(no subject)

[rusty_halo]

I realized that Brian/Michael hits the same kinks for me as Sirius/Remus.

Seriously, aren't those couples, like, so similar?

Best friends who are just a little too close to be just friends. Known each other since they were very young. There's the wild, brilliant, fucked-up one, and the steadier one who keeps his friend grounded.

You can totally see Sirius wanting to protect werewolf-Remus, becoming an animagus to accompany him, just like you can see Brian wanting to protect Mikey from bullies or whatever. And you can totally see Remus or Mikey being there for Sirius or Brian when they'd otherwise have totally lost it from having to deal with their fucked-up families. And Sirius and Brian totally hit the same character kinks with me, that arrogant brilliant fucked-up asshole type.

Right?

Christ, I'm comparing Queer as Folk to Harry Potter.

I spent an inordinate amount of time reading QaF fanfic this weekend. My brain hurts from all the badfic. *sob* And I DESPISE shipper agenda fics. BRIAN AND JUSTIN ARE NOT INTENDED BY FATE TO BE TOGETHER 4EVA OMG!!!!11!!

It's weird to watch how writers twist canon to fit their agendas. Did you know Brian never really liked Michael at all, and only hung out with him because he felt sorry for him, and now that Brian has Justin, Michael's just an irritating nuisance who only shows up every once in a while to whine?

Yeah, I didn't either.

I could tolerate the Brian/Michael stories better, since I actually like those two together, and I think they make more sense. But I really didn't find a single good one that wasn't a high school flashback. They all basically go like

"One day Brian realized that he had always been in love with Michael, but had been too afraid to admit it. Michael, of course, felt the same. Brian admitted that he'd been an emotionally closed-off jerk, and he promised to always be open about his feelings forever and ever. So they dumped Ben and Justin, and Brian he swore that he'd always be faithful to Michael, and then they had the hottest sex ever, and got married, and exchanged rings, and bought curtains. The end!"

This is really only slightly better than the Brian/Justin fic, which goes nauseatingly like

"Brian realized that he and Justin were FATED BY THE STARS to be together. So he admitted that he'd been an emotionally closed-off jerk, and he promised to always be open about his feelings forever and ever. (Michael was annoyed, but no one cared because Michael was just an annoying twit that Brian had never really liked anyway.) So Justin graciously forgave Brian, and Brian swore that he'd always be faithful to Justin, and then they had the hottest sex ever, and got married, and exchanged rings, and bought curtains. The end!"

And I try hard not to vomit.

But anyway. The best story I read so far was "The Importance of Being Brian" by Julad. All of Julad's stories are good and worth reading. Unforunately they're Brian/Justin.

Honestly, I don't think I can ever read another Brian/Justin story. Reading so many this weekend has left me with a reflex of nausea at the very thought. It sucks, because I want badly to read Brian fic. But I really can't stand Justin at all. I hate that he's so annoying and intrusive and whiny and that he's constantly trying to change Brian. I like Brian just the way he is, thanks. I'm reading these stories thinking "my god, Brian, get the hell away from that creep, don't fall for his bullshit, don't change yourself for him, ewwwww ewwwww ewwwww!!"

I found the one thing that I'll read no matter how badly it's written, though. Brian in high school, preferably with Michael around. Because, no Justin, and also, fic writers like to water Brian down and make him talk about his feelings (uuuugh), which is completely implausible, but if you imagine he's high school age it's slightly more plausible. And when you put him with Michael, it's even more plausible. Plus, high school Brian is just so delightfully fucked up, what with his badass attitude and his hideous family and Michael the only thing keeping him from losing it. :)

Comments

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

Ohh, QAF!Stuff. & :-) Say, would you mind putting together a rec list? If there are only five decent fics, so be it; just...if you got some, I'd love to see them.

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

Well, I haven't found much.

By far the best I've read is Chase's "The Man Who Wasn't There." She totally gets Brian and delves deeper and darker than the show has ever bothered. She doesn't try to change him or wuss him out like the VAST majority of other fic writers do. And she's focusing on his relationship with Michael, not Justin. Oh yeah, and it's got Spike, and action, and violence, thank god.

Everything by the following authors is good, but is unfortunately Brian/Justin:

Mint Witch
Valerie
Rachel Anton
Julad

herself_nyc has a Brian/Spike fragment here.

I haven't found anything else that I would recommend. A few other vaguely tolerable pieces, but nothing really worthwhile.

There's a recs page here, and more recs here, but I didn't find either of these very helpful. Most of it is stuff you'd have to like Brian/Justin to appreciate.

[chase820.livejournal.com]

Thanks, as always, for the shout-out. Without exception, Brian is the most difficult character I've ever written. He drives me absolutely nuts with his sulking and his demands and his diva-like behavior. But when he does get off his gorgeous ass and decide to work, there's nobody better. I'm glad to know all my suffering isn't for nought. :)

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Val and Rachel as well as Chase are on my flist; will check out Mint Witch and Julad plus the Brian/Spike fragment.

