Subject: Sucker Punch/Penguins of Madagascar. Mine. But WHY?
Author:
Posted on: 2011-08-24 11:32:00 UTC
Why did I get this idea stuck in my head? I KNOW it's going to be really, really hard to pull off, but it got stuck in my brain and I knew it was going to nag at me until I did it. So I started it. And then, much to my annoyance, discovered that I am apparently the only person on the planet who knows both canons, and so I have nobody to giggle over it with.
I've noticed we have several separate threads on this general subject so I thought maybe we could just keep it on one.
This is also a "Why [unknown deity] WHY?" "Why gods WHY?" "Why rules of science WHY?" "Why Tolkien WHY?" "Why random fluctuations-in-the-space-time-continuum WHY?" etc. etc. thread.
Why did I get this idea stuck in my head? I KNOW it's going to be really, really hard to pull off, but it got stuck in my brain and I knew it was going to nag at me until I did it. So I started it. And then, much to my annoyance, discovered that I am apparently the only person on the planet who knows both canons, and so I have nobody to giggle over it with.
What could possibly go wrong? A lot, as it turns out. One of my buddies described Shadow of the Opera to me, and even though I'm almost completely unfamiliar with the Sonic franchise, I made her send it to me so I could share it here, because, well, the WTF speaks for itself. I'm not entirely sure the whole thing wasn't run through Google Translate a few times in a few languages, because English does NOT work that way. From Chapter 1:
On the rainy night, there was the Opera house with Opera cast. They are mobians. Just then, a young rabbit came up the stage with her chao.
"Everyone! We have a new member who will be joining us!" She said excitedly.
"Really, Cream?" A pink hedgehog asked. Cream nodded.
"Well who is he or she?" A red echidna asked.
"She's a pretty hedgehog. Her name is Maria." Cream replied. The mobians looked at each other with concern.
Outside the Opera house, a carriage stopped by. A elder man opened the door for a yellow hedgehog who dresses in a grey jacket and a hat on.
"Come out, Miss Maria. Your life is here." A elder man said impatiently. Maria sighed sadly and stepped out of the carriage. She got her suit case in her hands, her eyes closed, her head was down as she was walking up the stairs. The carriage leaves as Maria opens the door of the Opera house. As she was inside, voices were heard from across the hallway to the doors that leads to the stage. Maria walks to the doors and opens them and saw the cast practicing their acts and singing.
"Um.... Hello?" Maria called. A blue hedgehog, Sonic, sees her and smiles at her, he ran up to her.
"Hey there! You must be Maria, right?" He asked.
"Yes. I was told that I would be here with you." Maria replied while taking off her hat.
"Yeah, we know. And..... we're sorry about your father." Sonic says as he scratches his head. Maria closes her eyes again, not showing her tears in her eyes.
"You don't need to be, sir. Though it was very upsetting." Maria says opening her blue eyes again.
"Yeah. Oh! By the way, I'm Sonic the Hedgehog! Let me introduce you everyone else here." Sonic says while bringing Maria to the stage.
"Ahh! You kicked me!" A pink hedgehog yelled at the red echidna who was on the floor and now stood up.
"It was an accident, Amy! I slipped!" He yelled.
"Hmph! You always 'slip', Knuckles. You're almost as worse as Silver." Amy says.
"What'd you say?!" A white hedgehog cried.
"People!" Sonic yelled., everyone turned to Sonic's attention and sees Maria. "Everybody, this is Maria. She's going to be living here with us." Sonic says. Maria looks at the mobians shyly.
"Umm.... Hello there." She says.
"Oh, nice to meet you!" Amy says nicely. "I'm Amy Rose."
"Knuckles the Echidna."
"Rouge the Bat." The white bat introduced in a rude way. Maria ignores her.
"I'm Silver the Hedgehog." A white hedgehog said. "And this is Blaze the Cat." The purple cat nodded at Maria.
"I'm Miles Prower." A yellow fox said "But call me 'Tails' like everybody else."
"And I am Cream. It's so nice to meet you, Miss Maria." The rabbit says with a smile. Maria made a small smile to everyone.
