasus has to consider (unless it's Cecilia herself) how he might reconcile his widower status with his new relationship, and whether he'd be able (I dislike Mai/Pegasus as a pairing for the sole reason that the person who suggested it to me said "because she looks like his wife" and it really, REALLY put me off.) Mai pairings have to consider the fact that she's a sought-after woman-- who really knows for sure how many other Jean Claude Magnums there are in her past? (Certainly Valon can't be ignored, either, if you're going by anime continuity, and Joey can't ever be ignored here, even if you only consider him her close friend.) Téa is more likely to ask her friends directly what they think of a boyfriend or girlfriend, but not what they think of a crush.
Sometimes, after considering the out-of-pairing interplay, the potential conflict I see causes me to drop a pairing. I don't pair Téa with Joey more because Joey would be determined not to hurt Yugi than because they wouldn't make a good couple (and I don't like that kind of "we can't hurt him! SNOG" story. Personal taste.) Other times, the potential reaction sucks me in, and I just can't keep myself from rubbing my hands together and grinning from thinking about it. I love the idea of Ishizu marching her brothers into a family meeting and declaring, like a general heading into battle, "I am in love with Maximillion Pegasus!" I also love the mental picture of their faces after she's declared. XD (Sigh. Now I have to do a picture.)
Finally, how the two characters actually do treat each other, or how they might treat each other. This is wrapped up heavily in temperament-- Joey's going to be at least a little rough and playful with pretty much anyone. Yugi will be sweet and supportive even if he doesn't want the relationship. Most people who try to have a relationship with Kaiba are going to find themselves taking on a mildly parental role, and because of this, their probable parenting styles should also be considered. (I'm not saying Kaiba's an overgrown child. He just tends to need somebody who can handle his vulnerable side in a way that won't backfire and piss him off.) This is pretty important towards whether a relationship will work, yet at the same time, the way two characters treat one another will and should change within a story, especially one focused on a pairing.
Anyway, that's the bulk of it. Hope this got the gears working for at least a few of you (and if you can't figure out why someone likes a pairing? Ask me, I can probably come up with at least one reason.)
Friday, February 5, 2010
Fanfiction Peeves
I was looking through some notes for some pairing essays that I did, and MAN, I am rather opinionated, aren't I?
For those of you who follow this blog without following us at DeviantArt, you might have missed that I plan on updating at least once a week here, and probably at least once a week at the DA, from now on. Trust me, I have every determined intention of actually doing this. I'm making my Angry Yugi Face right now. (The little cute guy. I couldn't pull off Atem by any stretch of the imagination.)
So for today, I give you my list of things which, if I see it in the first few paragraphs of a fanfic, I'm liable to close the window and look elsewhere. I don't actually run into them on a regular basis (thank RA), because I now only skim recommended and favorite fanfic lists, but I still find 'em from time to time. There's no accounting for taste. XD
1. Kaiba using the word "mutt" when referring to anything other than an actual dog.
-Kaiba only very rarely uses animals as insults, even in the dub, and he really only ever insults Joey to his face. (Probably because he's going for a reaction, because I don't see him as actually disliking Joey.) I think he's called Joey a "monkey" more than he's called him a dog, so really, we should be calling it "Monkeyshipping" instead. Or "Bonkotsushipping." Maybe "Moneybags-shipping."
2. References in the narration to Téa as a "bitch," "mean girl," or anything else blatantly negative.
-Okay, I get that you don't like her, but good narration is unbiased. This also goes for when a character who is friends with Téa in the show reacts with some form of horror or distaste when they see her coming. I GET that you don't like her, but Yugi DOES. A good fanfic writer accepts that sometimes a character they like gets along with a character they dislike.
3. Taking a character out of a scene from the show due to dislike.
-Yeah.
5. Slavish imitation, in dialogue, of a character's accent.
-So you want the characters to "sound" like themselves. I understand. But Joey's "voice" has little to do with his accent, it has to do with the words he chooses to use. Having him say "da" instead of "the" is one thing. Having him say "Da quick braown fohx jumped ovah da lazy dohg" is quite another. Writing like that hasn't been in fashion since Mark Twain. Stop doing it. (On the other hand, using British spelling, like "colour" instead of "color," is a perfectly acceptable way to imitate a British accent. Why? It's less distracting.)
6. Runtogethersentencesandparagraphswithoutformatting.
-Don't upload with notepad; save it into Word or something first. And if FF.net eats your formatting anyway, keep at it until it's at least sort of readable. Just trust me on this. Don't have any of the acceptable filetypes except for txt? Get them. You're going to need them eventually anyway.
7. Mixing dub names and Japanese names, such as calling Serenity "Shizuka Wheeler."
-Following a mixed continuity? Almost impossible not to do, since the different continuities fill in each others' gaps. Using mixed names? Confusing and weird. I used to put up with this, but my tolerance has gone down the more I've seen it.
8. A character like, say, Tristan, calling Téa "darling," and then you realize a few sentences later it's because he's gay.
-Tristan would be the butchest gay guy ever. Not all gay guys talk like that.
9. Realizing a few sentences in that the character you thought was a canon character is actually an original character who happens to have the same name.
-Curse you all for the confusingness! Make it clear from the outset! Good grief.
