Give me a Team 7 blueberry pie. And recs, among other things.
I haven’t been on LJ for a month due to personal reasons, but during that time, I’ve been reading. Books, physics guides, doujin, medical texts, wiki pages on Japanese cultures, and fanfiction.
Especially fanfiction.
I think… it was good for me to step away from fandom for a bit. It gives you a whole new perspective. Fandom has affected my life in countless ways - I’ve practically grown up with it since I was ten. So I cannot not blog about this… ~trend~ I’ve come to notice in fandom shipping. The people who are for or against a pairing, their arguments, holes in their arguments, supplementary “evidence” for their pairing, their motivations for writing that pairing, their willingness/unwillingness to accept, move on and branch out. And see it from the other side.
Note that all of the above has been observed by me, lurker extraordinaire, on mainly FFN, Narutoforums and LJ. I refuse to say anything about FFN. Narutoforums threads… amuse me. And at the same time, scare me with their fucking fierce arguments and troll threads. It’s practically a war in there (but I’m glad to say things have calmed down considerably since 2006/2007. Most of the older fans are just tired of the shit Kishimoto keeps pulling on occasion, so our reactions to everything are just “meh, LOL KISHI. Just. LOL.” >__>;;).
LJ seems a lot calmer so I tend to do most of my blogging here, because I’m a wuss like that. Note that “calmer” is only applicable for the active Naruto communities (thank you, mods♥) - I cannot speak for the more private Naruto-related interactions that take place on this site.
(Interestingly, I’ve heard rumours of the friends-lock option on entries being put to good use, especially if you f-list tends to be huge/has people of diverse [read: conflicting] interests. I cannot decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. :|)
This is how I am about pairings when I’m stressed:
Sasuke Uchiha/Sakura Haruno
Skip, unless you're willing to give up a big chunk of your time
Fandom has been fun. Fandom has been amazing. But sometimes, it’s just not fun at all. It’s the total opposite of amazing.
…You know what pisses me off about fandom the most? It’s when all those wankers someone claims something can’t be done. What I want to say, but refrain from saying is: “You don’t know that so stop acting so self-righteous.”
If something can’t be done then explain to me how this was done. Or this. This. And this. this. Perhaps this.
I find it hard to believe that people who can, to quote a dear friend, “coax beauty out of simple words”, can be “shallow”, as haters like to often put it. Sure, there are SasuSaku fans who... give the pairing the label of "Product of Shallow Fangirlism", but when people's reaction to SasuSaku is immediately "shallow", it's a... bit of an insult to the writers who slave over the pairing. Writers whom I respect because they breathe new life into a pairing turned cliché by the masses.
One of the main arguments used against this pairing, among others, is: SasuSaku is cliché. But then again SasuNaru (rivalshipping) is cliché, too. And so is NaruSaku (main boy/main girl). And I’m feeling a bit suicidal so I’ll say NaruHina is, too. >_>
(Shy girl worshiping/pining after the outgoing, overconfident male seems to be a recurring theme in animanga - often used as nothing more than a way to glorify aforementioned outgoing, overconfident male. But that’s a story for another day.)
The point is: They are all clichés. On the surface, for even though the general theme of ~.+friendship+.~ and idealism has been recycled and reused and remained constant over the last eleven years, the characters have matured (not… in the best ways, perhaps, but still) and the way they see each other must have changed, too.
For example, I don’t believe Sakura’s feelings for Sasuke are superficial as they once were (why do people still insist on saying that despite chapter 474?) or that Naruto’s obsession with Sasuke can be explained away with “because he promised” thank god canon disproved that \O/ or that Sakura and Naruto are nothing but “good friends” (it’s true that they found common ground in Sasuke, but how much they’ve grown to care for each other isn’t something to be dismissed so easily - I’ll stop before I write an essay on them).
So I don’t get why haters won’t see Naruto as anything more than a loud, annoying, typical shounen hero friend who’s an annoying pest and should always on the sidelines of Sasuke and Sakura’s tragic twu lub or, preferably, not at all because he probably isn’t that important anyway, because Sasu and Saku have each other and their family of a billion children and their happily ever after, Sakura as something other than the shallow, typical Tsundere main girl bitch who abuses Naruto and is out to get in the way of Sasuke and Naruto’s obvious and hawt lyk burning man-feelings for each other, look at those intense I’ll-beat-the-shit-outta-you gazes, mmmyeah baby, they’re totally checking each other out and Sasuke as something other “emo, cool, typical rival for shounen hero” the fucker who betrayed them all and just won’t die so Naruto and Sakura can start pining after him and start having sexytiemz, he doesn’t deserve them, they deserve each other so obviously Naruto/Sakura will get tired of him and kill him if the chance strikes and proceed to start having aforementioned sexytiemzzz.
