Some responses and thoughts.

Subject: Some responses and thoughts.
Author: PoorCynic
Posted on: 2014-06-12 02:29:00 UTC

First off, I should point out that I am definitely not the person who should be reviewing this piece. My antipathy towards the works of Tolkien is at least relatively known on the Board. I did my best to put that aside, but it still colored my perception of the story a little. Sorry.

I like that this is a story that doesn't involve the DMS or Floaters. I like to see the smaller departments in action. I also really like that this is written from a first-person perspective. It's a point of view that is rarely seen in PPC missions, and it's rather well done here. The moment where Agent Huinesoron is forced to confront his prejudices in particular is quite good.

This is a very little thing, but I'm a little glad you didn't blow up the CAD. I'm a bit tired of that running gag.

I noticed you used the stand-alone ellipsis as an indicator for silence a few times. This might just be me, but I'm not a fan of that particular usage. It strikes me as almost being a cheat: rather than saying something like "she stared at me in a brief gobsmacked silence before doing whatever action she did," you just write " '...' she did the action."

A technical point: the sentence ""How do we know the Strider is a friend of Gandalf's I mean come on his horse is a black horse of Morgul?"Merry questioned Frodo." is supposed to be italicized, as it is (what I assume to be) a quote from the badfic.

Finally, a bit of rambling on SIELU. I think that SIELU could actually be a bit more interesting if it wasn't so specific to Middle Earth. What if it was spread out from just Tolkienian Elven to a wide swath of fictional languages? You've got Klingon, R'yehian, Na'vi, Tamriel Dragon, Hutteese, and what have you. You could even include real world languages if badfic characters keep spouting phrases in German or French or Japanese. Not everyone is going to be an expert in every language. That's where the new and improved SIELU would step in, sending agents to act as translators and proofreaders. I'm basically saying that I want SIELU without the 'E'.

I kinda wandered away from the main point of this post. Ahem.

Nice job, hS. The subject matter wasn't necessarily my cup of tea, but I still found myself enjoying it.

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1-2-3-PLUG! by Huinesoron on 2014-06-09 12:24:00 UTC Reply

First up, some unrelated archival. Anyone remember the Board member Artemis? That's the original one, not the newbie from sometime this year. She created the DIA and the DBR, and then, uh, her website was lost with Geocities and all the original DIA stories are gone.

Or not! Well, all the ones from her website are... but I found a pair of stories elsewhere, which I've archived for your convenience.

DIA & DBR

Featuring the earliest surviving appearance of the Tiger Lily, and also apparently Black has a dragon? Don't know what that's about.

Second up, some more archival! I found a couple of snippets of Agent Kaitlyn, from the DCPS, which I've saved here. Again, since the DCPS LJ is gone, this may well be all that's left. Not a lot to say here.

Unlike this: a mission!

Of Wolves and Fellowship

(LotR; no warnings)

Featuring the return of Agent Huinesoron (see previous mission: Help from the past) and his, uh... let's go with 'wacky adventures'.

Any and all comments and reviews are of course welcome. Actually, part of the way this mission ended up is because of a comment on 'Help from the past', so definitely welcome.

hS

Some responses and thoughts. by PoorCynic on 2014-06-12 02:29:00 UTC Reply

First off, I should point out that I am definitely not the person who should be reviewing this piece. My antipathy towards the works of Tolkien is at least relatively known on the Board. I did my best to put that aside, but it still colored my perception of the story a little. Sorry.

I like that this is a story that doesn't involve the DMS or Floaters. I like to see the smaller departments in action. I also really like that this is written from a first-person perspective. It's a point of view that is rarely seen in PPC missions, and it's rather well done here. The moment where Agent Huinesoron is forced to confront his prejudices in particular is quite good.

This is a very little thing, but I'm a little glad you didn't blow up the CAD. I'm a bit tired of that running gag.

I noticed you used the stand-alone ellipsis as an indicator for silence a few times. This might just be me, but I'm not a fan of that particular usage. It strikes me as almost being a cheat: rather than saying something like "she stared at me in a brief gobsmacked silence before doing whatever action she did," you just write " '...' she did the action."

A technical point: the sentence ""How do we know the Strider is a friend of Gandalf's I mean come on his horse is a black horse of Morgul?"Merry questioned Frodo." is supposed to be italicized, as it is (what I assume to be) a quote from the badfic.

