timepiececlock

I wrote this poem in 2002, a sort of fanfiction thing, which I used to do quite a lot of in high school but hardly ever do anymore. This one is a strange, abstract thing that has very little in it that is strictly BTVS... it could be read as not having to do with the show at all. But in my mind, it's for Spike.


"moon and sun and something grey"


fancy me with something grey
or maybe just some black and red
with guns and nails and pointy eyes
yes grey’s the thing, i think
not too much black you see,
i’m not quite dark as that
maybe was, but isn’t now
though there’s a one or two who’ll swear
my hat is bloodied and brown,
not white at all
and they’re closer than i want you to know

but you, well look at you!
all cream and yellow and orange
like needles in my eyes
didn’t anyone tell you too much sun can be a bad thing?
must be the california in you
spoiled little ray-child,
all righteous with your glowy skin matching hair
and that damn white cover you can’t lose for a minute.
you must’ve been odd as a brat,

no think thinking caps for you, it’s
did you remember your justice cap today dear?
wear it golden proud
and strike down the unvaliant, the unright, the made ungood
you and your stupid sunlight are all the same
all big-eyed laughter but no sense of humor
irony goes over your head, in my un-asked opinion

me? i’m a moon person, not that it matters to you
you of the
light and bright and all that morning shininess,
of the
i’m so happy in the sun in love and warm and—

—as I was saying,
a moon person, really;
stars are pretty too
but they’re really only little suns, so they don’t count.
in moonlight i could be green or blue or violet
i could be just like one of yours
…and i guess i’d still be only darkly grey
but it’s a pleasant thought, n’est-ce pas?

if you’d come out at night and see,
a moonbeam makes everything grey
orange is grey
and brown is grey
and grey is grey still
and you’re much prettier where i can see you
for real

the moonlight on your hair like that
i say
is maybe worth more than days in the sun,
not that it matters to you.

Fandom Music Videos

A mass list of fan videos by series/show:
http://www.livejournal.com/tools/memories.bml?user=vidding (the community "memories" page of the "vidding" community on Livejournal-- everything from tv shows like BSG to movies like Equilibrium or shows like Band of Brothers)

( reference list of vidding communities for sci-fi shows )

Is there an LJ comm for Lord of the Rings videos?

Aahhhhh...nostalgia. Spike/Buffy, my television OTP of OTPs. Fandom_wank brings back the memories.

avatar_fans, you think you have shipwars? You don't. You have ship pebble-tosses. Ship thumbwars. "You haven't even begun."

It's actually kind of nice though. Shipwars can be tiring (another reason I try to avoid the competitive side of HP fandom whenever I go back to it) and I've moved past the militant phase of my fandom youth toward the "lazy and self-serving" phase which focuses heavily on "ship and let ship" and "what do I care as long as I've got fic to read?"

I was skimming the article "Boys' Comics vs Girls' Comics in Japan" on www.sleepisfortheweak.org, one of my favorite anime/manga review websites. While skimming the article, It made me think of both Twelve Kingdoms and Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon (my first anime), for different reasons.

The article says this on teams/friendship in Shounen manga:

"He almost never goes at anything solo--he may be at the top in the end, but he'll never get there without his best friend/group of friends helping him, and he'd never turn his back on a single one of them (not even on the jerk or the hothead or the coward, because every group has at least one). ... ...but bonds outside of the main two or three people are usually less solid, and a shoujo lead is perfectly able to live her own life with her man and leave her friends to their own devices (or, frankly, out of the story)."

My first thought was for Sailor Moon, the series that was my first exposure to anime and to this day is my initially defining idea of shoujo (though this is probably a poor example, as SM is a superhero story more than what I now define as a shoujo story.) But when I think aobut it, SM actually differs quite a bit from other shoujo I've since read: the team and friendship is all-important to the story of SM. Although SM has a very prominent love story, the show is, in essence, about friendship and teamwork. In some ways it's oddly like Buffy-- the love life of the heroine and her brooding beau may go up or down, but at the end of the day she has her scooby gang and her wise mentor to make everything alright. SM is so into the idea of friendship and teamwork to fight the good fight that it's practically a Care Bears episode at times. Side note: Being fairly femnist-minded, I think I'm weirdly lucky that, for all its many flaws, my first anime was a superhero story where the girl is the hero and her boyfriend is a perpetual sidekick/villain... well, except for the first season where he's a dark rescuer with mysterious loyalties... oh fuck, I shoudl really sit down one day and list the ways Buffy was like Sailor Moon.

The primary focus on friendship/teamwork doesn't make SM any less shoujo (there's a lot of other ways the series defines shoujo cliche, especially in the little things), but it makes me curious to realize that, when I think back on it, I actually can't remember many other shoujo series I've read where teamwork/friendship is a big deal. It's certainly not a big deal in Fushigi Yuugi (teamwork that is, as friendship *is* a big deal but only because the best friend is the antagonist of the series), the only other shoujo series I can think of at the moment that I've seen from start to finish (Princess Tutu doesn't count because that series is its own genre of themes and styles.) Is Paradise Kiss a shoujo series? For some reason I want to label it something else.

