Crossover recs

[selenak]

It's that time of year coming closer again; the Multiverse ficathon results. Ever since andrastewhite and iamsab started it in 2004, I've been enjoying reading and writing for this particular ficathon more than for any other. So, for new readers of my journal, or for those who have discovered new sci fi fandoms since the last time I raved about this, what is the Multiverse ficathon? One devoted to sci-fi crossovers. You can find the results of past years here:

Multiverse 2004

Multiverse 2005

Multiverse 2006


Crossovers are a particular art form in fanfiction. There are so many ways they can go wrong - too much exposition, for example, i.e. characters from one universe tell characters from another their basic backgrounds in a terribly clumsy way ("Hi, I'm Captain Kirk, my ship is the Enterprise, my best friends are, and did I mention I had an illegitimate son who died?"), or conversely, characters from one universe behave as if they already know the character from another as well as the author and the fans do. And then there is the question of tone, of atmosphere; many fictional universes are very specific there, so which ones to match? Stories who manage to get characters from two universes right, and do tell their tale in a way that makes equal sense to readers who know both universes, or know just one of them, are all the more amazing.

Here are some of my favourites from the last years:

Home from the Sea: a Star Wars/Star Trek crossover which is a wonderful and heartbreaking portrait of Leia.

Pieces of the Dead: Farscape/Babylon 5, an encounter between Stark and G'Kar and Lyta on their travels. It answers a question in FS canon the show never did and offers fantastic characterisation for all three participants.

That Magical Sum We Were: Battlestar Galactica/Dr. Who - Laura Roslin and the Doctor. Lyrical and haunting.

Outside In: Alien/Dr. Who: the Ninth Doctor and Ripley - Ripley8, that is, from Alien: Resurrection. It's gut-wrenching and won't leave you for a good long while.

Catch a Tiger by the Tail : Farscape/Battlestar Galactica: Harvey and Head!Six, the encounter that had to happen, and is made of pure awesome.

Travel Light: Dr. Who/Farscape: my very favourite Doctor/Companion team, the Seventh Doctor and Ace, encounter Moya, Moya's Pilot and Stark. This, incidentally, is one of those crossovers who pull of the magical trick of working even if you don't know one of the canons in question - if you're, say, a DW only fan, then regard Stark & Co. as the guest star, about whom you find out exactly as much as a DW episode offers about its guest stars as well - and if you do know both canons, then you find it doubly layered.

Take care of yourself for me: Firefly/Babylon 5: River finds another woman who's been experiment on. The River pov is poetic and crazy and scary and intense, just as River should be, and I love it to bits.

Where the stars are strange: Star Wars/Farscape: Yoda and Rygel, and no, this is anything but crack fic. I love it.

There and back again: Stargate/Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Sam Carter goes through another wormhole and meets Jadzia Dax. It's that rarity, a story meshing plot, character exploration, and a completely believable pairing. Bonus points for a nod towards My Darling Quark and his not so secret Jadzia love.

Playing Poster Child: Farscape/Babylon 5: Zhaan and G'Kar are both characters who in their respective shows went through epiphanies. But this story presents them long before they reached this point, when they're still raw with anger, and it's fascinating and compelling to read.

Displaced Persons: Blake's 7/Farscape: Kerr Avon, meet Scorpius. It's terse, laconic, full of one liners as you expect with these characters, and the punchline is one of the best ever.

Crosses and Naughts: Firefly/Farscape: Mal Reynolds lost nearly everything (again); so has Aeryn Sun. Still the best Mal and the best Aeryn characterisation I saw in fanfic, imo as always.

Now: just one more week or so before Multiverse 2007!


In other news: it's always good when other fans write rants you don't have to: go read this excellent post on JKR and the sense of fannish entitlement. What she said.

Comments

[wee-warrior.livejournal.com]

This is more or less unrelated to this post, but I wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed your B 5/Sandman crossover with Londo. Absolutely brilliant.

Now off to look at the recs... :)

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Oh thank you! I loved writing it, and the Endless due to their nature really fit so well in Londo's life that this particular plot bunny just wouldn't let me go. (It started after discussing the fifth season episode "Day of the Dead" which after all Neil Gaiman wrote with andrastewhite, who observed the episode feels like an unofficial Sandman/B5 crossover...)

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

This, incidentally, is one of those crossovers who pull of the magical trick of working even if you don't know one of the canons in question

I am so glad this worked well enough to be worth remarking on, because it's very much what I was going for... And as I'm generally one of those people who writes for an audience of people who have the relevant canon effectively memorized and never bothers explaining anything, it was a bit of a challenge.

Must finish tweaking my Multiverse story for this year and get it in...

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Well, admittedly I knew Farscape long before reading your story, but I think one still can tell whether or not a story relies on people being familiar with both canons, and I thought you gave just as much information on Stark and his people (and on Moya and Pilot) as an episode of DW in which they were guest starring would have given. Magnificently done!

With my own Multiverse crossovers, I usually went for a single pov - i.e. for one of the characters, to whom this other character and/or universe would be new - and let the reader know as much or as little as this character finds out.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much what I ended up doing last year, although in that case it was mainly because I wasn't at all sure of my ability to write the second character well. :)