New fanfic; Astonishing X-Men; Season 4 of Angel revisited, first part

[selenak]

Lj not delivering any comment notifications is annoying, but what else is new? On a more fun note, I put up some of my newer fanfic in various fandoms and wrote another DS9 drabble. Here are the links.

"Stain" (aka yours truly has a revisionist take on Vedek Bareil and The Collaborator)

"Ghost in the Machine" (my Star Wars/ Farscape crossover, in which Obi-Wan Kenobi encounters Scorpius)

"Faith Manages" (Kai Winn, through the seasons)

"End of the Affair" (Londo/G'Kar slash I originally wrote for theatrical_muse and rewrote to fit with B5 canon instead of roleplaying canon)

****


My local comicstore finally delivered Astonishing X-Men #3 and #4, so I've been revelling in Jossian goodness. So many things to love - the way many of the mutants react to the "cure" news, Beast's argument with Wolverine (note to self: must find good fanfic about Hank McCoy), the ongoing Emma and Kitty bickering, Emma Frost in general (is it me, or does Joss continue to give her the best lines), Dr. Rao (hooray for not-evil, not-mad female scientist still on opposing sides of Our Heroes)… Oh, and when Scott started to talk to this one-eyed chap, something in my memory triggered. "I know him," I thought, and then recalled 1602 which featured, among many others, the Elizabethan version of one Nicholas Fury. 1602 was the first time I encountered the gentleman and I was disappointed when andrastewhite told me he isn't that complex in the usual Marvelverse. (The Elizabethan Fury is a most intriguing antihero who owes something to Walsingham and even more to Neil Gaiman's knack of great twists.) Anyway, modern-day Fury as written by Joss Whedon might not be that complex, but he's got something up his sleeve, and I'm sure we'll see him again.

****

Now, the first part of my Angel season 4 rewatching: As I said before, this is the season plotted most tightly. Which probably makes it impossible to watch for newbies, but it's ever so rewarding for the faithful fan.



Deep Down is Steven DeKnight's AtS debut. He came fresh from delivering dark and controversial episodes like Dead Things and Seeing Red on BtVS, so I knew he'd be good for the team, but the opening episode is more than good. It also, incidentally, served to wipe out the bad taste of Tomorrow had left when I first watched it.

The opening sequence, Angel's first hallicunation, will be echoed by the very last scene of the season in Home, and it's interesting even if you don't know that. The friends and family dinner Angel imagines, with everyone getting along fine, includes, most poignantly at this point in canon when they had last seen each other when Angel was trying to kill him for abducting Connor, Wesley. Wesley with glasses, hailing back to season 1 and early season 2, when he, Angel and Cordy were closest. "Family," Cordelia said in To Shanshu in LA. "To family," Wesley says in Angel's dream, Wesley who like Angel came from an extremely dysfunctional one. Which Angel knows. Family, the blood one and the one formed by friends, is a concept investigated again and again in any Joss Whedon show, and it will be a main theme in season 4.

Angel's one and only living blood relation, Connor, is the loving son here, bright and happy, the way he won't be until Angel has him mindwiped. And yet even before the reality of the sea intrudes again, you also get some literary foreshadowing: "Do I have to watch?" Connor asks when Angel and Cordelia are about to kiss. "Poke out your eyes," Angel replies playfully. The most prominent mythical figure who poked out his own eyes is, of course, Oedipus, who did this when finding out that his wife was his mother. Angelus, much later in the season, will harp on the Oedipus comparison for Connor, but it is not really fitting the way he means it. Connor did never regard Cordelia as his mother, nor does he remember her fulfilling maternal functions.

