I blame all this silliness on Rumiko Takahashi, whose created worlds
have been mangled and twisted by wannabe writers time and time again;
on Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., whose writings remind me of my own, only much,
much better written (but about as coherent); and Takezo. Damn you and
your prose.
Comments and further discussions are very welcome.
Gratuitous Self: Meta-Meta-What?
- 3 -
Bob enters the picture.
At the time, I felt that Bob was my true self-insertion, the
guru helping the newbie, the sempai to Takezo's kohai. I was, after
all, moralizing to my heart's content. (As I am now, come to think of
it.) Someone was astute enough to point this out later on, although he
mistook me for an Ukyo fanboy. Ah, well. Not everyone can be Sherlock
Holmes.
Bob had that clever little name instead of some other feudal
Japanese swordmaster's name because, as I mentioned earlier, I had a
wee-bit-'o-the-drinkie. Otherwise, he'd be named after that great
Japanese blacksmith, what's-his-face. No, I am not drunk right now.
At any rate, Bob taught Takezo one of the most important lessons
I believe a writer can learn.
For example: Almost everyone who remembers it recognizes 'The
Bitter End' as an important work in Ranma fanfiction. It was the
epitome of Ranma-angst, in my view.
At the time, the [Dark] tag became vogue. All over the place,
you had Ryoga raping Akane, Kuno raping Nabiki, Ranma raping Kodachi,
Soun raping Kasumi, rape, rape, rape. True, it was shocking at first
(I couldn't get the taste out of my mouth for days after reading
'Poison'), but it got really boring after a while. People making Genma
rape P-chan just to get their names posted is not a healthy sign for
the list.
Then came [Sad]. People dying all over the place. Ukyo is dead.
Nuku-Nuku is dead. Ranma is dead (oh, wait, that's not a sad fic). You
name the character, bang! Dead.
Zen decided one day to have a nice little Ranma 1/2 murder,
neatly combining death and the [Dark] tag.
All over the place the responses flew. Akane is OOC. They
shouldn't have died so easily. Excellent piece of work. I just came
from my failed suicide, and then I read this.
Everyone happy? Nope. General consensus? Good piece of writing.
So anyhow, Takezo takes Bob's advice, ignores the pointless
flames (you suck, but I won't tell you why!), takes the constructive
criticisms to heart, and comes out with a much better fic than if he'd
pandered to everyone's whims.
Like Bob said, you can't please everybody.
- 4 -
What's the point of fantasy if you can't do what you want?
This is what usually runs through the minds of anyone (and I
mean anyone) who begins to write an SI. I believe that the two factors
that control the shaping of any SI are wish-fulfillment, and shame.
That's right. Shame. While wish-fulfillment would normally make you
want to endow your fictitious self with incredible sexual prowess, for
example, shame prevents you from making Nabiki, for example, say 'Oh,
wow, were we really going at it in there for a year and a half,
straight?"
That is, unless you have no intention of posting the fic. I
believe that for every SI posted on the list, there are five unposted
ones, and for each of those unposted ones there are ten unwritten ones
stuck in the would-be writer's head. Those guilty, raise your hands.
Okay, put those hands down, I can't see the people at the back
anymore.
So, with such a two-dimensional impetus, it's no wonder why some
people say that if you've read one SI, you've read them all.
Enter 'Turning Road'.
Why did Bob and the list give this particular SI the chance it
got?
Well, if you ask me, it's because Takezo took a rather
unorthodox theme to his SI: Disillusionment.
Anecdote: The prince met the princess and lived happily ever
after.
Story: The prince met the princess and discovered he had to face
another prince in a duel for her hand before they could live happily
ever after.
It's been said before, and it'll be said long after I say it,
but stories have plots, and plot have conflict. In your average SI,
the protagonist (the author's character) either has to beat some evil
nemesis to save the romantic interest character or has to overcome
their mutual shyness. That's the conflict. Real life takes a back seat
to swashbuckling or elementary-school-level romance.
What is Takezo's initial conflict in Turning Road? His
disillusionment with Nabiki, who is turning out not to be the dream
girl he imagined her to be.
So his courtship of her turns into a subdued rivalry, a Cold
War, if you like. Takezo's self-inserted character (and Takezo
himself, for that matter) doesn't realize that by giving his SI this
bent, he has set up a story that practically writes itself.
