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? ;)

[bogwitch.livejournal.com]

I fully admit to being a characterisation fundamentalist.

I read and write fic to get more stories about the characters I love and I find weak characterisation a big turn off. I personally don't see the point of writing characters OOC, otherwise you might as well be writing original fiction.

Of course, how canon characterisation is interpreted and implemented by different people (even within the show) will vary considerably!

[wildannuette.livejournal.com]

I try really hard to keep my characters down pat and I tend to steer clear of OOC fics when reading. That said, everyone sees different things so some degree of OOCness will probably occur naturally dependent on pairing and fic. I've read some of your stuff and i wouldn't class it as ooc.

Admitedly not read all, but to me OOC is when the character may as well be named anything, because he/she/they aren't the ones i've seen on tv or read.

[erin-starlight.livejournal.com]

I mainly think of writing them in character in non-kink areas. It for example really ticks me off when I happen on a fic where for no apparent reason everyone is nasty to a character. Everyone from friends to family treats them like dirt in favor of another character most usually the rivial of character A for the affecions of another.

I never wrote kink, but there are some things I try to steer clear of reading. And when I hint to sex scenes I try to leave it up to the reader or I say how I personally view the pairing in question. Depends on who it is.

[gillo]

I love the characters as I first met them, in the TV shows, and tend to avoid reading anything that diverges too far from them. I can take a lot of non-canon pairings as long as I feel the canon characters might have reacted in something like teh ame way in the given circumstances. Otherwise, why bother. All-human AUs with OOC characters - what's teh point? Just giving the characters the same names and mentioning the odd forehead, bleached hair or eyes isn't the same thing, and I don't really see the point of it. I want to see the "real" characters cope with new situations, not strangers with familiar names.

[lilithbint.livejournal.com]

*grin*
I will read pretty much anything when I'm in the mood but over the top OOC tends to put me off cause I keep asking 'why didn't you just give them different names and call it original fic?' since I spend too much of my reading time getting grumpy because the characters named would not act that way in any circumstance...
except kink. For me kink is game playing as much as the physical enjoyment of the kink. So Spike can call Angel daddy during sex games but I'm not so keen on it in normal interactions (especially when it comes with him crawling into Angel's lap at meetings) unless of course it is an insult.
If Angel wants to wear woman's underwear (what? He might) that's fine but I couldn't imagine him wanting to go to a drag show in a dress and call himself Angela. Unless he was forced to for undercover purposes and maybe discovered he liked it but then I could only see him dressing up in the privacy of his own room and being mortified when Spike caught him. (Oooo plot bunny)
Anyway... what was I saying?
It's all about characterisation which I take the bulk from the show and when I deviate I like to try and make it believable. Spike isn't going to suddenly morph into William and write poems to Angel or anyone else and Angel isn't suddenly going to be caring of Spike and understanding. They grate on each other, the snark is what makes their relationship so much fun but that doesn't stop me making them fall in love *grin*

Gah! I'm babbling and now I have to go back to my WIP and check I haven't done any of what I have just railed against.

[spikendru.livejournal.com]

Well, this is difficult to answer, as many of the official writers for the show saw the characters in different ways, and thus there were episodes in which Xander or Spike seemed to be OOC to me, so I imagine it's the same, if not worse, in fanfic. My feelings are that if you're writing about these specific BtVS/AtS characters you'd want them to be as recognizable as possible because isn't that why we read/write fanfic? Because we love the characters we saw on screen? It may be different if one is writing to a specific kink, but even when pairing characters for ficathons or whatever, I still like to come up with a believable reason that Y and Z are shagging like bunnies when apparently they had nothing in common/disliked each other in canon. That's probably why I don't write PWP - it usually takes me a lot of words and plot to get Y and Z together in a way that makes sense and feels like it could have happened, given these circmstances.

I don't think there's anything wrong with writing kink!fic, and a lot of people enjoy reading it, but to me it's better if the characters are recognizable. One of my personal turn-offs is the use of the word "childe" which seems to be frequently used in fanon but was never, ever, used in canon. That alone is enough to jar me right out of a fic. Also, renaming Buffy as "Elizabeth". Yes, sometimes "Buffy" is a nickname for "Elizabeth", but Joss made it perfectly clear that Buffy the Vampire Slayer's legal name is "Buffy". It's on her school transcripts and her tombstone and in Something Blue, she tells Spike "My mother gave me that name," so I really don't understand to urge to rename her "Elizabeth". I just don't get it. *sigh* But that's just my personal opinion.

[menomegirl.livejournal.com]

Here by way of the su_herald. I took the poll and wanted to add this:

I think fandom characterisation is vastly different from canon for several reasons. You have shippers who write their ships in spite of canon (I myself do this). You also get character-bashing fics where the author dislikes one or more characters or a pairing. Then you have authors who write a character in a wildy AU manner to the point where there's little resemblance to the actual character.

So I suppose you could say fandom characterisation depends on the author and is in the eye of the beholder.