Finally, a bit of rambling on SIELU. I think that SIELU could actually be a bit more interesting if it wasn't so specific to Middle Earth. What if it was spread out from just Tolkienian Elven to a wide swath of fictional languages? You've got Klingon, R'yehian, Na'vi, Tamriel Dragon, Hutteese, and what have you. You could even include real world languages if badfic characters keep spouting phrases in German or French or Japanese. Not everyone is going to be an expert in every language. That's where the new and improved SIELU would step in, sending agents to act as translators and proofreaders. I'm basically saying that I want SIELU without the 'E'.

I kinda wandered away from the main point of this post. Ahem.

Nice job, hS. The subject matter wasn't necessarily my cup of tea, but I still found myself enjoying it.

Thank you! by Huinesoron on 2014-06-12 10:31:00 UTC Reply

I know what you mean about blowing up CADs. My view is that they should only explode when faced with a really extreme case - which this story didn't include.

I'm in two minds about the "..." thing. On the one hand, you're sort of right. ^-~ On the other... I think I'm using them to semi-trick the reader. They go in places where you expect speech - but there isn't any forthcoming. To look at the second example:

“Was she an elf too?”

“…” My jaw actually dropped.

The "..." is strictly redundant there; the jaw-dropping covers it perfectly. But I think it adds something anyway, though I admit I'm not clear what. (Or were you also talking about the "... I say this"-type examples, where it indicates initial silence? I'm unclear)

Italicisation fixed. For some reason uploading to GDocs straightened 2/3 of my italics. I thought I'd gotten them all back in, but missed that one.

SIELU! My plan if I ever do anything with them is to expand that 'Elven' into all types of elf - so they'll have experts in Drow and the Eldar Lexicon as well as Quenya and Sindarin. I don't think they'd expand beyond 'Elven' - but there might be other SILUs with similar remits.

(Idea: maybe they all have the same acronym! You'd have the Special Interdepartmental Earth Languages Unit, the Special Interdepartmental Extraterrestrial Linguistic Unit, the Special Interdepartmental Extradimensional Linguistic Unit... and since they're all 'SIELU', they keep getting calls for each other)

Anyway: thanks for the review!

hS

SIELU. by PoorCynic on 2014-06-12 17:49:00 UTC Reply

First, in regards to the "...", I wasn't referring to the initial silences. Those I don't have a problem with. It's the stand-alone ellipses I was talking about.

But on to SIELU. Expanding it to encompass all elves would have been my second suggestion. I also find the idea of every language unit being referred to with the same acronym as being pretty funny. The Poison Ivy could run all of them, watching (and maybe taking a bit of glee) as her agents constantly trying to redirect calls to the correct SIELU.

And you're welcome for the review!

Thank you! by Huinesoron on 2014-06-12 10:31:00 UTC Reply

I know what you mean about blowing up CADs. My view is that they should only explode when faced with a really extreme case - which this story didn't include.

I'm in two minds about the "..." thing. On the one hand, you're sort of right. ^-~ On the other... I think I'm using them to semi-trick the reader. They go in places where you expect speech - but there isn't any forthcoming. To look at the second example:

“Was she an elf too?”

“…” My jaw actually dropped.

The "..." is strictly redundant there; the jaw-dropping covers it perfectly. But I think it adds something anyway, though I admit I'm not clear what. (Or were you also talking about the "... I say this"-type examples, where it indicates initial silence? I'm unclear)

Italicisation fixed. For some reason uploading to GDocs straightened 2/3 of my italics. I thought I'd gotten them all back in, but missed that one.

SIELU! My plan if I ever do anything with them is to expand that 'Elven' into all types of elf - so they'll have experts in Drow and the Eldar Lexicon as well as Quenya and Sindarin. I don't think they'd expand beyond 'Elven' - but there might be other SILUs with similar remits.

(Idea: maybe they all have the same acronym! You'd have the Special Interdepartmental Earth Languages Unit, the Special Interdepartmental Extraterrestrial Linguistic Unit, the Special Interdepartmental Extradimensional Linguistic Unit... and since they're all 'SIELU', they keep getting calls for each other)

Anyway: thanks for the review!

hS

Loved the mission by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 21:39:00 UTC Reply

I've been rambling away on this thread, and forgot to say how much I loved your mission. Not only was the badfic really bad (not even bothering to show us the all-important scene of Pippin learning he was a werewolf for the first time!) but your writing of the mission was fun too. Agent Kaitlyn's Hobbit fixation was cute, and it's always great to see a pompous Elf being taken down a peg or two,
Re: mission (aka I know little of Quenya or British English) by doctorlit on 2014-06-10 06:14:00 UTC Reply

First off, congrats on turning up some lost stuff. Do you mind if I ask where you found it, so I can try sniffing around myself?