10. Author's notes that say anything along the lines of "Marik is the yami, Malik is the hikari, okay?"
-It's not so much that I begrudge you the right to do that, but if you do, you're going to confuse me. It's a difference of one letter that doesn't actually happen to be much difference; the dubbers call him "Marik" because that's what the Japanese VAs sound like they're saying. And I, personally, am very mildly dyslexic: I am going to forget which you said is which, and I am going to get frustrated. Besides that, it's not even accurate to either versions of the show OR to the manga. Call Yami Marik something else in narrative-- if you don't like "Yami Marik" (and there are so many reasons not to) you can call him "Ishtar," or "the Ishtar demon," or whatever else that appeals to you and makes sense. (Yami M himself considers his name to be that of the original Marik Ishtar, because he considers himself to BE his "hikari.")
11. A sex scene between two members of a non canon pairing in the first chapter.
-I love silentshipping, as anyone who knows me should know. I love it to death. But I accept that any fic featuring it needs to nurse it along, to nurture it and let it grow. A good silentshipping story accepts that the "blimp scene" doesn't point to eternal love; Kaiba's reaction to meeting Serenity again would probably run more along the lines of "Oh, it's you. Uh. Hi." Not the first meeting, but it might as well be. Personally, this fanfictionist can't see Kaiba as a "kiss on the first date" kind of guy, much less a "sex after the first walk in the rain when we're not even sort of dating" kind of guy. I mean, yuck.
12. The lyrics of a song, cut and paste verbatim.
-I have no problem with songfics, even though ff.net's management does (obviously, you get around THAT by not posting it on ff.net) but I didn't click into your fic to read a huge block of text that didn't come from you. If you're planning to incorporate the lyrics into the story itself, be a little more creative than that. And if your story is only INSPIRED by a song, all you need to do is point out the song's official video on Yuutube and inform the reader of the relationship. It'll keep you out of trouble AND be less annoying. I didn't used to click out of these right away, but now I don't tend to waste time on them-- because I've spent too much time already reading through the songs in the past, only to find out that the story itself is only two paragraphs long.
13. Overly cute stuff.
-I'm not really talking about fluff here. When I come across a sentence like "Yugi skipped across to Kaiba and stared up at him with enormous puppy eyes," there's something wrong.
14. A character being the wrong gender without explanation.
-If it's an AU (alternate universe), please, please tell us before we start reading. If it's NOT and Kaiba is secretly a woman, please explain in the story WHY she's a crossdresser (and shame on you if Mokuba doesn't know already.) And for heaven's sake, DON'T gender switch someone just because you like a pairing but can't get past the ghey. Pairings don't have to involve sex or romance. Write something where they become brotherly friends and get it out of your system.
15. Male pregnancy with no explanation.
-One time I read this story in which Bakura was "getting really chubby" and the doctor was all "Oops, Marik, you got him preggers!" It was supposed to be funny, but the fact that nobody even batted an eye at the idea of a pregnant man and the only explaination was "gay sex" really killed the humor for me. Even humor has to make SOME sense. When you treat male pregnancy like it's a normal thing, it is not funny absurd, it's just absurd absurd.
16. When the summary of the story is essentially the first paragraph.
-It's a narrative. Not an essay. Take a writing class.
17. Dialogue, in a supposedly serious story, which sounds like chat-room speak. And also narrative that sounds like chat-room speak.
-USE PUNCTUATION. USE IT. USE SPELL CHECK. IT DOES NOT COST MONEY. For that matter, reread your story before putting up for the rest of us to read. The computer, she misses things.
18. Being dumped into a non-canon status quo without any warning, explanation, or reaction on the part of the characters.
-If it's a few years in the future, say so in the narrative. If it's AU, say so in the author's notes (unless it's a case of "AU clashes with Canon Universe," then you can just do it in the narrative.) If the story opens with Pegasus essentially saying "I love you kay?" to somebody we've never met before, there needs to be some explanation of how the characters got to that point, like "ever since they had met several months before" or "Since Joe was the first person Pegasus had laid eyes on after drinking the magic potion...." I mean, seriously.
19. Mokuba needing a babysitter.
-Did we seriously watch the same series, guys? This kid is an awesome little ninja who referees tournaments and is the vice president of Kaiba Corp. And when he's not in school or being Kaiba's ninja messenger and head general, he's hanging out in Kaiba's office, apparently making sure he stops working long enough to eat and sleep. If anybody needs a babysitter, it's Kaiba-- and he's got one: Mokuba. Being able to take care of himself and more mature than he might have been otherwise is one of Mokuba's character traits-- and anyway, at the age of ten, he's already old enough to be left home alone by most countries' laws. The same goes for Mokuba feeling ignored by Kaiba or for Kaiba abusing Mokuba in any way after Duelist Kingdom. This isn't going to happen.
20. Kaiba having a girlfriend that Mokuba doesn't like.
-Unless she has eldritch powers and is controlling Kaiba's mind, this isn't going to happen either. Kaiba places his brother's needs above his own when it comes to this kind of thing. Mokuba doesn't need any help getting Kaiba's brain out of the gutter and the girl out of the house-- all he really needs to do is say "Well, Seto, I hate to say it but she's kind of a bitch" and Kaiba'll respond with "Oh well, sex isn't everything." (My cat has a similar hold on my love life, so I know what I'm talking about.) (On the other hand, if your story actually features this conversation in just the first few paragraphs, I would totally read it.)