MY POINT IS: They’ve all grown out of the “TYPICAL” and so-
-so it pisses me the fuck off irritates me when, despite all the evidence (note: I use this term very loosely), shippers tend to label their preferred pairing as “kawaii” (god, I see nothing “kawaii” about teammates who keep potentially life-altering secrets from each other/lie to each other/try to kill each other/think that dying together would be so awesome, fuck yeah) and pass off their hated pairing as “cliché”.
To be honest, what really is original anymore? Sometimes, when I read something from seasoned writers, I often get the feeling that they’re tired. Of the clichés.
Just like, I’m sure, all of us are. Le sigh.
Clichés in the SasuSaku sub-fandom, from what I’ve seen over the last six years, sprout from the gross generalization of Sasuke and Sakura’s relationship in canon. I feel like posting a link to various web-cities of the fandom internet (LJ, NF, FFN, dA etc) for each of the words I’ve italicized to support my statement. But I will not, for it involves Naming Names and that’s just childish (and potentially hazardous to my life, if the Unnamed happen to be on the revenge crack that Sasuke’s on ;__;).
I have a tendency to cheer for the underdog - SasuSaku definitely is the underdog given the collective hate from all sides for either or both characters. Many claim it’s hard to see them on equal footing.
If relationships were all about physical strength, then NaruSasu would definitely win out. And more than half the heterosexual couples in the world would’ve saved them the trouble and turned gay/lesbian.
It saddens me to say that despite it being a fucking ninja world (a world of ninja!), Sakura will never be as strong as Sasuke, as a ninja (oh Kishimoto, you misogynist… just. I can’t. I applaud your ability to constantly render me speechless with rage every. single. time.). I wonder just how relevant that is, but am unwilling to think further about it in case I burst in vein in feminist indignation.
The same can’t be said for the emotional aspect. And this is where the gross generalization of haters (note: this term is, once again, used very loosely) comes into play. As I write this, I feel the mother of all headaches coming on - probably an allergic reaction to all the HATE I imagine is being directed at me right now. don’t kill me. ;__;
This has turned into a “Cliché? What do you mean? D:<” rambling that encompasses Team Seven more than an analysis of “Why the SasuSaku hate?” It is probably going to turn into an essay on fandom peace of insanely lengthy proportions if I do not get to the point soon.
-Skip End-
What I’m looking for:
→ Fantasy. There’s a severe (and unfortunate) lack of this genre for this pairing, so I’d like to see more of it. Or I’ll have to keep going back to Daughter of the Land for the rest of my life♥ (which I wouldn’t mind, really.) Something that borders on the Supernatural would be awesome, too. And please: nothing with vampires. Just. No.
→ A mood!fic. With pretty metaphors. And rain. Atmosphere. Memories. Something that would make you think of rice-white bones and ink bleeding into paper. Something with... very, very nice prose.
→ Angst. Fuck, yes. Canon!verse or future canon!verse is preferred. AU is welcome, if well-written. High school fics of any kind are not.
→ Something with heavy plot. Heavy, heavy plot. Like Adariaswrath23's fics on FFN, or the Eien no Kessoku and its wonderfully thought-out sequel.
→ Smut, of course. Asphyxiation is kinky.
→ Subtle, painfully understated romance.
→ SOMETHING FROM THE EDO PERIOD. OR SET DURING THE MEIJI RESTORATION. OR HAS ~GEISHA~ IN IT. OR A PIECE SET DURING ANY POINT IN HISTORY, I don't care.
→ Friendship fic. Plain and simple. Canon-verse, pre-shippuden. There's so little of them that I die I a little inside. I miss those halcyon days when they were twelve and made of so much angsty, adorable, heart-wrenching fail.
→ Something that blurs the lines between angst and humour is always nice, too.
Naruto Uzumaki/Sasuke Uchiha
-Skip-
I'm reluctant to talk about this pairing, actually because A)I fear I'll come off biased and B)I fear I'll not come off biased enough to be considered a shipper.
