Shipping: a note on and a meme about
Jul. 15th, 2007 11:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jlhI got an email not long ago that made some assumptions about my own shipping—not the ships I ship, but why I might ship them—and so I thought I'd write a post to clear all of this up, since I've heard these assumptions in places other than that email. Maybe I'm just different than other shippers (though I can't imagine it), but these are assumptions that frankly, I find insulting. So:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dollsome: Comment with a ship you know I like, and I'll tell you how I wound up falling for it in the first place.
Happy Sunday!
- Just because I ship a pairing doesn't mean I think it's true, in "canon" or in "real life." It means, generally, that I like reading fic about them, because I like their dynamic in canon/real life. After reading the first four books of HP I knew that canon would be Ron/Hermione and Harry/Ginny and I figured JKR would do as good a job with that as anything else. I just like reading and writing Harry/Hermione and Draco/Ginny and Ron/Padma-or-Luna fic, because I like the way those characters go together. I have a whole essay here about what I suspect is really happening with Ryan Seacrest and Simon Cowell, but the short answer is: imagining that they are fucking is giving them a happy ending that I very much doubt they even conceive of in real life. In reality their relationship seems vaguely obsessive and deeply fucked up, but what do I know? Nothing! So I get giggles and fun out of writing stories and reading them and talking to people about silly little moments.
- Just because I pick up on certain "evidence" doesn't mean I think those things would be "evidence" of people fucking in real life. I met my best friend—a straight guy—when I was 11, and we became very close when I was 15. We've never dated though most of our high school (the half that didn't think he must be gay because he played music) thought we were, and it was irritating to keep saying, "No, we're not dating." And yet I ship Harry/Hermione. Hypocritical? No, because real life isn't fiction, or reality television. I also don't think that if two people give a third person a joint present then they must be fucking, but that doesn't mean I can't see it as an Incident for Sirius and Remus. I don't think that being chummy and giving each other Significant Looks is always a sign of people sleeping together, but I think it can be, and while mostly I like that both Chris Richardson and Blake Lewis are openly affectionate friends, I also like reading about what it would mean if they had fallen in love in the middle of all that Idol insanity.
- I can't see the upside to unfinished-canon shipping, so I don't do it. Note that I really don't like canon speculation; if we're going to find out, then I don't care what other people's guesses are. I grew up reading and watching romances where the pairing is clear from the beginning and the pleasure is in watching them work through their shit to be together, so I honestly cannot understand how you can write a romance with a real suspense on who they will choose at the end. To me, that's not romance and doesn't even feel like love, but I'm deeply enmeshed in a certain theory of romance and I know that not everyone subscribes to it. Still, if you can't tell within the first 20 pages of P&P that Darcy and Lizzie are Our Couple, you aren't paying attention. So that said, since canon shipping is in the hands of someone else, I don't get the point of backing a horse with any kind of emotion because as far as I can see, it leads to heartbreak. Even iff your ship comes through, it's not in the way you wanted to see it (Mulder/Scully anyone? Danny/Jordan in Studio 60? Harry/Ginny in HBP?) So where's your reward?
dollsome: Comment with a ship you know I like, and I'll tell you how I wound up falling for it in the first place.Happy Sunday!
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Date: 2007-07-15 04:51 pm (UTC)2. Ditto.
3. write a romance with a real suspense on who they will choose at the end. To me, that's not romance and doesn't even feel like love
That's interesting. Do you mean that if the ultimate pairing isn't broadcast at the beginning, then the pairing doesn't seem quite as substantial or believable when the characters do finally get together? It sounds like what interests you is not wondering 'who' or 'if,' but watching the 'how;' is there ever a situation where you aren't absolutely sure who will be The One for the main character, but you still enjoy watching potential relationships evolve? I guess...it seems like any well-written story will provide support for the eventual pairing, but I myself don't always see the evidence beforehand. In those cases, I might still enjoy the story; and if I do, what I like is to be able to go back for a second read and watch the 'how' that I missed the first time around.
I think I'm talking in circles. I'm trying to write this while having to take breaks to help my son practice the piano, and I think coherence is suffering....
since canon shipping is in the hands of someone else, I don't get the point of backing a horse with any kind of emotion
I do agree with this. There are times when I do get emotionally invested in what I'd like to see/how I'd like to see it turn out, but that tends to ruin my enjoyment of the work. Although, I don't know if I stop enjoying the work because of my own emotional investment; or if I'm open to latching onto my own vision/preferences because I've stopped enjoying the work...