21. Yugi being significantly younger than the rest of the cast, or Mai being in high school with the rest of the cast.
-Yugi is shown as being in high school. Mai is explicitly stated as being out of high school even in the dub-- as being IN HER TWENTIES even in the dub. Yugi is not a little kid and Mai is not a teenager; jokes are made right in the series about Yugi looking younger than he is, and a large part of Mai's character is that she's been around the block once or twice. I'd totally read a story about Mai before Duelist Kingdom, but you can't just shove her in a Domino High uniform, plop her in Yugi's class, and expect me to go along for the ride.
I'm stopping here, because these are the main things that kill a fic for me in the first chapter. Ciao for now!
For those of you who follow this blog without following us at DeviantArt, you might have missed that I plan on updating at least once a week here, and probably at least once a week at the DA, from now on. Trust me, I have every determined intention of actually doing this. I'm making my Angry Yugi Face right now. (The little cute guy. I couldn't pull off Atem by any stretch of the imagination.)
So for today, I give you my list of things which, if I see it in the first few paragraphs of a fanfic, I'm liable to close the window and look elsewhere. I don't actually run into them on a regular basis (thank RA), because I now only skim recommended and favorite fanfic lists, but I still find 'em from time to time. There's no accounting for taste. XD
1. Kaiba using the word "mutt" when referring to anything other than an actual dog.
-Kaiba only very rarely uses animals as insults, even in the dub, and he really only ever insults Joey to his face. (Probably because he's going for a reaction, because I don't see him as actually disliking Joey.) I think he's called Joey a "monkey" more than he's called him a dog, so really, we should be calling it "Monkeyshipping" instead. Or "Bonkotsushipping." Maybe "Moneybags-shipping."
2. References in the narration to Téa as a "bitch," "mean girl," or anything else blatantly negative.
-Okay, I get that you don't like her, but good narration is unbiased. This also goes for when a character who is friends with Téa in the show reacts with some form of horror or distaste when they see her coming. I GET that you don't like her, but Yugi DOES. A good fanfic writer accepts that sometimes a character they like gets along with a character they dislike.
3. Taking a character out of a scene from the show due to dislike.
-Yeah.
5. Slavish imitation, in dialogue, of a character's accent.
-So you want the characters to "sound" like themselves. I understand. But Joey's "voice" has little to do with his accent, it has to do with the words he chooses to use. Having him say "da" instead of "the" is one thing. Having him say "Da quick braown fohx jumped ovah da lazy dohg" is quite another. Writing like that hasn't been in fashion since Mark Twain. Stop doing it. (On the other hand, using British spelling, like "colour" instead of "color," is a perfectly acceptable way to imitate a British accent. Why? It's less distracting.)
6. Runtogethersentencesandparagraphswithoutformatting.
-Don't upload with notepad; save it into Word or something first. And if FF.net eats your formatting anyway, keep at it until it's at least sort of readable. Just trust me on this. Don't have any of the acceptable filetypes except for txt? Get them. You're going to need them eventually anyway.
7. Mixing dub names and Japanese names, such as calling Serenity "Shizuka Wheeler."
-Following a mixed continuity? Almost impossible not to do, since the different continuities fill in each others' gaps. Using mixed names? Confusing and weird. I used to put up with this, but my tolerance has gone down the more I've seen it.
8. A character like, say, Tristan, calling Téa "darling," and then you realize a few sentences later it's because he's gay.
-Tristan would be the butchest gay guy ever. Not all gay guys talk like that.
9. Realizing a few sentences in that the character you thought was a canon character is actually an original character who happens to have the same name.
-Curse you all for the confusingness! Make it clear from the outset! Good grief.
10. Author's notes that say anything along the lines of "Marik is the yami, Malik is the hikari, okay?"
-It's not so much that I begrudge you the right to do that, but if you do, you're going to confuse me. It's a difference of one letter that doesn't actually happen to be much difference; the dubbers call him "Marik" because that's what the Japanese VAs sound like they're saying. And I, personally, am very mildly dyslexic: I am going to forget which you said is which, and I am going to get frustrated. Besides that, it's not even accurate to either versions of the show OR to the manga. Call Yami Marik something else in narrative-- if you don't like "Yami Marik" (and there are so many reasons not to) you can call him "Ishtar," or "the Ishtar demon," or whatever else that appeals to you and makes sense. (Yami M himself considers his name to be that of the original Marik Ishtar, because he considers himself to BE his "hikari.")
11. A sex scene between two members of a non canon pairing in the first chapter.
-I love silentshipping, as anyone who knows me should know. I love it to death. But I accept that any fic featuring it needs to nurse it along, to nurture it and let it grow. A good silentshipping story accepts that the "blimp scene" doesn't point to eternal love; Kaiba's reaction to meeting Serenity again would probably run more along the lines of "Oh, it's you. Uh. Hi." Not the first meeting, but it might as well be. Personally, this fanfictionist can't see Kaiba as a "kiss on the first date" kind of guy, much less a "sex after the first walk in the rain when we're not even sort of dating" kind of guy. I mean, yuck.