On to the mission: Holy macaroon, even with that gigantic list of ten years' Tolkienverse missions on the LotR page, and we're still finding new, unique badfics for new, unique missions in that fandom. This one would have been unique even as a DMS-style mission, just because of all the werewolf nonsense, but you went above and beyond the uniqueness bar by making it a DCPS mission. It turned out swimmingly; that moves the perspective of the mission from the surface contradictions against canon to Agent Kaitlyn's specific love and respect for the hobbit characters. I like how that turned out; we don't tend to see that kind of possessive love for particular characters nowadays as often as we did in TOS' days. It would be nice to see missions swing back into this style, as it feels a lot more character-driven, on both the parts of the agents and the canons.

I also liked your treatment of the moment when Aragorn became character-replaced. Each individual piece of that sequence was a tiny scene in itself, and they added up to a very complex and momentum-building sub-plot overall. Aragorn's awareness of a problem breaking the badfic's hold over him for just that split-second is brilliant. The tone of Aragorn's speech before and after the POV shift is jarring enough that the timing--which might seem overly convenient at first glance--ends up feeling natural and logical by the time the scene has played out.

~~Usual typo list~~ Actually, I'm not even certain these are typos. Here we go.

When Aragorn is released from the plothole, you spell it "Dunedain." In the full charge list, it's "Dúnedain." Is the accent mark interchangeable?

~~You used~~ Never mind I just looked it up. "Whingy" is apparently a word. (We Yankees tend to be "whiny" instead.)

The one legit typo is . . . a mini-Boarder! It's Elvea Aure, not Aura. ~~I must sound like such a tool, correcting someone's spelling of the name of a person they knew whom I never met. Boy, I like stike-through text tonight, don't I?~~

Finally, I must finally and embarrassingly ask . . . how is your name pronounced? >_> I've been saying "win-ES-ur-ON" all this time, but seeing it interspersed with all this Elvish today, I realized: it's actually more like "hoo-EE-nay-SORE-own" isn't it?

Thank you! by Huinesoron on 2014-06-10 09:27:00 UTC Reply

Mini-Boarder remerged with her original; 'Dunedain' shipped off to Cassie. (For the record, the accents count, but I often skip them, since they're a pain in the asterisk to put in. In't old days, accents and capitalisation didn't make minis; times have changed). And whingy is a great word. ;)

Thank you for your review! I really liked writing Agent Kaitlyn; she turned out to be more and more fun as she went along. I think it stems from what you're talking about - rather than, like with all my other agents, focussing on nitpicking the details, her focus can be boiled down to one thing: hobbits are awesome! So everything else becomes peripheral to that. Really interesting to write. (And for my next mission: Agent Sambar, from Finance)

I found the lost stories through the Livejournals of their authors. I'm pretty sure there's no more for Artemis or Kaitlyn, and a lot of other LJs from that time have been deleted. If you want to find a lot of stuff to archive, you can... oh, ppc-hq's been deleted. Greeeeeat. So you'll have to try and make connections between the various agent LJs by hand. Dafydd's friend list should be a good place to start. But be aware that it's a... very big job.

... oh, stars. So (Allie and) Chelsea is the same person as (Kaitlyn and) Chelsea. And she has a journal. Kaitlyn's wiki page is not going to be the simple job I expected...

-- and my name. It's four syllables, and the H is pronounced. In Quenya, the second-to-last syllable is stressed. So either 'hween-ey-SOR-on' or 'HWEEN-ey-SOR-on' works. I'll also accept 'HWEEN-ey-sor-on', since it might be easier to pronounce. But the first version is most accurate.

(Which means, apart from your breaking the dipthong in the first syllable, your 'Elvish' version was correct)

But generally, I avoid saying it. ;)

hS

Oh, neat! I've been pronouncing it right! by Iximaz on 2014-06-11 16:11:00 UTC Reply

Now pardon me; I have a mission to read. ;)
I've been working my way through those LJs. by doctorlit on 2014-06-10 16:12:00 UTC Reply

Most of them don't have more than twenty entries, which is good from a time perspective (Agent Black's journal took me three days to copy) but bad from a lots-of-PPC-content perspective. I now wish I had gone through it more slowly, since now I'm going to have to go back through all the Word docs I made to get all the info on the wiki.