But then, Oedipus never had an Oedipus complex in the Freudian sense. Oedipus went out of his way to avoid the prophecy about killing his father and marrying his mother he was given. He exiled himself from what he believed to be his home country, and was determined never to see the people he believed to be his parents again. Which was, inevitably, how he ended up in Thebes, his real home country, marrying the widowed Queen, his real mother, after defeating the Sphinx and her riddles. One French version of the story is called La Machine Infernale. The Gods really have it in for Oedipus, and no matter what he tries to avoid, it still comes true. Though he is not without fault. He killed a stranger on the road because of a petty argument and his hot temper. He could have avoided this with a little more self-restraint, by making the wise choice, and thus avoided killing his unknown father. He could have listened to the seer Tiresias, who tells him he does not want to know the answer to his questions. But he did not listen, and he made the wrong choice.

Connor, whose strings got pulled as relentlessly as Oedipus' ever did, who had a hellish machine going on against him and yet contributed by making several choices himself, who saw Jasmine for what she was but did not want to understand and chose wilful blindness every time, could definitely relate.

Incidentally, methinks the reason that Angel is projecting Oedipus issues (in the Freudian sense as well as the mythical one) that early onto Connor already, as well as later when he's soulless, is that he himself does have that famous complex going on. Tim Minear once memorably summarized Angel's feelings for Darla as "you're my mother and my lover and my damnation, and you're really pretty". When pregnant Darla in season 3's Offspring says "my darling boy" when Angel puts his hand on her belly, she could be talking to either him or Connor. Liam's real mother never talks during the Prodigal flashbacks, and he takes leave of his sister, not of her. It's his father all his issues are about; his natural mother is a pale figure never mentioned. Darla, otoh, is an obsession he wants to return to even two years after regaining his soul. "You made me," he tells her in Five by Five desperately, when she banishes him. Ah, parents throwing one out. Sounds familiar?

Angel practising tough love on Connor near the end of the episode is a very cool scene. In retrospect, it did contribute to the tragedy in the making, and yet it's hard to say what Angel could have done differently at that point. It's the repetition of the "I love you. Now get out" in Habeas Corpses that will prove fatal.

Connor's decision to remain in the Hyperion with Fred and Gunn during these three summer months might have been partly for strategic reasons (he could keep them from finding Angel this way), but it also speaks of his need for family, that need that made him respond to Angel against his will in Benediction. His repeated "that was cool, wasn't it?" sounds eerily like mind-wiped Connor in Origin, and says something about his need to get acknowledgment from Fred and Gunn even while he's deceiving them. For those summer months, they formed a family triad, as Connor, Cordy and Jasmine do, or Connor, Jasmine and Angel, or the one he never experienced, Connor, Angel and Darla. When Connor, in Slouching Towards Bethlehem, rescues strangers and tries to talk to them only to be suspected as a freak and/or a menace, they are again the classic family triad, father, mother and son. In retrospect, they're also much like Mindwiped! Connor and the Rileys in an identical situation in Origin.

Speaking of Fred and Gunn, parts of their dialogue again reminds me of my bafflement about the "Fred was hardest on Wesley" fanon. When Fred, as she did at least once in every late season 3 episode, suggests again that they should ask Wesley for help, Gunn brusquely replies that Wesley doesn't care about them anymore.

Fred: Did we give him any reason to?

Interestingly, Fred reacts much harsher to the discovery of Connor's deception than she ever did to Wesley's. Of course Wesley, while lying and kidnapping, was trying to save Angel and Connor both, as Fred had found out herself when hunting for Wesley's diaries. Connor, otoh, had deceived them to keep his father sunk in the ocean. But it's more than that. Fred using the tazer on Connor repeatedly and being in an unforgiving mood for months to come (again as opposed to the Wesley affair) is connected to that tentative family bond which had started to form, and the way she saw Connor as an innocent child. Season 3 Wesley had been her friend, but Billy had ensured she didn't let him get too close. Whereas she had let herself care for Connor.