12. The lyrics of a song, cut and paste verbatim.
-I have no problem with songfics, even though ff.net's management does (obviously, you get around THAT by not posting it on ff.net) but I didn't click into your fic to read a huge block of text that didn't come from you. If you're planning to incorporate the lyrics into the story itself, be a little more creative than that. And if your story is only INSPIRED by a song, all you need to do is point out the song's official video on Yuutube and inform the reader of the relationship. It'll keep you out of trouble AND be less annoying. I didn't used to click out of these right away, but now I don't tend to waste time on them-- because I've spent too much time already reading through the songs in the past, only to find out that the story itself is only two paragraphs long.
13. Overly cute stuff.
-I'm not really talking about fluff here. When I come across a sentence like "Yugi skipped across to Kaiba and stared up at him with enormous puppy eyes," there's something wrong.
14. A character being the wrong gender without explanation.
-If it's an AU (alternate universe), please, please tell us before we start reading. If it's NOT and Kaiba is secretly a woman, please explain in the story WHY she's a crossdresser (and shame on you if Mokuba doesn't know already.) And for heaven's sake, DON'T gender switch someone just because you like a pairing but can't get past the ghey. Pairings don't have to involve sex or romance. Write something where they become brotherly friends and get it out of your system.
15. Male pregnancy with no explanation.
-One time I read this story in which Bakura was "getting really chubby" and the doctor was all "Oops, Marik, you got him preggers!" It was supposed to be funny, but the fact that nobody even batted an eye at the idea of a pregnant man and the only explaination was "gay sex" really killed the humor for me. Even humor has to make SOME sense. When you treat male pregnancy like it's a normal thing, it is not funny absurd, it's just absurd absurd.
16. When the summary of the story is essentially the first paragraph.
-It's a narrative. Not an essay. Take a writing class.
17. Dialogue, in a supposedly serious story, which sounds like chat-room speak. And also narrative that sounds like chat-room speak.
-USE PUNCTUATION. USE IT. USE SPELL CHECK. IT DOES NOT COST MONEY. For that matter, reread your story before putting up for the rest of us to read. The computer, she misses things.
18. Being dumped into a non-canon status quo without any warning, explanation, or reaction on the part of the characters.
-If it's a few years in the future, say so in the narrative. If it's AU, say so in the author's notes (unless it's a case of "AU clashes with Canon Universe," then you can just do it in the narrative.) If the story opens with Pegasus essentially saying "I love you kay?" to somebody we've never met before, there needs to be some explanation of how the characters got to that point, like "ever since they had met several months before" or "Since Joe was the first person Pegasus had laid eyes on after drinking the magic potion...." I mean, seriously.
19. Mokuba needing a babysitter.
-Did we seriously watch the same series, guys? This kid is an awesome little ninja who referees tournaments and is the vice president of Kaiba Corp. And when he's not in school or being Kaiba's ninja messenger and head general, he's hanging out in Kaiba's office, apparently making sure he stops working long enough to eat and sleep. If anybody needs a babysitter, it's Kaiba-- and he's got one: Mokuba. Being able to take care of himself and more mature than he might have been otherwise is one of Mokuba's character traits-- and anyway, at the age of ten, he's already old enough to be left home alone by most countries' laws. The same goes for Mokuba feeling ignored by Kaiba or for Kaiba abusing Mokuba in any way after Duelist Kingdom. This isn't going to happen.
20. Kaiba having a girlfriend that Mokuba doesn't like.
-Unless she has eldritch powers and is controlling Kaiba's mind, this isn't going to happen either. Kaiba places his brother's needs above his own when it comes to this kind of thing. Mokuba doesn't need any help getting Kaiba's brain out of the gutter and the girl out of the house-- all he really needs to do is say "Well, Seto, I hate to say it but she's kind of a bitch" and Kaiba'll respond with "Oh well, sex isn't everything." (My cat has a similar hold on my love life, so I know what I'm talking about.) (On the other hand, if your story actually features this conversation in just the first few paragraphs, I would totally read it.)
21. Yugi being significantly younger than the rest of the cast, or Mai being in high school with the rest of the cast.
-Yugi is shown as being in high school. Mai is explicitly stated as being out of high school even in the dub-- as being IN HER TWENTIES even in the dub. Yugi is not a little kid and Mai is not a teenager; jokes are made right in the series about Yugi looking younger than he is, and a large part of Mai's character is that she's been around the block once or twice. I'd totally read a story about Mai before Duelist Kingdom, but you can't just shove her in a Domino High uniform, plop her in Yugi's class, and expect me to go along for the ride.
I'm stopping here, because these are the main things that kill a fic for me in the first chapter. Ciao for now!
Friday, July 3, 2009
Magic Light: Page 31-Bonus Tabloid
DANG, I need to not make goals for when I'm gonna post these things (I had the goal, I'ma post a commentary blog once Magic Light's DONE, not sooner. Dippy GDG, DIPPY!)
SO.
