Fanfiction Turn-offs: Heroes edition

[selenak]

At a guess, as readers of fanfiction, we all have our buttons, not just the good ones which make us love a story immediately but also the ones that take us right out of the narrative. Doesn't always have to be something glaring, or something that would even matter to any other reader, but they exist. I've found some of mine in just about every fandom I was/am in, though it usually takes a while for me to discover what they are. After three quarters of a year of watching Heroes and reading Heroes fanfic, I have come to the conclusion that the following things especially annoy me when they show up in a story:



1) The name thing. Back in the Jossverse, I used to groan over the existence of "Delia"; it's not like BTVS and AtS are short of nicknames, and the woman in question is "Cordelia" or "Cordy". Nobody, but NOBODY on either show ever called her "Delia". So why introduce that in fanfic? In Heroes, the two equivalents of "Delia" are "Pete" if used by someone other than Nathan, and "Nate". Nathan occasionally calls his younger brother "Pete" instead of "Peter"; not all the time, just now and again, and it usually conveys something emotionally. Nobody else does. Which makes Sylar's use of "Pete" so effective a taunt in the climactic revelation scene from "Five Years Gone", as in "But we know better, don't we, Pete". Consequently, if Peter gets called "Pete" all over the place, be it by Claude or someone else, it irritates me. The use of "Nate" irritates me even more, because that's entirely made up and not used by anyone on the show, including Peter. (It also immediately brings Nate Fisher from "Six Feet Under" to mind.) Now everyone has their own fanon - mine is that Nathan would either ignore people calling him "Nate", given them one withering stare and then ignore them, or make a sarcastic remark, depending on who they are - but I think the way Heroes uses pet names, or doesn't, isn't just random. It's menat to signify something about the characters. The fact that Noah Bennet calls his daughter "Claire Bear" is one of the first humanizing touches we get, an early hint that the character who got introduced to us as a sinister force might have a different side. Nobody whom Peter meets calls him "Mr. Petrelli", everyone uses his first name, which fits Mr. Instant Bonding. By contrast, when Matt meets Nathan at the police station in Lizards and reintroduces himself, mentioning they met briefly in Odessa when Nathan retrieved Peter, he calls Nathan "Mr. Petrelli". So does Mohinder. The big exception is Hiro. Hiro gets Nathan's full name during their first encounter, and also gives his full name, but on subsequent meetings, when he doesn't call him "Flying Man", he calls him "Nathan", and Nathan when explicitly seeking out Hiro in Parasite also addresses him as "Hiro". (Whereas he always refers to Mohinder as "Suresh" or "Dr. Suresh", as in "We can talk to Suresh". The only time he uses Mohinder's first name is when it's not Nathan but Sylar in disguise, in "Five Years Gone".) Matt and Nathan graduate to last names without "Mr." or "Detective" pretty soon, and Matt uses "Nathan" for the first time when trying to get Nathan out of his Maury-induced nightmare; Nathan keeps switching between "Matt" and "Parkman" for the rest of volume 2. Kensei/Adam nicknames Hiro "Carp" early on, and keeps using the pet name after their breakup, usually at a point when he wants to convey bitterness and betrayed affection. Bob uses his "call me Bob" opening time and again, and never makes anyone call him "Mr. Bishop"; it's part of his "I'm harmless and forgettable, underestimate me, please!" facade. Oh, and while we're talking Elders, if Kaito, who not only has known Angela for decades but used to have a sexual relationship with her, doesn't call her by a nickname but "Angela", I very much doubt anyone else did. Again, all of this gives us indications about how the characters see each other and themselves, how distant or close they are. So when in a story details like this are randomly ignored, I am anal enough to react badly. Lastly: what is it with Mohinder suddenly calling Matt "Matthew"?