Eh, who am I kidding. I love editing the wiki and reading PPC stuff. I think I'm going to make Irvine's page today. Did you know he's a badfic copy of Irvine Kinneas from Final Fantasy VIII? Did you know he was dating Teena? And that he also had a female youkai form that was dating Kit? And that s/he had baby fox things with Kit? And did you know that an alternate universe version of Irvine named Diablos was stalking him around HQ for a long time, and no one even knows where Diablos came from? (Or if they did, that scene is lost now.) Woo! Information!

The way I read, I basically "talk" all the words to myself in my head. This means I'm a self-enforcing stickler for pronunciation, which gets difficult when I'm reading something like Elvish (or French, for that matter) that I have no direct practice using. I took me a good, long time getting through The Silmarillion because I kept having to flip back to the language guide to get through individual sentences. I'm glad I got at least the rudimentary vowels right after all this time.

(This also makes reading H.P. Lovecraft hard, since "Cthulhu" is specifically stated to not be pronounceable by human tongue, which is the only one I have. ~~That, and the constant racism and classism.~~)

Ooh, I like. by Ailavyn Siniyash on 2014-06-09 17:37:00 UTC Reply

The mission, that is. I haven't read the other stuff yet.

In any case, Agent Huinesoron is getting character development! Yay! I really like how you handled his revelation, and the introspection that followed.

(I would find a mission with Agent Râmwê incredibly hilarious, by the way. Maybe I'll even go badfic-hunting, though, inexperienced as I am, I'll likely not turn anything up, if there is even anything to be found. There probably isn't.)

-Aila
Oh, and an impossible challenge. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-09 14:36:00 UTC Reply

With reference to Agent Râmwê: if anyone can find me a badfic which either (in order of preference) a) uses Primitive Quendian/Primitive Eldarin/Primitive Elvish (ie, this language), b) is set before the departure of the Eldar from Cuivienen, or c) is set during the Great March (ie, before the Vanyar and Noldor sail to Valinor), so that I can actually use Râmwê, I will write you a 1000-word story of your choice as a reward.

hS

Perhaps another? by Ekyl on 2014-06-13 23:02:00 UTC Reply

This one says it uses some Primitive Quendian, does that count? I don't know if you meant a fic that is 100% in Primitive Quendian, which probably really would be unfindable.

http://www.storiesofarda.com/chapterview.asp?sid=5793&cid=26449

Replies to the whole lot. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-14 20:35:00 UTC Reply

-'The Last Vanya' fits the timeframe, uses Quenya for the names (and occasionally what looks disturbingly like Sindarin), but doesn't look all the bad. I've only skimmed it, though.

-'A Borrowed Voice' uses Quenya... pretty well. There's an incorrect idiom ('Istan quetë' is used as 'I can say', when it actually means 'I know how to speak [a language]'), but it's pretty decent. It also deliberately uses an archiac word ('az' replacing 'ar' for 'and'), forms the tenses correctly... it's good. And it's Quenya, not Quendian, so.

-From the two Cuivienen fics, 'Ambassador' actually looks really good (and uses PQ names correctly). 'Of Ingwe Ingweron' seems well-written, doesn't use PQ (though it is set at Cuivienen), and, uh, makes the bizarre decision to make the Vanyar warriors. It confuses me. ;)

-'Fiondil's Tapestry' is essentially a linguistic discussion hidden behind a story. If I ever wanted to persuade Ramwe to think about other languages, I'd send him to visit this fic. It's not too bad.

I guess that's the problem, really. Silm fic is already biased to the good because you have to read a pretty dense book just to get started - them's not got no films to ease you in. And Cuivienen (and PQ!) is so obscure that almost no-one writes about it - and those who do, do a decent job.

Which was nice to see! Especially 'A Borrowed Voice', it was fun to look at Quenya and go 'hey, I can almost read that'.

hS

(Does having found fics you like count for anything? :P) (nm) by Ekyl on 2014-06-14 20:49:00 UTC Reply
Aw. Yeah, that was my worry. I'll keep looking. (nm) by Ekyl on 2014-06-14 20:48:00 UTC Reply

Two more Cuivienen fics here: by Ekyl on 2014-06-13 22:54:00 UTC Reply

http://archiveofourown.org/tags/Cuivi%C3%A9nen%20fic
This one says it uses Old Quenya... by Ekyl on 2014-06-13 22:50:00 UTC Reply