What annoys me about most SasuSaku fans is that they seem to think it's "kawaii" (what? WHAT?) and more often than not, this mindset leads the regurgitating of high school fics and two boring, two-dimensional characters I do not recognise. What annoys me about SasuNaru fans is it's "either SasuNaru or nothing at all" - that seems to the unspoken rule.
I wonder why though. SasuNaru wasn't my first yaoi pairing. I shipped Sendoh/Kaede from Slam Dunk like crazy (Hanamichi/Kaede, too, on ocassion), Green/Red, Ash/Gary (oh, what is it with all this rivalshipping?), and sometime afterward, shipped the hell out of Nuriko/Hotohori from Fushigi Yugi (to think I was twelve when it all happened. O__O)
But never before have I seen yaoi fans get so defensive about their pairing as SasuNaru fans. Of course, it can be attributed to the fact that Naruto is a much larger fandom than any of the above mentioned, but why insist that they are, in fact, gay when there is no evidence and it's a shounen series?
I've seen that being countered by "There's no evidence they're straight, either" but. But:
They don't need to be "gay" in order to have ~man feelings~ for each other. This is me being biased, because "gay/lesbian", "bisexual" and "asexual" have never really meant anything other than a preference. There's no evidence to support you're 100% heterosexual, either. In fact, limiting Naruto and Sasuke to being "gay" or roles like "seme" and "uke", for that matter, just seems... a bit offending, personally. It feels almost... disrespectful(?) to the bond they share - and it's a bit disheartening that fandom seems to focus so much on the sexual aspect of their relationship~
This is why I never go SN fic-hunting (I... mostly just read a select, highly recommended authors, to be honest) - the amount of sex in there scares me. Makes me think "So. This is what their bond amounts to in fandom?" What scares me even more are spineless, dickless, whimpering things that are uke!Naruto or uke!Sasuke. I can't even---
---I'm not brave enough to get into this in detail (this shit was present in fandom since so long ago, and to think it's still even here, after so many years D:), so I'll just redirect you to here (1), here (2) and here (3).
The SasuNaru fandom tends to be as fierce as the boys themselves when it comes to who's on top. It's just a sexual position. Link 1 argues in favor of NaruSasu (solid arguments, lots of controversy), Link 2 SasuNaru (this goes to show exactly why I prefer SN to NS) and Link 3 shows (literally) why they're both so badass that who tops doesn't matter, dammit, your arguments are invalid.
Trying to relegate either Naruto and Sasuke into traditional "uke" and "seme" roles is just plain insulting because neither of them really fit these stereotypes, weren't meant to fit these stereotypes and never will. >__>;;
I think-- I think SasuNaru is unhealthy. For both the boys involved and for me as well, because never has anything been able to raise my blood pressure faster than a sub-fandom creating war on itself. Especially this one. (It's so painful to see my favourite boys butchered over and over again because of this barbaric seme/uke tradition.)
It's preference, I suppose. Just because I prefer SN to NS, doesn't mean I won't read 10Rankai's works (I'm a big fan of the circle, actually, although arguments stated in Link 2 ring truer).
-Skip End-
What I'm looking for:
→ Originality. Sometimes I wish this subfandom (and the SasuSkau one as well) wasn't as popular as it is. At least then, I wouldn't have to dig through the bad!fic galore to find a concept that hasn't been killed to death by fandom. T__T
→ Something that has them being friends. With excellent characterization. Something like this. AUs like these are ♥.
→ High school/College/Uni. I can't believe I'm saying this. DX I don't mind SasuNaru HS/C/U fic at all, if it's well-written. I was actual looking for something resembling the doujin And We by SIGNAL. Or maybe Seishun Kyousou Kyouku. The art styles for both of them (along with their sequels) are lovely. I love how Naruto and Sasuke are such guys about everything. *__* Some of us could probably learn a thing of two about writing HS!fic from them.
→ Something with actual, solid development. That's so rare in this sub-fandom - I've seen writers just "assume" Sasuke and Naruto hold romantic feelings for each other and get straight to the smut. Of course, some try to be "subtle" and end up being -and forgive me for saying this- pretentious instead because they're still working under that same assumption.
