Strange Bedfellows (APA)/Issue 015

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Strange Bedfellows 15 was published in November 1996 and contains about 94 pages.

There were 28 members sharing 20 subscriptions.

cover of issue #15
The photo of Gillian Anderson, David Duchovny, and Chris Carter from the May 1996 issue of "Rolling Stone" was used on the cover of this issue, and may have been part of some RPF discussion and speculation of what if?. See: The "Rolling Stone" Factor.

Some Topics Discussed in "Strange Tongues"

  • The X-Files, comments Scully and Mulder in fiction
  • "SLASH AND WOMEN WHO DESERVE TO BE IN IT": since "characters in slash represent a new literary gender role. These aren't "heterosexual men" or "gay men" but "slash characters." They are not even "sensitive new age bisexual guys," why can't women be automatically as important and included in our fanworks and discussions?
  • Forever Knight: Natalie or Janette or both or neither?
  • Babylon 5 and Deep Space Nine, and "cross-species mating" in fic, female characters in fic, speculations and analysis of other pairings
  • female characters in Due South, the the DtWOF test (The Bechdel Test)
  • the vanillia-ness of Due South fic
  • deep analysis of Benton Fraser, Meg Thatcher, and Ray Vecchio's sexuality and psyches
  • Sailor Moon, War of the Worlds
  • dislike of "Star Trek: The Noxious Generation" and of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and this fan's "pigheaded refusal to tolerate stupid scripting"
  • comments about Deuce Double #2, see that page
  • writing dutyfic
  • discussion of Hetslash in Beauty and the Beast (TV)
  • opinions about the Mulder/Krycek fic by Bren Antrim, Slick
  • feminist academic discourse and symbolic penises
  • episodic television, closure, dead girlfriends of the week
  • comments on the story, Blood and Shadows, on the story, Chains of Being, see those pages
  • issuefic, or writing to teach fans something, or writing as a duty

Excerpts from "Strange Tongues"

Slash stories often picture a couple as unique, loving each other because those two specific people are fated to be in love. The "we're not gay, we just love each other" line originated in this feeling that the characters' sex, names, serial numbers, shoe sizes, self-images, family backgrounds, previous sex lives, potential future sex lives, and so on, were trivial compared to the love between the two of them at that moment. (Perhaps a better phrasing would have been, "It doesn't matter if we've ever been gay or not; we love each other.") At its most cliched, this led to stories where Kirk and Spock, or Illya and Napoleon, or whoever, for no visible reason let their eyes meet one fine day and were instantly "in love," whatever that meant to the writer. (Usually hot sex, whatever that meant to the writer, and some of it's been pretty weird. In other stories, "in love" meant exchanging teddy bears.)

The comparison is to fan stories where the characters are openly gay, so that some fan readers feel (or say they feel) the couple have no reason not to fall into bed together anyway, negating the transformatory power of "in love" revelations. This suggests a comparison to gay pornography in which the two men in the first paragraph are there solely because they'll be fucking like bunnies on the second page and won't be characterized beyond fucking styles. (If that.) It seems to me that the same can be said of slash that doesn't bother to show anything about Starsky and Hutch before they go into that blue-eyed double look of love, closely followed by naked activity on the nearest double bed. Such by-the-numbers slash has a hard time claiming quality as writing on the basis of the story characters' unique aspects as realized individuals.

[...]

If the sudden dawning of love transcends the need to conform to social norms and mainstream standards, and wipes out the characters' previous assumptions about, oh, everything (particularly everything to do with sex) the story assumption is that previous hetero experience is irrelevant to this new and unique love — but so would be any previous homosexual experience, or what's unique about it? The love is an unsupported miracle, unrelated to previous gender preferences. A gay/bi male character has no reason to fall in love, in that thorough and exclusive way, with any particular man, any more than a straight man expects hearts-and-roses, wedding-bells love with any particular woman he might meet. The bolt of lightning is unexpected and devastating regardless of all previous self-knowledge, or it wouldn't be "unique."

As a sprawling novel in weekly episodes, B5 is showing more and more signs of Dickensian breadth and pacing. I'm very hopeful that B5 will eventually inspire the variety of fanfic and ever-expanding epics that ST and B7 have... or do I care? (a) Much fanfic is the end result of a fascinating process, but is less than stellar in itself. The speculative, branching discussion of possibilities are enjoyable in themselves, and we're doing that already, (b) It may, like Tolkein and some other large-scale but essentially closed-boundary narratives, never really inspire more than incidental fictional commentary. This all remains to be seen. All I can say at present is that B5 is too big to evaluate at one sitting, even a five-year sitting. What the combination of B5 and fandom may engender is entirely uncertain.

Yes, the only good excuse for writing f/f, or any other kind of fanfic (including m/m) is because the characters are too interesting to leave alone. Fanfic as public service announcement has never quite worked, even if it's possible to get socially-responsible themes into a story where the scenario supports it. Female characters seen in a traditional way (including as victims of social bias) aren't likely to inspire any new interest, even if know we should share their concerns — even if we do share their concerns when we're not in R&R, or fanfic, mode.

I have to agree that fanfic likes closure, whether explicit, implicit, or something the author meant to include but didn't figure out how. Drama and storytelling need closure; it's part of what makes art better than life. Episodic series have to avoid some storylines — there's a reason for all those dead girlfriends, you know - and can look artificial as they keep the characters the same for next week. Fanfic is free to ask and answer questions such as why an apparently desirable hunk can't keep a girlfriend. Is he secretly killing them off, or so bad in bed that they leave, or gay? (Just make a wild guess which is easiest to think about...)

Re yr ct on my WotW writing, you're right there, too. It's different to rewrite a show through ignorance instead of for love, obsession, one's preferred vision of the characters' futures, or even deliberate twisting of the fictional universe. I hope in this case my memory functioned as a selective forgettery and systematically ignored the less tenable bits of the show's background while keeping the interesting character dynamic; but that may be an untrustworthy mechanism for doing something fandom wants to see done by choice, not chance, even if some fans' choices are not what other fans want to read about in a million years.

Um, I hate to say it, but I enjoyed "Slick." Brenda Antrim has a touch for comedy (she's done a couple of DS pieces with it, too) that rescues an otherwise plain little story premise, by means of some good lines and a hint of proportion. I've seen this general sort of K/M story once or twice before, all vile and stiff and unbelievable. I'm not sure it's believable, here, but it's a lot more fun to not believe in.

If you like plain vanilla slash, I suggest that you run, not walk, to a fan with a Due South collection and dive in. There is more sweet custard and milk of human kindness and well-comforted hurt than you may ever have seen in one place. It's in the show, all but the actual sex. APA members here are crying in the sugar-frosted wilderness for something, anything, with any faint flavor spicier than maple syrup. The tease is that we think we see it, somewhere below the frosting, mocking us like a cherry at the bottom of a tall glass...

