OOC: Reflections on Sueishness and on canon/fanon vs h_h.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

The latest issue of Bitch magazine has an article on Mary Sues in fanfiction! (If anyone is interested, I'm willing to scan it.) Done. (Usually they post this kind of thing on the magazine website, but at the moment the website is undergoing an overhaul.)

It prompted me to formulate some tl;dr thoughts on Maturin's canon Sueishness. After writing this, I started to think about the nature of canon chars vs. fanon and h_h!chars.

For example, h_h!Ginny's humorous application, which played on the fanon trope of slut!Ginny, resulted in h_h!Maturin's strongly disliking her for a long time, since he believed her behavior would probably spread venereal diseases throughout the school. h_h!Maturin's application and some of his subsequent behavior were pretty fanon with respect to his feelings for Jack Aubrey, but now that Aubrey has applied and Maturin is embroiled in het smut, he's swinging more toward canon. And I only recently learned that h_h!Adam is 19, rather than 12 11 years old as he is in Good Omens.

I'm interested to hear others' thoughts on the relationship between their canon and the way they play their characters in h_h, especially since many of the canons -- particularly the anime ones -- are unfamiliar to me.

Comments

[anthony-crowley.livejournal.com]

I read your analysis with interest and am intensely jealous of the wealth of material you have to work with! Crowley is one of the main characters in Good Omens and he's in barely a third of the book. :p

Canon!Crowley does have some Sueish tendencies. He's good-looking, wealthy, nearly all-powerful, quick-witted, and exceptionally fortunate. His only personality flaws seem to be impatience, a quick temper, and indolence, which are nearly as endearing as his pros.

Things happen to him. We're told he didn't mean to Fall from grace, he just hung out with the wrong people. He got a commendation for his work on the Spanish Inquisition because he was in Spain at the time, but he mostly hung out in the cantinas and had no idea what was going on. And the baby mix-up that led the real antichrist to be raised as a normal child wasn't even his fault.

His only redeeming feature from Sueishness seems to be that he genuinely likes people. Against everything he is and is told to be, he cares about them. That's the aspect that I try to focus on in my characterization. To show those generally internal thoughts and feelings through his less than endearing speech. Otherwise he'd come off as a terrible jerk and bully. (and dear Adam, I hope that isn't the case!)

Speaking of Adam, (nitpick: he's 11 in canon) he's the character I've changed from canon the most. Apart from making him eight years older - because who's going to listen to anything an 11-year-old has to say? - I've had him grow up a little in mannerisms and slightly more correct speech patterns. He's a lot more altrusistic than he was.

I justify the changes by the addition of his powers. In the novel, he doesn't know who he is or what he can do until the very end. I figured that the knowledge, and eight years of living with that would change him significantly enough to make HH!Adam plausible.

And again, I try to redeem his Sueishness (good-looking, all-powerful, ridiculously nice, even-tempered, helpful) with genuine affection for people, and, although it hasn't happened at HH yet, a terrifying demeanor when he gets truly angry.

I won't bore you with comments about the others. Rowena, I know very little about so far and Bertie I've had to dumb down because in his canon, he's narrating his own story, so to go from first person (in which you must remember that he's terribly clever to come up with turns of phrase he uses) to third, cuts out a lot of his thought processes.

Anyway, this is an interesting topic and I hope other people with analyze their chars as well.

[sensiblesusan.livejournal.com]

I started out writing Susan as a little warmer and more ... well, human than she is in the books. I'd like to pretend that it's because I'd placed her post-ToT, and that she'd learned a bit about love and was a bit less icy, et cetera, ad infinitum.

But it was really because I hadn't read the books in forever and was going off hazy memories. Having the Valentine's Day thing happen meant writing her really off-canon for a day or two, although it also allows me to justify my early-h_h!Susan as having been thrown severely off-balance by all that. She's much better (read: colder and more canonically IC) now (especially since I've re-read ToT and am now re-reading Soul Music). But I still persist in writing her a little more kindly than canon; though I'm told I share many characteristics with Susan, I tend to be a nice-ish sort of person in real life, and some of that has rubbed off on her. Which is probably some sort of reflection on my skills as a writer.

Lord Peter is an interesting case; Ngaio Marsh once commented that Dorothy Sayers rather made an ass of herself when she "fell in love" with her own character; and it's arguable that Harriet is a bit Sue-ish -- although she's not staggeringly gorgeous, etc., she is an Oxonian female mystery writer (albeit not a translator of Dante as Sayers was) and she does get to marry Lord Peter and have lovely children with him. She also does so on her own terms, in what is established as a marriage of equals.

I've been writing him as thoroughly devoted to Harriet, largely unflappable and unfailingly polite, and also haunted by his experiences in the Great War -- all of which are canon. My education level and verbal acuity are, unfortunately, barely a fraction of his own, but we do what we can, don't we?

Continued thoughts...

[sensiblesusan.livejournal.com]

CMOT Dibbler: well, what can you say? Sneaky, conniving, good-natured, always out for the main chance, not terribly scrupulous, not really a bad guy either ... Dibbler is my comic relief from the intensity and occasional angst of Susan, and the demanding intelligence of Lord Peter. I'm not 100% confident in the accuracy of my writing of him; mostly I just try to stick to those traits listed above, with a bit of Cockney con-artist thrown in, and it seems to work.

Fillerbunny's highly limited vocabulary and childlike mind are something of a challenge, but it's fun. I'm really, really glad that River, Ryuuji, and Stephen have befriended him, because writing an eternally miserable FB would have become rather unpleasant. Canon!FB is such a sad, tormented, wretched little creature. Here, he is something of a little innocent, free of guile or deception, devoted to River (and Mister Bignose), and rather surprised that life can actually be pleasant, although he's always afraid that one day they'll be back, and it'll be the needles in the brainmeats all over again. Also, he doesn't trust anyone except River, Ryuuji, or anyone that River says it's okay to trust (so Stephen too). Poor little fellow has a good reason for that, sadly.

[spiritoferos.livejournal.com]

*begs for the scan* Eros is pretty much HH!influenced because dude, it's hard to characterize a god. I tried to stick to canon for how he and Psyche interacted, but the flamboyant flirtatiousness underlied with malice (occasionally good natured) is pretty much just for the fun of watching the other characters back away from the skimpily-clad maniac carrying weapons. And the pity for unrequited love is just to stop him from being a total jackass. XD

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

Done (http://damnfinecupof.livejournal.com/512.html), and posted in Cooper's journal -- because Stephen's is getting OOC-cluttered (I need that space for friendslocked drafts of dissection fantasy porn!) and the article far exceeded LJ's character limit on comments. I'll edit this post to add the link.

[conriocht.livejournal.com]

I've been playing Lupin as more aggressive and snarky than he appears to be in canon. I say "appears" because in canon, he's seen through the eyes of the student characters, and I imagine that's not his entire personality - he has a history as a prankster and a troublemaker, which I imagine emerges more when he's interacting with adults. When he's interacting with younger h_h characters - e.g., River, Calvin, and Harry and co. - I have him revert back to "kindly professor" mode.