Billy was arguably the first time we got a strong hint that his dysfunctional childhood with Wyndham-Pryce Père and all that time locked under the stairs had resulted in Wesley having more that just some issues boiling under the skin. Deep Down, like many AtS titles, refers to more than just one thing. It's Angel under the water, true. But it's also Wesley. What he does to Justine, keeping her prisoner in a closet, is more than just ruthlessness in order to find Angel. It's sadism. (Quentin Travers and his father would no doubt approve.) The relationship with Lilah looks downright healthy in comparison. When last we saw them in season 3, he had told her "I didn't even think about you while you were there" (talk about post coital cruelty - that beats Buffy's "you were just convenient" in Wrecked any time of the day, but hey, Wesley is a guy, so it doesn't elicit the same fannish reaction). Three months of splendid sex later, they have progressed to conversations (which mix truths with deliberate lies on both their parts) and, more revealingly, post-coital cuddles.

The high point of the Wesley/Lilah relationship, the moment when they're genuinely happy with each other and ready to admit this, comes in Slouching Towards Bethlehem, when he calls it a relationship and she makes him sign a dollar. But this is also the scene where you can see why it will never work at the end. They both deceive each other within minutes after this gesture; Wesley listens in to Lilah's telephone conversation while pretending to be asleep, and Lilah deliberately sets him up to give Team Angel misleading information so she can go after Lorne. The signed dollar note falls on the floor when Lilah leaves, and she does not notice. I could not love thee, dear, as much, loved I not business more.

Lilah spent season 1 and 2 in competition with Lindsey, Holland Manners' favourite boy who got indulged in his flirts with the other side again and again, and aware that it was a competition she was in the process of losing. In season 3, she came into her own, as Gavin the toadie and Manners' poor replacement really were no match against her, but she still had to defer to said poor replacement. In season 4, that changes. She gets herself a promotion in the very first episode. Gone is the Lilah who swallowed pills in secret to preserve her smug façade; she is at her confident glowing best, and sparks not just in her scenes with Wesley but also with Angel, in Ground State. Lilah on top of her game makes that other brunette with a sharp tongue look somewhat pale in comparison, and that had never been true in the past.

When we see Cordelia in her higher being state, it's worth noting that the aura of light surrounding her has the same tentacle shape Jasmine has when being born. As Skip works for Jasmine, I'm assuming that Cordy in effect never was with the Powers. So where is she until the end of The House Always Wins? With Jasmine, I assume, not that Cordy knows it, experiencing the Jasminiac bliss (and being bored by it already, but then she's supposed to be). When she comes back in Slouching Towards Bethlehem, she's a fragmentary creature, trying to stitch together what was her old life. Looking at remnants of it, including (thanks, continuity gods!) the Sunnydale year of 1998 book. Seeing the photos of chearleader Cordy with her gorgeous long hair is heartbreaking for other reasons, too, if you allow me the frivolous aside. So, with the knowledge that Jasmine is in her already, how much of this is Cordy?

Almost everything, I'd say, with the arguable exception of being drawn to Connor and trusting him. (Though I could see Amnesiac!Cordy even without a Power That Was inside her pulling the strings appreciating his honesty that much.) We see her alone when no one else is watching her, so her confusion and comments have to be the genuine article, not a manipulation. And yet, as she tells Connor, she feels something horrible coming. Lorne reads it, and gets his Yeats quote in. "…What rough beast/slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" That same poem, The Second Coming, has the line "the good lost all conviction and the worst/ are full of passionate intensity", which certainly fits season 4.

Throughout the first four episodes, the photo we first saw Wesley carrying in his wallet during the Pylea episodes of season 2, that photo showing him, Angel and Cordelia, keeps turning up. Angel looks at it in Ground State and goes off to talk to Wesley, who does not believe he wants anything else but help in the search for Cordelia. Wesley radiates intensity, and he's not the worst, but he's certainly still deep down. Whether or not he's correct with his estimation of Angel's motives is besides the point here; what is important is that Wesley's self-esteem, despite outwardly quite a good status quo (he has his own gang of demon-fighters, and a gorgeous girl friend), continues to be at an all-time low and does not allow for a belief Angel might genuinely want him back. His feeding Angel with his own blood in Deep Down is more than just a method of saving Angel; it's a very self-destructive move, right after hearing the words "I should have killed you" from Angel. (Wesley doesn't know they were addressed to Connor.) I think that every since Loyalty, Wesley subconsciously or consciously expected and even wanted Angel to kill him. Or to die for Angel. No matter how you interpret the relationship, Angel was the most important person in Wesley's life (Fred comes close, but note that when Wesley believes Gunn to be responsible for her fate, he knifes him; when he thinks Angel might be, he tries to find explanations).