I note grumpily that no fan, with or without a Methos fixation, ever mentioned that the show, Highlander, has female Immortals, and more than one at that. Maybe some of the high-profile fannish fascination is sparked by the Quickening, an occurrence which appears to be a kind of Immortal orgasm of death (or murder) heralded by lightning flashes that do nothing to dispel the impression of the grandest of petites morts. It has to be some other Immortal's death, but not another male Immortal's, necessarily, as Methos demonstrated in the course of showing Duncan what things were like before Chivalry. Pretty much the way they are after Chivalry, apparently: women are seen to die for some reason other than childbed or drudgery.

Yes, the WotW slash was mainly Paul Ironhorse/Harrison Blackwood, those being the most obviously antagonistic central males; the structure of the show and their given backgrounds made them diametric opposites, which in a way makes it easier to slash them: they each managed to approach much the same mindset from opposite directions. The show put them in a relationship tailor-made for slash as well: isolated with few people, forced to work together for the survival not only of themselves, but the human race. I don't know what you'd say is "quite a bit" of slash: I only ever found about three zines that were overtly slash and some stories in mixed-fandom zines. There were several other WotW zines that emphasized the characters' partnership but stuck to action-adventure storylines. The latter, for good or ill, contained the best of the writing, and some of it was excellent. Ironhorse is a classic fan magnet and (like some other characters we know) could have met a lot of people in Vietnam: Special Forces R Us, Daring Rescues a Specialty. But as far as the story-writing goes, he didn't boff anyone there. I agree (as do most of the writers I've talked to) that Ironhorse wouldn't normally contravene military standards of conduct; and practically none of the stories I've read quite succeeds in suspending that particular point of disbelief, though that doesn't stop me, either, from reading anything I can get my hands on.

Maybe slash is so exceedingly attractive in Due South because all the women who might be serious candidates for the romance figure in Fraser's life are clearly mis-matches for him, one way or another

...the walrus skin and "bonding" lines in the last episode [that was just aired of Due South], the show spells out a very close connection for the partners, avoiding explicit sexual suggestion only by the narrowest of interpretations. It's a real exercise in slash brinksmanship.

Here's a paradox, to go with the rest of the ingenious paradoxes of the show: DS has a strong feel of slash, but it also has lots of well-drawn female characters who can be hard to ignore. However, one of the show's gags is that all the women are pointed directly at one or both of the men; they relate to each other very seldom, and always about either Vecchio or Fraser. This is not a show that passes the DtWOF test. Women are either wonderfully independent beings (this is actually kind of realistic, if you ask me, but it's not very slashy) or they're potential partners for one of the men, as the show itself makes quite clear. Some women manage both, like Susan Chapin. Victoria very nearly absorbed Eraser into her own agenda: it's a measure of the show's pushing of the envelope that she was on the point of succeeding. However, the ongoing female character who occupies fans during second season is Inspector Thatcher. Sitting here with my Clearly Canadian Wild Cherry drink (with ice) and thinking of the stories I've seen off the net, I have a feeling that no sanity about Meg Thatcher is available. I even wrote a story about her myself, but I'm not convinced I haven't been every bit as MS-ish (is that "missish" or "Miz-ish" or "manuscript-ish or, all three?) as everything else in fandom that tries to pair her with Eraser, even if I do thipk, modestly, that I got a bit more realism into the thing than most. F/Th writers! mostly seem to have little or no inkling of the characters as they already exist. I read one story based on the idea that they were already married, and it was kind of cute if you'd swallow the premise, but swallowing the premise was the hard part. Mainly, she's not going to get married (or not to Fraser) and he's not going to screw around without some obsession or commitment (or some other perfume name) to get him going, and where's your story?

Ivanova started by showing that her morals, career and honor meant more to her than the fact of an old boyfriend's existence, when Malcolm showed up (in first season)'and proved to be a rotter. Ivanova/Talia is canonical as far as it goes, and fannish treatment of it is unlikely to ignore Ivanova's (or Talia's) personality as might be done in an m/f story. Think of, say, Ivanova/Sinclair, just as an exercise. Note that it's exactly as insane and interesting, from a military-regulations standpoint, or for character mix and cultural contrast, as K/S ever was; but which character's dilemmas would be likely to drive the story for I/S, just based on their screen roles?

There are enough well-realized female characters [in Babylon 5] to make up at least one f/f pairing we've seen, and a couple more m/f possibilities where (I am glad to say) the women hold their own as interesting characters. The female-character-as-numinous-and-therefore-slashworthy argument only works if the woman stays numinous in the company of male characters. A central, pivotal wom.an in any story, on screen or in a zine, has to be central, not just "central when there are no men onstage." I'm not sure if it's harder or easier to show a f/f couple and keep them numinous. The writer has to believe, and make the reader believe, that both the women are heroic and godlike, or at least important to themselves and the reader. It's hard enough for some writers to show even one of a m./m couple as more than clay. Female characters as central to anyone (including themselves) is such a few-and-far-between subject in fanwriting that I'm almost as happy to see one at a time as two or more. The first major example in fandom as we know it, Servalan, was something of a grotesque - but one must start somewhere.

I was surprised, after making it a joke, that someone did write a Jan/Nat story, but there it seems the mere premise wasn't enough to drive a story by itself. Both characters do have careers and lives based on something other than a leading man; it's just that the show's structure therefore makes them peripheral to its leading man, Nick, and his leading man, LaCroix. I'm still waiting for fanfic that actually works with the latter pairing.

For Scully and Mulder there've been at least a few good stories, I have to admit, and one tends to just let the routine ones slide off like teflon, they being more or less like the show, but duller. The offensively make-Scully-cry ones are fortunately a small minority, just enough to be Bad Examples. I've just read a story series titled Intriguing Possibilities that takes pains to present Scully and Mulder as partners first, skeptic and speculative thinker, bickering friends, and lovers as well when circumstances work for them. This is exactly the kind of full-bodied partnership I like in slash and I see no reason not to like it for the same reasons and in the same way here. On the other hand, that story series is low on the kind of erotically-charged scenes that are one major appeal of slash for some readers and writers.

The [fan] writers obsessed with getting Mulder into bed with someone else (male or female, i.e., whether it's slash or a Mary Sue idea) generally either leave Scully out altogether or give her some importance as Mulder's nonsexual partner, rather than villainize her. This can't be all bad, even if the millennium of equality isn't quite here yet. There have been, I fear, no zines and not even more than a couple of stories that concentrate on getting Scully into bed with anyone but Mulder. The woman doesn't even have videotapes! Doesn't anyone want to fix this obvious lack of sex life? Well, all the queer fans I know say they'd volunteer for the project in person, but none of them seems to want to write about it.