I've tried to avoid most concessions to fanon!Lupin, who's often depicted as being very good-looking, sexually insatiable, very aggressive around the full moon (alpha-male!Remus), or having magical wolfy powers such as heightened smell or hearing. Despite fandom spats over his sexual orientation, especially following book 6, I'm depicting him as mostly straight and very devoted to Tonks, though I've hinted at some bisexuality going on. (I'm a Remus/Tonks "shipper," but I still think he did some canoodling with Sirius at school.)

My only real nod to fanon is that h_h!Lupin loves chocolate, which is a favorite fanon cliche. Actually, in canon, he just uses chocolate to help with the effects of dementors, but somehow fans interpreted that to mean that he's a chocoholic. I just decided to roll with that since I figured probably everyone else around here has the same idea. ;)

[5000yearold.livejournal.com]

I've tried to keep Methos canon as he can be, with the exception that he'd never tell anyone that he was an Immortal, because well, way to get panicky. But, I decided for the game sake that it was okay because with everything else that goes on in the wizarding world, he's just one more oddity.

Caesar I've kept him pretty close to Xena canon, he's just not obsessively hating on anyone at the moment :p

[nemofound.livejournal.com]

I play H_H!Nemo a little bit older than he is in canon, inasmuch as his entire life span, specieswise, is probably only a few years. But if movie!Nemo could be said to be around six (starting school), I try to play him around ten, a little more independent while at the same time a little more hero-worshipping of his dad, just as he is at the end of the movie. That goes along with his interactions with Dr. Grant, whom Nemo has adopted as a sort of substitute-dad; and with Ryuuji, with whom Nemo interacts much as he did with his mentor Gill in the movie. He rejoices in the words he's not allowed to say (the S word, the F word and the C word, among others as yet undetermined).

Nemo still has his "lucky" damaged fin - a 'hatching defect', as it were, that keeps him from swimming quite as fast. In the movie, his dad tries to cast this in a positive light, something I embraced because my own handicap is similar to Nemo's, and I use Nemo to explain my situation to children.

During his sorting, somebody mentioned that Nemo would probably be ill-suited to Hufflepuff because Fenrir would try to eat him. Hence, Nemo is scared of Hufflepuff even though the only direct threat came to him from Voldemort, a Slytherin - but, that was a threat which Nemo faced down. As many children are, he's more afraid of the threat only hinted at than the concrete known one.

(Incidentally: the S word is sushi, the F word is fry, and the C word is chowder.)

[nemofound.livejournal.com]

And now I've spent most of a day RPing Chibi!Human!Nemo, an idea which started when I wanted to play with the Gaia avatar creator anyway. Chibi!Nemo was met with such delight that I decided to keep the idea around. I'd only just had Oliver-mun help me apply for a house-elf to help Nemo. From there, the idea of allowing the house-elf to change Nemo into a human in order to obtain a break from fish-sitting - and thus gain a way of conversion not dependent on lunar cycles or animagus training - grew out of a conversation with Oliver-mun (a dear friend of mine who naturally is also Grant-mun and thus represents two of Nemo's closer friends IC).

The plan was always to have Nemo get a chance to go flying with Oliver; it's turned rather more accident-prone than that, as it naturally would with a handicapped child. But Nemo keeps getting up and trying again, just as he does in his canon. And just as I did, and still do. I suppose in that respect, Nemo has a bit of the Marty Sue in him, but I think it's okay since I can play him that way without veering too far from his canon. (No, I'm not being careless, I say Marty Sue because Nemo's male while I'm female.)

I expected Nemo to be frantic at being turned human, but was surprised at the speed with which it seemed to be logical for him to adjust.

Please allow me to say how very touched I am that all these characters, who in their other lives and other threads get explicitly slashy and/or violent, still make time for some innocent hanging out with a ten-year-old fish.

[dice-addict.livejournal.com]

I've added this to the fanworks post, as well as given it its own special category. XD Might do Ryuuji later, since I ought to run out to the grocery shops about now if I plan on eating dinner/breakfast. ^_~

[bestkogalever.livejournal.com]

Eee... It's been a while since I had a chance to comment very much on H_H. Mostly due to exhaustion and a lot of running around on my part. (Blushes a bit)

And I do think that, when it comes to the game, the character most affect by this is Ran. In her canon, Ran can be seen as very Mary Sue-ish. Most problems in the serious don't have a long term effect on her. Also, she is well-loved by most of those around her, despite being a selfish brat most of the time. In contrast, H_H Ran is not exactly the most popular girl in the school. There is some social clashing for her, a lot coming from the setting as well as her interactions with people. I do think she's not as sue-ish as she is originally.

Armstrong, in contrast, is... Well, I wouldn't claim him as a Gary Stu. Even if he is "Righteously Perfect Mister Shiny", he's both a minor character and scares/annoys the cast quite a bit. He hasn't really changed very much for H_H though, except for the fact that he once toned down the sparkling for the sake of one the characters.

Chii and Freya, they come close to Sues but they definitely aren't... Even if Chii is a well-liked character, and is adorable as anything, she does have problems for most of the series learning acceptable behaviour and the like. And while Freya is powerful, she is also mentally unstable, and has the tendency to angst a very great deal. I think I'm playing them accurately in-game... Chii moreso than Freya (Freya interacts with the players a lot more than she would in her normal canon. I guess she figured it would be a lot more effective to talk out problems than "blast with powers, then fly to someplace high and possess all robots in a particular radius.")

And Rita... Rita is certainly not a Mary Sue. She's not even close to being a Mary Sue, she's like an Anti-Sue, she's so far off. She's close to how she was in canon too, with basically being cranky, high-strung, and fond of SHOUTING ABOUT HER HEADACHES.

[ginevram.livejournal.com]

Interesting topic!

I'll start with Lana, because she's easy. I play Lana for laughs and nothing else. She's as Sueish as a Sue can be, and, IMO, she is that Sueish in her own canon, so I can Sue her and still be IC.

Sara Sidle's not a Sue in her own canon, and I've tried to play her as ICly as I can in game. She is smart, so I try to have her do well in classes when she attends them, but her social skills suck and her love life is awful. I've tried to keep her as focused on school/prefect duties as she is on her CSI work on the show. I've made her a little flirty for H_H, but she's been flirtier on the show this season, and more relaxed. The one thing I did over do a bit was the drinking, but, since she's get a canon drinking problem, and there was nothing and no one at Hogwarts to put the brakes on it, she ran a bit wild and got into trouble. I'm really sorry that Simon's AA meeting never happened, because she could certainly benefit from it. I'll have her go to Morfin's support group, though.

As for the hat, I have very little canon to work with, but I do try to incorporate it in the way I play it. Obviously, the original sorting hat doesn't take bribes or put people in a particular House just because it thinks that's funny, so I am playing him a bit ICly on purpose. And I've been trying to make it behave just a little more ICly these days, in part because it's owner is back.

And finally, Ginny. As noted above, I was playing on the fanon (and particularly Harmoanian) concept of slut!Ginny when I wrote her app. But then, I had the advantage of knowing she was going in Slytherin no matter what the votes were. I'll admit, however, that it was still surprisingly difficult reading the Tootsitramp votes, because my Ginny muse is anything but a tramp, and I knew I'd never actually play her as one. As a result, she developed some rather strong dislikes for some characters. Fortunately, Ginny and Maturin have resolved their differences, and hopefully she'll work through that with other characters, as well. I'd rather not discuss discarded storylines, so I'm going to leave out a big chunk of what I've done with her at H_H. They have had some influence, mainly in that I am still overprotective over her. But I hope that I am keeping her at least somewhat IC. I don't agree with many of the fandom (and again, especially Harmoanian) criticisms of Rowling's character. What I do think, is that we generally see her in the books through the "Harry filter," and that makes it a little more difficult to sort out her real character from his interpretation of her character. I also think she's the most Slytherinish of the Weasleys, even more so than Percy, perhaps, but that it's tempered by her family's and friends' influence. I could probably think of more, but it's easier for me to analyze characters by answering questions, so if any of you have any, please do ask.

