DEAR YULETIDE WRITER of 2016 ♥
ABOUT ME
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-Fandom tags: Eastern Promises • iZombie • Kings • Kitchen Confidential
LIKES
-Fresh, lively conversation. Banter, casual danger dialogue, dialogue that sub-consciously reveals things about the characters, suspense-ratcheting, etc. (Anything that doesn’t exemplify that sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.)
-Protagonists of a story making time to be friends with their best friends. Scenes of this interspersed with the main romance, action/adventure antics, zombie apocalypse, etc. really makes my day.
-Plot-driven stories, rather than pure character studies.
-Here are the results from my Ultimate Fanfic Tropes Showdown (which I find weirdly telling).
DISLIKES
-Clichés (mooks being simple-minded or easy to defeat, Draco in Leather Pants*, overdone romance tropes, Villain Ball).
-Excess of either angst or fluff; character death. (I cry every time a fairy falls down dead because people didn’t clap hard enough).
-PWP. But I do love UST and the delectable build-up to the deed, and sex scenes where characters talk and curse and banter, and just have fun.
* My motto in life is the immortal words of Jake Peralta, Best Detective Ever: "Cool motive. Still murder."
FANDOM SPECIFIC THINGS
Of the nominated characters for each of these fandoms, I love the whole lot of them to bits. Some characters I like more than others (and I’ve mentioned accordingly below), but you don’t have to include all the mentioned characters in your story. As long as any or two of them is there, that’s absolutely fine.
CHAMPIONS LEAGUE - NORTHENDGIRLS
*internally screaming because I still can't believe this is a thing and thank you so, so much to the person(s) who nominated this!* Biggest thank you of all to anyone who writes this.
Characters: Arsenal, Chelsea, Juventus, Liverpool
Gen or shipfic: Either! Both!
Small degree of background: here
What I would like to see:
- The most epic fantasy your glorious heart desires.
- Not even kidding, go wild. An alternate history of Europe? Brand new fantasy kingdom? Sentient characters in a game? Steampunk space opera with royalty? (It definitely doesn't have to be tech-exclusionary fantasy or magic-exclusionary sci-fi.)
- One request: please bring on the medieval POC but not so much of the medieval white people tropes. Dragons, prized virgins, castles, dreadful winters and Gregor Clegane type armour is old hat. Give me the merchant ships, gunpowder lovers,, deserts, temples, dancing troupes, and polytheists and ladies in really sharp suits and gorgeous crowns.
- It would be a lovely bonus if you included the other clubs from the Player Select piece. (You definitely don't have to incorporate football culture, of course, let alone anthromorphised clubs. I'm just really excited about seeing stories about these characters as people populating their own amazing world.)
Prompts (optional):
- Arsenal and Chelsea as members of a political machine by day and rival assassins by night. Or rivals, period, who use lethal weapons to get the job done.
- Juventus + this post.
- Liverpool as the Crown Princess who is a falconer and champion fighter who brings together a band of knights to go on a diplomatic mission (which is just the cover to retrieve a royal heirloom from a rival kingdom.)
- Royals who are also space captains (Madrid, Monaco, hopefully City). Magicians who use illusions as a cover for murder (Barcelona). Star athletes and stately healers (Atletico and Leverkusen). Blue collar workers in war times (Shakhtar Donetsk and Schalke). The nominated characters in any role that you see them in. Whatever floats your boat!
- Steampunk or clockpunk story set in Asia and/or any era but Victorian London.
Characters: Kirill, Nikolai Luzhin
Gen or shipfic: Either! (Not only do I ship these two with the power of a thousand burning suns, I really love the crazy mind-melting tension between them never fructifying, just intensifying into the most fucked-up emotionally dependent bromance of all time.)
What I would like to see:
- Loyalty! Support! Classism! Power struggle! Bro-hood!
- More scenes like the basement incident or the ending, where the story of Kirill’s ambitions ends with him being absolutely dependent on Nikolai.
- Creepy and violent slice of life among vor y zakone.
- Kirill dealing with the fact that his former driver, longtime bro and living emotional crutch, is more powerful and a bigger threat than he’d ever imagined.