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10161260/1/A-Borrowed-Voice

"A young man survives a car crash that should have killed him… but when he wakes from his coma, he no longer understands English. He speaks gibberish... or so the doctors think; they don't know Old Quenya after all. When he meets Maka Smith, speech therapist and oath-bound kinslayer, an unlikely mission from the Valar forces them to work together… whether they like it or not."
How about this one? by Ekyl on 2014-06-13 22:47:00 UTC Reply

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9349250/1/The-Last-Vanya

"Before the Elves left their Waters of Awakening and Endor for a new world far to the west under the protection of the Valar, a darkness had already fallen upon them and some of their number were lost to them, never to be seen again. This is the tale of one of those Elves and her fate far from the light of the stars, deep in the bowels of Utumno and of Angband. Strong adult themes"

Seems to fit b) okay, and looks dubious, though I'm not 100% if we count it as "bad" just yet because I only just found it.
OT - Talking of Elvish by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 20:27:00 UTC Reply

There seems to be a recent trend for Elf Mary Sues to be called Erulissë. (e.g. See here and here.)

Leaving aside the question of why any Elf would be blasphemous enough to use "Eru" in someone's name, or why an Elf outside Aman would be using a Quenya name, how did this Suvian trend for Erulissë start in the first place?

Hmm. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-11 09:18:00 UTC Reply

The main reason an elf outside Aman might use a Quenya name would be if they're a Feanorian (and that's an accent I have no qualms about leaving out, since it's simply a pronunciation guide). House Feanor openly flouted Thingol's no-Quenya decrees. But there were no open Feanorians in the Third Age.

'Erulissë' apparently means 'grace', which given the Elvish taboo/respect around the Name, suggests an origin in one of Tolkien's religious translations. And yep, this suggests it's from his 'Hail Mary' (which you may know continues 'full of grace').

The normal translation for 'grace' is 'Eruanna' ('God-gift', rather than the more poetic 'God-sweetness'), so my guess is that some website recently added 'Erulissë' to their list, and people named Grace have started using it.

And on a side note - that second link includes a half-elf, half-dwarf. Now, obviously the usual interspecies-couples-are-Fated restriction rules it out, but... if someone could concoct a decent justification and setting for that relationship, I'd be very interested in seeing it done. Because there's no reason it couldn't happen, apart from the Fated one.

hS

What does Fated mean? by zdimensia on 2014-06-11 21:55:00 UTC Reply

And does it mean the Gimli/Legolas mpreg I saw once was worse than I thought?

Allow me to answer by way of a fic plug. by Neshomeh on 2014-06-11 22:52:00 UTC Reply

"A Practical Guide for the Courtship of Elves, by Beren son of Barahir" by Nerdy Nell is awesome and should be read by anyone with the slightest interest in Middle-earth, and chapter four specifically, "Step Two: Doom Yourself," should answer your question.

Enjoy!

~Neshomeh

That is hilarious. :D by Huinesoron on 2014-06-12 10:53:00 UTC Reply

Thanks for linking to it! It also contains the best line of advice ever written:

Avoid Any Deed Celegorm Fëanorion Ever Performed in the Whole of His Wretched Existence

hS
Still confused by zdimensia on 2014-06-12 01:23:00 UTC Reply

If this is a mass of "what's going on" to me, maybe I can't trudge my way through any of the original stuff.

BTW, what's wrong with Samwise making mashed potatoes?

Mashed potatoes by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-12 09:58:00 UTC Reply

It's just a throwaway in-joke reference to the fan-theory that the food Mîm the dwarf gave Túrin was potatoes.

Well, I say "gave". He stole the food from the dwarf, neither one knowing that one of Túrin's friends had actually just killed Mîm's son. (As you can see, not a very happy memory for him. Not that he has any very happy memories. Basically, any memory can seriously piss him off.)

The whole point about Doom is that fate and destiny in Middle-earth work on a sort of twisted Karma principle. If you're destined for a lot of really great stuff, you're also destined for a lot of crappy stuff to balance it out. And if you actively try to find ways to get round it and just have the good bits, it'll all go horribly wrong and you'll end up with just the bad stuff instead.

Thanks (nm) by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-11 10:20:00 UTC Reply

And now... by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 14:13:00 UTC Reply

Half the boarders are probably wondering whether to write a badfic that meets that description, and post it under a false name so that Râmwê can spork it. (Maybe doing things like writing speech in Esperanto as a translation convention to represent Primitive Quendian, just to really annoy him!)