In the previous commentary, I promised stripey socks, and on Page 31, I delivered! I don't know if there's something in the Domino HS dress code that forbids girls from having interesting variation between their clothes or something, but it's actually a little annoying. The boys have all sorts of variation-- the studious, repressed, and straight-laced wear their uniforms like they're supposed to, the slacker kids wear their jackets open, Yugi gets away with a black shirt and a leather collar, the little punk, but the girls? The girls all wear their uniforms exactly the same. Except those chicks hanging around Kakenura or whatever his name was (the false seer guy from the manga) who were wearing priestly accrouments over their uniforms, and that doesn't count. XD
Which makes absolutely no sense, because girls are crazy about accessorizing and wearing cute stuff. XD
ANYWAY. I also love Yugi's expressions in that page. I think he swings between being amused with or put off by Serenity, probably because she's so like Joey, in her way. (lol)
I confess, Mai's legs are too long in Page 32. This used to be a real problem for me, but I'm working on it, and when I pay attention it's not too big a deal.
I like designing outfits for her, though. For some reason, Mai's outfit esthetic comes naturally to me (which is odd because you couldn't catch me dead in those skirts.) Probably just 'cause I like looking at her.
Yes, I'm an extreme Mai/Joey fan. What's there in the series is the only real "out" love story Yugioh GOT until Jessie/Jaden (I'm mostly kidding) or perhaps Jack/Carly (I'm not kidding at all.) I'm the last person to say that "evidence" is really a reason to support a pairing, but I like what the series writers did with it. It was beautiful. It was only missing an ending.
And anyway, you know after the Doom saga parting Mai was going to come running when she heard about Joey's accident. :3
I admit: I may be writing this, but Page 33 STILL had me muttering "it's about damn TIME you told her, you big jerk." XD Also, that nurse's expression was even funnier in the sketch for this comic. Maybe someday I'll scan it and post it in YnY's scraps or something.
Also, I don't know how, but Joey always ends up being oddly eloquent when he needs to be. That's probably part of why I love him. (Mai too. Who can resist a goofball who has the ability to suddenly transform into Shakespeare?)
Pages 34 and 35 were really fun to do. I love writing Kaiba being sad, and I love writing Serenity tripping over her own words. Ironically, Page 36 was originally a last minute afterthought-- I was going to leave Seto and Ser hanging at the lines "thank Mokuba for the locket" and "Ehh!?" And it turned out to be one of the best pages of the entire thing. Mokuba's been great throughout the whole story; I should really buy him a parfait.
Kaiba's expression was just so awesome I made it into an icon. XD (Feel free to use it, just make sure to point anyone who asks about it back to me!)
Yes, Mokuba set the Batman ringtone specifically to his brother. He considered a James Bond theme briefly, maybe Mission Impossible, but after a lot of snickering about how there's no WAY Kaiba gets that much action, he settled on Batman instead. XD
Also, that kid wasn't actually intended to BE anyone, but as someone pointed out, he DOES look something like Leon Schroeder. I have no problem with this at all. I think Mokuba and Leon would have an easier time hanging out with each other than they would with other kids their own age.
Téa is reading The Book Of the Dead in page 37. Sadly, due to angle and her arm, that wasn't entirely clear. ^^; I have the same feeling toward the covers of these things; I had this cute idea that all the Game of Dreams covers would have cards on them that represented an overlying theme of the chapter (Magic Light's was Yu-Jyo) and I've gotten almost finished with the next cover and you can't tell what the cards are at all.
FYI, because (I can't believe I DID oh Bastet) I've actually had issues about this before with other people, I'll say it right now: The Book of the Dead is the English name of Coming Forth By Day, a collection of spells and a guide to the Eqyptian afterlife. It is NOT A FICTION PIECE they based The Mummy on. They based The Mummy on a novel (or maybe it was a play) called The Mummy.
For Ra's sake.
I like Bakura in this sequence. Especially his expression right here from Page 38:
That looks way better than it has any right to. I think not being worried about being randomly taken over is good for the lad, he's got a much better idea what's going ON now. XD
Serenity's behavior from Page 39 on probably surprised a few people, but I got mostly positive feedback so that's fine. XD I actually see it as perfectly in character. Joey's mad at Mom, Serenity's mad at Dad. Serenity is MORE mad at Dad when Tristan comments that, hopefully, he won't have anything to throw on hand. Serenity also wants to be like Mai when she grows up (and to be honest, squeaking in like a mouse WOULD have gotten something thrown at them. Scaring the pee out of him probably was a better idea. XD)
I like Serenity's plaid skirt.
And on Page 40, we see what my design for Mr. Wheeler looks like. I sort of worked backwards from Serenity and Joey and took out anything they more likely got from Mom. My Mr. Wheeler is blonde. He's also named Jonathan. XD (Because if they got "Joseph" out of "Jounouchi," why shouldn't I get "Jonathan" out of it?) I love how bewildered he is.
Of course, Ol' Jon ain't taking threats on his beer lying down, but Serenity ain't taking threats on her person any less seriously. XD The only other thing I have to say about Page 41 is that, from time to time, I work as a bagger. I promise I've NEVER put anything that ridiculous together-- but I HAVE seen other people do it.
Page 42! I have no idea who that guy is! It doesn't matter! Yugi's making mincemeat out of him!
When Yugi says "sorely," he means it. Feel the fear, goggles wearing fool! FEEL THE FEAR!
XD
As for the Bonus Tabloid, you can mostly draw your own conclusions. It's there to be funny. There's going to be at least one for every story of Game of Dreams. I don't know if they're all going to be issues of The Big Eye, though. One thing about the secondary cover article, however? The one that's headed "BOUGHT OFF???"