A few closing words about the episode which got quite a few complaints when it was originally broadcast, The House Always Wins. Aka The Angel Gang Does Las Vegas. Honestly, I like it. It's a good David Fury comedy, arguably way better than those other Lorne vehicles, that episode in season 2 with a name I don't recall in which Lorne and Noir!Angel stop a mini apocalypse, and Life of the Party in season 5. (What was the season 3 Lorne vehicle, btw?) The explanation for the slot machine zombies even the most casual visitor of a casino is bound to be weirded out by rings amusingly true, and the plot provides a credible excuse for Lorne to rejoin the LA team. Would that he had remained away, of course, considering what Angel is going to ask him to do, but it all makes Angelverse sense. Also, Andy Hallet's rendition of Lady Marmalade rocks.

Comments

[zeelee-penguin.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm loving Astonishing X-men! And it's true, Emma definitely has the best lines. I love what Joss is doing with her.

Have you gotten to the big surprise ending of #4 yet? What did you think of that?

What I thought

[selenak.livejournal.com]

"I can finally die" - hmmmm. So Benetech creates some undead/zombie state for its test subjects? Advertendly or inadvertendly? Also, since I know Pjotr Rasputin (that's him, right?) only from his brief cameo in X-Men 2, I might be missing some serious canon background here.

Re: What I thought

[zeelee-penguin.livejournal.com]

In comics canon, Colossus (Piotr Rasputin) died a while back to save everyone from a deadly virus. He was pretty damn dead--I mean, there was a comic about Kitty scattering his ashes, so I'm not sure how Joss plans to explain him being back. I hope he's back for good, though--he was one of my favorite characters.

Re: What I thought

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Aha! Thanks for the explanation. So, if ashes were involved, maybe we can blame that handy Shanshu scroll used to resurrect Darla?*g* No, seriously, that's veeeeery interesting, to quote Captain Jack Sparrow.

Now, where can I find Emma Frost icons? (Aside from yours used above, I mean.*g*)

Re: What I thought

[zeelee-penguin.livejournal.com]

Heh. I've heard there are a *lot* of similarities between Astonishing and Buffy--I can't remember who or where, but someone posted a Buffy screencap that looked almost exactly like the last panel of Piotr hugging Kitty. *g*

Now, where can I find Emma Frost icons?

Well, newredshoes just posted a bunch of Astonishing X-men icons, including a lot of Emma ones. And x2icons has a lot of x-men icons, period, and you can find Emma icons if you're willing to sift through a *lot* of movie icons. simply_blah also has some at her website, I believe.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

At the risk of repeating myself: Poor Londo. Poor, poor Londo. *wibbles*

Thanks!

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Most tragic character on TV ever. (TM)

Re: Thanks!

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

He so is. And oh, god, did I mention the whimpering going on over here when he took the Keeper? Looking at first season Londo, I never could have forseen that act of sheer, stunning, pure bravery and self-sacrifice. Oh.

(One wonders what G'Kar's reaction was when finding out what Londo had done.)

Re: Thanks!

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Looking at first season Londo, I never could have forseen that act of sheer, stunning, pure bravery and self-sacrifice. Oh.

In her review Andraste called it the bravest thing anyone did on B5, and that's saying something. Many of the main characters show themselves capable of self-sacrifice, but it's one thing to die for something, and another to volunteer for years and years of unrelenting hell. But now think back: "Self sacrifice is the third principle of sentient life" was said in the first season, in A Voice in the Wilderness... where the Great Machine called three inhabitants of the station specifically because it had identified them of being capable of that kind of sacrifice - Draal, Sinclair and Londo. Not G'Kar. Not Delenn, who only comes along to take care of Draal. Londo.