2) That projected knowledge and feeling thing. This I found more in roleplay journals during the course of the last year than in fanfic, but it's in fanfic as well, and again, Heroes doesn't do anything there which other fandoms haven't done as well. To wit: the writer projects her/his feelings about another character on the character she's writing, regardless of how "her" character sees that other person on the show. In Heroes, stories that have Peter hostile towards his mother stumble right against my suspension of disbelief. Post-volume 2 stories are an exception; it's anyone's guess how Peter will react. But if you are setting the story before the season 1 finale, I don't care how much you dislike Angela Petrelli. Peter doesn't. He takes her part, not Nathan's, in the show pilot. His scenes with Angela are free of the tension that characterizes the interaction of Angela and Nathan. He looks neither surprised nor skeptical when she says he's her favourite. Mind you, it also never seems to occur to him to tell her about the flying, or to give her an alternate explanation for the incident that lands him in the hospital than the one Nathan gave, and he clearly disbelieves her "he doesn't love you" in the pilot, so you can make a case for Peter not being as close to Angela as he is to Nathan, or for not believing her every word. But he clearly loves her and has no anger or hostility towards her. (If Peter is hostile, he kind of makes that noticable. Ask Isaac.) What's more, please don't write stories in which Angela forbids Peter to go to nursing school and Nathan supports him. We have canon on that. In "Six Months Ago", Angela makes her "we need a nurse in the family, we have enough lawyers" remark, and Peter, kissing her and saying "thanks, Mom" clearly takes that as approval. Meanwhile, Nathan just as clearly at best doesn't take Peter's job very seriously and at worst sees it as something below his brother. (The shoes are a joke between brothers, but in the car scene when he's talking to Heidi, he sounds clearly annoyed when he says "my brother the nurse, can you believe it?" and in the pilot of course he basically says "the whole dreamer thing is cute, but it's time to get a real job" and offers Peter one at his campaign. Now what I can buy is that Angela, being the arch manipulator she is, wasn't keen on Peter being a nurse, either, and first had Arthur play the bad cop to her good cop and after Arthur's death tried to make Nathan into the bad cop. But if so, she successfully disguised it, and a pre-season 1 finale story has to take that into account. (A post season 1 finale story could have Peter react to the whole Charles Deveaux-Angela conversation he overheard, of course, but then the problem is that during the three months at the Company, he had other things to angst about, and afterwards, he had amnesia. In "Out of Time", when he gets a series of memories about Angela back, they obviously are positive ones.)

3) Admittedly solely based on summaries: Sylar isn't Mr. Hyde, and Gabriel Gray isn't Mr. Jekyll. In other words, the man isn't schizophrenic, and Gabriel isn't an alternate well-meaning but weak personality. We got a good long look at Gabriel pre-Sylar in Six Months Ago. I seem to remember an obsessive type who really, really wanted to be special and had quite a temper when hearing he might not be. So if a story is summarized as portraying some Sylar-Gabriel struggle, I am tempted to suspect the writer has watched AtS' Orpheus once too often.

4) Also based on summaries and a few aborted attempts to read the stories in question: Claire might have a penchant for hurting herself, but at no point is she portrayed as downright suicidal. At her most desperate and guilty-feeling, about the seemingly dead Noah in Truths and Consequences she wishes the Haitian would take her memories away. She doesn't wish herself dead. So I very much doubt that she spent the months between seasons 1 and 2 suicidally pining for Peter and wishing she had died instead. In fact, the phonecall from Four Months Ago portrays her in a rather healthy state of grief, the moving on one. And there is no reason why she shouldn't. Yes, she did the instant bonding with Peter, and he deeply affected her, but the most time she spent with him was a week (between her arrival in New York and election day). This does not make her Juliet in the last act. Note that in her brief conversation with Nathan, she goes from I know why you do this, I miss him, too to talking about the way she can't deal with pretending to be someone else and to figure out who she is, which makes for the main part of the conversation. If you want to write for a female character who is feeling suicidal with grief, go for Maya.

5) Claude: Not Nine In Disguise. Any stories in which Claude behaves towards Peter like Nine did towards Rose instantly make me click away. Those were two different characters, people, and two entirely different relationships. I think around "Unexpected" Claude had reached the point where he thought he maybe didn't hate the kid. But then came kind reminders of the past, and he got out of Dodge post-haste. But even if you postulate he was a firm believer in tough love, had an instant attraction to Peter he cunningly disguised with snark and somehow knew Peter wouldn't die when thrown of a roof, no matter whether or not he'd be able to use a power, we've yet to see any sign he didn't do just what he said he would - get out of town, since he had no intention of either getting himself captured or being there when the big exposion happened. So stories in which Claude really was invisibly body-guarding Peter or angsts about Peter non-stop have the clicking-away-instantly effect on me. And let's not even mention stories in which Claude lectures Nathan on his behaviour towards Peter. See above, re: projecting feelings on characters.