Still can't see it? Look a little closer. Closeeeerrrr..... EGADS! That's a KaibaCorp symbol on that paper! Kaiba gave Mrs. Wheeler his business card!
(Well, he had someone pass it on to her, but still.)
SO.
In the previous commentary, I promised stripey socks, and on Page 31, I delivered! I don't know if there's something in the Domino HS dress code that forbids girls from having interesting variation between their clothes or something, but it's actually a little annoying. The boys have all sorts of variation-- the studious, repressed, and straight-laced wear their uniforms like they're supposed to, the slacker kids wear their jackets open, Yugi gets away with a black shirt and a leather collar, the little punk, but the girls? The girls all wear their uniforms exactly the same. Except those chicks hanging around Kakenura or whatever his name was (the false seer guy from the manga) who were wearing priestly accrouments over their uniforms, and that doesn't count. XD
Which makes absolutely no sense, because girls are crazy about accessorizing and wearing cute stuff. XD
ANYWAY. I also love Yugi's expressions in that page. I think he swings between being amused with or put off by Serenity, probably because she's so like Joey, in her way. (lol)
I confess, Mai's legs are too long in Page 32. This used to be a real problem for me, but I'm working on it, and when I pay attention it's not too big a deal.
I like designing outfits for her, though. For some reason, Mai's outfit esthetic comes naturally to me (which is odd because you couldn't catch me dead in those skirts.) Probably just 'cause I like looking at her.
Yes, I'm an extreme Mai/Joey fan. What's there in the series is the only real "out" love story Yugioh GOT until Jessie/Jaden (I'm mostly kidding) or perhaps Jack/Carly (I'm not kidding at all.) I'm the last person to say that "evidence" is really a reason to support a pairing, but I like what the series writers did with it. It was beautiful. It was only missing an ending.
And anyway, you know after the Doom saga parting Mai was going to come running when she heard about Joey's accident. :3
I admit: I may be writing this, but Page 33 STILL had me muttering "it's about damn TIME you told her, you big jerk." XD Also, that nurse's expression was even funnier in the sketch for this comic. Maybe someday I'll scan it and post it in YnY's scraps or something.
Also, I don't know how, but Joey always ends up being oddly eloquent when he needs to be. That's probably part of why I love him. (Mai too. Who can resist a goofball who has the ability to suddenly transform into Shakespeare?)
Pages 34 and 35 were really fun to do. I love writing Kaiba being sad, and I love writing Serenity tripping over her own words. Ironically, Page 36 was originally a last minute afterthought-- I was going to leave Seto and Ser hanging at the lines "thank Mokuba for the locket" and "Ehh!?" And it turned out to be one of the best pages of the entire thing. Mokuba's been great throughout the whole story; I should really buy him a parfait.
Kaiba's expression was just so awesome I made it into an icon. XD (Feel free to use it, just make sure to point anyone who asks about it back to me!)
Yes, Mokuba set the Batman ringtone specifically to his brother. He considered a James Bond theme briefly, maybe Mission Impossible, but after a lot of snickering about how there's no WAY Kaiba gets that much action, he settled on Batman instead. XD
Also, that kid wasn't actually intended to BE anyone, but as someone pointed out, he DOES look something like Leon Schroeder. I have no problem with this at all. I think Mokuba and Leon would have an easier time hanging out with each other than they would with other kids their own age.
Téa is reading The Book Of the Dead in page 37. Sadly, due to angle and her arm, that wasn't entirely clear. ^^; I have the same feeling toward the covers of these things; I had this cute idea that all the Game of Dreams covers would have cards on them that represented an overlying theme of the chapter (Magic Light's was Yu-Jyo) and I've gotten almost finished with the next cover and you can't tell what the cards are at all.
FYI, because (I can't believe I DID oh Bastet) I've actually had issues about this before with other people, I'll say it right now: The Book of the Dead is the English name of Coming Forth By Day, a collection of spells and a guide to the Eqyptian afterlife. It is NOT A FICTION PIECE they based The Mummy on. They based The Mummy on a novel (or maybe it was a play) called The Mummy.
For Ra's sake.
I like Bakura in this sequence. Especially his expression right here from Page 38:
That looks way better than it has any right to. I think not being worried about being randomly taken over is good for the lad, he's got a much better idea what's going ON now. XDSerenity's behavior from Page 39 on probably surprised a few people, but I got mostly positive feedback so that's fine. XD I actually see it as perfectly in character. Joey's mad at Mom, Serenity's mad at Dad. Serenity is MORE mad at Dad when Tristan comments that, hopefully, he won't have anything to throw on hand. Serenity also wants to be like Mai when she grows up (and to be honest, squeaking in like a mouse WOULD have gotten something thrown at them. Scaring the pee out of him probably was a better idea. XD)
I like Serenity's plaid skirt.
And on Page 40, we see what my design for Mr. Wheeler looks like. I sort of worked backwards from Serenity and Joey and took out anything they more likely got from Mom. My Mr. Wheeler is blonde. He's also named Jonathan. XD (Because if they got "Joseph" out of "Jounouchi," why shouldn't I get "Jonathan" out of it?) I love how bewildered he is.
