Hook in Hand · 3:02pm Sep 5th, 2012
I usually don't do this sort of thing, but I felt like writing something today which wasn't necessarily the next chapter of Air. However, at the same time, I will be addressing something that has been a constant question, and one that I wanted to answer for myself as well as for everyone else. Also I get to talk about myself. Which is fun. So let's see if I can pull this off without looking like a butt. Spoiler alert, I probably don't.
So in case you're new here, you're probably aware that my stories are usually less-than-cheerful. In fact, the story I'm most known for is complete and total destruction of a character. Ideas that have come and gone in my brain have always followed the same tone and theme. And as a result, in PMs and Skype chats with the other pre-readers, I receive the same question.
Chromosome, why can't you write happy ponies?
To which my response, up to this point, has consistently been:
The truth is, I didn't really have an answer. I mean, it might not be an exactly serious question, but it still makes one think. Even the one comedy (sorta) that I've written is essentially dark in its humor.
I myself am not an extremely dark person by nature. I wouldn't plonk myself as a goth, punk, or emo, as far as stereotypes go. I'm certainly quiet, but I don't walk around thinking "who or what can I make miserable today?". Well, I maybe do that once in a while. My taste in music ranges from ecstatic to disheartened, and I haven't been exactly exposed to some traumatic events that have caused me a sociopathic craving to cause misery to pastel horses.
Now, one could draw up all the psychological reasoning in the world to determine why I relish in angst and agony. But I'll try to fumble up a reason.
Simply put, I just find it more interesting. When I go into a fic, I usually start writing based on one of two things: a moral or a specific scene. I then tie that into a story and get it all into a neat little outline. And as you might guess, those morals tend to be along the lines of "some things simply aren't meant to be", and the scenes dip into a man watching his family evaporate in nuclear fire. I want to feel like I'm heading towards a purpose, and that I'm pitting the main character against forces he cannot necessarily control. Sometimes he overcomes them. Often he does not. As a kid, I was always weary of happy endings. Forget the "happily ever after". I wanted to see the bad guy get his way for once and blast the chipper hero into oblivion. One of my favorite movies is "Up in the Air", with George Clooney, for its bittersweet ending that left me pleasantly surprised and satisfactorily saddened. I wanted to replicate that in my stories, to deny the reader the upbeat ending they could have had and tell them to deal with it.
Over time, my views on this changed, and I realized that the change the character went through himself determined whether or not a happy or disparaging ending was appropriate. But while my overall approach towards endings changed, my perception towards character struggles did not. I'm still compelled to make characters struggle to achieve their ends. Perhaps it's my adoration towards seeing characters fight for their happiness and often failing that leads me away from shipping as a concept. I just can't get into ponies facehugging ponies. No matter how adoracute it might be. I suppose I could say that if I wanted my cutesy stories, I would look to the show itself. Cold in Gardez once said that he didn't write about ponies, but about humans that happened to have hooves. I couldn't agree more. And that's the glory of fanfiction, isn't it? That's not to say I wouldn't write a happy story if a good idea for one came along. But ideas like that rarely crop up. So until then, I'll take my ponies with a side of angst and brutal struggle.
TL;DR - I'm more inspired writing about darker situations.
Roseluck is best background pony.
There are so many things in this that I agree with. Including your judgment of Up In The Air, which was amazing.
My problem is a bit more specific: I find it incredibly hard to write anything that doesn't have at least one searingly snarky character that can just say whatever I want them to say. I like building characters and do tend towards darker plotlines that most, but in the end I just can't get interested in a story for very long without being able to make at least some part of it funny.
Also:
Shipping doesn't have to be cute. Shipping doesn't have to be happy. My shipfic Detective and Magician certainly isn't. Early romance novels were often tragedies.
Morals. Man, I hate morals. The problem with morals is that writers always get them wrong, and write another damn story about the curse of immortality, or the importance of hard work, or some other stupid slogan they teach the sheep in elementary school.
I'm thinking out loud here, but this sounds right to me at the moment: If the story is the kind where the protagonist is dealing with a problem inside himself, then a protagonist who changes or takes bold action gets a good ending, and a protagonist who doesn't change or doesn't take action gets a bad ending. In stories like Anno Domini and White Box, where the protagonist is dealing with a problem outside himself, then a protagonist who allows himself to be changed gets a bad ending, and a protagonist who doesn't gets a good ending, or at least a whatever-the-hell you call the "I didn't teach ponies war" ending to Anno Domini. (This is modern stories only - in the middle ages and ancient times, change was always bad.)