This last few months in fandom, I seem to have run into not just the occasional woman in a role where she'd be slashed in a second if she were male, but lots of interesting material that has some m/f and f/f couples worth comparing to slash. Of recent shows, for plain (and fancy) m/m there are still Ray and Benny in Due South in a traditional model, but the big fannish-interest shows of the 90's often feature at least intermittent, and sometimes ongoing, female characters worthy of comment.

Even Highlander, of which I have seen very little, provides an independent-minded female Immortal as Duncan's date through the centuries, even if Methos is clearly a good candidate for slash once he shows up. I'd like to make an argument that the characters in slash represent a new literary gender role. These aren't "heterosexual men" or "gay men" but "slash characters." They are not even "sensitive new age bisexual guys" though that may be closer to at least one slash style's ideal character. I then hop to the concept that if slash characters (or anyway some slash characters) represent a gender role, not a sex, why shouldn't woman as well as men take on that role? Aside from the evident fact that it doesn't turn on the hetero female reader in the same way and thus doesn't represent the "slash" thrill she's accustomed to looking for, what's the difference? Well, um. Maybe there isn't one, and all I need to do is write it, about Ivanova or Scully or Xena with partner-of-choice. This sort of thing represents a slash-or-slashy thrill for me, and apparently for some other readers, even if not all.

On the other hand, to rehash a fine old discussion, maybe a female superhero needn't be a guns-n-action type, but should play to the strengths women (those being the target audience, here) value in women rather than in men, rather like Nicole Hollander's Romance Cop and Fashion Cop types: they don't save Gotham City from a falling meteor any more than they'd take out the garbage (we've got male superheros for that), but they'll warn you off of a bad marriage, which is surely as much of a service to someone's life. Well, no, speaking from my own gut, that's not nearly as much fun as being (or watching) Ivanova as she repels meteors, lurkers, and anything else she wants to. Some of that male-stereotype action competence still seems necessary to producing the slash thrill for me, even if I don't insist on male genitals to go with it.

...the idea of m/f or f/f as stories that really show what I want to see in slash, that I often do see in m/m stories, is nearly as revolutionary and exciting. Perhaps more so. Much of the energy in slash comes from the taboo: men aren't supposed to have sex together (in the Western mainstream thinking of the 70's, and often even now) and letting them do so on paper opened a gate to sexuality for readers like no other. When women, who weren't supposed to make their own choices about anything "important" (in traditional Western thinking, of which many traditions still linger), can be seen and written about as self-determined beings in ways that include sex as valid and important to themselves, I'm ready to explore that field as well.

Some Topics Discussed in "Cat's Darkling Zine"

  • why lack of Highlander slash?
  • the internet as overwhelming

Excerpts from "Cat's Darkling Zine"

Ann Teitelbaum is putting together slashy clips tapes: people send in their favorite slash clips of various series, movies, event, whatever, and she compiles an anthology of scenes based on relationship. A lovely idea that. I got the first tape. It's got Blake's 7, ER, Professionals, Equalizer, Muncle, Highlander, Star Trek, SAAB, the Sentinel (which I never heard of before), etc...

Macho men saving each other's lives. It is an icon of slashdom. Clashing characters. But when push comes to shove, they will jump in the way of bullets for each other. Which seems a lot easier to do than say "I love you", or even "I am fond of you". Weird world.

Internet, to which [A] is linked : it's too much for me. I lose the posts I need to keep. Of course, I do the same with regular mail, but there is so much *less* of it. Zines I had lying around for ages, waiting for an elusive *right time* to read them (the overwhelming certainty that, yes, this is what I *really* want now. One reason I read zines in short, intermigled sequences): Now is the time for 'Holes in the Ozone'. Makes me shiver all over, very nicely. Could you call it a Post Gauda Prime Wiseguy story ? And I don't see what is so awful about "Elvis Prim".

Highlander seems to be the show with the highest story content in it. Minimum of chases, creation of a whole new structure of morality. I'm impressed. Why no slash zines? Could it be because Ray Vecchio and Benton Fraser are basically losers, thus easier to write about? Is Duncan such a noble, competent figure, so efficient, so wise, so knowledgeable that the average fan feels awed? Who feels strong enough to tackle him? Is it not easier to feel protective of Ray Vecchio? His failings, his insecurities, are so obvious.

Some Topics Discussed in "Twinbear"

  • some examples of pairs that include non-white characters
  • disabilityfic

Excerpts from "Twinbear"

About disabled characters, the only Simon & Simon slash stories I ever liked were an incredibly interesting series of fragments where AJ, dumped by Rick, turned for comfort to an old friend of his who had been castrated in Vietnam. To the surprise of both of them, it turned into an extremely hot sexual relationship which finally gave AJ the courage to give up Rick completely. The friend was a wonderful character, both sane and nice, and no, his balls did not suddenly grow back at the end of the series.

Some Topics Discussed in "Babylon 5 Security Transmissions"

  • lots about Babylon 5, the episode, "Z'Ha'Dum"

Some Topics Discussed in "Ghost Speaker"

  • a scold about a show spoiled
  • comments on Highlander
  • comments about the Bren Antrim story, "Slick"
  • explaining the term hatstand (but getting it wrong)
  • the differences between vampires (Forever Knight) and immortals (Highlander)

Excerpts from "Ghost Speaker"

Ah, hatstands. Yes. Well, so I'm told, in a early Profs slash story, which I have never read, someone refers to someone as being "bent as the hatstand in Cowley's office". (Cowley does have a hatstand in one of his offices, and yes, it is bent.) The word is accredited to Profs slash stories in general, at least by the time I first heard the term, which would have been around 1985.

I just finished reading yet-another Blake-fucks-Avon-fucks-Vila B7 story, read your comment re. B7-slash inhabiting a separate pornographic universe where the three of them do nothing but screw, and sniggered. You have a point there. Well, three. I do, however, have a strong preference for stories (such as Sebastian's, M.Fae's, or even mine) where the canonical events of the B7 universe are shown to affect what the characters are doing. Even if it's just 'Tm tired of always having to be the charismatic leader of the rebellion, I think I'll go and get fucked".

I read "Slick" with attention but not a lot of interest. I've never seen Krycek. Or Cancerman. It feels as if it could have been (could still be) a really good story, but it needs polishing - finishing. It feels unfinished. Is this typical of netfic? In some ways that's like early circuit stuff, where because it wasn't going in a zine fanwriters seemed to think it didn't matter.

Hey, you, (and other Americans who forgot this rule); what happened to the friendly and polite custom of prefacing discussion of episodes/films/stories which other fans have not yet encountered, with "SPOILER WARNING"? I don't want to know what happens in the last episode of Forever Knight until I see it, thank you very much. Rather, I didn't want to know; unfortunately, thanks to you, I know now. Grr'rr.