I was about to volunteer but... by zdimensia on 2014-06-10 19:25:00 UTC Reply

That would take way too much research. I don't even know enough about what he's talking about to write a generic badfic that can get blackwashed into something that might work.
BÃ¢! KwettaÃ® de ho maghtÃ¢i Ã®dÃª ni ho ringiwÃ¢! (nm) by BerГґ RГўmwГЄ on 2014-06-10 14:54:00 UTC Reply

And in English, that means...? (nm) by son_of_heaven176 on 2014-06-10 15:16:00 UTC Reply

'No! Your words coldly handle my heart!' by Huinesoron on 2014-06-10 15:28:00 UTC Reply

Or something like that. ^-~

And 'Berô' is the word meaning 'warrior'. Since Râmwê refuses to speak any other language, he's had to come up with a Primitive Quendian title for himself.

(Obviously, that message was dictated; he'd never sully himself with letters)

hS

Wouldn't the Universal Translators just translate him? (nm) by Ekyl on 2014-06-13 22:21:00 UTC Reply

Personal canon. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-14 07:56:00 UTC Reply

None of my agents' UTs work on other agents - only on badfic characters. So they all have to learn English, or simply not communicate with most of their colleagues. This allows for preservation of non-English language in mission reports.

I'm aware that J&A's UT translated Korean, but I choose Rule Of Funny over a single throwaway precedent.

hS

Easy to assume they keep theirs turned off, too. by Ekyl on 2014-06-14 12:14:00 UTC Reply

Ah well, it was really just the first thing that popped into mind, that if he has his working it makes the whole language thing a moot point. But I guess that's me working too much about consistency. :P Oh well, hope you like my finds upthread.

Look on the bright side by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 18:26:00 UTC Reply

The translation convention could be that it's represented by a mix of Grelvish and Polari.

"How bona to Elbereth your dolly old eek again."

"Thank y... Wait a minute. 'To Elbereth'?"

"Ooh, isn't he bold! It's another way of saying 'to varda'. That's your actual Elvish, you know. Anyway, what brings you Olog Hai-ing in here?"

I need some second opinions. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-10 12:28:00 UTC Reply

I've found three stories that fit my b) requirement (still hoping for one that actually uses the language!), but I'm not sure if they're, well, bad. So can someones offer opinions?

1/ Of old Fires

Set, according to the A/N, before the Awakening at Cuivienen. Finwë has a brother, named Nárwe, who has a sword (which he shouldn't), and... dies, for some reason. I'm not really sure what happens in this story.

2/ Legends and Crazy Elves

Set at Cuivienen. The word mellon is derived from melons. Since this actually discusses language, I'd love to throw Râmwê at it - but since it butchers language and culture alike, I'm unable to see past that to decide if it's actually funny (since it /is/ supposed to be humour). Someone with less investment in the Silm than me - what do you think?

3/ More Today Than Yesterday

Starts at Cuivienen, and then falls into Modern Earth. It completely lacks in plot, and has... well, this:

"Elwe seems to have met some elf friend of his from Cuivienen. They're crying and hugging and kissing and talking in their other language - "

"Excuse me, kissing?"

"It sure looks dangerous, but we did have that talk before. My point is, Elwe might not come home without the kid."

So yeah. My main issue here is that they're explicitly speaking English after Chapter 1, so I don't think there's anything for Râmwê to do. It also lacks anything I could bully into being a Geographical Aberration. Aaaaaand, yeah, the main charge is 'author appears to be a Christian fundamentalist', which a) isn't a charge (since we don't comment on the authors!), and b) we don't touch religious fic anyway.

I'm kind of hoping #2 is deemed bad, honestly. It has a 'woodland village' for Huinesoron to burn down, and rampant abuse of language. I'm just worried it might be funny... ;)

hS

From bottom to top: by Hieronymus Graubart on 2014-06-11 09:33:00 UTC Reply

I’m psychically unable to waste my time by reading more than a few random sentences of the third fic, so there’s no comment here. (That’s probably bad news for my future agents; they will never get to work if I can’t read badfic.)

I didn’t laugh when a read the second fic, but this doesn’t tell you much, because I generally don’t like teenage prankster stories.

Where did you get the impression that the first fic is set before the Awakening at Cuivienen? From what I see in the fic and know from the Silmarillion, this probably happened when the elves left Cuivienen or on their way westward. To me the A/N seem to be an attempt to explain the author’s belief that Finwe and the other “first elves” (some of whom got canonical siblings) weren’t actually the first elves, but may not remember their parents. In the second fic, Finwë, Ingwë, and Elwë got parents for the same reason: the authors didn’t understand how some of the first elves could be considered to be siblings if they weren’t children of the same parents.