So, and I know I've read what you have said about this before, but I have a memory like swiss cheese (or maybe I just like when you talk about it): what drew you to Seamus/Dean? And out of curiosity, is that what kept you interested in them as time went on, or did what you like about them evolve at all?
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Date: 2007-07-16 09:17 pm (UTC)I find that I don't actually get involved in that many canons where it's ongoing enough that the potential relationships really have to evolve over a long period of time. I'm finding more and more that I like shorter, finished canons, rather than, say, long and open ended ones. I've found myself growing more frustrated with these television dramas, especially ones that aren't essentially comedic like, say, Ugly Betty. I like things that know where they end. I think, ironically, that fandom has done this to me, made me so much more impatient with shows going pear shaped, between the higher level of critique we bring to a show, as well as the endless WIP fic that either are abandoned or take some bizarre left turn at some point. I'm becoming a much bigger fan of the sort of limited run shows that the UK creates, or even Telenovelas, which also have a beginning and an end. This US TV thing of endless seasons and who knows where it will end is really not for me.
That said, Chandler and Monica is one of my favorite ships, and that certainly wasn't clear from the beginning. But from the time they got together, it was fairly clear that the show was going to keep them together as a counterbalance to Ross and Rachel.
I'm also reminded of something Alan Ball said about the writers on Six Feet Under and how they'd have story arc meetings and the writers would say, let's create some drama by breaking up David and Keith! and he would say, but why? We've already seen David as a sad single dater. We've already broken them up once. How about some drama that can happen that they have to face together, that sure, they can fight about, but that wouldn't break them up? So I think also, that television writers can be unimaginative, and don't see the romantic plots as an integral part of the overall structure of what they're doing. So with something treated so cavalierly, I don't know why I should invest my time and emotion into it, you know?
Seamus/Dean (http://jlh.livejournal.com/334163.html#cutid1)!
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Date: 2007-07-15 04:56 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2007-07-16 10:04 pm (UTC)Also, no worries here regarding spoilers. Oh, except this one...did you know Book 7 will be out soon? I'm leaving for Jamaica on the 23rd so I likely won't read it until I get back. Wanna postcard? Some rum???
:P
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Date: 2007-07-15 06:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-16 09:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-15 09:16 pm (UTC)They'd both be Wizards of course. Duh.
And it's so nice to see a H/Hr fan who doesn't whine and complain, and thinks that H/Hr getting together is important to the fabric of society.
I'm a R/Hr fan, but I also like Ron/Harry and Harry/Luna and niether of those are happening.
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Date: 2007-07-16 09:29 pm (UTC)I don't even understand who those H/Hr fans ARE, except that they came into fandom post-OotP. That period was a weird one because PoA movie and OotP book were out at the same time and that is a lot of Harry and Hermione save the world! while Ron is doing something else. So I could understand in that moment maybe thinking that H/Hr could be canon. To me, those two books prove that Ron is not Harry's faithful sidekick; Hermione is. So those Harmonians? They are not my people.
My people are the old Pumpkin Pie crew from post-GoF canon, and believe me, we had our own battles with the rigid R/Hr shippers of that time who felt that writing "non-canon" ships was akin to being a bad fan, or a blasphemy in the sight of JKR, or something. But now that slash is so much more mainstream in HP fandom, the really extreme ones of those shippers have been moved to the margins, and no one cares if you write a noncanon ship.
I love Harry/Luna! I adore their dynamic, too!
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Date: 2007-07-16 01:28 am (UTC)As far as reading for the "how" rather than the "who" in romance (to steal from a comment above), yeah. That is totally it. I'm more interested in how X and Y get from point A to point B in their relationship than anything. Characters interest me. Plot contrivances do not.
The icon is in honor of DH coming out. I daresay I'll be telling myself those words a lot next weekend.
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Date: 2007-07-16 09:32 pm (UTC)I think that's why I'm REALLY souring on dramatic television right now. I just don't trust the writers or the networks to be able to finish what they've started. Veronica Mars and Studio 60 frustrated me so much this year that I don't want to "pick up" a new show. Some friends are watching Heroes and I might watch that with them, or BSG, but more for the companionship of it than anything else. Never mind, of course, that I don't really care about saving the world. Which makes me feel like a hopeless horrible girl, but there it is.