The article says this on goals in Shoujo manga:

Shoujo is usually less about the goal and more about the "getting there," so, while a shounen manga may have a very desirable ambition and a very specific route the characters must follow to succeed, shoujo titles usually stay away from that formula and focus more on the varying things that happen to the lead throughout her life.

That made me think of The Twelve Kingdoms, where lack of focus is never a problem for the heroine's plotline, and the story is all about the adventure. This was then followed by the thought "You know, 12K has a lot of the elements of a shonen series." Why? Because it's a cool adventure story about action and fighting and war and battles and politics. Its main character just happens to be female instead of male. And I don't mean she embodies traditionally "masculine" traits, because she doesn't-- she just happens to be set on an adventure where she learns to kick ass and take names and save the kingdom from destruction.

I'd love to have more series like that. I can name the few that I've watched that are like that on one hand: (12K, SM, Read Or Die OVA, Princess Tutu)

I'd love to see more anime or manga where you can have battles and adventure and drama... and the hero is female. I want more Buffy's and more Beatrix Kiddo's in my anime, please.

My roommate K just informed me that she never saw how Buffy ended.

We were talking about romance and I ended up talking about Spike's redemptive romantic character arc and how much I loved season 7 and she ASKED ME HOW IT ENDED.

I nearly died on the spot. I had to cover my mouth not to speak.


We're watching all of season 7, from the beginning, over Spring Break. OMG SHE'S GONNA CRY. SHE'S A CRIER. THEN I MIGHT CRY BECAUSE SHE'LL CRY.

This viewing will be possible due to the kindness of a certain wonderful someone. ::winks:: You know who you are. Thank you so much, because now my friend's gonna get to see it too.

I think I need to buy Season 6 of Buffy on DVD. Seriously. Because I was just thinking about "Once More With Feeling", and "Tabula Rasa", and how much I'd like to see those episodes again. Cause damn, they were pretty and romantic and happy and sad.

And then I'll have to buy Season 7 so that I'll feel okay again after I finish Season 6, which will no doubt leave me depressed. Plus Season 7 ends with the burning hands, which is still my choice for most purely romantic tv moment of any show I've loved.

Season 7:




I was thinking about making this a Fruits Basket icon. Maybe like so:






Anyone wanna make it for me? In my day of extreme laziness? We could have lots of different versions!

Last night while trying to fall asleep I made a list in my head of my "most OTP OTPs"... i.e. the pairings I'm most emotionally invested in, and the ones I think are "even more meant for each other than your normal OTP." Televison and anime/manga. In order of true-est.

P.S.: I typed for two hours to write this stuff. It's like a mega-essay. So please, comment! Squee with me or disagree, I don't care. :) Let me know what you think. What your most-OTP OTPs are.

( Anime (big spoilers for Princess Tutu, Escaflowne, Fruits Basket, and Gundam Wing, mild spoilers for Sailor Moon, and Ranma 1/2 )


( Television (spoilers for Buffy, Farscape, The X Files )


What did you learn from this meme?

That just as often as Shaka's ships have happy endings, the other half of them ends in tragedy or bittersweet departure. I guess I come from the Casablanca / Gone With The Wind school of romance.


*CURSE THE BEE! THE DAMN BEE!

Giles is a pain in my slayer neck.

He hobbles about and I have to waste 4 continues trying to keep him from getting killed.

Anyway, I'm on level 5 now, wandering the FE's version of Alternate!Sunnydale looking for my Scoobies.

Is it just me, or does VideoGame!Buffy stand just a little too close to VideoGame!Ethan Rayne?

AAAAAAAACK! My VideoGame!Buffy has sexual chemistry with the enemy!

....Alright, so it is Buffy we're talking about here and that kind of chemistry is to be expected I suppose. But Ethen? Ick. Clearly fewer pixels on the tv means fewer standards for this heroine's love life. Flirt with Spike, dammit! He's like right next to you! Which button is "flirt" on Playstation controllers?

Best get her back to DVD soon where she's attracted to properly sexy villains.

On other comments... I get a kick out of VideoGame!Willow and VideoGame!Tara together. And the character designs for all the characters are pretty good, I think. In most respects they have made an effort to make them looke like the characters. Willow's eyes are particularly well done.

The Bad News: I'm on level five and I still haven't figured out how to throw the holy water or hellfire bottles.

Also, the game pamphlet says I can kill things with the axe, but so far, not the case. I can damage them with axes, but I have to stake them for them to die.

I have to stop reading other people's episode summaries.

I just have to... stop.

I was happy. Really, really, happy. And other people's comments are making me feel depressed, and what's more making me bad for liking the show.

Unlike a lot of you, I like this show, I like this season, and I liked the last episode.

And I don't want to be made to feel bad for actually liking my favorite show on tv.

So I'm just going to skip all the episode summaries for the next 2 weeks until it ends. Or, most of them. I'll probably break and read a few. I'm weak.

But instead I'll be commenting on icons and fic and random stuff, rather than ep response/discussion.

ETA: This is not meant to pinpoint one specific person. And see previous post where I said I :heart: you all and want to read your fic. Just not ep summaries, for another 14 or so days.