Of course, Ol' Jon ain't taking threats on his beer lying down, but Serenity ain't taking threats on her person any less seriously. XD The only other thing I have to say about Page 41 is that, from time to time, I work as a bagger. I promise I've NEVER put anything that ridiculous together-- but I HAVE seen other people do it.
Page 42! I have no idea who that guy is! It doesn't matter! Yugi's making mincemeat out of him!
When Yugi says "sorely," he means it. Feel the fear, goggles wearing fool! FEEL THE FEAR!XD
As for the Bonus Tabloid, you can mostly draw your own conclusions. It's there to be funny. There's going to be at least one for every story of Game of Dreams. I don't know if they're all going to be issues of The Big Eye, though. One thing about the secondary cover article, however? The one that's headed "BOUGHT OFF???"
Still can't see it? Look a little closer. Closeeeerrrr..... EGADS! That's a KaibaCorp symbol on that paper! Kaiba gave Mrs. Wheeler his business card!
(Well, he had someone pass it on to her, but still.)
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Magic Light: Page 23-30
Yeah. I fell behind on some of these a little bit. OH WELL.
SO. On page 23, I drew the best Duke Devlin that I have ever drawn. Ever. Speaking of which, I was using the last few manga issues as reference for these pages, and I don't think even Takahashi is entirely sure how to draw the guy. His headband just kind of.... vanishes behind his bangs. Never to be seen again. I sacrificed accuracy to the character design so as to draw a headband I could believe existed.
GORGEOUS.
SO. On page 23, I drew the best Duke Devlin that I have ever drawn. Ever. Speaking of which, I was using the last few manga issues as reference for these pages, and I don't think even Takahashi is entirely sure how to draw the guy. His headband just kind of.... vanishes behind his bangs. Never to be seen again. I sacrificed accuracy to the character design so as to draw a headband I could believe existed.
Kids? Duke is a player. Serenity is not stupid. She's either very uncomfortable or insincere pretty much every time he's up in her face. Serenity knows Duke is a player.
Which is pretty much why I spit acid at the pairing. There are ways it could work, but to be quite honest I don't think Serenity would put up with it for very long. She's just too nice to tell him so and is hoping he'll eventually lose interest.
As I noted in the comments for page 24, this is pretty much Duke giving an honest opinion for once. I tend to think he mostly chases Serenity to agitate Tristan anyhow, but apparently with everything going on, he's gotten a little tired of Tristan denying that it bothers him. Or something. This is so in character I can't even puncture it in a way that makes me sound like I know what I'm talking about. (What can I say? I write more intuitively than anything.)
Yay for page 25! I used to ship those two, before I stopped shipping Kaiba/Ishizu. No, I seriously, seriously did. I can't even remember why. But I do know that any good story that considers romances seriously has to take into account all the relationships outside the romance, and this is an important one. Even more important, for the purposes of GD, than the relationship between Joey and Kaiba. Why? Because Mokuba loves his big brother desperately and wants him to be happy. I'll let you consider the implications of that on your own.
Red Eyes Plushie is awesome. He's also a little on the fat side, but that's because I was trying to consider the need for stuffings.
I don't actually have much to say about page 26 except that it was mucho fun to draw. XD
Small spoiler for page 27: Serenity is deliberately fooling herself. She knows perfectly well it was not Kaiba who would be so thoughtful as to give her such a gift, she knows perfectly well Mokuba's the considerate one.
She does not care. Right at this moment, she feels good, she knows that Mokuba is a potential avenue to spend more time in the vicinity of Kaiba anyway. And he's a nice kid.
I totally wiggle my butt like that when I'm happy. XD Picked it up from my cat.
The Ishizu of page 28 is not the best Ishizu I have ever drawn. But that's okay.
For some reason I find the line "after destiny comes paperwork" both hilarious and deeply profound.
Page 29 and page 30 make me happy for a number of reasons. For one thing, Pegasus feels completely in character. For another, he's gorgeous.
GORGEOUS.XD
Check out that shading around where his left eye used to be. It terrifies me. I love it. XD
(I don't consider this bragging, because I often don't have a clue how I pull this sort of thing off.)
Also, it makes me happy because I love the pairing. Whoof. Perhaps essays on such matters will rear their over-emotional heads sooner or later.
Preview for the next set of pages!
Striped socks will be seen. Joey will get a most welcome break from hospital boredom. Serenity will give Kaiba a guilt trip without meaning to. Téa will do some reading. Serenity will "reconcile" with her father. (Not really.) And then Yugi will end Magic Light with some introspective narrative. :D On to the next story!
Friday, June 20, 2008
Pairing Crack: Whar's teh slash?
Darnit, this is the wrong computer to upload an "appropriate" image from to head the blog off with. Oh well, we can edit it later. XD
There's no way to keep everybody happy when it comes to pairings. Some people only like a fic when all the pairings are "totally and undeniably canon," whatever that means, while others can't stand anything resembling canon pairings and will only read a fic if Weevil is paired up with Princess Adina from the VR episodes right after Duelist Kingdom (or something equally WTF.)
And then, of course, there's the people who can't stand slash ("gay" pairings) and the people who can't live without it.
This is a nexgen. GDG and Invid (the authors) are both very creeped out by MPreg. Therefore, there will be little actual slash to speak of between canon characters.