"Nice meeting you too." She says. "Is there a room for me in this place?"
"Well of course there is!" A green hedgehog replied. "The name's Manik, by the way. The room for you is the one on the top floor." He says.
"NO!!!" Everyone cried out except Rouge and Knuckles. Maria was confused.
"What?" Manik asked with a funny look.
"Maria is NOT staying in that room alone." Blaze added.
"Why not?" Maria asked.
"That room is forbidin!" A voice said, a rabbit came out from the shadows. She was wearing a black dress.
"Madame Vanilla!" Everyone said.
"Mother! You're here!" Cream says surprisingly.
"Hello Cream dear. Maria, I welcome you to the Opera house, but the room from the top floor is forbidin. You have to be in Cream and Amy's room." Vanilla says.
"But, what's wrong with that forbidin room?" Maria asks.
"It was his room, but never sleeps there anymore. I promised that room of his will never be taken." Vanilla replied.
"'His'? Who's room is it?" Maria asks.
"I can't say anymore, dear. I'm sorry. Amy, Cream, take Maria to your room that you two will have to share with her.
"Yes ma'am." Amy says walking to the left side where the stairs were. Cream took Maria by the hand by leading her to the stair and the room.
Above the girls who are going inside the room, a black figure watches them with red eyes. He then walks away.
"A newcomer in my Opera house...." He whispers. "The girl will be well trained here by Madame Vanilla."
Oh, god. My 'faaaaavorite line'? Quote;"Yeah, we know. And..... we're sorry about your father." Sonic says as he scratches his head. Maria closes her eyes again, not showing her tears in her eyes.
"You don't need to be, sir. Though it was very upsetting." Maria says opening her blue eyes again."
*Cough*Mary-Sue*Cough*
I'm actually reasonably familiar with both canons, and the name itself is pretty groan worthy, but the thing that really irks me about this piece is not the bad grammar, the outrageous idea, or the fact that "forbidin" can't be spelled right; but that the author felt it necessary to resurrect Maria as a hedgehog. Maria is actually a canon character, but she's a human, and dead, who had a sister like relationship with the character portraying the Phantom. For some silly reason, Sonic fanfic authors feel the constant need to bring Maria back as an animal and set her up with a romantic relationship with Shadow, which I'm really really hoping this fanfic isn't heading towards. It's one of my biggest pet peeves. >_
WHHHHHHHHYYYYY?
Even without reading theEmily's post below, I'd be prepared to bet money that Maria and Shadow get together. After all, he seems to be playing the Phantom while she plays the part of Christine (I assume from the title and that extract). Since the Phantom stalks and kidnaps Christine, murders people and threatens to murder the man she loves, we know that their love is clearly meant to be and all fanfic should work to correct the mistake made by Leroux when he split them up.
[/irritation]
[/ sarcasm]
That's just… ugh. If you ship XYZ but can't have an interspecies romance (and I understand if that squicks you,) then you might want to consider switching to an OTP where you don't have to fundamentally alter the characters' bodies in order for them to have a relationship. This goes for people whose only reason for writing genderflip stuff is "I love Bob/Dave, but I hate slash!" too.
If you care about having this fic spoiled, I suggest not reading the rest of this message. Otherwise… well, you might want to get someone to restrain you so you don't spork out your own eyes.
******HEY, YOU. YEAH, YOU. SPOILERS AHEAD.******
According to my friend, who did read all the way through, shenanigans ensue, they "fall in love," despite barely knowing each other, and then eventually Shadow dies in Maria's arms… but he gets resurrected in the sequel. Yes, sequel.
*Gets person to restrain me, then reads spoiler*
WHHHHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYYY?
*Proceeds to attempt to spork out own eyes*
But in all seriousness, I agree. I can be a bit strict when it comes to what I consider to be a canonical/plausible pairing, but if you have to drastically and physically change a character's body, orientation, or previously established relationships in order to make your OTP work... it just upsets me. A lot. *Sigh*
Absolutely with you on altering bodies (with a very few exceptions, like allowing someone to grow up) but I can usually grok non-canon pairings— I ship nearly everyone/everyone else. As far as sexual orientation goes, I only get annoyed when writers (fan and otherwise) forget that not everyone is straight or gay. Yes, some people can feel attraction to more than one gender. Shocking, I know.