Highlander, has anyone else noticed that this unbelievably trashy series to which unfortunately I appear to have become addicted, while everyone else is getting addicted to Due South, melds rather nicely with Forever Knight, to which I have happily become addicted? What I think I'm after is McLeod/Knight slash...

Some Topics Discussed in "Yamibutoh"

Excerpts from "Yamibutoh"

Well, you know that I agree with you about dear Klaus' personality and his serbus need to have it readjusted. To fit with Dorian (presuming Dorian still wanted him once he could have him which I, personally, think is iffy), he'd need a personality readjustment on the par of what Vicky did to the villain of Go Lion. She took the lovely shit as he was and then put him through serious hell in order to change him into someone endurable. Maybe, some ambitious writer should do that for Klaus.

Two men an a girl/woman seems to be English. One man/one woman seems to be American. Japanese is the team of 5 that you see in many of the early anime team shows (like Gatch) and still in a lot of the live action shows; the hero, the sidekick (often the more interesting character), the kid, the girl and a fifth character who is either the heavy guy, the old man, or some one else, (recently, the black guy is popular or blonde).

Some Topics Discussed in "Mardi Gras Favors"

  • some early description of the X-Files archive Gossamer
  • Babylon 5 fic on the net
  • a long description and review of the Babylon 5 story, Balance of Power, see that page
  • a reprint of the Babylon 5 story by elfin called "Nights" (was posted to The Slash Cafe)

Excerpts from "Mardi Gras Favors"

And for X-Files there is the Gossamer Project - X-Files Fan Fiction Summaries which is currently at http://gossamer.simplenet.com/. This site has added some great new listings: QueerXF, X-Files Erotica which will lead to Brenda Antrim's imaginings of Mulder & Krycek's alternately fighting & fucking, as well as lots of heterotica. And, if you really like Alex, there's Ratboy Fan - fiction which links to a listing of several dozen stories about a rather transient character we all hope to see more of.

I wondered whether the Net had any Babylon 5 slash so, after trolling thru a dozen or so web sites via Alta Vista, I made my electronic way to a web site that's called Satrycon a GoGo at http:// www.ar.com.au/~jrlddler/slash.html. Among lots of other topics. It listed a link to Slash Fiction on the Net which sounded promising. Slash Fiction on the Net pages had a dozen or so shows listed; the largest section was for Due South. Much as I like that show, my interest doesn't go further.

B5 has two stories listed: the shorter one was a Sinclair/Garibaldi story "The Gift" which was adequate. The other story was "Balance of Power" by Jennifer Lyon, A. Manley Huff & Sue Phillips. I skimmed several pages and it looked promising so I printed it out. Fifty-five pages later it finished with a file size of 187k.

[...]

While looking for more B5 slash I came across elfin's homepage - the Home of the Slash Cafe at https://web.archive.org/web/19980709101341/https://www.burble.com/jane/. One of her links to Babylon 5 - Spoiler City - will take you to lots of background info & speculation on the human, minbari & vorlons who populate B5. It also goes to the site for gen B5 fanfic which is clumped according to season.

However, my interest was on her link - Slash Night at the Karoke Cafe which led to a few slash vignettes, elfin's "Nights" is a brief, evocative vignette between Sinclair & Sheridan which I'm including on the next pages. I couldn't find any more. Sigh. Well, it's early, perhaps "Balance of Power" will inspire others.

The funniest slash I've read so far for B5 was in NO HOLDS BARRED #12. Janis Cortese has several stories here for different fandoms, but her most effective is "A Drunken Boink" between Marcus who makes a drunken dare with Garibaldi.

Some Topics Discussed in "The Magic May Return"

Excerpts from "The Magic May Return"

I'd say the Japanese rarely do serious cross-overs. I can't think of a single example, though there are (generally one page) gag ones: especially if the visual styles of the two strips are completely different or two of the names are the same. As in the manga I sent you, they're much more likely to draw Klaus and Dorian x Louis and Lestat. Doubtless another effect of the visual form - as well as the need you mention for working by the rules. Most dojinshi artists are 'amateurs' in that they draw - for Japanese- surprisingly badly and have no notion of story at all. Even the expert artists often lack the resources to concoct a good story-line to back up their pretty pictures, and so they merely repeat the same patterns. Also, innovation isn't a virtue in Japan. If it worked once, it will work the ten millionth time; and that's what the fans seem to want

Wherein is it written - and who did the writing - that slash is inherently angsty? The basic principle, as I understood it, was two men together: not two men suffering separately through pages of doubts and fears, or suffering together through authorially-inflicted pain, or because one of them is into abuse, or whatever. So how did it fall into the masochism mold? Kirk/Spock, I know it was Kirk/Spock — but why? Angst, where I come from (Japan) is a synonym for cheap thrills of the most embarrassingly adolescent sort. I'd ascribe the vast amount of K/S h/c, and its slopover development into angsty slash, to the age of the fen writing the first stories. (Or innate female masochism. Or, in Sarah's case, innate female sadism. TYP.) But I thought we'd all grown up since classic Trek. Really, you'd much rather watch your guys suffering than having a friendly snoggle together? In that case, why bring them together at all? Write a 60,000 word story where they pine in silence for each other- chronicle all the springing hopes and inevitable disappointments and waking nights and tear-sodden pillows and leave it at that. Much more realistic and much more satisfying: then you can write a sequel that does it all over again. An infinitely delayed orgasm (Russ was right) - it's never over. Best of all possible worlds.

I'll admit my TNG fandom is pretty faut de mieux, and not unlike eating potato chips. You think you should enjoy it more than you do. But lady, if the Holographic Doctor pushes your buttons— oh dear. Beyond Baroque. Into Rococo. Beyond Rococo. The doctor is the human equivalent of one of Mad Ludwig's castles.

I'm allergic to flat-footed mundane reality being intruded into fantasy programs, which is one of many good reasons not to read DS fanfic. [Nausea at the idea of Ray and Benny naked is the other, and never mind what I've said in the past about the idyllic yaoi concept of sex for all, not just the beautiful. There are limits.] If the fan writers are capable of writing in the show's surrealistic style, they're simply repeating the show's content and there's no point in reading it. If- much more likely- they aren't, or aren't even about to try, then they've removed the major interest I have in the show, and there's no point in reading it.

Fictional characters can look (within limits) as beautiful and sexy as I want them to. With a tv show or a movie you look and say 'Yecch'. Undress that slab of beef? (Blake, Kirk) Get all hot about the discreet but visible roll of fat at the belt? (Sheridan, Avon) Breathe heavily over the concave chest? (Spock, Picard) Rhapsodize about the zits on his bum? (Fraser. Yes he does. That kind of complexion gets zits without even trying.)