Comments

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

One that always throws me out of a story is Servalan addressing people as "dear". I once combed through the scripts to confirm that she never, ever utters the word, though a couple of characters use it to her (Verlis says "my dear", and Krantor "my dear Commander"). She usually flirts through her voice and body language, rather than words. But in fanfic she's constantly dearing everyone she meets.

[linaerys.livejournal.com]

I am so with you especially on the "Pete" and "Nate" things. I'll buy a non-canonical nickname if and only if it's set up well over the course of a long, well-done fic. Heroes does use names very carefully. The only time I ever used "Nate" was when Nathan was 18 and someone is trying to get under his skin. I can't imagine him going for that.

Re: Peter and Mrs. Petrelli--I can definitely see futures where Peter becomes suspicious of her. I think he loves her, and takes her love for him as a given, but he overheard her calling him weak and I think he's not completely blind to her manipulations and her dark side. So I can buy a lot of different futures for their relationship.

And GOD, I've never understood this whole treating-Gabriel-Gray as a different person. He's Sylar's past, not a different personality.

[yahtzee63.livejournal.com]

I can buy some Peter-Angela friction, depending on how and when it's portrayed. Peter obviously does not have a lot of anger about Angela that he carries around at all times, and his relationship with her is (on the surface) smoother than that he has with Nathan. On the other hand, could I believe that Angela and Peter have had fallings out in the past? Definitely. Peter's too canny about his own ability to emotionally manipulate the people in his family to have been wholly unconscious of the twists and turns of Petrellilogic that Angela employs. (Whether or not Peter can translate this ability beyond the Petrelli clan remains to be seen.) So a story in which they have clashed in the past could completely convince me. It's when people assume that Peter cannot stand his mother and has a purely angry relationship with her that they lose me.

I agree with you 100% on Sylar/Gabriel. I have no idea where people are getting that.

[elyssadc.livejournal.com]

I love you for this. And I wish this was mandatory reading for anyone considering writing in this fandom.

[wee-warrior.livejournal.com]

*applauds*

Wonderful, wonderful. So much word, especially on Angsting!Claire and the alleged Sylar/Gabriel divide. The boy was pretty much one sandwich shy of a picnic, and bashed a man's head in because he didn't like his attitude towards being special, for heaven's sake - that's not the behaviour of someone who is just a meek and decent guy.

Concerning nicknames: I tend to do that in reviews a lot, but when I call Nathan "Nate" or Matt "Matthew" it conveys something about my thoughts on their specific behaviour in a given situation. Doing the same in fic would mean to impose my own views on them on other characters, and especially in using "Nate" parallel to "Pete" it somewhat derails the reason for the nickname - Nathan uses it from a big brother point of view, which means it is both endearment and belittlement, and Peter or even someone else using "Nate" completely misses the context. I think the only person I could see using "Nate" under specific circumstances and not get his head bitten off is Arthur.

[wychwood]

*skims through, after spotting spoilers* *g*

On the suicide thing - I definitely thought, watching the show first time around, that Claire was trying to kill herself. The "that was attempt number six" thing. That she'd found out about her powers because she'd tried to commit suicide and failed.

*bookmarks for later*

[pjferret.livejournal.com]

I haven't gotten into the fanfic portion of the Heroes fandom yet myself, but I think all of those would peeve me to no end, as well. Especially the nickanmes and the Syler-as-an-MPD-case. I've seen it in RP, and don't get why people try to make Gabriel a separate personality. As far as they've shown us, Sylar is just the name Gabriel chose to go by in order to keep his evildoings somewhat anonymous and/or unconnected to his real name/identity. It's like Bruce Wayne going by Batman. An alter ego is not the same thing as a split personality!

And I'm glad I'm not the only one that cringes whenever someone uses "Delia" in a Jossverse fic. Especially when the character calling her that is Angel or someone else that has already been established in canon as calling her Cordy or Cor.

[mimesh.livejournal.com]

but I think the way Heroes uses pet names, or doesn't, isn't just random. It's menat to signify something about the characters.