HG

Re #1: that's the thing. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-11 10:10:00 UTC Reply

The story clearly takes place during the March - but the author thinks differently. The summary reads 'In the beginning there was... well, let us first assume there was a beginning at all'; the A/N says 'I doubt Finwe and the other "first elves" simple appeared on the face of earth. Perhaps they simply cannot remember the beginning. Or don't want to.' It's clearly implying that this story takes place before the (recorded) beginning of the story. Cuivienen is the place where 'the... "first elves" simpl[y] appeared on the face of earth'; by its own description, this story can't take place anywhere other than before the Awakening.

(The question of whether the three emissaries to Aman were of the first generation of Quendi is an unresolved one; I've postulated here that they were, drawing on the lack of mention of parents, and discussed how they can be called 'brothers', but honestly, there were years between the Awakening and the emissaries being taken to Aman; 52 Valian Years, which could be either 520 or 7500 Years of the Sun (depending on the number you use; I'd prefer the former). The Eldar marry early, come of age at 50 YotS, and have their children early, too; given that the Firstborn awoke as full adults with their wives beside them, there could easily have been five full-grown generations between the Awakening and the Great March)

hS

Speaking of Netilardo... by Ailavyn Siniyash on 2014-06-11 18:09:00 UTC Reply

...would you mind doing one on the Entwives?

-Aila

Um. Well, I did this. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-12 16:03:00 UTC Reply

And, uh. I've had to switch it out of Deep Places and label it a Not-So-Crackpot Theory, because what I came up with... well.

Tolkien Not-So-Crackpot Theory #17: The Fate of the Entwives

hS

Whoa. by Neshomeh on 2014-06-12 17:55:00 UTC Reply

That makes so much sense, it's kinda disturbing. That's a really dark story. Evil Entwives. Yikes. O.o

~Neshomeh

A lot of Netilardo is fairly dark. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-13 15:06:00 UTC Reply

And, I hope, fairly convincing. See: What if... Gandalf lied about the Ring?

hS, sneakyplug

Hmm. by Neshomeh on 2014-06-13 19:07:00 UTC Reply

Interesting, but I can poke one little hole in that one: Frodo did see Galadriel's ring for himself. From "The Mirror of Galadriel":

[Eärendil's] rays glanced upon a ring about her finger; it glittered like polished gold overlaid with silver light, and a white stone in it twinkled as if the Elven-star had come down to rest upon her hand. Frodo gazed at the ring with awe; for suddenly it seemed to him that he understood.

From the above passage, we know that at least Nenya has a stone, just like Gandalf said. They talk a bit more about rings, and she implies that Elrond knows about hers (if not all the Three). She also seems to identify Frodo's ring as the One Ring. Not necessarily conclusive, but I'd think she knows what she's talking about.

~Neshomeh

Nah. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-13 19:29:00 UTC Reply

We know Nenya has a stone - but we also know it's made of silver, and connected to water. Why should we extrapolate one thing and not the others?

And, again: Galadriel has never laid eyes on the One. Of course she thinks it's the One Ring - she's a mind reader, the entire Fellowship is absolutely positive it is. Except, oh yeah, the person who'd know otherwise is dead. ;)

And again, she probably knows of the existence of Narya... but she was in Lorien when the Three were made, so there's no reason she should have ever seen it. It was worn by Gil-Galad, so Elrond could have seen it... but the Three weren't worn during the War of the Last Alliance, because the One was active in the world. So it's quite likely Elrond didn't know his king had even one Ring of Power until he gave it to him. There's no reason to think he'd ever seen Narya; Gandalf doesn't seem to have worn it very often.

hS

Wait, there's more! by Neshomeh on 2014-06-13 20:45:00 UTC Reply

Frodo and Sam see all three of the Elven rings at the Grey Havens.

There was Gildor and many fair Elven folk; and there to Sam's wonder rode Elrond and Galadriel. Elrond wore a mantle of grey and had a star upon his forehead, and a silver harp was in his hand, and upon his finger was a ring of gold with a great blue stone, Vilya, the mightiest of the Three. ... On [Galadriel's] finger was Nenya, the ring wrought of mithril, that bore a single white stone flickering like a frosty star.

A couple pages later, Gandalf arrives: As he turned and came toward them Frodo saw that Gandalf now wore openly on his hand the Third Ring, Narya the Great, and the stone upon it was red as fire.

A nice set, aren't they? {= )

~Neshomeh

That one had occured to me. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-14 07:54:00 UTC Reply

It does confirm, incidentally, that Gandalf didn't normally wear Narya - since he 'now wore [it] openly'.