I don't believe there'd be the same wave of Ray/Ben stories if Ray was black. I think there's a huge cultural resistance to seeing black men as being both sexual and human at the same time. Put a black man into a sexual situation and watch all the cultural subtexts come shambling out of their graves. Who was pointing out all the maimed (symbolically castrated) black men on TV? Someone else said someplace that TNG's Geordi was always paired with a black woman, which was a nice piece of Freudian rethink because all Geordi's infatuations as well as his main love were very white. Look at all the hoo-ha about the colour of the woman Franklin dances with - dances with, not beds. And both those series are set in the - presumably equal - far future. Write a black male character and you're writing a lot of Sensitive Social Issues that have to be danced around very carefully with many assurances that the racist language used by your character(s) does not reflect the author's views etc etc. Why would anyone bother in an atmosphere like that? Take an instance: a black Chicago Ray who fancies his partner is going to have problems with the strong anti-gay feelings he grew up with as a black man. It's OK for our Vecchio: he's Catholic, we know the Catholic church is homophobic, any qualms he has sure culturally justified. (Not that most writers seem to care that Ray has a homophobic background. He's presumed to have sloughed it off at some point, or else it just didn't take.) Maybe a black Ray could be given the same never-never immunity to upbringing. Who knows? But I'll bet there'd be screaming about black Ray having abandoned his heritage, or being an Oreo, or whatever: unless there were screams about "You're saying all black men are homophobes!" Who needs the aggro? It's safer to write Ben/Dief stories.

Brilliant analysis of the whys of Japanese yaoi. A visual based on a visual will necessarily emphasize the visual component. I'm convinced half the 'But they just GO together' reaction, if analysed the way we analyze, comes down to "I like it that way." What replaces logic in Japan is emotion: the primacy of how someone feels over any more abstract concepts of reason or right.

The Japanese don't put everyone with everyone indiscriminately, true, but depending on series, there's no actual barrier to putting anyone with anyone. The Slam Dunk fans may go ballistic if Sakuragi is paired with anyone other than Ryukawa, but that was a rare exception to the general tolerance. As with gayness itself, the strongest reaction is 'kimochi warui' (I don't like it) or "kyomi nai" (not interested) rather than 'you're a horrible pervert for even suggesting such a thing.' No-one would be trashing Avon/Tarrant fans in Japan. "Kimochi warui. Hand me that A/B zine." The level of emotional involvement in a series, while intense, is also brief: people's fandoms constantly shift to accommodate new shows and new (zine-buying) fans, so that it's rare for anyone to stay in the same fandom for more than a few years. Westerners seem like models of constancy compared to the Japanese- ten years in the same fandom? Sugoi! (literal equivalent of 'awesome!!') Here, there may be - by all the evidence I've seen, there definitely is - a higher level of emotional commitment to one series, and hence to that fan's preferred version of that series.

I don't think enough stress can be laid on the results of having characters operate in a closed plot universe. True, a large portion of the zines are put out when the series is still running. (Japanese fans would be baffled at the notion of waiting for JMS to finish - what possible effect can doing a zine now have on what happens in two years' time? Hell, I'm baffled at the notion of waiting for JMS to finish. I suppose it's a compliment, in its way, to think fannish versions have a reality comparable to the source's.) The on-going zines reflect the sort of series it is weekly tragedy or final catastrophe or Dragon Ball's 'nothing seriously wrong here, folks- we bring 'em back with a halo.' Read from the perspective of the show's ending, the early zines have a nice A/U feel to them. (Depends, too, on how twisty and perverse the series' author is: where there are no huge shifts, the stories can stay canon.) But my impression is that the volume of zines grows as the series reaches its climax, and peaks thereafter as people deal with the emotional fall-out of the ending. OK: it's all changed. We know what's going to happen to Yui or Joe or Gai (No we don't, not half), now we have to go back and do it all over again.

Certain of the Gundams seem to me to resemble B7, in that the heavy hand of the studio can be discerned in the changes of plot. That interference seems to give a justification, if any were needed, for rewriting or even ignoring the ending. The last Gundam was more like B5 or Tyler: a single controlling artistic intelligence is at work, which gives an unarguable authority to the plot— and which somehow leaves little room for satisfactory fanfic, at least in the Japanese series. It's all thought out and done for you. You don't need Tyler zines. (And for those of us who wanted something hot and kinky with Tyler and Dom, damned if the OVA didn't go and provide it.)

Taking B5 as the closest we have to a thought-out plot-driven anime, will the same things happen there? Garibaldi and Sinclair have had an eternal parting, without the chance even to say good-bye. Doesn't that fact colour any G/S story you can write now? Think what will be like if Garibaldi dies. More important than whether he's making it with Marcus or Ivanova is the fact that he won't be here in two years' time. (Which is why people should be writing now...)

I'm not sure I understand your comment to [E]. She was talking about American writers living in a racist society and wondering about the effects of that fact on their writing. No-one doubts there are other racist societies in the world. Maybe in fact all societies are racist as a fundamental part of human nature. That wasn't the point. [E] was talking about the society we live in- which we may generally acknowledge to be racist- and how it affects us. A response of "everybody else is racist tool" seems to me a total non sequitur. "Lousy weather, isn't it?" "It's lousy in Seattle too, you know!" Yeah, but we're here, with the rain dripping down our backs.

Some Topics Discussed in "Wide-Eyed and Breathless"

Excerpts from "Wide-Eyed and Breathless"

I can't even do the usual 'how I got into slash' thing because J's clever mosaic of our correspondence told you all that. It was peculiar, re-reading some of those months-old letters. I found it hard to believe what a sea-change I'd undergone between February and July. Where now was the nice quiet - all right, quiet-ish - respectable housewife and jam-maker of yesteryear? Where, come to that, was the woman who started out as a convinced Bodie/Cowley fan? (Gone, dissolved, 'ticed away by the adorable "No Unicorns". But then, who could resist H.G. and Sebastian in glorious concert? And it was all downhill from there.) So I'll just do a quick resume of the pertinent points, adding a bit of autobiography here and there. Dull, I know, but bear with me; it seems so rude to muscle in on a conversation without introducing oneself.

I'd never completed a piece of fiction in my life before "Flowers for Bodie" and wrote it in a state of jaw-dropping astonishment. I don't suppose I'll produce another, unless that same sheer inability not to write the damn thing overtakes me again. (Not a word of a lie, it was like a physical compulsion. Took three afternoons and I didn't believe in it even as I was frantically typing.) Fiction is too much like hard work. I've a half-finished novel in my bottom drawer and I know whereof I speak. But my enthusiasm for reading the stuff - ah, that's another matter. I had the joyous experience for a newcomer of plunging into the slash pool and staying blissfully submerged for weeks and weeks. (No work, remember?) Oh the delight of discovering a new fascination and being able to indulge it to one's heart's content! I've never had an obsession before and it's a strange - though interestin' - experience. I'm told by Those Who Know that it won't last, after a year or so the inferno will cool and I'll emerge blinking and hopeful into the clear light of reality.