Again, very cool. Will browse around a little.

[chase820.livejournal.com]

Have you read Josselin's Queer Survivor? It is, like so many fics with good Brian characterization, Brian/Justin. And it gets really, really schmoopy at the end. But the main part of the fic is incredibly funny and Brian is his wonderful, manipulative alpha-bastard self.

I agree with your assessment of 99.9% of B/J and B/M fics, by the way. Why is it that so many authors want to tame Brian, when it's Brian's wildness that makes him so damned attractive?

[chase820.livejournal.com]

Oops. Here's the link to the story: Queer Survivor

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

I get the feeling that much QaF fic is written by unhappy heterosexual housewives who are desperately trying to validate their own existences by convincing themselves that all Brian Kinney really wants is to settle down and get married and live a safe inane little domestic life exactly like them.

I can't stand the thought of Brian domesticated. Honestly, if that's what you want, go read a Buffy/Riley fic.

I haven't read "Queer Survivor." I will give it a shot (assuming I can get past the Justin parts). Thanks for all the recs, btw. :)

[chase820.livejournal.com]

I think the point many people (including the show's creators) miss is that Brian is already in a long-term committed relationship, and has been since he was fourteen. His tie to Michael is unusual by anybody's standards, but that doesn't mean it's not heartfelt and genuine. Sadly, Michael seems to be the only one who gets that.

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

This is one of those things that drives me crazy about, well, humans. Something can be real and genuine and meaningful, but if it doesn't fit into some pre-defined template it doesn't "count," it's not "real."

Like Buffy pining for a normal life and failing to appreciate the wonderful friends and unique powers she already had, that were so much better and more meaningful than her white picket fence fantasy. Or everyone saying Spike's taking care of Dawn didn't count because he didn't have a soul, as if that made him love her any less, as if that made his sacrifices not count.

Or, yes, Brian's relationship with Michael--unusual, sure, but a hell of a lot more real and meaningful than some stupid little traditional romance done for the sake of "legitimacy." (Michael's romance with Dr. Asshole, for example. So wrong for each other in every way, but oh, he's a rich doctor, so it must be worthwhile!)

I hate seeing people give up the things that are meaningful to them because society says that those things don't count. Like best friends losing each other to marriages, when the friendship will always mean more. Or "real writers" criticizing fanfic, because it's not as "legitimate," when some of the best stuff I've ever read in my life has been fic. Or my parents acting like there's something illegitimate about me living in a tiny East Village apartment instead of some condo in the suburbs.

I'm so babbling. *sigh*

Yeah. Brian/Michael. It drives me crazy, too--watching morons like Deb and Ted and Lindsay lecturing Brian and Michael about how they have to give each other up and "grow up." Who defines what growing up means, or what counts as a legitimate relationship? I would never give up a real friendship for such a moronic reason--true friends are one of the most rare and amazing things you'll ever experience in life.

[chase820.livejournal.com]

That's why I hated the Ben/Michael marriage plot in Season Four. In my mind, Michael is so attached to Brian he'd never make that ultimate commitment to anybody else. (Or even make it with Brian, for that matter. They're relationship doesn't need conventional labels like marriage because it transcends such.)

But also, it seemed like Michael was giving in to everything everyone had been telling him all along, that his happiness was to be found in a relationship that resembles white-picket-fence heteronormativity as much as possible. And I've yet to see any indication that he has much more in common with Ben than he did with David. Superheroes aside, half the time Ben treats him just as condescendingly as the good doctor ever did. As Vic pointed out in one of my favorite scenes ever, Ben is just a substitute for Brian. But in the last couple of seasons, Cowlip seems to have forgotten that.

Clearly, as best friends of nearly twenty years, Brian and Michael have a much deeper relationship with each other than they ever had with any of their lovers. Sadly, Cowlip seems bent in the final two seasons on undermining this relationship completely in favor of the conventional B/J and Be/M romances. It's the exact same message every sickeningly conventional romance plot of the last 500 years has crammed down our throats--that nothing, nothing is as important as erotic love. All other attachments must bow down before it.

In doing this, Cowlip has totally betrayed everything Russell Davies ever tried to do with the original British Queer as Folk, which was all about rejecting the hard-and-fast heterosexual relationship models that so rarely work for heterosexuals, let alone gays.

Okay, now I'm ranting, so I'll stop. :)

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love this rant. No need to stop.

This is something I'm always arguing with myself about: to what extent do I need fiction to validate my own existence?

My immediate response is that I don't, of course not, how very pathetic.

But then I think about being a kid in suburbia, and seeing no options outside the college -> marriage -> kids -> death route, and hating it, and feeling utterly out of place, and wanting to die because life had no point and why bother? And how it meant the world to me to find role models who offered other options--how I honestly wouldn't have known there were other options if I hadn't seen them (coming to NYC and hanging out with musicians and going to college and taking gender studies classes and seeing people successfully living outside the norm).

So role models are important, right? I mean, that's how we form understandings about pretty much everything, from the time we're born; we model our understanding of the world on what we observe. And fiction is really important--think of all the stuff we learn through narrative!