Go with what inspires you. Given the view count of your works, others tend to agree.
Heh, like you said, if I want a cheerie good time, I'd stick to watching the show and skip over this horsecrap posted on this site and elsewhere.
(Not implying that anything you wrote or any other authors are shoveling crap.
)
yay rose luck
Hmm.
Sads/Tragedies/Darks are best fics!
Hey, have you read Eyes Without a Face? It has Roseluck as the main character and the story needs much love.
As for your blog post, I understand where you are coming from. I've noticed whenever I write a story, they tend to revolve around two themes/ideas/....emotions. One of them is a reckless spiral of despair as everything falls apart because of that's character's wishes or inaction of things. Simply, I go out of my way world-build a perfect world/scene and write as everything falls apart. It's true I kinda get a kick out of it but mostly I like to see what happens next. I've more or less forced an END to a character's ignorance/innocence/joy or something physical like the loss or death of people close to them. I like to think that after they go through a ENDing, that when the story really begins.
I really hate myself when it shows in the things I write (Which is by accident) and people tend to like them more than when I try to censor that theme out of my writing. Makes me feel pretty bad that I can't write some thing final with a true ending and without character mental/physical struggle.
But that kind of writing comes from all of the 'endings', 'fins' and 'that's it folks!', that jipped me from actually being satisfied over the years. That and Silent Hill.
Kindred spirits we are, you top-hatted fuck :3
I agree with most of this. There are a few things that bug me, but I can't put words to them yet, so I'll just leave this here.
And no, you've got it all wrong; Romana Minuette Colgate is best pony.
So, Earn Your Happy Ending -- and sometimes failing to get one even if the characters have worked hard. This trope enforces the themes behind some of my favorite stories in the fandom, and I'm still waiting for the day when I get to write such a story myself.
Funny... we seem to be identical in this respect. The only comedy I ever wrote was full of dark undertones. Wait, scratch that; the entire tone of the story was abusive.
Huzzah for dark humor!
I have to agree with what you said about Up in the Air. I liked the movie very much just because of the ending they served. For once, it wasn't the usual 'they lived happily ever after'. And that scene on the plane at the very end. Brilliant!
About the best background pony, though--I believe you mistyped Derpy Hooves. dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/sillyfilly_Derpy_Hooves.png
I like reading happy stories because they make me feel happy. I like writing happy stories because they seem to make other people happy.
I like writing dark stories because they let me explore topics or characterizations that you can't reach with happy stories.
A place for everything.
Whatever gets your engine going, man.
An idea though, dunno if it's any good, but here we go.
"Pinkie Vs. Super-Evil Organization"
Taken in the way of cartoons, of course. Meaning typically over-thought plots, incredibly complex death machines, and Pinkie as our comical hero! Could even throw in a dark ending that'd actually make sense, so long as the characterization is there.
Comedy mask with a Dark face that's revealed at the end of the story. I think that'd do pretty well.
i think your problem is........ you dont write shipping. try some shipping, it will (hopefully) be brighter. and yes, you should try to write lighter stories. diversify. not saying to change all together. just some diversification in writing styles can improve writing over all. it will be good and fun i think. give it a try, i implore you to please think about it. if you hate it, you can always stop after all.
also the only thing ive read from you is whitebox, and that confused the buck outta me!
This quote is perfect.
Also, you shouldn't feel the need to justify your stories' tone and mood. The struggle against forces out of one's control is one of the most fundamental building blocks of a good story. What I like about fiction in general though, is that they don't have to end like they would in reality. I completely agree with your assessment that the end of a story should suit the change in the character and not the other way around. It just so happens that your mind works a certain way. That's perfectly fine with me. I've lamented in the past that I can't write a good comedy, when I do, it just feels forced. I'm too serious and cerebral to do slapstick so I settle for being clever or ironic when constructing "funny" scenes. If you come up with a happy story, well that would be quite the tale to tell.
I couldn't agree more. I had a friend, who is familiar with the show in a casual sense, take a look at my grimdark today. He loved the story I'm trying to tell, but he had a hard time understanding why I wanted to take a show like MLP and twist it into such a brutal monstrosity. I pretty much tried my best to explain what you said here. Tragedy/struggle just makes better stories in my opinion.
Part of my recent exercise in crapola writing was to see if I was capable of making "happy" stories. But, as you can relate, my taste of happiness is almost always accompanied by dark humor. I think there's a fine line between "writing a happy story" and "writing a story that makes me happy." The former is harder, cuz when trying to make readers happy, it's equally possible to make them bored, verdad?