Unexpectedness - that's the thing. I never expected slash to be so very well written. I never expected it to treat so tenderly and powerfully of the emotions. I never expected it to be so serious. Or so funny. I never expected it to move me as it has, to delight and dismay and sometimes both at once. I certainly never expected to cry over it. And as for the sex - well. I find it instructive, if slightly alarming, to have discovered at my advanced age a taste for erotic stories about homosexual love affairs between fictional characters from twenty-year-old TV series. I mean, really. Bodie and Doyle of all people, one crop-haired and tough, one all curls and sensitivity, galloping about saving the world with macho insouciance to the sound of gunfire. Wasn't I supposed to get all that adolescent stuff out of the way in, er, adolescence? (The real irony is, I never watched it when it first came out; above all that boys' games shooty-bangs sort of stuff, don't you know. Hah. The whirligig of time brings in his revenges and no mistake.) This is most uncharacteristic; and therein lies the fun, of course. I'm sure it's because I was brought up to be such a nice gel that the wickedness of the thing can have its full flowering. (A connected but different pleasure from that of enjoying the stories themselves and the quality of the writing.) It's wonderfully liberating, being so very much Not A Lady. (Actually I'm curious as to whether male slash fans get quite the same thrill of subversion, given men's different conditioning about appropriate behaviour. Henry - hello! - I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this one.)

Some Topics Discussed in "Desert Blooms"

Some Topics Discussed in "Thoughts of Love... Power... Lust"

Excerpts from "Thoughts of Love... Power... Lust"

...women who hold the kind of power that Scully or Natalie or Ivanova do are already deviant because they are so powerful in ways which are traditionally recognized as male. Therefore to add lesbianism to that deviance is just another piece in the puzzle of women who don't fit the traditional mode. It would not be very subversive because Scully & etc. are already subversive. So, I agree that lesbianism is deviant. But for Scully/Ivanova/Natalie it would be just a check on the long list of deviances, not the pinnacle. What I was trying to say before is part of the charge of slash for me is that the men are perfect in the patriarchal sense: healthy, fit, aggressive, powerful and should therefore keep right on and father lots and lots of smaller versions of themselves. Slash subverts that perfection, is a blot on the face of an otherwise perfect portrait.

Ah, Homicide, I love that show I think Pembelton [sic] is one of the most attractive men I have ever, ever seen!!! He and Bayliss are made to be together, the way they bitch and snipe and ignore/annoy one another. [...] While I wish there was some (any) Pembelton/Bayliss to read, I probably won't be writing it. I think you're right: the problem with any fanfic for Homicide (slash or gen) is the structure of the show — like B5, [Homicide] is too tightly written to create room for fan writing.

I have not seen any Riptide. I would slash Rick with Magnum, if I were so inclined. Fortunately that hasn't happened (yet). I never found much appealing about Higgins, save his wry sense of humor, and loyalty to Robin. Then again, I haven't seen any Magnum since high school and I don't remember much of it. Maybe when Mulder and Scully kiss (finally!) they could bump glasses, that would be a good compromise and meet both of my rather arbitrary criteria; near-sightedness and shortness.

Oh, my God, they canceled our show, [Due South]! This made me remember when I was too cool for TV, when nothing could depress me unless it was global politics, my relationship with my parents or the end of a novel. Not now, now that I am a corrupt slash fan I can barely survive CBS canning a program. Sob. The fan fiction seems to be going strong, even off the net (thank whatever beings may be responsible) and so, at least it will live in fannish imagination. I imagine that if it was still on I would either hate it because they messed it up (there were rumors of a Thatcher/Fraser extended romance) or hate it for any number of other reasons (dogs, children, etc.). But instead, here I sit, depressed as I was the first time I could vote in a national election and every single candidate I voted for lost.

I may be revising my opinion about women and slash with Xena.... The show is campy (at best) and quite fast and loose with myth, history and well, violence. But Xena has a secret, damaged soul which Gabrielle alone sees (with the exception of the occasional male, who, upon knowing Xena's true self, dies). This show is so dedicated to women and women-choosing women in relationship as a primary goal. It's astounding, and if I have to put up with a bunch of anachronisms and camp to see this kind of female relationship, then I will do so.

Some Topics Discussed in "With Friends Like These... "

Excerpts from "With Friends Like These... "

... about the appeal of A/T vs. A/B. Not only do I find Blake unappealing, but I find the dynamics of the A/B relationship tedious. They don't share the same values and never will. There's no realistic possibility of resolution between them; that kind of relationship holds no appeal for me. With A/T and A/V, there's enough surface conflict to keep it interesting, enough congruity underneath it all to build a genuine relationship.

Yup, I'll believe just about anything now. You, who used to rail against slash at panels? That Pat Nussman, drooling over Steele/Murphy? After such a turnaround, you really can't blame the Blake Police for hoping you might convert to A/B next.... ☺

Hi! It was nice seeing you at MediaWest. And I'm glad you liked theMulder/Krycek vids. At least someone liked them; I was afraid we'd get bomb threats or something... And I'd be happy to provide copies. Cody Nelson has given me permission to distribute hers, too, so I'll include them if you want. I haven't done any more XF vids since MediaWest, but I plan to. Maybe in time for Eclecticon...

BTW, I think you may have misunderstood Cody at MediaWest. She is not writing a sequel to The Best Lies. She thinks it's complete as it is. However, she is working on a lot of other hot Mulder/Krycek stories. She printed part of an in-progress story in the first issue of Whereabouts Unknown, her Krycek APA (e-mail her at [redacted] if you're interested in joining), and there's another one called "Extrophile" in the next Dark Fantasies [1]. And lots more coming down the pipe!

No, my mother is not a fan. In fact. Mom doesn't approve of fandom; she's been waiting for me to outgrow it since I was in second grade. (She told me once that the most depressing day of her life was when she read an article that said college students were Trek fans.) Nevertheless, slash has been part of my life since childhood. I was a truly rabid Trek fan, and found out about K/S at a tender age ~ seven or eight, maybe. It just seemed so natural, I didn't even question it ~ because I was so young, perhaps, or just because it seemed such a reasonable outgrowth of "Amok Time." I wasn't particularly interested in K/S, because neither Kirk nor Spock was my favorite character, but I always knew about it. So it wasn't like I ever had some big slash revelation. Unlike many fen, I can't remember how I first heard about slash or what the first slash story or slash zine I read was. It was just always in the background, and somewhere along the line it started moving forward.

