Characterisation

[lady_windermere]

Was having a chat about characterisation last night to a couple of people, and realised that I don't always use my own idea's on characterisation when writing. In some areas I am quite willing to allow a lot of OOC when I am reading as well. Especially with Angelus and William.

I write Daddy!Kink, and Baby Boy because my friends enjoy it, and use what I consider to be the fandom characterisation for that kink. So even if my Angelus and William the Bloody do not really fit into that, I will quite happily write it anyway, using the general characterisation.

I wondered if anyone else felt the same?

[Poll #984998]

Comments

[ruuger]

My view with all fiction (fanfic, profic, movies and all) is that the plot should always be a slave to the characterization, not the other way around. Because the characters are no-longer the characters I'm interested seeing/reading about if the way they act is based on what the plot dictates, not on "what would Buffy do".

My biggest problem with OOC-characterization is then that it feels like cheating to me; rather than coming up with a way to make the plot work within the boundaries set by the characterization, the writer takes the short-cut and changes the character. I feel the same way about fanon.

As for AUs and ARs - different circumstances can change a character, but the change has to be justified (though I don't get the point of OOC all human AUs - isn't the whole idea of an all human AU to have the same characters in a different setting?). That's actually one of my complaints about the S8 comic - the characters feel OOC, but that could be explained by the fact that 1,5 years has passed from "Chosen", except hat we're not given any explanation why they have changed.

Kinkfic is a whole different matter, IMO, because the kink is the focus there, not the characters or the plot. I don't think a pure kink PWP needs to have strictly canon characterization because it's main function is to just titillate the reader. I do wish, though, that more kinkfic writers would mark the fics as such because a lot of bad feeling comes from people not interested in pure kinkfic reading it and expecting canon characterization, and then leaving bad feedback about the characters. Of course, the line between kink and non-kink isn't set in stone. Take the daddy-kink, for example: I can't see a scenario where Spike would call Angel 'daddy' in all seriousness (especially since he's pretty much the only character in Buffyverse who doesn't have daddy issues), but I can see Angel thinking of Spike as his son in a way (on the other hand, I can't really imagine Angel getting turned on by seeing Spike as his son, unless the story has Angel/Connor undertones...)

And I'm just gonna stop here, I think, before my comment reaches thesis-length - can you guess that I'm having a boring day at work? ;)

[http://users.livejournal.com/woman_of_/]

Yes, I know a lot of people really do get upset when they read something and consider it OOC. Then many have strong views about characterisation in their own heads, which are not felt by the writer. I do have strong views myself. I tend to keep those for writing Gen fic, as I feel to make shipper fic work, then certain aspects are not always kept true to character.

Yes with non-canon ships, you can keep the major characterisations, and explore how two people would have a relationship, within the boundaries. But the point is it is not canon.

I have been disappointed in the season 8 comic as well, especially as Joss is writing it. I know it takes place 1 1/2 years post "Chosen" (and am still trying to figure out how they got that operation together in that short space of time), so maybe everyone has changed slightly, but these seem major changes we have just had dumped on us.

I find my views of the characters are not ones everyone agrees with, so I am quite willing to allow some leaway for writers because of it. I thought the poll would be slightly better than a character study (I would love to do one of Darla for example, but I think my Angelus and William the Bloody would just show how much I don't stick true to even my own characters to write kink).