(no subject)

[butterfly]

I read the SGA story that's being recced up and down (freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose), and it really made me realize how secondary my SGA love is to my SG-1 love. I couldn't buy that the SGC would go, well, asshole. I couldn't believe that Sam and Daniel and Jack (and Landry and Hammond and Mitchell) would ever let that happen. Because of that, I was jolted out of the story and was never able to re-enter it fully, reading it from a distance instead. Also, I wondered why the story mentioned Landry and yet didn't mention the Orii, leaving me at a bit of a loss as to where it departed from canon in the SG-1 universe. As these things apparently bothered no one else, perhaps it's just a 'me' thing.

The story itself is, as the recs imply, quite well-written and it delves quite deeply into Rodney's character. It's a good story. But it's not for me (just as Farscape was a very good television show, but just wasn't for me).

This is not the first time this type of story has failed to appeal to me (I have never finished reading The End of the Road, a due South story where RayK and Fraser's relationship fails to work out, but RayK stays up north and I believe ends up falling in love with Canada itself. (ETA: No, apparently the one where he stays up north is a different story that depresses me, as he does end up leaving in this one.)). Even thinking about it makes me kinda want to throw things. And certainly not because it's a bad story.

It's not even the type of story itself -- I read angst and the getting over of angst. I'm not opposed on principle to relationships not working out or John getting himself killed and Atlantis being abandoned. I've read and enjoyed stories about... well, actually, not that last one, as it's pretty specific, but about that kind of thing.

I think it's because when I read fanfiction, I like the vibe of the story to match the vibe of the show. That's part of why cesperanza's due South stuff works so well for me -- it's got the same sweet, slightly off-kilter vibe that the show has. When I'm reading fanfiction, I'm looking for more of what I love about the show, and that differs depending on the show.

Road and Freedom seem to inhabit slightly... less magical (more real?) realities than the shows themselves. And since a large part of why I love those shows is the sparkle and zing, I miss the gloss when it's stripped away.

Comments

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

I should say that I don't watch SG-1, so I can't speak to that characterization, but I did experience this story as very realistic (far more realistic than I usually like my fanfic/entertainment to be, actually), and from that perspective I can understand and believe a good program losing good people, being overtaken by bad people, and fundamentally changing--I've seen it happen in real life. :-/

Right -- if you don't know just how determined and damned stubborn the flagship team of the SGC is, it's easy to see how that kind of thing could happen. But they've fought against changes like that in episodes of SG-1, so I kept wondering how they could fail this time (SG-1 has a long history of pulling brilliant solutions out of their asses in times of crisis). Any normal operation, I could buy it happening. But not the SGC, not while so much as one member of SG-1 is still working for them (and we find out that Sam is not only still working there, but has been promoted all the way through Colonel and up to General, in only five years).