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That is excellent. I was kinda iffy at the start, because it's so easy to get heavy-handed and lose track of the story with these things, but... Wow. Very, very well done story. Props to the author for sure.

I actually know this author somewhat...I'm working with him on a Batman fanfic. He's one of those people whose religion is with him all the time, but he deals with any issues that arise with a stoic grace. I really enjoy his work...though I haven't read this one yet.

Awhile back I was paging through the Animorphs section on ff.net, and I came across one incredibly interesting story:

Sacred Host by Qoheleth
Somewhere in the Yeerk pool, you know someone is doing this.
Animorphs - Rated: K+ - English - Drama/Spiritual - Chapters: 18 - Words: 27,830 - Reviews: 172 - Updated: 4-21-10 - Published: 3-29-07

If you can't stand religion at least academically, this story is probably not for you, but it's just so thoughtful and the author uses such a deliciously ironic narrative voice that I couldn't help but get sucked in. It is sadly unfinished, but in progress, and I felt I had to share it.

~Neshomeh

Shouldn't they say 'if they fail the reverse Bechdel Test?

Who do they bring back?

The vampire one isn't horrible--I mostly chose it for its similarities to the fic Moon came from. And it suffers from "this victim is exsanguinated, there must be vampires" syndrome, despite the fact that Babylon 5 characters would think of half a dozen explanations before latching on "vampire."

But the planet of magical unicorns, complete with names out of Mercedes Lackey, who magically resurrect a major canon character (and all this in the first chapter)? Yeah, it's every bit as bad as it sounds. Probably worse.

I wouldn't have ever considered it myself, but then I did a literature degree, which contined whopping great doses of feminism, particularly as applied to women in literature and women being allowed to publish stuff, etc. Then one starts noticing.

In one of my missions one of the agents makes a reference to Bechdel and Suefic:

"We should have a reverse Bechdel Test."

Tasmin frowned.

"A film passes the Bechdel Test if it has at least two women. These two women have a conversation, and that conversation is not about a man. A Suefic passes the Reverse Bechdel Test if it has at least two men. These men have at least one conversation, and each conversation is about a woman, more particularly, the Sue."

"What does it mean if a Suefic passes this test?"

Allison shrugged. "Another charge on the list."

---
I mostly read in a fandom that doesn't have that many women in it to begin with. Fanfic quite often only features one woman. In cases where this is a Sue, I have noticed that the men from canon suddenly seem incapable to talk about anything but the Sue.

And this is for B5?

Even phonetically that sounds terribly wrong.

Both stories have been added to the Unclaimed Badfic page.

I stick to the purist rules until they're officially changed - at least when my clients have non-fiction texts. When I'm proofing for fiction writers they have more leeway, but I still wouldn't let "an historian" pass without comment.

That's very depressing. My fandom experience pretty much begins and ends with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and comic books, so I wasn't aware it was such a problem in fandoms.

The gender of the author has little to do with it. Fics are still written in a cultural and societal framework that grants little to no worth to interactions between women that don't feature romance or men. Just because an author is female doesn't mean she hasn't grown up being repeatedly told that her only worth, in a storytelling medium, is in her facilitation of relationships with men.

You'd think it'd be different in fan-fic, considering that generally fan-fic is written by female authors. (From what I hear.) Then again, I'm male and most of my characters aren't...

Here's a list of exceptions, though. Most of them are pretty worth reading/watching.


Most of them.


http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheBechdelTest?from=Main.BechdelsRule

I saw something mentioned once about maybe some kind of special addendum for long running tv series, because most of them, if they run long enough, will eventually pass the test. The proposal for an addendum was to counteract that possibility of a show getting a pass because of a single conversation in a ten year run.

Don't know if that's relevant or not, but I agree that they shouldn't get a pass as a whole. Does the Bechdel test come with some kind of rating system that shows by what margin the test subject passed?

Yes, pretty much all Sues fail that test. So does pretty much all published writing. And all TV shows, and all films, and all any media outlet you care to name. It's not a distinguishing characteristic of Suefic. It's a distinguishing characteristic of anything written in the western world at some point in the last few hundred years.

"Okay, okay, point taken. Calm down. It was just a joke." He got to his feet and wrung out his shirt, still grinning rather unrepentantly. "Shame, really. You'd think two guys standing around in wet shirts was an invitation, really."

The cheeky-faced young man winked and raised his hands again. "I surrender, though. No more throwing stuff."

Yep, an oldie (2008ish) but I still think it's a goodie. Reposted on Livejournal since my old site went down - and barely fits LJ's size limit! So, if you've read it before, apologies - and if you haven't, great! Here will be where Kitty's missions go from now on.

Mission Title: The Bourne Believer
Canon: Bourne series, bookverse
Rating: T, for swears and riduculosity
Agents: Callahan, K. and Trevelyan, A.
Target: Helen Johnson
Word Count: 8,792
Source Summary: Set at the end of The Bourne Identity, Bourne finds a friend in a 12 yr old girl who believes that Bourne isn't at fault for his actions. She is determined to help him and she becomes Bourne's sidekick! Bad summary, better story!

http://wizkit.livejournal.com/524.html

I have a couple of female characters in the graphic novel script I'm writing. None of the major ones have had a discussion though. One of the major ones, Tallory, has spoken to a minor female character, Naj, during a larger argument. Here's how the conversation went:

Description: Tallory joins the rest of the group, who are each retrieving their horses from being tied to posts. Christof, the avorian man in thier party, is on his horse and gets into the conversation.

Christof:
What's all this now?

Tallory:
We're not killing anymore goblins.


Description: The Yeanese girl, Paj, buts in. She looks put off.

Paj:
And you're just deciding this for us, here and now?


Description: Tallory is on her horse now.

Tallory:
It doesn't bother you at all that we're killing for money?

Paj:
For five bronze bits I'd brain one of my sisters. There are plenty more where she came from.



What was the point of that? I just wanted to paste an amusing conversation from my script.

In the Sue fics I've MSTed, I've noticed an odd trend of Sue characters failing the Bechdel test. The Bechdel Test is a sort of litmus test for female presence in movies and TV. In order to pass, the film or show must meet the following criteria:

1) there are at least two named female characters, who

2) talk to each other about

3) something other than a man.


Is this something you guys have noticed too or have I just been reading the wrong Sue fics?

He bent down and picked up Dayn's abandoned bag of waterbombs. "Now then, monsieur, I am in a generous mood. Well, generous considering that I am soaking wet. If you leave now, and never throw anything at me again, I will not empty the entire contents of this bag over your head. You have to the count of three. Un...deux..."