So very true. I liked your overview of the use of names in Heroes and I agree that the show uses not only pet names but names very carefully.

2) I might add shipping tendencies who also have a habit of coloring characterizations to the point of OOC-ness.

Have you heard of Sybriel? Now that's something I really don't get although I have to admit it might even have some foundation in canon. *g*

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

I suspect that may be fannish contagion from how Jacqueline Pierce uses "DARLING!" as a response to absolutely everything in DVD commentaries and probably also convention appearances. Like the Buffy vanilla thing which apparently came out of an SMG comment about her real-world favourite fragrance.

[wee-warrior.livejournal.com]

2) I might add shipping tendencies who also have a habit of coloring characterizations to the point of OOC-ness.

My absolute favourites here are the characterizations in certain Claire/Peter fic summaries. Claire as the weepy romance novel heroine! Nathan either dead or as every villain cliché combined! Noah either conspicuously absent or secretly okay with his daughter dating her uncle!

[mimesh.livejournal.com]

Haha, you have to be psychic because I was actually talking about my foray into Paire fic when I was new to the fandom. After the third fic that painted Nathan as the ultimate villain and Peter hating his brother, I thought it might be wise to explore other parts of fandom. You find bad writing and clichés in every corner of the fandom but neglecting the basics of canon characterization such as the HRG-Claire and Peter-Nathan bond is one of my buttons.

[callmesandy.livejournal.com]

I so so appreciate seeing someone else pays as much attention to names and the power of besides me. Though, really, I did it in Sports Night, (my first fandom!) and then got burned out on the number of people who insisted on having Danny call Casey "Case" all the TIME when it happened twice in the series, and both times under extreme emotional duress. Ugh. So now I'm burned out on it.

I guess the way I won't read fic where Connor has become "Conner" is a different thing. :)

[47-trek-47.livejournal.com]

And, as someone pointed out (it totally may have been you...) Nathan very pointedly calls Angela "Mom," when he's always called her "Ma" before, when he's telling her Peter's alive. You're very right about Heroes very deliberate use of names and nicknames.

I always read these lists with terrified fascination, sure that I'll have done everything on it, but I only used "Nate" once, when I was new to the fandom and totally didn't know better. Whew.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Oh, I don't think Peter sees Angela as a harmless middle-aged/old lady now (though I don't think per-s1 finale he'd have suspected her of being in on the Blow Up New York plan), and as I said, it's interesting that he never tells her anything important. And for future fic, anything is game. It's just present day or past fic that postulates he actively hates her/despises her/has a hostile relationship with her instead of loving her that I can't buy because that is not what we were shown.

I remember Nathan's classmate calling him "Nate" to annoy him in your story! That actually worked for me, because Nathan reacted just as I thought he would.*g* And it's the kind of thing teenagers do.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I don't think Peter is completely naive about Angela's brand of manipulation, no, and as I said, it's noticable that he never tells her anything important through season 1 (except that he dreamt about Nathan's accident, maybe) even in those scenes when they're together and he tries to cheer her up or she tries the same. But what I'm talking about are stories in which he's really actively hating her, or coldly hostile, and they're set pre-season 1 finale, which just does not compute.

Re: Peter's own ability to manipulate people: well, there is one instance where he does do it deliberately outside the family, with Elle in Four Months Ago, though one could argue special circumstances, I suppose. (It's also interesting that he must have point blank and convincingly lied to Claire when promising not to call Nathan despite having every intention of doing so, but then this was after he knew Claire was family.) Still, Elle's the one with the keys and the electro shock power, and he gets her to plead with him ("just a little one?") and negotiate, tell him something about her past and finally completely buy that he likes her via emotional manipulation alone, and he does it consciously. Angela would be proud.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I think it was cadesama who once said that if Gabriel hadn't met Chandra, he'd still have embarked on a career as a killer. If not as a serial killer, then as someone like Mark David Chapman, killing a celebrity for the fame. He had that kind of personality.

Well, use of nicknames in reviews is different! That's you as an observer speaking, not an attempt to give one of the characters a voice.