- Them being unapologetically terrible human beings, but with sympathy. Them doing appallingly terrible, morally questionable things. (Come on, who steals a baby?)
- How Nikolai got to where he is when we see him in the movie. How does a complete outsider become Seymon’s red right hand? Tell me everything about who he screwed over (especially on his own side!) to win the consummate trust of the bad guys.
- Something to do with the restaurant. The deceptively sweet domesticity we see in that place always gets to me. Maybe another restaurant opens up down the street and creates competition, and everyone overreacts a little in trying to eliminate the competition win their patrons back.
- Adventures in the bath house. Not necessarily sexcapades, but how the bath house has been used as a conference room by mobsters before, what alliances have been cemented and vendetta satisfied amid ceramic tiles and half-naked old men.
- Kirill’s post-movie rise to power. With him not being the sharpest tool in the box, this ought to be good.
- James Bond AU. But with more love from Russia.
Characters: Liv Moore, Lowell Tracey, Ravi Chakrabarti
Gen or shipfic: Either! (Ships I love: Liv x Lowell, Liv x Ravi, Major x Ravi, Ravi x being the sexiest nerd of all time)
What I would like to see:
- Hashtag Lowell Lives. Regular fic set post-Patriot Brains where Lowell is alive for no apparent reason. For example, I have a burning desire to see him being around during Liv's frat boy phase. (Liv x Lowell is my OTP of OTPs, but if that’s not your thing, my second OTP is def. Lowell x being alive.)
- Liv having a social conscience about wanting to kill the guy who’s abducting and murdering at-risk children, but you know, independent of the fact that said guy just killed her boyfriend.
- The morgue! There is nothing I don’t like about morgues and forensic science, so bring on the shenanigans among the dead.
- Major and Ravi being bros. Liv and Peyton being soulmates. (Although I haven’t requested Major or Peyton, them being around and being awesome people and even better best friends to each other and to Ravi and Liv would be a lovely bonus.)
- How Ravi deals with the entire cast mispronouncing his name.
- Liv and Lowell being young zombies in love and subverting romance tropes. (I especially like how Lowell swings between being incredibly smooth, like the time he made Liv that chilli cocktail, and being adorkable, which the rest of his absurdly short life.) Maybe they get roped into some couple’s retreat in a picture-perfect B&B, but since neither of them can enjoy any of the food nor socialise too well, they snark a lot and have a good time anyway.
- Casefic. A diplomat dies under mysterious circumstances, and the cast has to navigate paranoia, spy shenanigans and state secrets to catch the killer.
- Or not even casefic; just the excuse for Liv to eat odd brains. E.g. a ghostbuster or a bank robber or say it with me: the most epic Dungeon Master of all time (either that makes Major or Ravi’s dreams come true, or else they’re really snobby about tabletop gaming; either way, SHENANIGANS FOR LIFE.)
- Ravi being even a little bit desi. Just because he’s brown doesn’t mean his whole life revolves around the fact, but just the occasional reminder of his culture and how that fits with his Anglo-American life in a basement with a dead girl would be awesome.
- Noir PI AU.
Characters: David Shepherd, Jack Benjamin, Michelle Benjamin, Rose Benjamin
Gen or shipfic: Gen (I like David x Jack best when the one is not so nice to the other.)
What I would like to see:
- POLITICS. Out-and-out down-and-dirty unabashed scheming and manoeuvring. To me, this is the backbone of the show and why I’m so hooked on it. The political intrigues give me LIFE, how a plot starts out as one tiny throwaway comment, snowballs throughout the episode and/or lurks in the background, and then BAM! comes the outrageous payoff/reveal at the very end.
- Humour. The show has a very grim, dark tone, but the way it infuses levity (Silas in the kitchen, Rose being snarky, both of them and their parenting quips, Jack being insouciant) is perfect. Give me more of the faux-domesticity, the family banter and the deadpan delivery.
- JACK BENJAMIN. When I said that I live and breathe for the dirty politics, I meant Jack. I love how he said he’s always trying to wipe out David because he’s “fighting for his right to exist”. His methods are so remorseless and borderline sociopathic, and the motivation itself is so petty, asdfghjkl. (Jack is my favourite and I wanted so badly for him to succeed every time he gets smashed down, but I’m also perfectly okay with him never being redeemed.) BONUS: Stu. Jack and Stu is my oxygen.