Sad fics have a nice edge to them. Because for a true sad fic to be sad, it has to be happy... or at least have happy moments. You need to know what the protagonist has had taken away from her or him in order for readers to truly understand what has been tragically lost. Without that cathartic punch, sad fics have no real substance. In a lot of ways, I see sad fics as a means of making people feel happy, but in a really wyrd, backwards, psychologically cryptic way.
But anyways, I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't feel sad for... always writing sad stories. People don't exclusively read stuff just so they can feel miserable. There's a rewarding experience in the end, and I think we end up appreciating who and what we are after receiving a dose of your philosophical musings in ponyland. F'naaa
-SS&E
The answer most likely has to do with you looking like a butt. :V
If my Roseluck/Thunderlane shipfic ends up in tragedy because of this post, I'll be sure to dedicate it to you.
I'm with you there bro. I've found myself writing about some pretty dark or sad subjects myself on a regular basis: rape, abortions, drug abuse, mental handicaps, war, and even life itself being meaningless. A stage of my own personal thought process is often to think of a problem in the world that I can make people empathize with, and then proceed to do that.
The thing about sad stories is that they have a struggle present to the reader to overcome. If things are already doing fine and dandy, the issue at hand needs to almost be shoehorned into the story to give the characters a challenge. There are ways to write "happy" stories that aren't always sunshine and cheer, but make you feel good, like Toppa Tenga Gurren Lagan, but those are far and in between, because it's incredibly hard to nail without feeling fake.
I thought I'd have something deeper here to say, but I guess I just agree with you too completely to add anything meaningful. I wouldn't say I write dark humor as much as cynical humor, but even that was just a goofy attempt at pandering. Personally, if your stories weren't so sad, I probably wouldn't look up to you as much as I do, so I'm glad for it.
If you do want to write something genuinely happy, I'd look to Pixar for reference. While their movies have their sad moments, they mostly just make you smile, and still have a full arc for each character that feels fulfilled and meaningful at the end.
337849
You're right on the shipping front. I have no issue with tragedies, but the place where I've seen myself draw the line is at pony. I enjoy seeing characters fall because of foolish or illegitimate love, but there's something about ponies trying to get into romantic relationships that pushes me away from a story. I'm not saying that shipfics are bad, of course, just that they're not my theme. Also yeah. Moral probably wasn't the best word to have used there. Pretend I said "theme" instead.
337875
Argh, a good Mare-Do-Well fic! Oh well, I'm still going to write mine once I get around to it.
338071
Why are you so darn quotable?
338405
I suppose so. It's not that I necessarily feel bad about writing sadfics constantly, more that I notice that it tends to be a common trend in my writing that I wanted explained. And in regards to happiness being needed for sadness, didn't a certain masked character once say that "True despair cannot exist without hope"?
Sadfics are the bestfics
i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/242/171/525.png
Hmm, I used to love dark (Who am I kidding, I still do) but I found that happy is surprisingly easy to write at times. It's lighthearted, so you can go easy on the prose if you so choose.
Hmmmm... That is a very thoughtful and insightful reason as to why you.
Because Fics with happy poines are fucking boreing. Because human in equestria fics are overrated. Because in most storys the poines seem like mindless happy zombies. Because im getting off topic. Because Because Because Because this fandom is crazy.
'Saw Up in the Air with some family just the other day and it was very good. I was dreading that the main character would decide to conform and suddenly find contentment with the American Dream somehow out-of-the-blue, and in the end nothing would've made sense, blah. I was happy they didn't go that route. I liked the message that "some wanderlust you can't cure."
I've also been feeling a little bit reflective lately on my genres as some people in my production-group were leaning on me to send in some VA-auditions for a fan-project. Mentioned what would happen if the storyline turned to something I didn't like after I'd already committed. One response went something along the lines of "What, you think they'll suddenly just make everything extremely grimdark all of a sudden and you'll be along for the ride?" I was too embarrassed to say that I'd almost prefer that, atleast over d'awww kawaii, shipping, and use of background characters in such silly forms that it almost gets me shouting.
'Thought for a long time that the stereotypical white-clouds-&-radiance heaven for me I would find whistfully crushing. I'd likely be too bitter to be happy in death when I never reached happy in life, anyway not for any long period. I guess I'd maybe prefer something of a cyberpunk Valhalla that had like... magic and talking animals and we'd actually be in charge of making things better on Earth and be given tools to do it because contraveiling forces... and... okay I'm going to stop before this turns into a fic.