RatCreature (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ratcreature) wrote2022-01-05 09:09 pm
ratcreature) wrote2022-01-05 09:09 pm
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Snowflake Challenge #3
Challenge #3: In your own space, put some favorite characters into an AU, fuse some favorite canons together, talk about your favorite AU/fusion tropes, or tell us why AU/fusions aren’t your cup of tea.
Anyone who's known me fannishly for longer than five minutes will have noticed that I love AUs of (almost) all kinds. I haven't updated my AU recs page in years, but I still read a lot of AUs.
One of my few pieces of fandom meta writing was an essay on what I think about AUs, and that is many years old now, but I still basically think about AUs like that, i.e. I like when they somehow relate to canon by diverging from it.
The main exception to that for me are AUs that I like because they push some kink button (like A/B/O fic). Then I don't really care. But in those genres I also read if I have no clue about the canon in the first place.
My least favorite AU trope is probably "mundane" AUs, i.e. ones that strip a canon of its fantasy elements, though I have read some that I really like. But in general, if there is, say, a coffee shop AU with superheroes or such, I actually prefer them to still have powers, but it's an universe where they have to deal with their superpowers while also managing a coffee shop, or such scenarios. I like world building, so AUs with less of that than canon aren't my favorite. A prime example is that with LOTR I pretty much only like AUs that are still set in Middle Earth.
I'm also not that thrilled with genderswitch AUs. I mean, an AU-take on canon with a character being trans or genderqueer or such is fine, but the "always cis-female" type of genderswitch AUs or magical genderswitches rarely work for me. Crack AUs that do not take their premise seriously are also not my thing. OTOH some of those that do are among my favorites.
As for AU scenarios that I wish somebody would create, but I haven't found yet, there are so many. Here is an incomplete list:
Anyone who's known me fannishly for longer than five minutes will have noticed that I love AUs of (almost) all kinds. I haven't updated my AU recs page in years, but I still read a lot of AUs.
One of my few pieces of fandom meta writing was an essay on what I think about AUs, and that is many years old now, but I still basically think about AUs like that, i.e. I like when they somehow relate to canon by diverging from it.
The main exception to that for me are AUs that I like because they push some kink button (like A/B/O fic). Then I don't really care. But in those genres I also read if I have no clue about the canon in the first place.
My least favorite AU trope is probably "mundane" AUs, i.e. ones that strip a canon of its fantasy elements, though I have read some that I really like. But in general, if there is, say, a coffee shop AU with superheroes or such, I actually prefer them to still have powers, but it's an universe where they have to deal with their superpowers while also managing a coffee shop, or such scenarios. I like world building, so AUs with less of that than canon aren't my favorite. A prime example is that with LOTR I pretty much only like AUs that are still set in Middle Earth.
I'm also not that thrilled with genderswitch AUs. I mean, an AU-take on canon with a character being trans or genderqueer or such is fine, but the "always cis-female" type of genderswitch AUs or magical genderswitches rarely work for me. Crack AUs that do not take their premise seriously are also not my thing. OTOH some of those that do are among my favorites.
As for AU scenarios that I wish somebody would create, but I haven't found yet, there are so many. Here is an incomplete list:
- A MCU Captain America/Calvin & Hobbes fusion: Steve is Calvin obviously, Bucky (as Bucky Bear) is Hobbes
- XMFC AU: Erik and Charles meet in the Spanish Civil war in the International Brigades
- XMFC: In Roman Britain, Erik is a celtic druid (with his metal powers seen as magic), Charles is an upper class Roman
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I've bookmarked your essay because I love a good bit of fandom thinky thoughts and one on AUs sounds like my cup of tea, so thank you so much for sharing.
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Thoughts
I think I would love the hell out of that. Steve's art would match Calvin's imagination perfectly. You can just see health-deprived Steve dragging Bucky Bear everywhere because no other children have the patience to stick with him. Except that Steve's parents have secretly added his therapy weights to Bucky's arm, an ounce at a time, so when Steve swings Bucky at the bullies ...
>> XMFC AU: Erik and Charles meet in the Spanish Civil war in the International Brigades <<
That could work.
>> XMFC: In Roman Britain, Erik is a celtic druid (with his metal powers seen as magic), Charles is an upper class Roman<<
I think someone has actually written this, it sounds familiar, but I can't remember where I've seen it.
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A great thing about Snowflake is seeing names tickling various fandom memories, like Star Wars: Phantom Menace folks from the old Yahoo mailing list! Now it's bugging me that the memory has fled of a *possible collab?* Starsky/Hutch long fic that featured, er, one of them nearly drowning in the ocean, being rescued by the other, and they make their way slowly into the beach parking lot and almost into the car, ha. It was years in the writing and I wonder if it were completed.