By the way, I do use character questionnaires from my old acting classes sometimes to help me develop my characters, and I've heard of other RPers doing the same. Have any of you done that with your H_H chars?

[bestkogalever.livejournal.com]

Character questionnaires? Like the character analysis sheets that people fill out for OC_Analysis-type comms? Or do you mean something else? (I haven't thought about that, either way, but it would be a good idea to try, particularly with Freya and Ran. Do you have any available?)

My own characters, besides Maturin... Part 1: Cooper.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

Agent Cooper is, well, comic relief in Hogwarts Hocus ... and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the other players think he belongs in Qanonreip at this point! The character grew this way out of my initial determination that I had to be playing end-of-series Cooper, and needed to find an IC way to get him from the Black Lodge, where he is left in limbo at the end of the series, to Hogwarts. As implausible as it may seem, I feel that my Cooper is hewing as close to canon as I can make him -- that is to say, reacting the way my vision of canon-Cooper would react to finding himself mysteriously moving from the Black Lodge to Hogwarts, not knowing where he is. Those unfamiliar with canon and unable to access VHS copies of Twin Peaks season two -- as, sadly, there is no DVD release of the long second season yet, only of the comparatively quite short first season -- can treat themselves to Cooper wackiness via the detailed episode synopses (http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/show.cgi?show=51) at Television Without Pity. (http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com) An example (http://www.televisionwithoutpity.com/story.cgi?show=51&story=348&page=6&sort=&limit=all) that may bring to light why I feel h_h!Cooper is canon: "Cooper extracts a retractable pointer from seeming nowhere and extends it to its full length before commenting, 'By way of explaining what we're about to do, I am first going to tell you a little bit about the country called Tibet.' As the four attendees lean forward in perfect unison, Cooper flips over the chalkboard to display a full-sized map of the country. He offers a quick background of the political system of the nation, solidifies the Dalai Lama's place within its social and religious contexts, and retracts the pointer. And so to the point: 'Following a dream I had three years ago, I have become deeply moved by the plight of the Tibetan people and filled with a desire to help them. I also awoke from the same dream realizing that I had subconsciously gained knowledge of a deductive technique involving mind/body coordination operating hand-in-hand with the deepest level of intuition.' And these are connected how? Who cares, really, because we're in the middle of one of the coolest, most Twin Peaks kinds of sequences, so just shut up and watch, you."

Paul Atreides, Bothari, Morfin.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

I should have added that the above passage from a TWOP synopsis is of a scene where Cooper is explaining his thoughts thus far on the Laura Palmer murder investigation, not on New Age philosophy...

Anyway, next up: Paul Atreides, aka Muad'Dib, aka a whole slew of other names. I apped Paul simply because the David Lynch film of Dune stars Kyle MacLachlan in the role of Paul, and as MacLachlan also plays Cooper, I thought it would be fun to have the two running around confusing one another. I actually intended that Paul would freak Cooper out, but it's turning out the other way around. My Paul is based on book canon, not movie canon (and a good thing too, because the movie makes some horrendous plot changes that detract from the story), and removes him from canon taking him to Hogwarts somewhere midway through book two, Dune Messiah. Some of Paul's traits are based on his canonical youthful bravura -- he is, after all, only fifteen when the first novel begins and his family is plunged into ruin -- but as I began to play Paul, I started to realize that h_h!Paul also draws a lot from the National Lampoon version of Dune (the out-of-print Doon). In the parody, the Bene Gesserit order is an intergalactic cooking school, and the book's climax comes when Paul defeats his enemy the Baron Harkonnen in a cookoff; instead of the spice melange, they are wrangling over the production of beer; the giant sandworms are pretzels; Paul's triumph is largely possible because he invents peanut butter. So ... foodie!Paul.

Sgt. Konstantin Bothari is from Lois McMaster Bujold's popular series of sci-fi novels focusing on Miles Vorkosigan and his family. I'm playing Bothari as canon as possible and still have the man capable of speaking enough to RP. He's a tragic figure, I think, and it's good that Belldandy has taken him somewhat under her wing, otherwise Sadako would spell an end to his humanity altogether. I still wish a Cordelia Vorkosigan would apply, because Cordelia more than any other character is the one who redeems Bothari from his truly wretched state in canon, and Sadako has pretty much undone a lot of that (with my OOC consent, obviously).

And ... Morfin Gaunt Jones. Oh, Morfin. There is really no excuse for Morfin and I don't think I can explain him, so I won't try. Well, OK. Essentially Morfin began as someone else's brainchild (if you want to take credit, O frightening one, step up!), a 12-step Morfin who wants to make amends to everyone he's hurt, because he's on the ninth step or somesuch. To this I added the concept that Morfin was on Depo Provera by way of chemical castration. Much goading and crying of "Doooo eeeeet" later by various parties, and I posted the app. Is he canon? Not insofar as we see the character in HP canon, no. But is he what a Morfin who has been (possibly involuntarily) picked up by the Muggle world and "rehabilitated" would be like? Maybe. We'll find out, I guess.

[r-tam.livejournal.com]

River: in canon she’s a profoundly gifted, traumatized, psychic assassin. Nuff said. *snerk* Basically, I just concentrated on playing those aspects of her personality to the best of my own, much lesser, abilities. The short form is that I play her as I see her in canon, for the most part, or rather that I've let her "grow up" from where I think she was in canon shortly after the end of Serenity. I don't really do much with Firefly fanon; I think it's fair to say that h_h!River is probably fairly close to what I would write if I were writing for the fandom except for the influence that various characters and experiences here have had on her.

The area where I’ve had to extrapolate the most, and consequently where I fear I go off-canon the most, is in letting her “love to dance”, for certain lethal values of the term “dance”. Some of it was a choice on my part: I figured she’d either be deeply disturbed by her abilities or she’d embrace them, and I vastly prefer seeing people, in life and art, do the latter, i.e. doing what they love and loving what they do. It’s also that I think she likes not being helpless. We get hints that pre-Academy she was “a real brat” as Simon puts it, very confident and very comfortable in her own talents, and I wanted to have her trying to get back to that--- trying to own her life after what the Academy did. Also that she’d enjoy not being a liability anymore: someone who can take care of others, rather than needing to be taken care of.

It’s also what she sees in Stephen: not only is this a man like her brother but with a lethal streak to match hers *snerk* but his initial response to her is admiring rather than pitying or worried. (Speaking of which--- yes, I put her on sterilization-level birth control. Because neither Stephen-mun nor I want to RP any of the possibilities for an unwanted-pregnancy storyline, so we just decided to settle that one decisively, and I figure the 'verse probably does have kick-ass BC.) And in Stephen-mun I am blessed with an RP partner who enjoys taking these two out on the intellectual limbs that are natural to the characters and who not only doesn't mind River being... well... River, in all her profoundly-gifted-batshit-insane glory, but eggs me on!

