On Tue, 25 Jan 2000, Gary Kleppe wrote:
Vincent Seifert <seifertv@ccshp1.ccs.csus.edu> wrote:
And now for something slightly different...
"... a man with two genders."
"We've DONE that!"
argh! Put Hi & Dai back where you got 'em, that's a good fellow. :)
Ranma cleared her throat and bowed in turn. "Thank you,
wife. It's good to be home. I hope everyone's well?"
Kinda strange that you decided to start calling him by name at this
particluar point.
Well, I had to start somewhere... that seemed to be the right point, but
I'll have another look.
"Well, good," Ranma said. "I guess he's taking after his
mother. I haven't forgotten that time SOMEone brought in ca-
cats to drape all over me." He directed a mock severe look at
Kasumi.
"Mock severe look" doesn't quite seem right, though I'm not quite sure
what would be better.
He knows better than to give her a REAL severe look, or he'd be wearing
the rice cooker. :)
"I won't," Taro said. Jiro nodded.
Kasumi named them, right? Ranma'll never understand why she vetoed his
suggestions of "Moon Unit" and "Dweezil."
"I wanted my kids to have a normal life, so I gave them the most boring
names I could think of-- but it's NOT WORKING! Waaah!" :)
"Er...." Ranma wondered how to say it, then decided to just
say it. "Do you want another child, Kasumi?"
Kasumi smiled. "The two we have are enough for me, I
suppose. If you want another, though...."
"No, but I'd really, y'know, like to have sex again...."
No, that's someone else's Ranma. :)
Ranma greeted the sunrise in his customary way, on the road
or at home, performing a solitary, elegant dance of precisely
controlled violence. He finished and turned just as Akane spoke.
"That's new."
That's a rather vague description. Can we get a better idea of what it
looked like?
No, because I don't have one. It's just a few mental B&W drawings with
whooshy lines. Sorry...
Genma came down the stairs, a bit thicker all around, but
still moving like a bear rather than a hippopotamus. "Evening,
Son. Looks like you still have all your parts."
Huh?
Nothing obvious has been lopped off yet. He's asking if anything
unobvious is missing. Paternal concern, Genma-style.
"Kiima?"
"She, uh, didn't like having her picture taken, and I found
out the hard way. That blur there is one of her wings."
"Wings?" Genma and Nodoka queried in unison.
Why's Genma surprised by this? He saw her wings with his own eyes in
vol. 37-38. And Nodoka more than likely would've heard about her from
Genma or one of the others.
Phoenix Mountain didn't happen; that's the divergence point.
"Saotome School Ultimate Technique: Martial Arts Sneaking
Around Discreetly!"
That would be the Umisenken? :)
er... not exactly. Figure that Ranma didn't stop there.
Not bad, but frankly I think it suffers a bit from not being able to
break out of the tone set by your other work.
You have me dead to rights on that. Versatility does not appear to be one
of my strengths. :)
It could be that I'm just
misunderstanding where you were going with this... but it seemed to me
that this could've had a much harder edge to it.
I suppose it could. Even someone as innately optimistic and cocky as
Ranma might be crushed by the compromises he's had to make... but I doubt
it.
The situation you've set up is one where everyone's gotten what they
want, yet no one has.
Well, everyone of their generation, yes. The generations before and after
are pretty happy.
I think a lot of resentments would lie under the
happy exteriors of these characters.
Well, sure. And some of them were hinted at, and some of them emerged
a little. But sometimes people don't show their resentments... and
sometimes if they do, other people try to pretend they don't exist.
I'm not saying the story should be
an angst-fest, but there's a lot of conflict potential in that, and I
think you could exploit it better.
I think it *could be* exploited better, perhaps, but I'm not sure I could.
Sometimes AMAW feels like a fragment of a larger fic, and perhaps it will
be. But it would be about avoiding conflict... which can be a conflict
itself, on a different level.
Thanks for your comments, Gary!
Vince Seifert Fanfic Analyst FFIRC Frog
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Ideas are worth their weight in gold.