Draal then sacrifices himself to keep the Great Machine going. Sinclair will sacrifice himself by leaving everything he knows behind and becoming Valen, the Messiah of a people he once fought a war against. Londo will accept the Keeper to save the Centauri (and least we forget, G'Kar, who definitely wouldn't have survived otherwise).

One wonders what G'Kar's reaction was when finding out what Londo had done.

I think he has at least a good guess that something more than just Londo becoming Emperor is going on. There is the silent bow when everyone leaves, and then there is him telling Lochley, when she tries to cheer him up by saying surely Londo as the new Emperor is doing well, that he has never felt as sorry for anyone as he does for Londo now. Given everything G'Kar saw (especially the stuff happening to his own people), that can't just refer to Londo having become Emperor of a bombed Centauri Prime.

Otoh, I don't think he knew the exact situation yet. One has to write the fanfic about him realizing. One thing that keeps me from completely liking Peter David's Centauri Prime trilogy is the fact he doesn't write G'Kar. He cheats by doing stuff like this:

...hello, said G'Kar, suddenly standing before him.

Next paragraph: After G'Kar had left, Londo thought etc...

In the third volume, he finally can't get out of writing G'Kar, for obvious reasons, and then he doesn't do it very well. He's great with the Centauri characters but not only can't he write G'Kar, he also makes Sheridan, Delenn and Garibaldi, all of whom appear in the final volume, sound like escapees of a sitcom. This particularily glares if you compare it with the superb Psi Corps trilogy written by Greg Keyes. Like David, he was given a JMS outline, but unline David, he's good with all the canon and the OC characters, and manages to give Garibaldi in his third volume (where the guy has to turn up) more depth in his perception re: Londo with two sentences in a conversation than David's Garibaldi in what is supposed to be the same era has in an entire volume.

Anyway. Write the fanfic, I say!

Re: Thanks!

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

I really wish LJ would reliably deliver my comments, dammit!

In her review Andraste called it the bravest thing anyone did on B5, and that's saying something.

Especially the way he did it, with dignity, but no pride in the somewhat negative sense of the word. It's not stubbornness that keeps him from looking away from the Drakh (which he never does), but dignity and ... something I can't name. Am I even making sense anymore? Anyway, the way he did that just impressed me to no end.

Anyway. Write the fanfic, I say!

Argh. Get thee behind me, dammit!

[callmesandy.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love what you're saying here about Cordelia in those first four episodes. The idea that Cordy is with Jasmine and not the rest of the higher powers works so well. That it's her before everything got stuffed in. And Skip was the one who did the ascending thing and that makes so much sense. My friend and I were watching the commentary track of House Always Wins last night and she was all, "Why is Cordy trying to get out if she's already Jasminized?" And now I have to tell her your answer.

I tend to think Cordelia is being influenced by Jasmine from Birthday on, though my friend thinks that's me waving my hands over what she just calls
'bad writing' in the end of the third season. Though, I wonder in re: Connor. I think it's a pure Cordelia assessment to call Connor "a little too chess club" but looking at Xander and Doyle, she has a taste for fixer-uppers and shabby and insecure. (The main reason I doubt her actual attraction to him is Connor's near complete lack of a sense of humor until post-mindwipe.)

House Always Wins is always fun, even if I don't quite buy Angel hanging with the rat pack. (And the season 2 ep you're thinking of is Happy Anniversary and I can't think of a 'Lorne' ep in season 3 ... hrm.)

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I also think Jasmine was influencing Cordy from Birthday onwards, but subtly, and using what was already in her. She didn't get dominant until after the amnesia was broken. I also think the amnesia wasn't planned, it was simply a side effect of Cordelia now actually having Jasmine inside of her (as opposed to be being subtly influenced from the outside), something for which she had been prepared via the painful visions and the time "as a higher being", but which still had to come as a shock to her entire system.