Previously established relationships are a little trickier, but as long as rival love interests aren't vilified I'm pretty okay with a writer going "These two had a thing, but fell out of love with each other and now they're just good friends."
None of which is meant to imply that everyone should approach shipping the way I do. People like what they like, and that's okay.
Then, too, in my main fandom it's possible to make pretty much ANYTHING canon with a little Googling.
... are the literate bad ones.
I was reading this Dragon Age fic earlier and it had an interesting concept... and it seemed to address some subtle issues... but the more I read it the more I realized that even though the grammar was good and even though the construction was OK, the whole story revolved around getting the heroine laid over and over again. Somehow her awesome feats of combat were built on excuses. She managed things that would be totally unthinkable. And she bent the rules of the canon in order to be both a warrior and a mage at the same time...
Yes, the character was different from the norm. And I almost liked the thing. I almost thought it was a goodfic.
But it was just a literate suefic.
CURSES.
In a TV show about a police family in New York with less than 100 fics, I have already found:
-the "I can tell off any character and always be right" Sue
-TWO spankfics ... the recipient of course is 27 years old...
-a perfect example of a "heroes like redheads" and "I'm better than your wife so dump her and come with me" Sue
-One story that lacks SPaG to the point where the summary states: "Danny gets too ruff with a suspect"
I'm beginning to see Pratchett's points on assisted suicide, i.e.: just kill me now...
Did I mention I found all this in a couple of quick scans of 71 fics? 71 fics!
First Sue I tackled I found in a fandom that had less than 25 fics (12 on Ffnet and about that many on a number of other sites).
No spanking fics there, even though one of the mains is a twelve-year-old boy. But for a fandom that is based on a TV show where two time travelers correct history (as in make historical events happen) there are a surprising number of historical inaccuracies in the fics.
As a side note: I don't think you understand Pratchett's point on assisted suicide. It's not the badfic that's doing his head in. (While I understand that you were only trying to make a joke, I don't think his situation/quest to deal with it, is all that funny.)
I know iv'e posted a link to it in the boards a little while ago but, my god...Its just so horrible! "Why WoD WHY?"
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6736078/1/YouBelongWith_Me
AKA "I knew it was a bad idea. Why did I go looking for Ivanhoe fanfic?"
Now, in principle I don't think this is a bad idea. I couldn't pull it off, but I have only casual knowledge of Harry Potter and don't really care enough to put the effort into it. And here lies my "Why?"
The author gave as his/her first justification for why he/she had written this fic that it would require no creative input - just merging Scott's plot with Rowling's characters.
Why? Why, author, do you claim to love Ivanhoe and yet say that giving it an entirely new cast will require no effort? The only way that would be possible would be to simply do a find-and-replace on the names, but then why even bother? If I want to read Ivanhoe, I'll read Ivanhoe. You say it's an AU and you care more about characterisation than canon (by which I assume you mean plot) but how then can you say that this will require no creative effort on your part?
Why, author?
(And why do I keep being surprised and upset by this sort of thing?)
I think it scarred me for life.
With Fredandgeorge as Wamba? (I elide their names because the author seemed to be treating them as a unit) And the apparent claim that there are only two houses: Slytherin and Gryffindor?
Wow. Did she make them speak modern english? That would be amusing... or revolting.
"Call that work!" Ron exclaimed, while wrestling a niffler out of the crook of a tree, where a magpie's nest glinted with treasure. "I've got that, now come down." He swept the contents of the nest into his bag, and turned to his older brothers once more. "All you do is fool around all day!"
"Well, Ron," George said slowly, as if to a small child, "We're fools. That's what we do, you see. It's our job."
"We can't help it if you're dull as dry toast and forced to herd nifflers. The important thing is you do your part. Can't let the Slytherins win, you know. We're all cogs in a wheel."
"You two are so full of – Oi! Get back here, you!"