Something else I may have played fast and loose with is her capacity for self-control--- I’m actually not sure that she isn’t too controlled at times for someone whose amygdala has been stripped. (And OMG I want to get a Simon here so that we can maybe work out some appropriate imaginary neuroscience, because the imaginary neuroscience is one of the things I love about River in canon!) That’s part of her TMI-factor, the other big part being that she really doesn’t feel comfortable knowing things about people when they can’t know things about her right back. (And also that she doesn’t see anything to be embarrassed about--- her canon best friend is Kaylee, who canonically talks comfortably about a) having had a 14-year-old “boyfriend” and b)... uh, things that run on batteries. ;> )

Beyond that, I think the crew had a lot of impact on her generally, possibly including her attitude toward, ah, "dancing": Jayne, Mal, and Zoe are all lethal to different degrees and under different circumstances--- in fact, I think she may have "imprinted" on Mal way back in canon in some ways (vide "Ariel": "Daddy will come for us.") and has picked up some of his... interesting... combination of honor and pragmatism, and also his "us against the world" approach to his crew, regardless of their failings. (If Mal-mun at some point wants to comment on him, I'd love to hear--- I'm just going by what I see from him in canon, which may not be the same thing.)

Other random thoughts: the "switch in her head" is me extrapolating what would be necessary to have a functioning telepathic assassin who does some of the things she does, especially in the BDM. The idea that she figured out how to activate her own conditioning on command seems consistent with a) her level of intellectual ability and b) the stunts she pulls in the movie (her actions when Jayne comes for her, the mass Reaver-slaying).

[r-tam.livejournal.com]

And then there's Charles. Again, I don't do much with M*A*S*H fandom; I'm drawing him from my interpretation of canon. He's a very complex guy, in some ways, and not altogether predictable in canon--- you can't always tell what side of him you'll get: prankster, philanthropist, prig. Basically, I try to bring out all the sides of him in turn, as the situation warrants, and I tend to think that his initial reaction to anything is likely to be snide and self-important (or sycophantic, depending on his perception of the other person); it's only when you get to know him that you see the decent human being. (On which note, it's a shame that he and Stephen are pretty much going to be at odds with one another now, because having an associate who would call him out for his usual thoughtless snark and snobbery would have made him stop and think a little more often, which would have been very good for him indeed--- he needs to care a little more about his affect on others!)

[m-the-inspector.livejournal.com]

It's rather difficult to judge h_h!Javert against canon, because he has two personalities in the book and an additional one in the musical. Hugo describes him as a perfect incarnation of the law with absolute rigidness. The dialogue he writes tells an entirely different story, where instead of being a severe man, he has a healthy sense of humor. For example, when several bandits are arguing about drawing lots to determine who gets to climb out of a window first, Javert enters and cries, "Would you like my hat?" I've tried my best to bring this side out at h_h.

Musical!Javert is motivated by two things that simply don't match the book, the first being his religion. The only time Javert is described as having one is when he is preparing to jump off a bridge. Even this is brief and comparitively unimportant.

The second OOC trait is one that I actually try to bring out, mostly for the humor and slash value. Valjean, ex-convict-turned-saint, is pursued for most of the story by what can only be a combination of terrible luck and good police work, though it's treated as deliberate in musical-verse. Changing the story so that his frequent encounters with Javert were more than just chance changes the characters as well. I have an agreement with the Valjean player to take this path, which has resulted in many fluffy RPs (mostly on the characters' LJs).


Montparnasse is a difficult character to write, since he's a minor character. All we really know about him is that he kills for money to buy clothing because a woman once told him that he was handsome, that he knows all argots but speaks none (though he does use it while attempting to rob Valjean's house), that he doesn't want to work, that he carries knives, and that he has a relationship with Eponine.

Because this is such a slim list to go on, and he has almost no fanon to steal from, I've made him something of an amoral ladies' man. 'Parnasse greatly resents the no-kill rule, since it effectively stops his income. As a solution, he sells his sorting votes in exchange for bribes, and refuses to give them otherwise. If the applicant is an attractive female, chances are good that she will be hit on.

Fortunately, neither of these characters is particularly sue-ish, though they both have devoted fanbases consisting almost exclusively of teenage girls. XP

[late-born-myth.livejournal.com]

Taken in reverse order of application:

Sugar Kane: I was waiting on a slow thread one evening, and, despite the fact that adding a new char does anything but relieve stress, was suddenly struck by the idea of apping as Sugar. "Some Like It Hot" is just about my favorite movie, and Sugar, despite being theoretically just the hero's dumb blond love interest, has an amazing amount of pathos, humor, and realism. Although she's ZOMG Marilyn Monroe gorgeous, she's probably my least Sue-ish char, being only moderately talented as a musician, and by her own admission "not very bright" - especially when it comes to who to trust. My take on her is influenced by Monroe's own life history (fairly, I think, as the original char was written expressly for her); I don't think she's really out-and-out stupid, but she skipped town with her boyfriend around age 15, and she hasn't had much education except for hard knocks. She's fine if she knows what she's talking about, but if she has to talk about much besides jazz, men, and show business, she's a little out of her depth. Even men...she'd like to think she's figured out what she wants from men, and has vague plans to nab a rich, kind-hearted one, but her instincts are against her. (Which reminds me, she needs to write back to Damien about their date!) If she gets badly hurt, she's likely to fold into depression and alcohol abuse. H_H Sugar is post-movie canon: her last relationship was with Joe, who was at least genuinely in love with her. For the purposes of play (and because frankly it seems likely), I've assumed it didn't work out between them in the end, but Sugar, with her usual battered optimism, has bounced back and is quite happy right now, with all these dark and handsome men crowding around her.

Logan Echolls: Logan's another definite non-Sue. He's very smart and quite good-looking, but as "Veronica Mars" fans will know he's also riding a tiger of fury and frustration at the world and the way it's treated him. In canon, Logan is always up to his neck in usually-life-threatening peril, and if no peril exists he goes out of his way to create it. The latter quality is what's showing up lately; H_H Logan is absolutely determined not to let anyone he cares about get hurt (as he said to Susan, he has a real problem with people who kill girls...as you do when the first girl you love has her brains bashed out and the second has nearly been shot, exploded, and set on fire several times); as Veronica hasn't been in play much, this means he's starting to try to ally himself with people who have the qualities he admires (intelligence, snarkery, and a certain bad-assedness) and to interfere on their behalfs. He can be careless, or even gratutiously cruel, with the people he doesn't identify as real friends...and he makes a major distinction, here, between "friends" and "people he hangs out with." He can also be violent if he's given any reason at all. I tend to write him as extremely smart and hugely sneaky - which he is, in canon - but, much as I love him, he's got a massive impulse-control problem and is very likely to get in over his head at Hogwarts.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

So much love for Logan. It's too bad that after their fanfic discussion he probably thinks Stephen is rather less intelligent than previously supposed!

