The Mezzanine

Here's a John/Rodney slash fic. Because it had to happen eventually.

Title: Interloper
Rating: R
Word Count: 2790
Pairing: John/Rodney

Summary: Rodney is dying to get inside John's dreams. John is just dreaming. (And dying.)

( this is going to be hard to explain )

I'm finding it interesting getting to know other accordion players, and seeing how I differ from them. Not in terms of being better, or worse, but just… interested in playing very different stuff.

I'm coming to the conclusion that most accordion players hear traditional accordion music (e.g. Balkan folk music), think "yeah, I'd like to play that", and buy an accordion.

Whereas I happened to have an accordion, and decided to try playing any random crap I thought of.

Which, in practice, means that I go along to accordion events, and they're all working on Balkan folk music, or German folk music, or French cafe music, or Italian dance styles, or Irish music… and meanwhile, I'm there in the corner playing the Inspector Gadget theme song.

I am rewatching much television, and find myself newly fascinated by a series of four episodes that all came out in fairly quick sucession. They are:
Spirits (from Stargate SG-1)
Pangs (from Buffy)
The Indians in the Lobby (from The West Wing)
Skinwalker (from Smallville)

I find these interesting, because:
- They are all clearly written in an attempt to get Native Americans represented on television more (a fairly good idea).
- They are all clearly trying to be highly respectful of Native American culture (a fairly good thing).
AND YET
- They all fail horribly (with one exception).

So, here's my theory. I think the writers were each handed instructions of "write an episode of your tv show about Native Americans", and did the best job they could. But, because of the complete dearth of Native Americans in the previous few decades of television shows, the writers were all flying blind.

And, if you look at the episodes in question, they're all taking a very logical approach to fitting this episode into their show:
Stargate puts Native Americans in space, and relates Native American mythology to aliens (as they do with EVERY OTHER CULTURE).
Buffy raises a vengeful Native American spirit, to take vengeance for past wrongs (one of the more common Buffy plotlines).
The West Wing raises a political discussion on a subject of concern, and come up with absolutely no solutions (see: EVERY OTHER episode of The West Wing).
Smallville gives Native Americans an important link to Superman's destiny (as they do with EVERYTHING ELSE).

But, comparing and constrasting, I think there's a simple reason why the West Wing episode works, while all the others fail so horribly. All the other shows are taking a stereotype of 18th century Native American culture, dumping it unchanged into their script, and talking about "how connected these people are to their culture!". Which… doesn't work at all.

Whereas The West Wing is talking to Native Americans NOW about issues which affect them NOW. They're treated as real people, rather than mythical, totally-connected-to-their-really-awesome-culture stereotypes.

I'm watching all the Spider-Mans (all eight of them). And I think I've finally figured out the main thing that bugs me about the MCU.

It's Tony Stark. (Except not at all Tony Stark, because I actually love him.)

The thing is, in both the comics and the MCU, Tony Stark is kind of an arrogant prick. BUT, in the comics, his arrogant prickishness is much more tolerable – largely because Iron Man isn't usually in charge of stuff.

Iron Man is one of the Avengers. (And sometimes their leader.) But if there's a big problem in need of a super-squad, it could be handled by the Avengers, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, S.H.I.E.L.D., Spider-Man, or the Defenders …among others.

Whereas in the MCU, Iron Man is part of the ONLY team of superheroes. If they need rescuing, they talk to Tony Stark. If they need superscience, they talk to Tony Stark. If they need a spokesman, they talk to Tony Stark. If they need anything superheroey at all, they talk to Tony Stark. Which is a problem – because Tony Stark, as I mentioned, is kind of an arrogant prick.

It's a shame, really, because I love Tom Holland's portrayal of Spider-Man. But every time Iron Man comes on screen, I sit there wishing that he was Mr Fantastic. Or, really, anyone who people would actually want to be in charge of stuff.

A friend gave me a copy of the first 11 issues of the Spider-Man comics. They were rather fascinating.

Weird facts:

- The whole origin story (spider bite, death of Uncle Ben, etc) happens very fast. He literally gets bitten, immediately gets superpowers, and then ("a few minutes later") starts his wrestling career.

- He doesn't actually start doing much superheroing for a surprisingly long time. In the first few stories, he (1) mourns Uncle Ben and captures his killer; (2) rescues an astronaut (okay, this is legit superheroics); (3) fights the Fantastic Four; (4) gets accused of theft and proves his innocence; (5) sells pictures of the Vulture (and takes him down purely for the cool photos); (6) saves the world from an alien invasion. It's only post-alien invasion that he starts actually thinking of maybe saving people. Mostly, he's in it for the photo money.

- The writers haven't particularly figured out how his powers work – but one thing they're pretty sure of is that his main gimmick is crafting weird objects out of webbing. In just these issues, he makes a web-parachute, a web-column, a web-ball filled with web-fluid (?????), a web-shield, web-swamp shoes, a (flying) web-bat, web-wings, a web-heart to woo Sue Storm, and a giant spider made out of webbing on a wooden frame.

- He also totally trolls J. Jonah Jameson by using web fluid to stick his pants to his chair. Jameson spends the next scene walking around in his boxers.

- There is a Spidey Signal! It looks vaguely Bat-signal-esque, but projects from Spider-Man's belt. So, if you were looking at the Spidey Signal and turned around, you'd see Peter Parker standing there wearing a stupid belt and posing.

- He has a full-on romance with Betty Brant. I knew she was a love interest, but I didn't realise how totally into each other the two of them were.

- The second story totally forgets his name and calls him "Peter Palmer".

I'm feeling weirdly ficcy lately…

Title: A Confluence of Stiles
Rating: G
Word Count: 1282

Summary: Stiles is stuck somewhere, all by himself. Luckily, there are plenty of Stileses to help.

( magic is really a dumb idea, to begin with )

In January, I found the complete box set of Teen Wolf on DVD for fifty bucks. And I decided this was a fair price to pay for a show I knew almost nothing about.

(I knew: That the show was popular with my LJ circles. That it starred some hot guys. That the main ship was Stiles/Derek, otherwise known as Sterek. That is all.)

It is a really fun show! I'm really enjoying the humour, and the worldbuilding, and most of the characters.

Season 1 was wonderful.
Season 2 was way better.
Season 3 was good.
Season 4 was terrible.
Season 5 is pretty good (and a total relief after Season 4).

Haven't started season 6 yet. But I'm looking forward to it.



It's so nice having sci-fi shows I haven't seen before.

So my professional editing society sent out a call asking for people to present at a writers conference. It is called GenreCon.

They'll pay for the presentation, but not pay for the travel costs. So I'd be spending more money getting there and back than I'd get for presenting. But it's called GENRECON. Oh please, GenreCon, let me pay you all my money so I can present things at your conference!

...I have sent them an email. We shall see.

I am watching Smallville for the first time.

I have many thoughts on many aspects of this, but right now I'm just going to share three:

1) Buffy did high school so much better – especially in terms of recurring background students.

2) This show is doing Lois Lane perfectly, and I love it.

3) If I ever rewatch, I'm going to keep a running amnesia score for each character. I'm only up to season 5, and I swear some of these characters are already on double digits.

I have, unfortunately, failed to keep track of my flist. If you posted something important and I missed it... I'm sorry. Please let me know what it was!





This week is a very good one.

This week:
- we got a new Prime Minister!
- I finished my cancer treatment!
- I am turning 40!
- I will get to see Hamilton!

Now, if the board game I've ordered will hurry up and arrive already, it'll be the Best Week Ever.