But you're right - that could be a problem... except that there is such a thing as glue. ^-~ It's not like Frodo's taking a close look, after all.

I know, I know. But the point of the 'Filthy Liars' isn't to say 'this is likely' - it's to say, 'this is possible'.

hS

Awesome! I'll go take a look. (nm) by Ailavyn Siniyash on 2014-06-12 16:03:00 UTC Reply

Another possible interpretation of that fic. by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-11 10:41:00 UTC Reply

It could take place on a pre-Cuivienen, metaphysical journey from Dreaming to Awakening. And whatshisname, the brother, never made that journey, never Awakened, and so now only remains in Finwë's dreams. Or something. (That's why everything has a confused, abstract feel to it, like a half-remembered dream.)

Well, that was my impression anyway. But, you're right, it's not very clear what the author actually intended.

Some second opinions for you by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 19:37:00 UTC Reply

The pre-Cuivienen fic is bad. Any fic where the reader doesn't even have the faintest idea what's going on is usually bad, unless the author is very, very good - and this one isn't. (e.g. If the Elves don't remember their pre-Cuivienen lives, how come Fineë remembers enough to compare Nárwe with Fëanor?)

The mellon fic is fairly funny. Not great, but mediocre fic rather than actual badfic. (Although it hits my personal berserk button of giving Elwë a literal grey cloak, when I prefer to think of it just being a poetic reference to his grey hair. I hate people who take everything in stories literally!)

The third one is really bad, just because of the way it totally destroys all canon. Even if Elwë and co. do eventually return to Cuivienen, they've changed so much, there's no way they'll be able to resume their roles in the story, And even though there's not much for Râmwê to do, that could be the joke, as he gets more and more frustrated at being left on the sidelines, playing second fiddle to Despatch.

(OTOH the Christianity didn't bother me too much, since it's only a brief reference. And it's not too far out of character for these Elves to learn to worship God/Eru compared to, for example, worshipping Satan/Melkor. And IMHO the "kissing" line seemed more like clumsy humour about over-protective parents, rather than an attempt to preach.)

Hope that helps.

Thank you. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-11 09:21:00 UTC Reply

The problem with the first one as a mission is that... well, I don't have any idea what was going on. ^-^ How can I write a mission when I can't understand the story?

The problem with the third one is that nothing, uh, happens. Also, it would require Despatch, not DOGA, so having it as a hS mission would be difficult. (Another problem with it is that Elwe is apparently 37 in it - yet acts like a human teenager. These are Quendi we're talking about; slow physical aging does not equal slow mental aging)

The second one... hah, got it. Since it's a borderline case, I'll send in Kyaris from Intel, with DOGA/SIELU specialists. There we are, I have a Mission 5.

hS
Oops. FinwÃ« not FineÃ« (nm) by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-06-10 19:38:00 UTC Reply

Clarifying something. by Huinesoron on 2014-06-10 12:38:00 UTC Reply

When I said the main charge is 'author appears to be a Christian fundamentalist', what I meant was this:

You are free to be a Christian, or even a fundamentalist Christian. That's entirely up to you, and I make no comment on that. Hold whatever beliefs you like.

However, in my role as a PPC writer - and even more so, my role as a massive Tolkien fan ~~and elf~~, I hold the strong opinion that you are not free to (badly) project your beliefs onto Arda. So when your stories consist of:

-'The end of Middle-earth is the creation of the Garden of Eden'
-'This claims to be a Narnia crossover but, uh, is just Pengolodh wandering around Earth'
-'Look, the characters of Middle-earth are in A Very Christian Heaven'
-'Some ancient elves fall into Modern Earth, completely abandon their families, and go to church! Also boys shouldn't kiss each other ew'

... I will not be best pleased.

The charge isn't what you believe; the charge is what you stick in Middle-earth.

hS

Do not have time to read or search for badfic right now, but by World-Jumper on 2014-06-10 00:41:00 UTC Reply

if somebody manages it, I have a suggestion for a story.

A flower mission from before humans came along. Probably would be better if we could find some older badfic, perhaps one published in a fanzine. Back then, the Flowers were more concerned with plothole stabilization, rather then canon purity, which would require some humor beyond the usual "Oh god, it's so bad, I bash my head into the wall." Besides, since hS has written the most about the past, he seems the most qualified to write this kind of story. Bonus points for a lack of technology/terminology that we are used to today.

Anyway, just a thought.