[catremistrae.livejournal.com]

The problem with Jurassic Park is that it's about the dinosaurs, not the people. I'm drawing my characterization of Grant mostly from the first movie. He's quite a different character in the book, but I prefer the kid-hating romantically involved version. While I'm playing him after the third JP movie, I really don't take much from it. One, Ellie had married someone else and has kids, and I'm an Alan/Ellie shipper to the end. Two, the movie introduced some ambiguity into his sexuality, and I really didn't want to explore that with this character. I'm trying to play him as a reserved, somewhat cantankerous widower (small detail from the book) who's still not quite over his long-term relationship with Ellie. Part of why he likes Nemo is because he's not a real kid, and he thinks that Ellie would have really liked him.

I picked up Inara because until that point, every other Firefly character had offered her as a bribe. I wanted to play out her reaction to that. I don't play her as much as I should, mostly because I try to keep her close to canon. She's a very intelligent woman, and since I'm usually tired, I don't want to screw up her voice.

Damien would never tell people that he's the antichrist, but other than that he doesn't have much going for him. His powers run more along the lines of manipulating people, but I can't do much of that without godmodding. He doesn't have Adam's flashy powers. I have to admit that I'm a bit rusty on his canon, since I have the movies on tape, but don't have a VCR anymore. He's more of an asshole than he was in the movies, but only to people who he thinks don't matter. I know that in the movie he feels pain as kind of a pleasurable sensation, so I'm playing around with that a bit. He can also handle holy and blessed items.

Oliver is straight from the books, but he's a bit more peppy and cheerful. He IS Quidditch, and it's really all he cares about. He's loyal to his team members and friends. I also think he gets injured a lot, since in the movie he seems to take more Quaffles to the head than is healthy.

[catremistrae.livejournal.com]

Roxy is my favorite comic book character, and has been for years, because she's the complete opposite of me. Gen 13 is about a group of teenagers who inherited a Gen-factor from their parents. They're experimented on to bring out their super powers, escape from the lab, and go on the run. When the series starts Roxy is about 15 or 16. She was raised by a foster mother, and lived in a trailer. The other kids in school called her poor and trashy, and she ended going with what people expected of her. She smokes, doesn't care about school, and is very rebellious. I'm playing her a few months after escaping from the lab, when she's still very naive. As series goes on she begins to grow and recognize her worth as a person, and becomes more tolerant of others. Right now she's still trying to get used to the superhero life. All she really wants to do is party and have fun, and has a hard time getting people to respect her when she tried to be serious.

[ewoodhouse.livejournal.com]

Emma

Oh, Emma Woodhouse. When I first saw H_H I knew I wanted to apply, but as who? I had been studying Emma for my English class and had just had an exhausting time defending her to my peers, almost all of whom seemed to think that Emma was completely unsympathetic (obviously they are evil and there is little I can do for them). So I decided to apply as Miss Woodhouse.

Emma is not a sue. She is an anti-sue. The entire book surrounds her faults and whether or not she can grow as a person and see past her false perceptions. Since playing a character who has already completed her arch is no fun, I pick Emma up from the magical time in the novel when she sees the consequences of her actions, but does not yet learn anything from them.

In the beginning I think I was a bit closer to canon, since I would literally read a passage or two before posting, just so I got the tone right. Since then I’ve got lazy figured that Emma could have adapted to her new time enough so that I would not have to be so rigid. A great deal of her characterization comes from her being a Ravenclaw (it leads her to attempt to emphasize her intelligence) and her need control her friends (though the fact that she is not the queen of her social circle leads her to be a bit more subtle in doing so). Also, she goes out of her way to try to rub elbows with high society, which just so happened to include the Malfoys. One day it might be interesting for Emma to learn of the mud-blood, pure-blood thing. I could even see her attempting to bend the truth in order to maintain her status.

And since I enjoy writing humor, Emma interacting with someone and totally missing the boat is fun, too. She still wants to get that elusive VD. Anyways, maybe I will do Oz and the Rons later. I think I write too much for it to be all in one post!

[pdbw.livejournal.com]

I *heart* Emma, and what you've done with her in the game. And lord, I know what you mean about having to defend her to people.

Oh, and thank you for not using Paltrow!Movie!Emma in your icons. :)

[lord-of-dragons.livejournal.com]

I don't think Mokuba is much different from his canon!counterpart, other than he's about 2-3 years older, like Shizuka, as Kira-mun mentioned her. So he's a bit less naive. He's matured, especially since he went from age 10-11 to 13. Big difference there.

Hideki is also fairly accurate to canon, but because I've not done much with him here. I'm sure he'll alter and change a bit once he's interacted with other people more. He does seem influenced, to an extent, by those around him, but that because Hideki is so empathetic to other people in canon.

The Luggage...I'm literally playing off what little I recall from canon, and what little Ryuuji-mun told me when I signed up as the Luggage. That said, any idea how difficult it is to play a walking destrucive PIECE OF LUGGAGE? >D Yeah. Little difficult to say there how I'm doing. No idea.

Then there's Seto. *DEAD*

From his canon!source, Seto's been aged about two years. Mind, the boy alters and matures, and changes like mad in manga!canon itself, so I've been able to decipher Seto never stops learning and changing himself to adapt to given situations, so he's probably very different here than canon. Not to mention, I'm working off of manga!Seto, who differs from anime!Seto, in a few respects, and yet still mingling him slightly with a slither of anime!Seto since we included one arc from there in backstory.

In the end, he's just slightly more mature than canon!Seto, as he's aged a couple of more years, dealt with a couple more years responsibility, and after the end of the manga, probably altered from what he witnessed. Seeing oneself alive, dangerous, vindictive and possessed (and then go from that to leading Egypt into an "Era of Light?") 3000 years prior, I think, would alter most people. You would get a clearer outlook of yourself now, introspect quite a deal more. Then alter. Especially since Seto's a perfectionist. I doubt he centers that around his attitude, though.

Not to mention...the magic aspect. I only brought that in because he used magic in ancient Egypt. To attempt some sort of balance, he's only good at it because he's stubborn, a hard worker, and its canon for him to be that brilliant and dilligent where studies are concerned. Which, I think, is balanced out in canon from *HOW* he was raised for four years of his life. Not only that, but Seto mostly learned magic just to track Ryuuji down. Insane obsession...which is canon for him.

Then there's the fact we've done to this Seto what's never been done in canon before--had someone he cared for physically harm him, intentionally. I'm afraid that would alter any person, let alone one that's never had this happen before. Completely new grounds for him. Then we had Eros run into him with an arrow.

.... I miss having him snark at people.

I'm fairly certain this disgustingly incomprehensible, but I'm sure some explaination of the difference between h_h!Seto and canon!Seto is in there, somewhere. I know I balanced out what I could--he's still a jerk few people actually like, has little to no idea how to deal with people despite his intelligence--but it's not easy. >D

[vividtonks.livejournal.com]

I am an extremely casual RPer, which is of course reflected in my characters. I tend to equate RP with my experience in improvisational acting, fitting things in to make the story flow and to set up crazy fun. I don't know if I succeed, but I try. That "making things fit" vibe is why I chose the characters I did...

Tonks who can pretty much be anybody. No just because she can change her appearence, but also because there is so very little of her in canon. The poor girl has maybe a dozen pages between the two books she's in, but I loved her immediately because of her potential. HH Tonks came about primarily because I wanted a female character to play and because I adore Lupin (particularly HH Lupin, the mun does a fantastic job).