Connor and a sense of humour: well, a childhood with Holtz in Quortoth isn't exactly encouraging one, but he does have his pre-mindwipe moments, such as his teasing Angel with the "they're dumb dead things walking"/ "like you, you mean" exchange about the Zombies (and he's not being hostile there), and his "I thought you were more a tazer kind of girl" when Fred is aiming a cross bow at him during the Angelus episodes. Anyway, I don't think Cordy would have been attracted to him in normal circumstances, but I do think she'd have respected the fact he was straight with her, and would have felt protective.

Angel & The Rat Pack: I don't buy it, either, but I don't think we're meant to. The way he was name-dropping left and right throughout the episode screamed "he's making this up" to me.*g*

[callmesandy.livejournal.com]

I had always thought that Cordy's part demon powers were, in a sense, the first insertion of Jasmine. The glowy thing is that same glow Jasmine had when eating. But how much she had moved into Cordelia's mind is hard to say and I think I tend to ascribe everything Cordelia did from that point on that didn't match *my* idea of Cordelia to Jasmine. Heh. And yeah, I do think the amnesia was unplanned by Jasmine. But she did still have that Connor thing.

Connor has about three jokes in season 4 - he makes a few to Cordelia as well, but, yeah, I doubt Holtz was a big fan of frivolity and Quor'toth wouldn't have encouraged it either. It's interesting to me because I think Connor is one of very very few Jossverse characters who doesn't use humor at all - not as a defense mechanism, not as a crutch, not to hide anything, it's just not part of his arsenal.

I hope we weren't meant to buy Angel and the Rat Pack, though I can buy that Angel was in Vegas. Fury said something in the commentary about finding it funny and my friend and I both said at the same time, "screw continuity!" It was funny, absolutely, and I'd rather believe he was making it up than that the writers just completely ignored their own backstory. Brood, Angel, brood! :)

[ros-fod.livejournal.com]

It's interesting to me because I think Connor is one of very very few Jossverse characters who doesn't use humor at all - not as a defense mechanism, not as a crutch, not to hide anything, it's just not part of his arsenal.

Excellent point. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that humor is often used to highlight Connor's foreign-ness, and therefore his vulnerability. I like your hat, he says to a young boy after accidentally scaring him, and then the infamous, What's a Houdini and They're the luckiest people in the world moments during the Jasmine arc. He's not trying to be funny there; he's just so out of place that it's humorous. Or um...heartbreaking if you're me. :)

[rocalisa.livejournal.com]

Great analysis. I'll be looking forward to reading what you have to say about the rest of the season. I always liked it, but was never quite sure why; your comments are helping.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

*beams*

You're most welcome.

[kakodaimon.livejournal.com]

The End of the Affair is my now favourite fanfiction story, head and shoulders, and most of the spinal column, as well. I don't think I can say much more, because if I go into what I like, I'll end up recapping the entire thing.

Maybe I could restrict myself to: G'Kar and Londo's first time. The anger and fight in that was perfect.

No children, and what that meant. Oc, poor thing. "No children from your body" was somehow a powerful line, and it's sticking in my head.

Universe building with Cartagia. Argh, of course, that ass.

I'm going to slouch here and whimper awhile, if you don't mind...

[kakodaimon.livejournal.com]

See? I can't stop!

I just have to add that the second person also sticks you in the heart.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

That is a very cute Vulcan icon you have there.*g*

More seriously: Thank you.

Universe building with Cartagia. Argh, of course, that ass.

The advantage with Cartagia: there is no creepy psychopathic idea you couldn't accuse him of...

I just have to add that the second person also sticks you in the heart.

When rewriting this story and replacing the t_m stuff with canon-only references, I also created a third person version, but I just didn't find it as satisfying, so I'm glad to know that.

[kakodaimon.livejournal.com]

The icon is from a manga parody of Star Trek (TOS) I picked up at a comic book store that I wanted to hate, generally disliking things anime, but turned out to be strangely witty and well-done. At one part the crew goes back in time to eat the whales.