Some Topics Discussed in "Two Heads Are Better Than One"

Excerpts from "Two Heads Are Better Than One"

A few thoughts on your lament about not finding whole slash zines devoted to FK and Highlander: I really think we are undergoing a sea change in fandom and its name is the Internet. I decided to produce an all slash HL zine some months ago and put out flyers about it for MediaWest. At the time, I realized that there was a very active fiction list on the net that was devoted to HL exclusively. People posted stories in both general and adult categories and many of these were archived for easy retrieval. Still, this didn't bother me because HL slash stories were almost nonexistent.

However — and you knew I was going to say this — there now exists a list that is only adult and slash HL stories and quite a lot of fiction is posted to it. (Methos stories are very, very popular.) I have heard (read) old time slash authors say that they like posting stories this way, that it gets their work out to an appreciative audience quickly, and that they are more likely to get feedback (LOCs being few and far between these days). This is from people who have consistently published in zines in the past. Now I haven't heard anyone say they won't consider print anymore, but I honestly think that the fandoms that have sprung up and become popular in the last two or so years have —and will continue to have — an extremely strong net basis which may overpower, to varying degrees, print media.

I hear you saying yes, but what about a new fandom like Due South? There are lots of slash zines for it. I don't have an answer. There is a lot of DS slash on the DSX list (and gen on the general DS lists), as well you know, so it isn't totally in the traditional mold. Are the slash zines there because of the passion of the slashers who put them out? (Well, obviously yes, but that's not what I mean.) It only takes one really crazed fan to produce a slash zine if she's fanatic enough. You can write all your own material. How many different authors are actually represented in existing DS zines? I'll bet it's not that many yet.

I still want desperately to publish my HL slash zine next MediaWest and I may call in some favors, use a little coercion, and go back to writing myself. Maybe the zine's appearance will push things a bit and spark more zines. But I honestly think the net is going to remain the heart of this fandom.

I would also say the same thing of Forever Knight. The Forever Erotica list has posted lots and lots of stories and most of them are crap. (Thank you, net.) It's going to take an obsessed old time zine publisher, Joanne, to get an all slash zine out.

Am I happy about this turn of events? Yes and no. Like any other connected fan, it's wonderful to be able to seek out the net fic and get it for free. No postage or copying or zine costs. But so much of it is garbage, unedited, unrevised, and unfinished. Or maybe it just seems that way because so much of it is available. And I mourn the lack of the printed page that you can hold in your hand. It's now up to you, the one who down loads, to format and print out a story — or just read it on the screen. Ugghh. This could push me out of publishing if it takes over. My greatest pleasure in slash fandom (apart from reading that really terrific slash story that is so emotionally satisfying) lies in bringing together material, working with it, massaging it, designing something to make it look good. In short, it's publishing a "book." Is there a place for me in fandom's future?

about the lack of slash in comedic series. I agree with that it takes a lot more effort to write around or past the comedic elements. And this is mirrored, of course, in the structure and style of the best slash. I would argue that the most emotionally satisfying slash is the angsty kind. Certainly there are tons of humorous slash pieces— many of them quite memorable—^but I doubt they would make most fans' top 10 lists of stories that really "do" it for them.

I quite agree with you that you just can't do it to someone who doesn't see it—other than on an intellectual level or within the confines of a specific story. This, in fact, is how I view Bodie/Cowley and often, Avon/Vila. Good writers of these pairings can convince me utterly for the duration of the story. And that's all. For me, the whole raison d'etre of B7, the driving force of the entire series (esp. fourth season) is the Avon/Blake relationship.

[...]

Avon/Tarrant is something I will never understand. (Now, now Tarrant fen: my slash couple is okay, your slash couple is okay.)

G/B and other current ST slash on the net. Well, I don't really go looking for it. However, the slash-sis list started out primarily as G/B slash fen. They were pretty much all net-oriented and not aware of the wider world of fandom. Anyway, they have made available lots and lots of their G/B stories in addition to works featuring other ST characters. If you were to join them, they'd probably be quite willing to e-mail stories. Course, I don't know if what they write is what you're looking for.

I think reading mundane fiction is a different experience from reading slash — particularly if you fit the pattern of knowing the media source material for the slash story. (This assumes that slash is based on media characters and for the purposes of my comments, I will accept that. My own true definition of slash doesn't restrict slash to that requirement, though.) The media original both colors your perceptions as you read and the slash author's as she writes. I don't believe you can avoid it unless you are reading or writing from a very fourth wave vantage with no direct knowledge of the original source material. Opposite this is original fiction. The author has her own mental picture which she may or may not convey successfully in her writing. The reader, in turn, has a great deal of freedom to imagine what she will, even ignore what the author has described.

I know some of you think I'm abandoning my slash loyalties with forays into het territory. I assure you I'm not. I think the appetite for traditional het stuff has always been there, but it's not nearly as strong or consuming as the slash addiction. That said, let me confide that this fall's guilty pleasure is the new American network TV show Mr. and Mrs, Smith. It's a sort of cross between Remington Steele and Mission Impossible, starring Scott Bakula and an actress whose name I've never even noticed. Now I know I'm being manipulated completely by the scriptwriters, but my feeble brain is too weak to resist a standard overused plot device of: we have to work together, we hate each other, but naturally we are falling in love. I really am appalled that I'm enjoying this. I'm appalled that the anti-romantic I am (I even hate 19th century romantic era classical music) makes sure to watch a number of mushy het romances. Sometimes I have to go read a nice, bleak slash story just to prove to myself that I'm still normal. (Well, you know what I mean.)

I've been to lots of sf cons over the years, but this year's Worldcon was one of the more exciting ones for two related reasons; I got to vote for "The Coming of Shadows" B5 ep for a Hugo, and I got to see JMS win and accept that Hugo. Now if only all of third season B5 could be nominated as a whole for next year's voting.

How wonderful to find that the producers of Hercules and Xena may skewer historical fact but aren't about to skewer the fans by eliminating slash innuendo. Both shows are writing incredibly slashy lines. And even when they insert blatant het scenarios, they still manage to leave open and unresolved the questions of whether Herc & Iolaus and Xena & Gabrielle sleep with each other. I'd love to see them go ahead and admit what we slash fen hunger for, but because I just can't see it happening on American TV (and the fact is, these shows are aimed at the American market), I'm content that the hints and double entendres continue.

Some Topics Discussed in "For the World is Hollow..."

Excerpts from "For the World is Hollow..."

Re cancellation, when S:AAB was canceled, I had two reactions simultaneously: 1) oh, damn! 2) Thank God! Now it's safe from its incompetent creators...

Re The Wrap Party — a whole dealers' room for adult and slash zines? Do you really expect there to be that many of them? (Are there that many of them now, for B5? Wow.)