I play her focusing on three primary characteristics (an trick I picked up from improv): clever, friendly, and klutzy. Not deep, but enough to build on. First, I figure Tonks is clever enough to be an Auror and must have done well in school to get such a job. Besides, she's in the order which is a pretty prestigious group of individuals (for the most part). Her most obvious character trait in canon is friendliness. She treats Harry like a pal pretty much right off the bat, does tricks to entertain the girls, teases the other order members, and seems to genuinely like most people. As for the clumsiness, that's her other obvious canon trait and saves her (somewhat) from being a total Mary Sue. She's into music because she wore band t-shirts in the books and for gods sakes the girl needs a hobby or something. (Scraping the bottom of the canon barrel on this one!)

My Tonks is devoted to Lupin, although she is definitely not the clingy type. Bold on the surface, deep down she's a bit hesitant and uncertain in the relationship - not because of her feelings, but because he said it was a bad idea so often that it has rubbed off on her and she feels like she has to be careful with this precious, fragile thing. She suspects there may have been a Lupin/Sirius thing in the past, but she's totally okay with it. (As long as a notdead!Sirius doesn't show up here looking to rekindle things... that could get awkward, *g*).

My other character, Ford is also a fit anywhere character. In canon he's been pretty much all over time and space, so not much gets to him. He's generally an observer, but he does have the uncanny ability to make terrible situations much much worse with no effort whatsoever. HH Ford is pretty much a curious but lazy good-timer. Although I use movie icons, I base him off of the radio shows and the books where there is rather more drinking going on. As an early Ravenclaw, I suspect some of that house's new reputation may be his fault.

[conriocht.livejournal.com]

Aw, thanks. *blush* I'm really glad you decided to apply as Tonks, because Lupin needs some lovin'. ;) At one point, I was thinking of applying as Tonks myself, but the notion of writing love letters to myself seemed kind of odd. (I haven't applied as Sirius for similar reasons, since he'd probably mostly be interacting with Lupin.)

I seem to be playing Lupin as being clingier towards Tonks than she is towards him - I think because he's worried that after all they've been through, he still might end up losing her. That's why he immediately voted her into Ravenclaw even though he knew it wasn't a good fit for her. Of course, then he got worried that he'd scare her off by being too clingy. He's awfully neurotic.

I really like your Ford too, by the way - he's always entertaining.

[goddess-bell.livejournal.com]

Let me see ... about my characters:

Belldandy

Well, like a couple of the other characters here, Bell's pretty much a canon-Sue to start with -- she's a beautiful, powerful, intelligent goddess. Compared to almost any other character in the series, with the possible exception of Peorth and of course Kami-sama, she has the highest level of power /and/ uses it the most.
And yet what I try to bring out in hh!Bell isn't the powerful goddess aspect of her, but what some people refer to as her naivete and I see as her sense of wonder. Yes, Bell is /very/ nice. She is /very/ sweet, almost stickily so. But this derives from her ability to see the good in literally everything. And as my favourite info site points out, Bell's not devoid of the 'lower' feelings. She gets jealous, she gets angry.
She's just really polite about it.
Even though AMG runs to 30 tankubon, 5 OAV, 26 TV episodes, and a movie, throughout Bell's character is very subtle and a bit difficult to pick up on. What she goes through as character change is a lot harder to see than, say, Keiichi. So I'm trying to feel my way slowly to a slightly less subtle version of her.

Bran

I have to say, I apped Bran solely because the Hat wanted characters from his home series, and I couldn't see myself playing any of the others. I like Bran -- he's a lot like me in many ways. Unfortunately, in the books he's about twelve, and it's a bit hard to get a real handle on his personality, other than 'angsty', 'wounded', and 'stand-offish'. I'm trying to play him as more of a wise-guy, someone who's seen amazing things and been part of amazing things, who's been hurt, but who would rather poke fun at others than have them focussed on him.
I haven't really done enough with him yet to get a deeper handle on hh!Bran, and since he hasn't really interacted with many characters it's hard to know where he'll go. I get the feeling that he's looking for a mentor, and he seems to be tending toward Gimli for that, but that may solely be because Gimli is one of the few he's interacted deeply with.

I keep resisting picking up any more characters because I feel like I'm not doing my two justice.

I probably should answer my own question, re Maturin.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

I've been reading all the answers as they hit my inbox, and really enjoying them -- I love the high level of thought and care that goes into this crack comm! It occurs to me that while my tl;dr essay discusses who canon Maturin is, apart from a couple of brief thoughts in this post re Ginny I really haven't answered the question that I posed here, which was how the canon (and/or fanon) intersect with h_h!Maturin.

First off, Maturin is not easy to write. As Crowley-mun pointed out, there is a perhaps enviable wealth of canon from which to draw, plus secondary sources. The drawback to that is having a lot of material to remain faithful to -- which I really try to do, for the most part. I actually held off on applying as Maturin for a little while after my first exposure to h_h, even though I knew right away that he was the character I wanted to app, because I wasn't sure I could do justice to his voice. I'm still not sure I do.

How do you write a complex character who doesn't want anyone to know very much about him? To some extent I didn't do very well at this, in the beginning, partly out of unfamiliarity with text-based RPing conventions; instead of having Maturin *think* things, I had him saying them aloud, very uncharacteristically, because I didn't know how else to convey what needed to be conveyed. More recently, I'm trying to maintain a balance between the things that canon!Maturin is perfectly fine having known about himself and the things he isn't; e.g., he is prone to very public and frequent duels to settle matters of honor, and he's fine with people knowing about that, but he isn't fine with people knowing that he has violent tendencies and skills outside that arena, because they might suspect him of being something more than a harmlessly absent-minded if hot-headed scientist.

Even still, there are things about h_h!Maturin that don't jibe with canon because I haven't necessarily done a good job of bringing them across -- there is just so much to bring across, and short of delivering a load of exposition with every comment, some things have to slip. Primary example:

Many h_h characters, upon meeting Maturin for the first time, think of him as an "Englishman."

Now, he is a British subject, but by birth he is half Irish and half Catalan, and in canon, people almost never initially read him as being "English." His accent when speaking English tends to be an Irish accent; his accent when speaking French is, canonically, "southern", which makes sense given that Spain borders France to the southwest, since Maturin will have learned French as a child, even though his years in Paris could be expected to color his accent. His appearance and demeanor are also not at all "English." In the country house of the English family he'll eventually marry into, Maturin is first mentioned in conversation (in his absence) as "quite strange, quite like a foreign gentleman". Englishmen do not perceive Maturin as an Englishman, but tend to perceive him as somehow continental; while Americans in canon generally perceive Maturin as an Irishman.

So, when a character like Javert reads Maturin as "that Englishman," it's really not in keeping with how a Frenchman would perceive him. Yet I'm reluctant to hedge about every utterance with " *speaking in a southerly French accent indicating such-and-such geographical origin* " or the like -- particularly since, after all, Maturin is an intelligence agent, and can be expected to vary his approach to a certain extent.

As a result of Maturin's extremely private nature, he really stayed outside the swing of things at Hogwarts for a long time, except in contexts where I could have him plausibly getting very drunk and letting his guard down -- which in itself isn't very canonical! His involvement with River has brought him more into the daily life of the school, which is great for me (if not for him -- much tension there).

continued: why het and not slash?