Arthur: good point. We simply don't know enough about him to say whether or not he was the nickname using type, but if he was, he'd be the sole one in a position to do so.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

That's interesting. I was completely unspoiled despite starting to watch after the eighteenth episode had been broadcast and so there had been considerable Heroes talk on my flist, not all below cuts (though thankfully in general terms above cut, on the lines of "OMG Hiro is so cute!"), and it never even occured to me Claire might have tried to commit suicide when seeing the pilot. Now, of course, we know she didn't and how she found out about her powers, but back then, without that background knowledge - I suppose one reason why Claire didn't strike as suicidal was that, well, she was irritated and upset about this whole thing but not in despair, and worried how it might affect her day-to-day life and standing in school. (People often forget that Claire in the pilot was still very much in snobbish cheerleader mode, as evidenced by her "I'll even talk to you in public" statement towards Zach.) This didn't seem to me a girl who had tried to kill herself, or was trying kill herself.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I've seen it in RP, and don't get why people try to make Gabriel a separate personality.

I suspect it's because they want him to be redeemable and able to hook up with the character of their choice. But seriously, Heroes does the multiple personality disorder thing with a character. She is called Niki. If there was even the slightest intention to write Sylar as someone with an alternate personality, he'd have gotten similar scenes and imagery to Niki/Jessica. Which he didn't. He has been consistently the same character, no matter what he calls himself.

"Delia": you're so not the only one, trust me. honorh and self ranted about this to each other ages ago...

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Sybriel: have heard of it, yes, and true about the foundation in canon. (Those writers, ts!) And no, I don't get the appeal, but then I don't get the appeal of doppelganger slash in any fandom, even if the character in question isn't one I dislike anyway. And every fandom has doppelganger slash (i.e. where character A, played by actor X, is paired up with character B, also played by actor X, and in more rare cases actually character A with character A). It comes down to different kinks working for different people, I suppose, and this particular one never worked for me and never will.

re: 2) I see W_w and you have that covered. And yeah, that's how my valiant attempt to read some of that ended as well.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

He. The misspelling button is one that is more specific for the Jossverse to me - where it happens all the time, from "Druscilla" to "Conner" - and yes, I won't read those stories, either. Whereas I am a bit more forgiving in Heroes when someone misspells "Bennet" as "Bennett".

Not having seen Sports Night, I nonetheless think given your description that's a good example of what I mean about the misuse of names in fanfic. In most shows, it really is very important to characterisation. Going back to the Jossverse: it's ic for Xander to refer to Buffy as "the Buffster" - he did this a couple of times on screen. But it would be completely ooc for Angel to do the same thing...

[selenak.livejournal.com]

It wasn't me, but that's a neat detail, yes, and indicative of the way Heroes uses names and nicknames.

Also: I'm sure someone somewhere has a list of fanfic don't which includes stuff I've done, because yes, each time you write in a new fandom you are a bit insecure at first. That's why feedback is so important!

[cadesama.livejournal.com]

Absolutely agreed on 1, 2 & 3. Especially 3, because I already hate Orpheus and think it was a crappy, reductionist, cop out treatment of Angel/us. Plus, I absolutely think Gabriel would have become a serial killer with or without superpowers. You don't need to steal brains to become "special", and that's his primary drive. It's also ridiculous because Heroes already has a DID character. And one that's actually not completely wrong about the pathology and causes of the disorder.

Lastly: what is it with Mohinder suddenly calling Matt "Matthew"?

Well, that's what controlling wives do with their husbands -- they pull out the full name as if they are the mother of the man. (Not always, but yeah, that's what my experience has been there, which is why I can't help but wince when people think it's cute to do in fiction.)

Now what I can buy is that Angela, being the arch manipulator she is, wasn't keen on Peter being a nurse, either, and first had Arthur play the bad cop to her good cop and after Arthur's death tried to make Nathan into the bad cop.

See, I can actually buy that she was trying to undermine Peter being a nurse. Not actively, necessarily (since obviously it was a good ticket to hooking him up with Charles, and she was very possibly masterminding a Peter/Simone match through that), but she does make some comments about his salary in the pilot that show she thinks nursing is beneath a Petrelli. And I can't imagine that she or Nathan was pleased with the idea of Peter watching people he loves die for a living. Because, of course, he will love them.

But that's a rather more altruistic reason for trying to get him a new career than Angela bashers would go for.