- Rose being queen. This is a holdover from bad YA fantasy lit, but I just need more queens being actual queens: ruling through diplomacy and side channels, realising the importance of china patterns and how to manipulate the press. (None of that Dresses Are Bad and Tomboyishness Is the Only Way to Be Respected attitude.)
- Anything set before life really goes to hell in a handbasket, i.e. anything set between the pilot to mid-series. Pre-canon is not my most favourite thing, nor the last few episodes. (I just really, really love the Cross family + allies, you guys.)
- The royal family actually being a family. Not in a whitewashed way, but in the way they’re shown on the show. Rose and Silas are the unstoppable mutually manipulative duo, Silas doting on Michelle and Rose moving heaven and earth for Jack without ever really accepting all of him, Jack never really being on Michelle’s side but being there for her all the times it doesn’t properly count. Give me Slice of Life with them being themselves together. E.g. there's a bomb scare and the Service shuttles them out of the palace and to a remote cabin in the woods where the TV is only seventy inches. (Bonus: Thomasina being the Dragon to Silas.)
- Slightly alternate canon where Jack witnesses the butterflies landing on David and goes all-out to eliminate the competition, without knowing that Silas has to crown David or die. Along the way, he finds out that he’s written his father’s death warrant, but dear old dad is only too happy to die in the arms of someone who’s not Jack’s mother. Jack does an about-turn and makes the painful decision to have David crowned after all. (After all, accidents can always be arranged.) Give me more of their constant tug-of-war of power: David adoring Jack (and believing he is cared for in return) and Jack using and abusing that, even while he genuinely sees David as someone good and loyal.
- Jack and Rose (heh) going forth and being awesome together. (Bonus if Crossgen is also involved.) Maybe the two of them inaugurate an art museum or a veteran’s hospital, or just have a really productive Sunday pulling off a scheme together. I can’t get enough of how deeply and completely Rose loves him, and yet Jack always knows he’s been patronised and dismissed by her in spite of everything she does for him. I would love fic of them being on the same side, with this hanging between them throughout.
- Good versus Evil AU. Superhero, high fantasy archetypes, however you want to take it.
Characters: Jack Bourdain, Steven Daedalus, Teddy Wong
Gen or shipfic: Gen (but also if Jack x Steven or Jack x Teddy floats your boat, go for it!)
What I would like to see:
- The cast being un-PC and just downright terrible. The whole no-holds-barred sense of humour.
- Jack and Steven being Jack and Steven. The unstoppable, inseparable, unflappable dream team. Steven doing shady things to keep Jack at the top of the food chain, and Jack going nowhere without him. In short, the whole "I can't be me without you" dyanmic.
- Although I haven't requested other characters, I love the whole cast A LOT, so def. include them if you like. Teddy and Seth’s rollicking friendship. Everything to do with Mimi as the world’s funniest and most adorable antagonist. PINO! Ramon!
- The One Time Jack Went Too Far About Something and Steven (Against His Better Nature) Went Along With It Even Though Everyone Else Was Violently Opposed… and How It Ultimately Blew Up In their Faces.
- The trials and tribulations of being a poissonnier in a country of red meat-eaters. Teddy being Korean. (E.g. How many of his favourite dishes has he had to bastardise to suit the American palate?)
- The micro-aggravations of working in a kitchen. Diners who stroll in just before the kitchen closes, picky eaters who aren’t happy with the menu, food critics who don elaborate disguises to hide their identity, people who come in with their children. Any or all of the above.
- Heist AU.
- AU not even required; just an excuse to have caper-like shenanigans, e.g. infiltrate a restaurant to get a secret recipe or break into a supermarket to get high-quality truffles when their budget is tight (because they can’t be seen grocery shopping at Walgreen’s.)
PLEASE REMEMBER
If the fandoms we got matched are incompatible with your writing muse (or you're just having some insurmountable writer's block or a failure of inspiration), please note that I have a five-minute fandom (it's honestly just gorgeous art) that I love as much as anything else.
Take each requested fandom and go where your heart desires because I love all of them and their respective characters so much that no matter what you do with them, I'll be blown away by it ♥