If you've read Rasengan22's fics, you'll know what this "actual, solid development" I'm talking about is - her prose was great, not as fantastic as some writers' I know, but her storytelling was - well, let's just say the way she carried the story forward was something. I'd take actual development with nice, clean prose over fic based on assumption any day~
→ HISTORICAL SETTINGS, YES♥
→ And: REINCARNATION THEMES NEVER GO AMISS EITHER. *points at link above*
→ Mood!fic. Mellow. Evocative. Tranquil. A moment stolen, and sealed into memory. Things like that - the little things. (This is just another way asking for a fic where the boys aren't trying to rip each other's throats out.)
→ Smut~ Awkward, embarrassing teenage smut is the best kind♥ I don't care about who tops.
Sakura Haruno/Naruto Uzumaki
It's late - oh wait, it's already early morning - I have badminton practice in an hour, so I'll keep this short.
What I'm looking for:
→ Anything. I wasn't particularly impressed by Shades of the Leaf or Training for the Job but... I did like Garden of Sanctuary and its sequels.
I can never seem to find the best writers for this pairing. I have no idea why/where they are all hiding. T__T The fanartists, though, are all very, very sexy. ;)
/dead
Long desperate entry is long.
I guess what I’m saying is that relationships should be given their proper weight. I’ve seen people dismiss two of the… bonds between members in a team, in favor of glorifying one. It’s just a bit appalling (and heartbreaking) that people would choose to do that just to “justify” their reasons for liking one ship and hating the other, especially when romance wasn’t really the point of the manga at all: teamwork, friendship, ~bonds~ and all those other fun things were. Still are.
ANYHOW. It feels a bit liberating to get all of that out of my chest. I typed this as I thought, so it’s possibly very unorganized (hence, the center-font, which gives the impression of some semblance of order XD), and I hope this hasn’t given you a headache. ^__^!
I’ll be on hiatus for the next four months starting tomorrow (or perhaps the day after, depending on when my ISP providers call in to charge me). So I probably won’t reply to comments just itching to pick a fight, because I don’t have enough time - and even if I did, you’d only get a big smiley face from me nodding along to everything have to say for I’m tired and I may be young and naïve and impressionable but I refuse to be tempted over to either one side of the Team Seven dynamic.
(OT3 is another matter, entirely XD)
But four months without any connection to fandom just evoked the image of “GRAY EVERYTHING IS SO GRAY NOO D:” in my mind, so any recs would be much appreciated. I’ll spend all of tomorrow saving it all, so I have something to read even without my lovely, lovely net connection. So, rec away~
Thank you, fandom~! Goodbye for now♥
<33,
~I.
P.S. Do not bother rec’ing me stuff from authors like, I don’t know, ronsard or nthcoincident or octavius_x or questofdreams or alcedines or firefly or- @__@. Their works have been read and scrutinized and thoroughly loved. Of course, works from writers with similar styles would be much appreciated. ^__^
P.P.S. And you can never - never - go wrong with SasuNaruSaku the best OT3 to ever OT3 threesomes~ *__*
P.P.P.S.** You know what would be really nice? If you could, I don’t know, upload all your favourite fics (regardless of the pairing - I probably read more pairings than any person you know) into a folder (for this, Mediafire is preferred) and give me the download link? It’s… a lot to ask, I realize, but I probably won’t have enough time to save all the fics you rec since my net connection blows a fuse in app. 24 hours and I’ll be out all day, studying. ;__;
So, I was thinking: one-click automatic download >>>> manual saving? Please?♥
P.P.P.P.S. (Okay, this is getting ridiculous so I’ll shut up after this, I swear! DX) I’m sure most of you are aware of the dilemma on y!gal. I have a cousin with a masters degree on the computing sciences in Australia. He does system admin stuff for the company he works for and I would contact him - except that he’s married to this Korean lady, has two kids, and has probably never even heard of… boys doing naughty things with other boys in naughty places - yes, that was how I was going to put it to him when I considered whether to ask him or not. >__>;;
The possibility was ruled out, for more than several reasons. So if you know anyone who has the necessary skills to operate Debian Linux (whatever that is) and isn’t severely homophobic, do contact the y!gal mods.
ETA: I’m digging Burn Notice but my tv privileges will be severely limited for I like torturing myself exercising self-control. So, I was thinking of re-watching Grey’s Anatomy >__>;; I know, I know. Soap-opera to outgloom all other soap-opera but it's so addicting. I was sad when the final season concluded. I was wondering if anyone could rec a place where I can download at least seasons 1-3, for free? Fanpop and Hotfile seem to hate me. T___T
Also: Distance from Yesterday - I just remembered that this fic was written exactly ten years ago from this day and I can't believe how lucky am to have found it. It's Pokémon, and something from my childhood, and completely, utterly amazing.