On males in makeup, DVS did this in one of her Garak/Bashir stories — but she invents a new cultural background and physiology for Garak in every one of them, so it doesn't quite count as a universe. She does it very well, though! (I believe the story is Garak's Trip, in the first Plain and Simple Zine, but I haven't checked my shelves.) As for stories in which men make state marriages with each other, I know Helen Raven is working on a novel involving something like that. The plot, as I've heard it outlined, makes me shudder; but Helen is such an incredible and highly skilled writer that I don't doubt for a minute that she can pull it of. I just can't wait to see how she does it!

I'm a little startled that an actor-slash The XXX-Files: A Personal Fantasy is on the net. Then again, I suppose everything is on the net. Which is, of course, both the good and the bad thing about the net.

I've gotten hooked on Xena; Laura helped, but mostly I did it all on my lonesome. (This is a bit unusual for me.) The show is hopelessly silly, but a lot of fun both despite and because of that, and I love seeing an incredibly powerful woman with thighs like oak trees kick the shit out of baddies and pal up with her girl sidekick. (There've been a run of annoying hereto and sexist plots lately, though, unfortunately.) I'm eagerly awaiting a set of early tapes so I can see whence she came, and al that. (I'm not going to start watching Hercules, though. I can see guys with heads thighs like oak trees kick the shit out of people any day.)

I taped the premiere of EZ Streets, too, but haven't seen it yet. It's the best-looking of the new shows (best advance publicity, that is), but fan reaction so far seems to be muted. On the other hand, it seems to be muted mostly because there apparently isn't that much slash potential in the pilot, and that's not what I would primarily watch it for. Dramatic interest first, slash second, I think. (I'm sure there could be exceptions.) So I'm still hoping. I started a new tape for it, rather than dumping it onto a revolving junk tape, just in case it turns out to be good enough to save; if not, voila! Another junk tape.

B5 is as good as ever. I was startled (okay, maybe I'm slow) to see a picture of JMS on the cover of Locus (a B5 ep won a Hugo for Best Dramatic Presentation) and to discover that he's — um — of mature years! Mid-fifties, I'd guess, but it was a little tiny picture. I had thought he was a Young Turk, an enfant terrible, early thirties at most and probably less. Which would have gone some way toward explaining his juvenile handling of heterosexual relationships. (I've been muttering for years that the show — after first season — is great, but somebody should please dropkick JMS the rest of the way through puberty.) Now he's got even less excuse.

[...]

I so often want to drop-kick JMS the rest of the way through puberty, but I'm all out of insightful analysis at the moment. I'll just mention the scene (don't remember the episode title or plot; I don't archive B5 for repeat viewing—shameful, I know!) in which Sheridan was on the left side of the screen/room, being menaced by a bad guy in the middle. On the right side of the screen/room was Delenn, a trained fighter. She sees the man in the middle start to throw a knife at Sheridan — and rather than attack him, she screams a warning and dashes across the room, past the bad guy, outrunning the thrown knife to fling herself between it and Sheridan, allowing him to cradle her wounded body in his arms in a manly fashion. I wanted to put my fist through the TV screen. But I still think that it's a wonderful show; don't get me wrong. I just think JMS has a big blind spot.

Re slash on B5, I really have no use for Marcus. He's always seemed a pretty pointless character to me, put in for the same reason Vachon was put in on FK; they didn't have any pretty boys, so they put one in. Franklin/Garibaldi could work for me, although not in the only example I've seen so far (one of them gets outrageously drunk and the other one takes advantage of the situation and of him, even more out of character than it is physiologically unlikely). Garibaldi's attachment to Sinclair seems to have waned, and besides, one could do interesting things with that attachment and Garibaldi's desolation: he has the job because Sinclair wanted him, because Sinclair practically dragged him up again out of the slump his career was in, he came to this godforsaken space station for Sinclair, and now Sinclair's gone.

I agree that there's very little drive to write slash for comedy. Without dramatic tension, what's the point? I also have no desire to write slash for Xena and Gabrielle, because what could we do, other than the wet&slippery bits, that the show isn't already doing? "What barriers are there to cross? (It would be fun to see an episode where they visit Sappho's school for young ladies, though...ahem!)

There are no Nick/Schanke stories. Thank god. "Why not? Because Schanke is a buffoon. A lovable buffoon, true, and a great character, but being a buffoon — a comedic figure — he has very little dramatic slash-type interest. Also, he isn't physically sexy at all.

I think a Forever Knight x X-Files story would be great. Mulder would try desperately to understand Nick and get him to reveal some Cosmic Truths About Life and Death (TM), and Natalie and Scully could trade pathologist horror stories and share exasperation over the bizarre guys they're somehow hooked up with, while Scully helps Natalie with the data she's collected trying to cure Nick, and both FBI agents try to figure out what to do about the existence of a whole coven of immortal serial killers. And I would love to see Nick fuck the bejesus out of Mulder. Oh my yes. I just thought of that and quivered right here at my keyboard. Oh, please. Please.

..."Seducer Seduced" [2]. Oh man. Back when I was first discovering MUNCLE, your stories were the only ones I could count on to be consistently good to excellent, among a pile of saccharin junk. (City of Byzantium was my very first MUNCLE story -- picked off [J C's] floor -- and I'd barely heard of the show at the time.) I've found a few other good MUNCLE writers since, but I'll still read just about anything you care to write, in almost any fandom. For years, I've been giving copies of "Fool's Mate" to anyone I've discussed favorite versions of Illya with.

As I understand it, the term "hatstand" entered (Pros) because very early on a non-slash fan was shown some B/D stories, and she exclaimed, They're all bent as bloody hatstands!" The word became a technical term for a short B/D story, so that there is a very funny circuit piece called "How to Write a Classic Bad Hatstander for Bodie and Doyle," and Lois Welling's hysterical "How to Write Slash — A Desk Reference For the Millions" [3] includes in its list of necessary components of a slash story.
a. desire fraught with
b. anxiety (based on misconceptions and lack of faith)
c. attacks of conscience (usually misdirected, see (b) above)
d. soul searching, 10 minutes to 200 years
i. hatstand: 10 minutes
ii. novella: 3 years
iii. trilogy: 2 generations (of someone or something)
A hatstand is not the same thing as a PWP; it does have a plot, although probably a routine one. It's a short slash (B/D) story with a simple plot.

Some Topics Discussed in "To Be Announced by T H"

  • Babylon 5
  • description of a trip to western Canada

References

  1. ^ "Extrophile" did not appear in Dark Fantasies, but instead X-Plicit Fantasies. That story ended up winning a 1997 STIFfie Award.
  2. ^ a story in Compromising Positions
  3. ^ This second fanwork is in Pig Tails & Other Swill.
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