Subject: Well, yes, it can be hard.
Author:
Posted on: 2014-05-13 11:05:00 UTC

That's why they pay us such big salaries. ;)

Seriously, it could be equally hard to determine whether a character is OOC - except we have CADs for that. The agent's job is to determine whether something is canonical or not.

Taking New Moon as an example, having Bella angsting over Edward to any degree is probably canonical, since she, y'know, tries to kill herself over him. Having her go suicidal over Jacob wouldn't be canon-friendly, since she only vaguely mopes about him. Equally, Edward trying to kill himself would be canonical (since he does), but, oh, Alice having a breakdown over E&B wouldn't be. Except insofar as she's a walking permanent breakdown.

Yes, it can be tricky to determine whether something is in or out of character - but, uh, that's their job.

And no, the Department of Angst don't provide therapy, and the Department of Mary-Sues doesn't provide well-written OCs. What both departments do is remove the uncanonical influence long enough for canon to snap back into place. Except in severely broken canons, you don't need to try and fix everything - just break the lock. DOGA doesn't have to move mountains around to repair geographical contraction - the canon does that itself, once there's no badfic holding them in place. Angst doesn't have to solve a character's emotional problems - the canon does that itself, once there's no badfic holding them in angst. The situations are directly analogous.

hS

Reply Return to messages