Especially fanfiction.
I think… it was good for me to step away from fandom for a bit. It gives you a whole new perspective. Fandom has affected my life in countless ways - I’ve practically grown up with it since I was ten. So I cannot not blog about this… ~trend~ I’ve come to notice in fandom shipping. The people who are for or against a pairing, their arguments, holes in their arguments, supplementary “evidence” for their pairing, their motivations for writing that pairing, their willingness/unwillingness to accept, move on and branch out. And see it from the other side.
Note that all of the above has been observed by me, lurker extraordinaire, on mainly FFN, Narutoforums and LJ. I refuse to say anything about FFN. Narutoforums threads… amuse me. And at the same time, scare me with their fucking fierce arguments and troll threads. It’s practically a war in there (but I’m glad to say things have calmed down considerably since 2006/2007. Most of the older fans are just tired of the shit Kishimoto keeps pulling on occasion, so our reactions to everything are just “meh, LOL KISHI. Just. LOL.” >__>;;).
LJ seems a lot calmer so I tend to do most of my blogging here, because I’m a wuss like that. Note that “calmer” is only applicable for the active Naruto communities (thank you, mods♥) - I cannot speak for the more private Naruto-related interactions that take place on this site.
(Interestingly, I’ve heard rumours of the friends-lock option on entries being put to good use, especially if you f-list tends to be huge/has people of diverse [read: conflicting] interests. I cannot decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. :|)
This is how I am about pairings when I’m stressed:
Sasuke Uchiha/Sakura Haruno
Skip, unless you're willing to give up a big chunk of your time
Fandom has been fun. Fandom has been amazing. But sometimes, it’s just not fun at all. It’s the total opposite of amazing.
…You know what pisses me off about fandom the most? It’s when all those wankers someone claims something can’t be done. What I want to say, but refrain from saying is: “You don’t know that so stop acting so self-righteous.”
If something can’t be done then explain to me how this was done. Or this. This. And this. this. Perhaps this.
I find it hard to believe that people who can, to quote a dear friend, “coax beauty out of simple words”, can be “shallow”, as haters like to often put it. Sure, there are SasuSaku fans who... give the pairing the label of "Product of Shallow Fangirlism", but when people's reaction to SasuSaku is immediately "shallow", it's a... bit of an insult to the writers who slave over the pairing. Writers whom I respect because they breathe new life into a pairing turned cliché by the masses.
One of the main arguments used against this pairing, among others, is: SasuSaku is cliché. But then again SasuNaru (rivalshipping) is cliché, too. And so is NaruSaku (main boy/main girl). And I’m feeling a bit suicidal so I’ll say NaruHina is, too. >_>
(Shy girl worshiping/pining after the outgoing, overconfident male seems to be a recurring theme in animanga - often used as nothing more than a way to glorify aforementioned outgoing, overconfident male. But that’s a story for another day.)
The point is: They are all clichés. On the surface, for even though the general theme of ~.+friendship+.~ and idealism has been recycled and reused and remained constant over the last eleven years, the characters have matured (not… in the best ways, perhaps, but still) and the way they see each other must have changed, too.
For example, I don’t believe Sakura’s feelings for Sasuke are superficial as they once were (why do people still insist on saying that despite chapter 474?) or that Naruto’s obsession with Sasuke can be explained away with “because he promised” thank god canon disproved that \O/ or that Sakura and Naruto are nothing but “good friends” (it’s true that they found common ground in Sasuke, but how much they’ve grown to care for each other isn’t something to be dismissed so easily - I’ll stop before I write an essay on them).
So I don’t get why haters won’t see Naruto as anything more than a loud, annoying, typical shounen hero friend who’s an annoying pest and should always on the sidelines of Sasuke and Sakura’s tragic twu lub or, preferably, not at all because he probably isn’t that important anyway, because Sasu and Saku have each other and their family of a billion children and their happily ever after, Sakura as something other than the shallow, typical Tsundere main girl bitch who abuses Naruto and is out to get in the way of Sasuke and Naruto’s obvious and hawt lyk burning man-feelings for each other, look at those intense I’ll-beat-the-shit-outta-you gazes, mmmyeah baby, they’re totally checking each other out and Sasuke as something other “emo, cool, typical rival for shounen hero” the fucker who betrayed them all and just won’t die so Naruto and Sakura can start pining after him and start having sexytiemz, he doesn’t deserve them, they deserve each other so obviously Naruto/Sakura will get tired of him and kill him if the chance strikes and proceed to start having aforementioned sexytiemzzz.