Better than wish-fulfillment, Takezo now has a story that even
he doesn't know the ending to. All he has to do is toss the characters
together in a situation and let them sort it out. Which is basically
what happened. All the while, the readers wonder what's going to
happen next, unaware that the writer doesn't have a clue, either. He's
just waiting to see what happens, himself.
I think if you're going to write an SI, you might as well enjoy
yourself.
- 5 -
This is really turning out to be TimeRunner's Soapbox, isn't it?
Ah, well. It's my bully pulpit. I can say whatever I want while
I'm on it.
As I write this little post-modern meta-tale, I can't help but
wonder if it's too soon to pronounce Gratuitous Self dead.
You see, the main problem with GS right now is that I've written
it into a situation that I can't write out of. The Here is Greenwood
cast is messing up my style, and Templar ain't cutting it as a main
baddie - he's too pathetic. The love polygon, though, is very
interesting, and I'd love to write about it more.
So I will. Maybe. Someday.
Right now, though, I have to work out just what I want to do
with the series, and I guess that's what this little multi-part tirade
is for.
I guess another reason I haven't written about GS for so long is
because Ranma bores me now. I mean, I still like the series, and I can
recite the lines from the OAVs from memory, but, well... It's like
Macross. It blew my mind when it came out, but now even better stuff
has come out. Mind-altering stuff, like Evangelion, or Utena. Same
with Ranma. I've read all the manga, seen all the anime. Nothing left
but fanfiction, and even that is getting old.
Very few things about Ranma 1/2 inspire me anymore.
Except for the characters.
The secondary characters really pique my interest. Treated
properly, they can hold up a story on their own; notice the many Ryoga
or Ukyo stories. Ranma and Akane aren't all that bad, either; the
reason they get boring is because of everyone casting them in old
roles: Ranma the insensitive martial artist bumpkin, Akane the ill-
tempered gorilla-strong uppercutting bad cook. Boring!
Let's face it; Ms. Takahashi's characterization of her Ranma
cast left a lot to be desired. Why the Ranma cast wasn't as well-
characterized as her Maison Ikkoku cast, we can only blame on the
target audience - young boys. Yep, the same target audience for
Dragonball Z.
But that's what fanfiction is for, right? So we can treat the
characters the way we want, right?
Apparently not. Just ask your local 'OOC' nit-picker.
- 6 -
There was this Stephen King story (the title of which eludes me
at the moment), in which the protagonist, a drug dealer, got stranded
on an island with no food. Finally, he shoots himself full of drugs
and cuts off his leg, or something like that, so he can eat it. Ditto
with the other leg afterward, then one arm, then...
What does this have to do with Gratuitous Self? I'll get to that
in a moment.
Life taught me that anyone could crash and burn. Anyone.
Including me.
Anyone who's tripped and fallen face first into the rough
asphalt of courtship knows what I mean. It stings, doesn't it? It's
stings like hell. Your ego is not its healthiest after a beating like
that, let me tell you. How could someone you love not love you? Okay,
granted, it may be an easier question to answer for some people, but
for a conceited asshole like myself it was the dilemma to end all
dilemmas. Not only did I fail at the game, I lost face doing it!
Unforgivable!
What does this have to do with Gratuitous Self? Well, here it
is.
Takezo starts to write the 'Don't want to be tied down' scene in
Gratuitous Self 2, right? Where does he draw his motivation from? Me.
And where do I draw that from? My own experience, of course.
So what do I do? I summon up that intense feeling of jilted
indignation and inject it into the story. Personal experience lends a
convincing sort of sincerity to any work, be it a story or a painting.
Then, voila! Instant empathy from the readers. Readers are a smart
lot, you see. They smell something false in the text, they get turned
off. Refreshing honesty, on the other hand, makes you root for the
protagonist even more. How else do you explain the Ryoga phenomenon?
So there. Personal anguish distilled into a junk medium. It
works, doesn't it?
So, where does Stephen King come in? Well, writers sometimes
need to throw parts of themselves into their work. Makes for a
livelier stew, don't you think?
Yum.
to be continued...
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TimeRunner's Web Page:
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Towers/7482
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All persons, living and dead, are purely coincidental.
- Kurt Vonnegut