Can I also add a fic-squick of people writing Peter as naive to manipulation? Adam is pretty much the exception, and there are a hell of a lot of mitigating circumstances there. In general, Petrellis win at manipulation, and if I never see another fic where poor, delicate flower Peter is manipulated into dirty, dirty sex it'll be too soon. (If he's playing innocent, it's just so he can get someone to slam him into a wall and ravish him.)

Oh, and I randomly get tetchy about the idea of Peter going to public school or Nathan going to any college other than Annapolis. He was a pilot! You can't do that if you just enlist!

[cadesama.livejournal.com]

I actually have a lot less tolerance for misspellings in Heroes. They show us their names every week!

[selenak.livejournal.com]

I hate Orpheus, too, for those reasons and with a vengeance. But londonkds has the coolest fanwank ever, which is that the Angel/Angelus as two different people in that is the result of the combined projections of Faith - who has an idealized image of her "sponsor" - and Angel-without-soul - who WOULD have nightmares about saving puppies with one. Since we're in their heads. I.e. it's not a two personalities thing, it's how Faith imagines Angel/us plus some nightmares of the guy himself.

And I can't imagine that she or Nathan was pleased with the idea of Peter watching people he loves die for a living. Because, of course, he will love them.

Of course, and now I wish futuresoon had him have a longer conversation with Cameron in her House crossover. She loves her dying patients, too.

Adam is pretty much the exception, and there are a hell of a lot of mitigating circumstances there.

There are. I suppose you could add Bob - for having gotten Peter to agree to the Company custody to begin with - but that was directly after Peter exploded in the sky and got Nathan toasted, for heaven's sake. Also, Bob demonstrated via the Haitian that they did indeed have a way to contain Peter's powers, and if you had just nearly nuked NY because you couldn't control them, what would you do?

if I never see another fic where poor, delicate flower Peter is manipulated into dirty, dirty sex it'll be too soon.

Well, me, too, but you have to admit that the stories in which he's a slut are far more numerous. *g* I.e. the fanon that Peter had a lot of sex with people of either gender before we meet him in the show pilot. I usually go for that fanon, too, though I'll admit it doesn't quite square with his dorky behaviour towards Simone, but then Simone, being the daughter of Ideal Dad Charles, may have been in a different category for him.

[cadesama.livejournal.com]

Angel/Angelus as two different people in that is the result of the combined projections of Faith - who has an idealized image of her "sponsor" - and Angel-without-soul - who WOULD have nightmares about saving puppies with one. Since we're in their heads. I.e. it's not a two personalities thing, it's how Faith imagines Angel/us plus some nightmares of the guy himself.

Ohhh, I like that. It makes far more sense than it metaphysically being true, or than Angel himself seeing it that way (given that he has stated on multiple occasions that he is Angelus and there is no divide).

Cameron in her House crossover. She loves her dying patients, too.

They could martyr themselves together!

. Also, Bob demonstrated via the Haitian that they did indeed have a way to contain Peter's powers, and if you had just nearly nuked NY because you couldn't control them, what would you do?

Exactly. Peter was looking to be punished and to be contained. Even if Bob hadn't sold the place as a center to help mutants, he probably would have gone for it. If Peter had been thrown into a prison, he wouldn't have fought. He only decided to escape once the possibility of saving Nathan was on the table. Now, not realizing that he wasn't in a prison was pretty foolish, but I don't think he can really be held accountable for his mental state at that point. He was traumatized by the explosion and then drug addled for months.

I.e. the fanon that Peter had a lot of sex with people of either gender before we meet him in the show pilot. I usually go for that fanon, too, though I'll admit it doesn't quite square with his dorky behaviour towards Simone, but then Simone, being the daughter of Ideal Dad Charles, may have been in a different category for him.

Heh, yeah. The idea of Peter being a slut is really just too tempting, especially since so much of S2 plays into that idea. The way he acts around Simone, and mentions that he's changed and never would have been brave enough to confess his love to a girl before he went crazy and started jumping off of buildings, doesn't really fit well with it. Of course, there's also the factor where one of the reasons Peter is such a great manipulator is because he always means what he says in the moment he's saying it. So just because he's an awkward dork with Simone at first, that doesn't mean he isn't a slutty serial monogamist. He meant what he said when he said it to her, but that doesn't mean it's actually true.