MY POINT IS: They’ve all grown out of the “TYPICAL” and so-
-so it pisses me the fuck off irritates me when, despite all the evidence (note: I use this term very loosely), shippers tend to label their preferred pairing as “kawaii” (god, I see nothing “kawaii” about teammates who keep potentially life-altering secrets from each other/lie to each other/try to kill each other/think that dying together would be so awesome, fuck yeah) and pass off their hated pairing as “cliché”.
To be honest, what really is original anymore? Sometimes, when I read something from seasoned writers, I often get the feeling that they’re tired. Of the clichés.
Just like, I’m sure, all of us are. Le sigh.
Clichés in the SasuSaku sub-fandom, from what I’ve seen over the last six years, sprout from the gross generalization of Sasuke and Sakura’s relationship in canon. I feel like posting a link to various web-cities of the fandom internet (LJ, NF, FFN, dA etc) for each of the words I’ve italicized to support my statement. But I will not, for it involves Naming Names and that’s just childish (and potentially hazardous to my life, if the Unnamed happen to be on the revenge crack that Sasuke’s on ;__;).
I have a tendency to cheer for the underdog - SasuSaku definitely is the underdog given the collective hate from all sides for either or both characters. Many claim it’s hard to see them on equal footing.
If relationships were all about physical strength, then NaruSasu would definitely win out. And more than half the heterosexual couples in the world would’ve saved them the trouble and turned gay/lesbian.
It saddens me to say that despite it being a fucking ninja world (a world of ninja!), Sakura will never be as strong as Sasuke, as a ninja (oh Kishimoto, you misogynist… just. I can’t. I applaud your ability to constantly render me speechless with rage every. single. time.). I wonder just how relevant that is, but am unwilling to think further about it in case I burst in vein in feminist indignation.
The same can’t be said for the emotional aspect. And this is where the gross generalization of haters (note: this term is, once again, used very loosely) comes into play. As I write this, I feel the mother of all headaches coming on - probably an allergic reaction to all the HATE I imagine is being directed at me right now. don’t kill me. ;__;
This has turned into a “Cliché? What do you mean? D:<” rambling that encompasses Team Seven more than an analysis of “Why the SasuSaku hate?” It is probably going to turn into an essay on fandom peace of insanely lengthy proportions if I do not get to the point soon.
-Skip End-
What I’m looking for:
→ Fantasy. There’s a severe (and unfortunate) lack of this genre for this pairing, so I’d like to see more of it. Or I’ll have to keep going back to Daughter of the Land for the rest of my life♥ (which I wouldn’t mind, really.) Something that borders on the Supernatural would be awesome, too. And please: nothing with vampires. Just. No.
→ A mood!fic. With pretty metaphors. And rain. Atmosphere. Memories. Something that would make you think of rice-white bones and ink bleeding into paper. Something with... very, very nice prose.
→ Angst. Fuck, yes. Canon!verse or future canon!verse is preferred. AU is welcome, if well-written. High school fics of any kind are not.
→ Something with heavy plot. Heavy, heavy plot. Like Adariaswrath23's fics on FFN, or the Eien no Kessoku and its wonderfully thought-out sequel.
→ Smut, of course. Asphyxiation is kinky.
→ Subtle, painfully understated romance.
→ SOMETHING FROM THE EDO PERIOD. OR SET DURING THE MEIJI RESTORATION. OR HAS ~GEISHA~ IN IT. OR A PIECE SET DURING ANY POINT IN HISTORY, I don't care.
→ Friendship fic. Plain and simple. Canon-verse, pre-shippuden. There's so little of them that I die I a little inside. I miss those halcyon days when they were twelve and made of so much angsty, adorable, heart-wrenching fail.
→ Something that blurs the lines between angst and humour is always nice, too.
Naruto Uzumaki/Sasuke Uchiha
-Skip-
I'm reluctant to talk about this pairing, actually because A)I fear I'll come off biased and B)I fear I'll not come off biased enough to be considered a shipper.
What annoys me about most SasuSaku fans is that they seem to think it's "kawaii" (what? WHAT?) and more often than not, this mindset leads the regurgitating of high school fics and two boring, two-dimensional characters I do not recognise. What annoys me about SasuNaru fans is it's "either SasuNaru or nothing at all" - that seems to the unspoken rule.