That doesn't mean either of us really has anything against slash. Invid doesn't like sex in his fic fare at ALL, and GDG is bisexual. All sexual relationships in YnY and Game of Dreams will not so much be shown as hinted at (sometimes very, very strongly.) We believe that, for the purpose of this story, less is more.
There will be hints of pairings that don't actually end up happening in the long run. The driving force of Game of Dreams is mainly to get everybody together that are parents of main characters of YnY. After that, pairings won't be quite as central, despite the fact that Yukai's sexual orientation seems to be Kaiba's daughter. (If you've read the preboot, you know this already. It's not a spoiler.) But slash will rear its crack-dazed head more than once in both YnY and GD, occasionally humorously, sometimes as nothing more than a whisper, and possibly for real at least once.
But I refuse to limit any two characters by keeping them solely to each other. Yes, Kira Kaiba is Serenity's daughter and GD needs to explain how a heck that happened. But Kaiba's relationship with Joey plays a major role in that, as does Serenity's relationship with Joey. Even Mai's relationship with Joey. And the same goes for other relationships that exist in this fancomic, up to and including relationships with dead characters.
Game of Dreams is not a romance about any one pairing. It's about a web of relationships both romantic and otherwise. And YnY isn't really a romance at all. It's about a father-son relationship (and about one of the most entertaining characters I've ever devised, including my original works.)
One of the reasons I arrived at some of the pairings I use, in fact, is the fact that they create very interesting relationships between the main Yukai no Yugi cast. If, for example, Joey and Kaiba ended up together instead of Serenity and Kaiba, then not only would Yukai not be all weird about Kaiba's daughter (as opposed to Kaiba's niece, which mightn't be so charged), but Kira and Ken (Joey's oldest son) wouldn't be cousins and wouldn't act like siblings. I find the fact that Kaiba and Joey's kids act like brothers and sisters to be much more interesting than an uneasy friendship or fullblown rivalry would be.
If something having to do with pairings disappoints or upsets you, I apologize. Go over the Golden-Dragon-Girl account at DeviantArt (or email at yukaimotou@gmail.com) and send me notes demanding your slashcrack there. Or your hetcrack. Or your Weevil/Adina crack. It might not work, but then again it might. But don't knock YnY for something you dislike about the canon character pairings. You'll deprive yourself of all the crazy slashy jokes we start making about three (four? five? something like that) chapters in.
There's no way to keep everybody happy when it comes to pairings. Some people only like a fic when all the pairings are "totally and undeniably canon," whatever that means, while others can't stand anything resembling canon pairings and will only read a fic if Weevil is paired up with Princess Adina from the VR episodes right after Duelist Kingdom (or something equally WTF.)
And then, of course, there's the people who can't stand slash ("gay" pairings) and the people who can't live without it.
This is a nexgen. GDG and Invid (the authors) are both very creeped out by MPreg. Therefore, there will be little actual slash to speak of between canon characters.
That doesn't mean either of us really has anything against slash. Invid doesn't like sex in his fic fare at ALL, and GDG is bisexual. All sexual relationships in YnY and Game of Dreams will not so much be shown as hinted at (sometimes very, very strongly.) We believe that, for the purpose of this story, less is more.
There will be hints of pairings that don't actually end up happening in the long run. The driving force of Game of Dreams is mainly to get everybody together that are parents of main characters of YnY. After that, pairings won't be quite as central, despite the fact that Yukai's sexual orientation seems to be Kaiba's daughter. (If you've read the preboot, you know this already. It's not a spoiler.) But slash will rear its crack-dazed head more than once in both YnY and GD, occasionally humorously, sometimes as nothing more than a whisper, and possibly for real at least once.
But I refuse to limit any two characters by keeping them solely to each other. Yes, Kira Kaiba is Serenity's daughter and GD needs to explain how a heck that happened. But Kaiba's relationship with Joey plays a major role in that, as does Serenity's relationship with Joey. Even Mai's relationship with Joey. And the same goes for other relationships that exist in this fancomic, up to and including relationships with dead characters.
Game of Dreams is not a romance about any one pairing. It's about a web of relationships both romantic and otherwise. And YnY isn't really a romance at all. It's about a father-son relationship (and about one of the most entertaining characters I've ever devised, including my original works.)
One of the reasons I arrived at some of the pairings I use, in fact, is the fact that they create very interesting relationships between the main Yukai no Yugi cast. If, for example, Joey and Kaiba ended up together instead of Serenity and Kaiba, then not only would Yukai not be all weird about Kaiba's daughter (as opposed to Kaiba's niece, which mightn't be so charged), but Kira and Ken (Joey's oldest son) wouldn't be cousins and wouldn't act like siblings. I find the fact that Kaiba and Joey's kids act like brothers and sisters to be much more interesting than an uneasy friendship or fullblown rivalry would be.
If something having to do with pairings disappoints or upsets you, I apologize. Go over the Golden-Dragon-Girl account at DeviantArt (or email at yukaimotou@gmail.com) and send me notes demanding your slashcrack there. Or your hetcrack. Or your Weevil/Adina crack. It might not work, but then again it might. But don't knock YnY for something you dislike about the canon character pairings. You'll deprive yourself of all the crazy slashy jokes we start making about three (four? five? something like that) chapters in.
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