You said it, lady! I compltely agree. The other friendships/relationships can only be secondary to Reese and Finch. This is what attracts me to the show, because it's the thing that always atttracts me to my buddy/male bonding Relationship (note the captial "R") shows. And I don't really considered Reese/Finch to be AU, as I can totally see that they might get that much closer at some point, off screen. But while I'm bascially a slasher, I can and do enjoy the really good gen/friendship/h/c/pre-slash fic in this fandom. They mean so much to each other and need each other so much that all permutations of their relationship is worthwhile.
I've been thinking about (and still can't completely figure out) why slash in general appeals to me so much, and apparently to a lot of other heterosexual ladies. Women seem to be the main fans of what the Japanese have a whole industry centered around called "Yaoi" (fiction and/or artwork featuring M/M characters
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I've been in fandom for over 30 years and I've written mainly relationship stories, starting with friendship/male bonding for Kirk and Spock and moving into slash when I got into Starsky & Hutch in the early 80s. I chaired a slash con called ConneXions for several years and have been on many panels discussing the concept and been asked many times about it by both fans and mundanes alike, so I well understand the whole "gee, I'm a straight woman but I love slash" thing. Slash, to me, differs from yaoi in several ways -- slash doesn't depend on having one partner be the uke and the other the seme (if I have that right) or the one the top and the other the bottom. The roots of slash go back to women writing an equal relationship between two people, in a way that couldn't be explored between male/female couples. It appeals on a very elemental level to many of us heterosexual ladies, as you've noted. Then again, if men can get turned on by the idea of two women, why can't we see the appeal of two men together? No woman is being
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Wow! Sounds like you have had an extremely interesting time in the area of "fandom" and with slash in general. I'm new to this whole thing so I'm only going on my emotions (and hormones -LOL!) with regard to Finch and Reese. Because of them, I only recently started investigating yaoi and other forms of M/M fiction and stuff, because I was trying to figure out why it appeals to me so much. I'd love to read some transcripts of your panel discussions, if you have any! I think you are definitely on the right track with regard to there being no objectification of women being involved at all, and no "power" issues of who's in control, or on top vs. bottom (except in the M/M aspect of it). As Spock would say, "Fascinating!"
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