I'm curious as to the t_m one, now, seeing what went where. This is partly attributable to going into t_m withdrawl after such a huge jolt, what with the drinking and dueling and string-pulling.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

The t_m version is here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/londo_mollari/12826.html). And hey, why go into withdrawal? Get thee to write new Lennier & G'Kar entries!

[midnightsjane.livejournal.com]

Great commentary on Deep Down. I too believe that Cordy was already being Jasminized in her state of "higher being", but that Jasmine's influence was very limited and subtle until after the amnesia was lifted. Wesley's ruthlessness is so front and centre in this episode; keeping Justine in the closet really gave me the creeps. Thanks for a fine analysis.
BTW, I am also a huge Babylon 5 fan. I recently bought the whole 5 seasons on DVD. Lando is truly tragic; the scene in which he sacrifices his freedom to the Keeper to save his world made me cry.

[kakodaimon.livejournal.com]

Lando is truly tragic; the scene in which he sacrifices his freedom to the Keeper to save his world made me cry.

Sorry, I know that was a typo and I have no right to smirk (as I make them all the time), but it brought to mind an awesome image of Lando with a keeper on a throne, emerging from the shadows to show a shocked Delenn and Sheridan his suave moustachioed face.

But no, Londo getting his keeper made me cry, too, and I almost never cry at films/TV.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Thank you, and you're very welcome.

As another B5 and Jossverse fan: did Jasmine's "natural" look make you think of the Vorlons, too?

And yes, Londo is. I never get through The Fall of Centauri Prime without crying myself...

[andraste]

(note to self: must find good fanfic about Hank McCoy)

Or ask your local comicverse expert to find some for you *g*.

Beast doesn't get as much attention in fanfic as some other characters; he's well-loved but difficult to write, what with the erudite dialogue. Here are a few of my favourites that should make some amount of sense without detailed background knowledge:

First, Do No Harm by Poi Lass - in the comicverse, Hank McCoy and Bobby Drake are contemporaries and best friends. The Legacy virus is a deadly illness that only infects mutants. I think that's all you need to know to understand this wrenching, perfect story. I can count the number of fics that have made me cry on one hand, with fingers left over, but this is one of them.

Dialogue also by Poi Lass - a sort of flipside of the above. Not quite as excellent as First, Do No Harm in my opinon, but very few stories are.

Shoot Me by Mercutio - more Bobby & Hank ampersand. (Actually, one of the unusual things about Hank is that I think he's more likely to show up in ampersand than romantic stories.) Bobby has a problem.

The Shadow Inside by Amanda Sicher - Hank is attacked by the Shadow King, an evil telepathic villain.

Desperate Times, Ramen Noodles by Mel - comicverse fanfic has an unusual tradition of realistic self-insertion stories. Knowing Mel in person, I can tell you this is exactly what it would be like if Hank hired an Australian research assistant *g*.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I knew I could count on you! Thank you. Will check these out now...

Early Season 4 is the really confusing bit for me

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

I think the point of the amnesia is just more distraction - to try to stop anybody from asking any serious questions about why the PTB would offer Cordelia a new role, keep her doing nothing, then suddenly send her back to Earth.

What I still wonder is whether there was any reason why Cordelia's return happened to coincide with her manipulation of probability to save Angel in House Always Wins (which ep I still find utterly pointless). At the time the assumption was that she'd been punished by the PTB for interfering with life on Earth, which of course makes little sense now. I wonder whether Jasmine didn't expect that she would develop or work out that she could use such powers, and had to send her back earlier than planned before she was fully possessed, creating the need for the amnesia. The amnesia would also keep Cordelia confused and reduce the chances of her noticing that there was an external influence on her mind. I think the real answer will never be clear, because it ties in to the mystery about the precise extent to which Cordelia was or was not "possessed" during S4, or at least the first part of it. We didn't really get any clarification of that in S5, probably because any lingering questions over Cordelia's moral responsibility wouldn't have fit the lovefest of You're Welcome.