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

The River/Stephen storyline grew organically and surprisingly out of the characters' first interaction. Normally I don't find het very interesting to read or write, and my conception of Maturin's romantic life was dominated firstly by the fanon extension of his canonical attachment to Jack Aubrey, secondly by the Valentine's Day plotline in which he marries a man. The Aubrey-Maturin fanfic I find most plausible usually involves Aubrey and Maturin being in love with one another but not acting on their feelings due to Aubrey's opposition to sodomy and Maturin's general passivity. I interpreted the Valentine's Day events to be Maturin's first real experience with something he had perhaps always desired, but (once Eros' arrow wore off) outside the context of romantic love that made the idea less unsettling to him before. He had to confront the fact that, well, he really does like other men, not just his "particular friend" with whom he shares twenty novels' worth of arguable UST. (I say "arguable" because, after all, Maturin does act as Aubrey's personal physician -- yes, there are enemas aplenty in canon -- and presumably if either one of them found this to be a turn-on we would have to have something mentioned about it in canon.)

So I was fairly committed to keeping the character slashy. I have still maintained some of that, whenever Maturin has occasion to remember the Valentine's Day events. At the same time, canonically Maturin does spend books and books enslaved by lovesickness, unrequited and/or questionably requited love, and general angst having to do with the great love of his life who is, of course, a woman.

Then came the BPAL threads -- yes, drastically shameless BPAL pimpage, and those of you who are BPAL fans who don't already know me from alchemylab should drop me a comment sometime -- and with them, River happened to come into Stephen's orbit. It was natural for this character, whose continued survival has depended in large part on his reading people very well, to pick up on some of what was unusual about River. After writing his complicated reaction to their introduction, I sent River-mun an e-mail, noting that this could possibly be very interesting: we had already spoken some, since she also plays Dr. Winchester, with whom Stephen had been having some shop-talk. Originally, I sort of conceived of Stephen's strong emotional reaction to River as being very paternal in nature. The romantic storyline came out of mutual brainstorming, and it was too angstylicious to pass up, slash or no slash!

It's often cited of Lois McMaster Bujold (creator of another of my chars, Bothari) that she plots her books by subjecting her characters to 'the worst thing possible for them' and seeing how they come through it. This is very much the spirit in which the River/Stephen storyline works, with one huge exception, mentioned in River-mun's comment to this metadiscussion: no pregnancy. Maturin is so opposed to abortion that he won't give his own fiancee one in canon when she pleads with him that she can't marry him while she's pregnant with another man's child. Yet he also believes overpopulation is a huge problem, and at some point in canon remarks that he's amazed any woman willingly endures pregnancy at all. This is not at all out of line with what is at heart a very conflicted character -- for example, as a Catholic he believes suicide is a mortal sin, yet he conceals an ampule of poison in his mouth the night before an interrogation in case he needs to make the only exit available. We did address his attitudes on procreation somewhat in h_h, in the interaction with Winchester, which had the unfortunate consequence of ending Maturin and Winchester's otherwise promising acquaintanceship for the time being. But that's as far as we can really let it go without one or both of our chars being put in an intolerable situation. Further, I'm childfree and it's no fun for me to read pregnancy storylines, so why would I RP one?

[reallymydear.livejournal.com]

I try to play Aziraphale as ICly as possible, simply because canonically he is Damn Cool. No, really. He’s a sneaky bastard, beneath his tweed and frumpishness, and a lot less angelic than he’d like to think he is. He swears! He drinks! He makes the mafia go away. By smiling! And Crowley is so clearly his bitch.

::Ahem:: but yes. I think h_h!Aziraphale is a fair bit sillier than canon (I say think. I really need to read Good Omens again). Though, to be fair, considering the absolute crack of the place, who isn’t?

But I like to think that, beneath the silly, there’s a whole load of cunning just waiting to come out.


*only plays one character, alas*

[late-born-myth.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to tell you what an amazing job you do with Azi, and how much fun it always is to read one of your threads. I think he's very IC. And really, not necessarily any sillier, though granted the situations he's presented with her are frequently fairly ridiculous. But then, think of the birthday party magician!Aziraphale scene!

*waves cream buns under your nose to try to lure you into adding more characters*

[hugohurleyreyes.livejournal.com]

Some quick, scatterbrained thoughts from an RP n00b:

Hurley
I still need to write up a little post-it that says "Hurley is *not bitter*!" and stick it to my monitor.  I keep trying to capture the character's warmth, friendliness, and easygoing nature -- and it keeps eluding me.

And that warmth, I suspect, is his only Marty-Stu-like quality in the LOST canon.^[1]  He may not save the day week-in and week-out, but he's still tremendously likeable, and viewers often identify with him.


Staying on canon presents other challenges; for instance, I have to keep Hurley from getting verbose.  LOST (IMHO) is about as far as you can get from the Sorkin/Whedon/Rob Thomas territory of writing, where the love for language really comes through.  Many times with Hurley, I feel like I'm paring his dialog down to a haiku, and it still feels like too much.

And of course, the way the show is structured, they could add a ton of backstory for Hurley whenever they feel like it, so the fanfic-writer stands on shifting terrain, as it were.


GOB Bluth
Writing GOB comes much more naturally to me (what this says about me, I prefer not to contemplate). 

GOB certainly *thinks* he's Marty Stu, both in h_h and in canon -- and while that self-confidence is itself vaguely-Marty-Stu-ish, it's still a far cry from *being* Marty Stu.  In canon he's appallingly stupid -- not necessarily a bad guy, but so incompetent and so self-unaware that he frequently offends people, and succeeds only by chance.

So far I've erred in making GOB a bit smarter than he should be.  Canon!GOB wouldn't dream up little schemes to build a house for Li'l Tom (http://community.livejournal.com/hogwarts_hocus/186834.html?thread=10110162#t10110162) or to market Magic Cheese (http://community.livejournal.com/hogwarts_hocus/286084.html?thread=14478980#t14478980) -- but those were storylines I just couldn't pass up. :)


[1] Invisotexted season-one spoiler:

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

I love GOB and I really love your Hurley. I had so much fun with the Stephen and Hurley interaction at Hurley's sorting! They really do need to get together for a drink sometime.

My characters

[harrylives.livejournal.com]

I apped Harry as a kind of angry/angsty glory hound with possible gay tendencies. However, once I started playing him I couldn't resist being more and more in canon, and now I think I play him as canonically as I can. Obviously a little more..uhm...sexed up?

Kaylee
I've tried to keep Kaylee really close to Firefly, although I decided that she really likes being at school and in Hufflepuff, which is why she recently turned her Cap'n down for a bit of light thievery (she didn't want to lose her Prefect badge!! XD). It was fun at the beginning when she thought she'd never see Simon again and she could flirt outrageously with all the pretty boys, now Simon's gone again and I'm having trouble...getting her to understand?

Glory
Well, Glory didn't have much background in the Buffy series, a lot was left unspecified so I've been playing pretty fast and loose with that. I do know how she acts, and I can totally understand everyone trying to get her into Bitchiwitch. She is a bit of a Mary-Sue, but an "evil" one. in H_H she's mostly just lazy.

Mr Butlertron

God knows what's going on here.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

I want to know what's going on with Mr Butlertron!

[thranduils-son.livejournal.com]

I aim to (continue to) play Legolas as close to canon, both movie- and book-verse, as possible, with a few exceptions.