I wonder why though. SasuNaru wasn't my first yaoi pairing. I shipped Sendoh/Kaede from Slam Dunk like crazy (Hanamichi/Kaede, too, on ocassion), Green/Red, Ash/Gary (oh, what is it with all this rivalshipping?), and sometime afterward, shipped the hell out of Nuriko/Hotohori from Fushigi Yugi (to think I was twelve when it all happened. O__O)
But never before have I seen yaoi fans get so defensive about their pairing as SasuNaru fans. Of course, it can be attributed to the fact that Naruto is a much larger fandom than any of the above mentioned, but why insist that they are, in fact, gay when there is no evidence and it's a shounen series?
I've seen that being countered by "There's no evidence they're straight, either" but. But:
They don't need to be "gay" in order to have ~man feelings~ for each other. This is me being biased, because "gay/lesbian", "bisexual" and "asexual" have never really meant anything other than a preference. There's no evidence to support you're 100% heterosexual, either. In fact, limiting Naruto and Sasuke to being "gay" or roles like "seme" and "uke", for that matter, just seems... a bit offending, personally. It feels almost... disrespectful(?) to the bond they share - and it's a bit disheartening that fandom seems to focus so much on the sexual aspect of their relationship~
This is why I never go SN fic-hunting (I... mostly just read a select, highly recommended authors, to be honest) - the amount of sex in there scares me. Makes me think "So. This is what their bond amounts to in fandom?" What scares me even more are spineless, dickless, whimpering things that are uke!Naruto or uke!Sasuke. I can't even---
---I'm not brave enough to get into this in detail (this shit was present in fandom since so long ago, and to think it's still even here, after so many years D:), so I'll just redirect you to here (1), here (2) and here (3).
The SasuNaru fandom tends to be as fierce as the boys themselves when it comes to who's on top. It's just a sexual position. Link 1 argues in favor of NaruSasu (solid arguments, lots of controversy), Link 2 SasuNaru (this goes to show exactly why I prefer SN to NS) and Link 3 shows (literally) why they're both so badass that who tops doesn't matter, dammit, your arguments are invalid.
Trying to relegate either Naruto and Sasuke into traditional "uke" and "seme" roles is just plain insulting because neither of them really fit these stereotypes, weren't meant to fit these stereotypes and never will. >__>;;
I think-- I think SasuNaru is unhealthy. For both the boys involved and for me as well, because never has anything been able to raise my blood pressure faster than a sub-fandom creating war on itself. Especially this one. (It's so painful to see my favourite boys butchered over and over again because of this barbaric seme/uke tradition.)
It's preference, I suppose. Just because I prefer SN to NS, doesn't mean I won't read 10Rankai's works (I'm a big fan of the circle, actually, although arguments stated in Link 2 ring truer).
-Skip End-
What I'm looking for:
→ Originality. Sometimes I wish this subfandom (and the SasuSkau one as well) wasn't as popular as it is. At least then, I wouldn't have to dig through the bad!fic galore to find a concept that hasn't been killed to death by fandom. T__T
→ Something that has them being friends. With excellent characterization. Something like this. AUs like these are ♥.
→ High school/College/Uni. I can't believe I'm saying this. DX I don't mind SasuNaru HS/C/U fic at all, if it's well-written. I was actual looking for something resembling the doujin And We by SIGNAL. Or maybe Seishun Kyousou Kyouku. The art styles for both of them (along with their sequels) are lovely. I love how Naruto and Sasuke are such guys about everything. *__* Some of us could probably learn a thing of two about writing HS!fic from them.
→ Something with actual, solid development. That's so rare in this sub-fandom - I've seen writers just "assume" Sasuke and Naruto hold romantic feelings for each other and get straight to the smut. Of course, some try to be "subtle" and end up being -and forgive me for saying this- pretentious instead because they're still working under that same assumption.
If you've read Rasengan22's fics, you'll know what this "actual, solid development" I'm talking about is - her prose was great, not as fantastic as some writers' I know, but her storytelling was - well, let's just say the way she carried the story forward was something. I'd take actual development with nice, clean prose over fic based on assumption any day~
→ HISTORICAL SETTINGS, YES♥
→ And: REINCARNATION THEMES NEVER GO AMISS EITHER. *points at link above*
→ Mood!fic. Mellow. Evocative. Tranquil. A moment stolen, and sealed into memory. Things like that - the little things. (This is just another way asking for a fic where the boys aren't trying to rip each other's throats out.)