And it's like, in a weird way, something can't exist to you if you aren't aware of it, if you can't imagine it. I mean, if you can't imagine, can't picture a single example, of a woman living happily alone and single for her entire life, you're going to assume that every woman wants marriage and babies, right? Because that's all you've EVER seen. (I had this issue, with a friend of mine. I said "I don't want to get married and I don't want to have kids." She said "Yeah, you really do." And no matter how often I said I didn't, she refused to believe me, would even try to trip me up in conversation and get me to admit that I really wanted a man. And I don't. It was pointless, and part of what killed our friendship. [And I think she wanted me to "admit it" out of her own desperate need for validation, but that's another story.])

I think this is one thing QaF deserves credit for, actually, because until it aired, gay people on television were tragic AIDS sob stories or style consultants for straight people. It's important that QaF shows a diversity of gay people living for themselves, not for straight people, and not dying for it. But yeah, it doesn't go nearly far enough.

I had a professor for a gender studies class who was always pushing her theory that the focus of the current culture wars is shifting from a gay/straight dichotomy to a family/not family dichotomy. The idea being that it doesn't matter if you're gay or straight as long as you're married and monogamous and living in suburbia (*cough*Mel&Lindsay*cough*). And that by focusing the gay rights struggle on gay marriage, the mainstream gay rights movement is buying into this paradigm of what counts as a legitimate way of living. Trying to fit themselves into the existing paradigm, "prove" that they can be just as mainstream as the mainstream.

It would be a much bigger struggle to say, y'know, we're Brian Kinney, we don't buy into monogamy and marriage and suburbia, we live our own lives the way we choose, and that's just as valid. That there's not One True Way of Living. (I could go into this whole other rant about black and white thinking, inability to see ambiguity or multiple options....)(And also which is not to say that it's WRONG for gay people to want to get married and live in suburbia--if you want it, you should be allowed to go for it--but that it's not the ONLY legitimate way to live, or the MOST legitimate way to live, or whatever, it's just one of many options.)

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

[continued]

Oh yeah, so where was I? Right, fiction is a reflection of culture and fiction helps to shape culture. So it's not totally out of line to want at least ONE tiny bit of popular fiction to reflect YOUR way of life. That's why Brian Kinney makes me squee, because I go "OMG I've never seen a mainstream fictional character say these things, that I think but that mainstream culture treats as totally invalid!"

But then I remember that whole Spike nightmare. I got so involved in that, saw so much of myself in that character, was so desperate for validation. Free will triumphs over fate, right? And when ME said it didn't, fate wins, and get down and lick Buffy's boots, I felt so devastated. I cried when Spike got a soul.

And I look back and think, damn, why in the world did I ever think I needed a bunch of dumbass Hollywood TV script writers to validate my existence? I know I believe in free will, MY Spike never needed a soul, and who the hell cares what anyone else thinks?

And yeah, I know that I don't want to get married and I don't want a man and I don't want to breed and I definitely don't want to live in suburbia. And if anyone else has a problem with that, I really could care less, because it's their problem, not mine. (Though I understand that not everyone has this privilege, people who live in more conservative areas or work more conservative jobs or are young and stuck with parents or whatever, and who feel like freaks or who have to hide who they are, and that's one of those arguments for the importance of fiction to at least show other options to the typical mainstream ideal. But there's nothing I can do about that; I have to live my own life.)

[chase820.livejournal.com]

This post was so totally right on--my apologies for taking a week to reply to it. My only excuse is a raging case of flu and fic-fever.

I think your main point is incredibly valid--the stories we tell ourselves are important to how we see ourselves and the real world around us. Which is why it's so important when narratives don't always appeal to the safest, most middle-American common denominator. When the purveyors of entertainment give us something different from the same damn stories we've been hearing since we popped out of the womb.

In this instance, I think Russell T. Davies, the original creator of QaF, is to be worshiped for creating a story where a real and viable alternative to the white-picket fence model was presented. I don't think Cowlip did a very good job at expanding on what Davies created, and I'm certainly not happy with what they did to Brian Kinney in the past couple of seasons of the show.
However, I must give them a little credit for S1-3 Brian, and S1-3 Brian/Michael, when they did seem invested in portraying a friendship between two people that was at least as deep and real as any marriage could be. Those are the kinds of relationships I cherish in my own life, and the ones that I'm most interested these days in capturing in my work.

Thanks again for the great insights, Laura. It is amazing how much we agree on the issues. So nice to hear I'm not the only one who turns green at the thought of suburban bliss. :)

[chenanceou.livejournal.com]

You have fallen under the spell.
I dreamt about you - you had gone back to dark hair with pinks and we were going to Gobos for some bubble stuff and I kept telling you my tartan skirt was too short and that I was cold.

Weird, uh?

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

Hee! Wonder what the dream means.

I might go back to dark hair with red streaks--but eek, no pink!

You should come here and then we will go to Gobo and drink bubble tea. :)

::misses you::