My interpretation of him may end up being less severe and more humourous and lighthearted, and friendly, but hopefully not to an obnoxious degree, unless intentional; more on that later. Tolkien's lovely dialogue I sometimes find difficult to duplicate without mangling, so I'm bound to deviate in that area as well. Then most notably is his love for Gimli, which is actually very much canon - in friendship, anyway.

A few references, written by Tolkien himself:

(On Gimli)
"He was named Elf-friend because of the great love that grew between him and Legolas, son of King Thranduil, and because of his reverence for the Lady Galadriel."

"That the Elves ever came to know so much (though only at a time when the vigour of both their races was declining) is thought to be due to the strange and unique friendship which arose between Gimli and Legolas. Indeed most of the references to Dwarvish history in Elvish records are marked with 'so said Legolas.'"

(After Aragorn's eventual death)
"...Then Legolas built a grey ship in Ithilien, and sailed down Anduin and so over Sea; and with him, it is said, went Gimli the Dwarf. And when that ship passed an end was come in Middle-earth of the Fellowship of the Ring."

In Middle Earth, Elves and Dwarves normally strongly dislike each another. I think that last passage perhaps best illustrates just how dear Gimli is to Legolas. At no other time in Middle Earth's long history, at least what was written, has a Dwarf ever been afforded the honour of sailing to what is, essentially, "heaven" for Elves.

They both overcome all these deep prejudices to develop a wonderful relationship, and it has always fascinated me.

It's never mentioned in canon - which I consider anything Tolkien wrote/stated himself, not limited to his novels - whether or not Legolas ever marries, so I'm left to assume he doesn't. The same is true for Gimli. So, with no huge canon obstacles barring the way, I decided to take their canon love to the next level, thus Legolas is very much in love with Gimli, though Legolas himself hasn't fully realised it yet. It will be interesting to see how it plays out, as I believe it could be mutual!

Elves are monogamous and bond/marry for life (divorce doesn't exist in their culture), so even if Gimli doesn't return his feelings, it's quite unlikely that Legolas would/could form as strong an emotional attachment to anyone else... at least not while I play him. Something that may be interesting to note is that Tolkien wrote, of the Elves, "the act of bodily union that achieved marriage, and after which the indissoluble bond was complete." Which is widely accepted to mean if an Elf has sex with someone, it's as good as marrying them - the commitment is as binding regardless of whether or not there's a performed, "legal" marriage ceremony. (A good dissection of canon Elf love, marriage, sex, pregnancy, etc. is here (http://www.ithilas.com/morgoth.html).)

Other miscellaneous things... Elves are immortal, in that they won't die of natural causes such as old age, and they're the original emo, as they can literally die from grief by losing the will to live; usually follows the death of their mate. There are so many unique traits about them, and they have their own strange quirks, it would take far too long to describe them all. I would strongly suggestion reading Tolkien's works. Legolas is a fairly stereotypical Elf in habit and manner, though he does seem to have an evolved or slightly altered way of thinking (perhaps best shown by his willingness to "bridge the racial divide"), and I hope to express all of that in game play. He's capable of being so much more than what he's generally portrayed as in fanfic and the like. (I blame Orlando Bloom for being handsome, and obsessed fan girls/boys for being retarded.)

(continued, briefly...)

[thranduils-son.livejournal.com]

Now about being intentionally obnoxious... I'm a big fan of the Very Secret Diaries (http://www.ealasaid.com/misc/vsd/), the LOTR parody, and if any of them ever show up (someone mentioned playing crossdressing!Elrond ;) ), I'd be more than happy to have Legolas adopt his VSD persona when interacting with them - or not, which could also be funny. Otherwise, he will remain a fairly serious character and I'll try my best to not rape his canon too horribly.

And I don't think he could really qualify as a Marty Stu, but I suppose that's open to debate. It's canon for Elves to be these incredibly, inhumanly beautiful, skilled, intelligent, magical beings capable of living forever and achieving such perfection that humans/mortals can't. Did Tolkien originate the fantasy Mary Sues/Marty Stus? Maybe, in a sense, by making them so "perfect". But he also gave them a quite elaborate and believable (within that world's constraints) background to explain why they're that way. He created entire histories, cultures, and languages for them. For me, all of that justifies their existence and why they are the way they are.

[afraid-wizard.livejournal.com]

I try to play close to canon. I don't know how close I get. My Rincewind is much less sarcastic then the one in the books.

[tomorrow-knight.livejournal.com]

Terry McGinnis:

hh!Terry is based on canon, but there's so much stretch. First off, I read ROTJ (Return of the Joker) as just at the start of his third year of being Batman. Which explains part of why he's a little cocky about what he does, even though he knows he has a long way to go.

Then there's the part where I own S1 but only remember bits and pieces of S3 and have a somewhat better grasp of S2. Which is where a lot of him comes from - the friendship with Max, the ease in his relationship with Bruce, dealing with his mother and little brother, various strange foes and allies and more comfortable with who he is.

Terry isn't having an existential crisis about caring for / being in love with/ kissing Ryuuji. He's just surprised. Mostly because I think when you get called a 'House Boy' in canon, on national and possibly international news, several times; you get used to people assuming certain things about you. Heck, even Terry's canon gf thinks his relationship with Bruce is 'abnormal' since she can't know that all his late night urgent running after Bruce is hero-specific. So having dealt with the fact that people would flirt with him, or I assume pinch his ass, and certain people know his name thinking to use him as asset business wise, against Bruce, he's just calm about that.

His temper is canonical, though he's in a little bit better control of it in hh, partly based on his pride at being Batman and after dealing with the Joker feeling truly worthy to be the Bat. He's gotten Tim's blessing and it means the world to him

Which by the way, leads to the second part, wanting to be a good role model for Tim, even if this Tim is from a different universe. This is a 'little brother' who can understand more about him than his own blood brother ever could.

Canonically, Terry doesn't find out his biologically Bruce's son for 15 years, when he's in his early 30's. But it was information too good not to have 'about' to be picked up as needed. And now he's getting to have that 'wtf' at a much younger age, with a much shakier and newer relationship to Bruce, and with a Bruce who isn't -his- grumpy old man mentor thrown into the mix too.

I hope he isn't sueish, but I do use the genetic angle a couple of times, since I honestly believe Bruce's genes account for some of what he can do. Add those genes to the type of training Bruce would give someone he's mentoring to be Batman, vs a Robin and even without the suit I think Terry would be formidable for a 19 yr old. But, it's for a 19 yr old. And it'd be combining Bruce's training with dirty street tricks and a lot of mind games.

In the suit, well, he can't do much against magic, but there's a reason he wouldn't try and beat down Dick in the suit.

I observed and remembered how there isn't much made of the fact that people, villains, die around Terry. Sometimes he's even directly responsible, either by acting or deciding not to act. And Bruce hasn't called him on it. So given that he became the Bat out of -revenge- and his past (which I'm having a lot of fun extrapolating) he's got a looser moral center.

He's not the Bat who'll be upset that you killed someone in self-defense or in order to save someone else.

Hmm what else... Oh, I tend to think of him as having been chafing in his skin playing the normal kid, trying to be the normal boyfriend and shade over his past as a trouble maker and that being Batman was a saving grace, cause it re-channeled all his energies.

He's kind of basic, really.