→ Smut~ Awkward, embarrassing teenage smut is the best kind♥ I don't care about who tops.
Sakura Haruno/Naruto Uzumaki
It's late - oh wait, it's already early morning - I have badminton practice in an hour, so I'll keep this short.
What I'm looking for:
→ Anything. I wasn't particularly impressed by Shades of the Leaf or Training for the Job but... I did like Garden of Sanctuary and its sequels.
I can never seem to find the best writers for this pairing. I have no idea why/where they are all hiding. T__T The fanartists, though, are all very, very sexy. ;)
/dead
Long desperate entry is long.
I guess what I’m saying is that relationships should be given their proper weight. I’ve seen people dismiss two of the… bonds between members in a team, in favor of glorifying one. It’s just a bit appalling (and heartbreaking) that people would choose to do that just to “justify” their reasons for liking one ship and hating the other, especially when romance wasn’t really the point of the manga at all: teamwork, friendship, ~bonds~ and all those other fun things were. Still are.
ANYHOW. It feels a bit liberating to get all of that out of my chest. I typed this as I thought, so it’s possibly very unorganized (hence, the center-font, which gives the impression of some semblance of order XD), and I hope this hasn’t given you a headache. ^__^!
I’ll be on hiatus for the next four months starting tomorrow (or perhaps the day after, depending on when my ISP providers call in to charge me). So I probably won’t reply to comments just itching to pick a fight, because I don’t have enough time - and even if I did, you’d only get a big smiley face from me nodding along to everything have to say for I’m tired and I may be young and naïve and impressionable but I refuse to be tempted over to either one side of the Team Seven dynamic.
(OT3 is another matter, entirely XD)
But four months without any connection to fandom just evoked the image of “GRAY EVERYTHING IS SO GRAY NOO D:” in my mind, so any recs would be much appreciated. I’ll spend all of tomorrow saving it all, so I have something to read even without my lovely, lovely net connection. So, rec away~
Thank you, fandom~! Goodbye for now♥
<33,
~I.
P.S. Do not bother rec’ing me stuff from authors like, I don’t know, ronsard or nthcoincident or octavius_x or questofdreams or alcedines or firefly or- @__@. Their works have been read and scrutinized and thoroughly loved. Of course, works from writers with similar styles would be much appreciated. ^__^
P.P.S. And you can never - never - go wrong with SasuNaruSaku the best OT3 to ever OT3 threesomes~ *__*
P.P.P.S.** You know what would be really nice? If you could, I don’t know, upload all your favourite fics (regardless of the pairing - I probably read more pairings than any person you know) into a folder (for this, Mediafire is preferred) and give me the download link? It’s… a lot to ask, I realize, but I probably won’t have enough time to save all the fics you rec since my net connection blows a fuse in app. 24 hours and I’ll be out all day, studying. ;__;
So, I was thinking: one-click automatic download >>>> manual saving? Please?♥
P.P.P.P.S. (Okay, this is getting ridiculous so I’ll shut up after this, I swear! DX) I’m sure most of you are aware of the dilemma on y!gal. I have a cousin with a masters degree on the computing sciences in Australia. He does system admin stuff for the company he works for and I would contact him - except that he’s married to this Korean lady, has two kids, and has probably never even heard of… boys doing naughty things with other boys in naughty places - yes, that was how I was going to put it to him when I considered whether to ask him or not. >__>;;
The possibility was ruled out, for more than several reasons. So if you know anyone who has the necessary skills to operate Debian Linux (whatever that is) and isn’t severely homophobic, do contact the y!gal mods.
ETA: I’m digging Burn Notice but my tv privileges will be severely limited for I like torturing myself exercising self-control. So, I was thinking of re-watching Grey’s Anatomy >__>;; I know, I know. Soap-opera to outgloom all other soap-opera but it's so addicting. I was sad when the final season concluded. I was wondering if anyone could rec a place where I can download at least seasons 1-3, for free? Fanpop and Hotfile seem to hate me. T___T
Also: Distance from Yesterday - I just remembered that this fic was written exactly ten years ago from this day and I can't believe how lucky am to have found it. It's Pokémon, and something from my childhood, and completely, utterly amazing.