Fan Fiction Angst: We Love Them But We Hurt Them
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| Title: | Fan Fiction Angst: We Love Them But We Hurt Them |
| Creator: | Dasha K |
| Date(s): | 2000 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom: | The X-Files |
| Topic: | |
| External Links: | Fan Fiction Angst: We Love Them But We Hurt Them |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Fan Fiction Angst: We Love Them But We Hurt Them is an essay by Dasha K.
It was linked at the X-Files website Working Stiffs where it was given the title: "How do I write great angst?"
Author's Favorite Angst
- Separation Angst
- Sexual Healing Angst
- Cancer Angst
- /Other Angst
- Post-Colonization Angst
Some Topics Discussed
- angst
- how to pronounce it
- The X-Files
- kinds of angst plus some story recs
Excerpts
Today I want to talk about angst. Oooh, fanfiction readers and writers love it. I love it and I know you do, too. If The X-Files doesn't put Mulder and Scully through enough as it is, there are fanfic writers who are ready, willing and able to bring heartbreak, sorrow and pain to them.
On a related note, how do you pronounce angst? I've heard it pronounced with a hard 'a' and a soft one, but I tend to prefer the soft. It sounds so good. Aaaaaaangst. As in, "Oh Gawd, Iolokus has sooooo much aaaaangst!"
I have a love/hate relationship with angst, actually. Because the show does give M&S such a hard time (shootings, injuries, abductions, cancer, deaths of family members, stolen ova, etc.) sometimes I just want them to be happy in fanfiction. But I'm also a realist. Even if Mulder and Scully do fall in head-over-heels mutual love, it doesn't mean all their problems will be solved. Mulder will still look for Samantha. Scully will still mourn Melissa. Those ova probably aren't coming back. They have a whole host of issues to deal with and have not yet found the truth and saved the world from evil alien colonization. Even the hottest sex and coziest spooning in the world isn't going to make things 100% hunky dory. There will always be angst.
To me, angst has to have a reason for its existence. It can't just be angst for angst's sake. Nothing makes me angrier than a character being put through hell and back just because the writer wants to wrench a few tears or evoke horror in the reader. One example I can think of was a very short piece by a writer about Mulder and Scully being abducted and tortured by some random sickos. Mulder was forced to rape Scully to avoid her rape by their captors. And then the story just ended. Boom. There was no framing case to the story, no resolution, no aftereffects of this angst and torture. The writer was clearly trying to angst the hell out of the reader for no real reason.
Which leads me to torture fic. I cannot even tell you how tired I am of fiction that tortures the hell out of Mulder (or any other character) just to get that feel-good hurt-comfort vibe. You may disagree with me (and feel free), but if a character is horribly maimed or tortured, you'd damn well better do it for a better reason than to precipitate a romance between two characters or to infantilize Mulder. There's a rather well-known series out there where something awful happens to Mulder in every single installment. Hello, if he were truly that accident-prone, he would either have been let go from the Bureau or would have been killed. I'm not saying that every single torture scene in fanfic is a bad thing. Oh no, there's plenty of fiction where it's part of the story and has plenty of justification. Read Rachel Ehrentreau and Jennifer-Oksana's Outrunning Moirae to see what I mean. I'm just saying that if the torture and pain and diaper-filled aftermath is the point of the story-- yikes. I have to wonder if the authors of such fic are sadists, or if they are trying to exert control in a world where they have very little.
If you're going to write heavy-duty angst, I want a reason for it. Justify the pain to me. One good example of this is the rather controversial Iolokus by Mustang Sally and Rivka T. These two ladies do some truly unspeakable things to the characters. Lemme see, there's rape, anguish, gore galore, incest, and lots of brutal acts. When I first started the series, I was fully convinced I would never be able to finish, I was so horrified by what was going on. But, by the time I'd finished, I realized how masterfully Sally and Rivka had led their characters on a journey and through a well-defined arc. Yes, Mulder and Scully had to endure pain, suffering and angst by the barrelload, but in the end they had made some discoveries about themselves and each other, learned a good chunk of the elusive truth and had become better people for it.
And good angst does not equal melodrama. The characters should not suddenly seem like they should be on Days of Our Lives. Scully probably won't start sobbing while doing an autopsy in front of others (Erm- never mind, just saw TINH, although that wasn't exactly sobbing, was it?). Mulder won't scream out his pain in an OPR meeting. These are people who deal with emotional issues with restraint for the most part.