Oh, and Lorne didn't really get a vehicle episode in Season Three - the closest was That Old Gang of Mine.

Re: Early Season 4 is the really confusing bit for me

[selenak.livejournal.com]

To be fair, I think that if they had gotten CC for more than one episode, we might have received an explanation of just when Cordy lost her free will. As it was, you had the puzzling fact that she apologized to Wesley for Lilah's death (something I surely would ascribe to Jasmine) but had no problem referring to Connor when with Angel. And a continued belief in the benevolence of TPTB and destiny. But then, despite CC's glowing performance I didn't enjoy You're Welcome as much as most others did.

Jasmine sending back Cordy earlier than planned because Cordy had used powers she wasn't supposed to on her own sounds plausible, especially if you consider that according to Tim Minear, it was originally Cordy who at the end was supposed to kill Jasmine.

[viciouswishes.livejournal.com]

It always bothered me too that fans weren't harder on Wesley like they were on Buffy. Okay, Lilah was evil, and in measurements of people's reactions - especially men's - there will sometimes be cheering for the bitchy woman to die. However, Wesley at this time was also keeping Justine locked in his closet.

In "I've Got You Under My Skin," it's mentioned that Wesley was locked in a closet as a child.

As for Wes letting Angel drink his blood, it's very interesting in the overall context of vampire text, considering that they were originally used as a metaphor for sex. Dracula was considered very pornographic. And in Dracula, the women are used as vehicles for Dracula to get at the men, which makes Angelus drinking of Lilah's blood just add to the subtext.

Nice Jasmine connection to higerbeing!Cordy. As I was rewatching those episodes, I was like 'damn those swirly things look familiar.'

[selenak.livejournal.com]

It always bothered me too that fans weren't harder on Wesley like they were on Buffy. Okay, Lilah was evil, and in measurements of people's reactions - especially men's - there will sometimes be cheering for the bitchy woman to die. However, Wesley at this time was also keeping Justine locked in his closet.

I don't even want to imagine what the reactions would have been if Buffy had kept Andrew in her closet instead of as a "guestage" baking - what was what again - not muffins, anyway.

Anyway, I do think it's connected to the male/female dynamic. Wesley telling Lilah "I didn't even think of you when you were there" or "keep the glasses on" fits with the traditional film noir and/or hard boiled novel thing, where there is great sexual attraction between the detective and the bad girl, but he treats her quite contemptuously. (Or think of Gilda. Revealed to be not such a bad girl after all at the end, but before she is, any of the nasty remarks and even the slap by Our Hero is considered justified.)

With the gender dynamic reversed in Buffy/Spike, however, no such archetypes are there to fall back on. Mind you, I'm not saying the season 6 Buffy/Spike interaction was healthy, or that she didn't exploit him. But she has a clear awareness that this is wrong, which I don't think occurs to Wesley. (When he imagines Lilah in Salvage, she doesn't accuse him of anything but claims he wanted to save her from her evil ways and wouldn't give up on her, which clearly is not true for Wesley before her death.) The different reasons given for the breakups are interesting:

Buffy: I'm using you.
Spike: Not complaining here.
Buffy: And it's killing me.

Wesley: There is good and evil, Lilah, black and white, and one has to choose a side.

In "I've Got You Under My Skin," it's mentioned that Wesley was locked in a closet as a child.

Yup, I thought of that, too, when watching Deep Down for the first time. It's a cycle of abuse. I wouldn't be surprised if Wyndham-Pryce Senior had also at one point put a knife through Wesley's hands, too...

Sexual connotation to letting Angel drink his blood: I think that was deliberate. There is a strong Wesley/Angel subtext throughout the season, and Angelus even describes him as desirable in Calvary.

[viciouswishes.livejournal.com]

I never really made the Andrew and Justine parallels, but it would have been interesting if Buffy would have locked him up. Of course, I can remember the Scoobies bad reactions when Dawn slapped Andrew, so it seemed to be something far off the radar. I wonder if Giles had been there if things would have been different with how they kept Andrew.