The tinnny Interview

[mystizan]

Continuing with the 5 questions game, only tinnny  decided to focus on my fandom loves.

+ What's your all time favorite pairing (and why)?

Hodgela. (Dr. Jack Hodgins & Mrs. Angela Montenegro-Hodgins, Bones). I really shouldn't be able to choose since I love so many OTPs across so many fandoms but whenever I think about what I'd want in a r'ship I always come back to these two. There are things I'd do differently or not want in my own RL r'ship but I adore them so. I love that both Jack & Ange are so full of joy and wonder even though they've seen enough gore & our capacity to be completely barbaric to our fellow man. I love that Jack pwns his science (& 3 PhDs) without apology--- he doesn't care if you don't get whey he's so excited about whatever discovery he's made, he just bursts in excited anyway (give him a minute, he'll dumb it down for u).

As for their r'ship I love that Jack has long since passed what I call the Endorphin/Oxytocin induced haze that most couples are in when they fall in love & has progressed into what I call Real Love. In Real Love, you have the object of ur love front & centre even at great cost to urself. (For instance, Jack offering to be whatever Angela needed when she thought she was carrying Wendell's baby---if that meant giving her money, or marrying her or just listening when she needed it, he was willing & able.) That took guts: he made himself vulnerable to a woman who had left him a few years prior & was now sleeping with one of his close friends. & yet he did it anyway. I like that Angela's free spiritedness balances out Jack's calmer disposition. I love how supportive Ange is of him. I love that she doesn't ask him to change but tries to see the world from his perspective. And I love watching them together. u get the feeling that ur in the presence of something as fragile as a spider's web & yet simultaneously as strong as tempered steel. u can shatter Jack or Ange, but if u let them get together they are impregnable, indefatigable. I adore that.

+ Do you like/prefer het or slash and why?

I prefer het. I can't see slash. If the characters were gay on Show then it'd be different--this is how the creators drew them & so the Q for me would be do I want to watch that? But when I get invested into a Show & start shipping ppl & then I see in fandom where u have A. broken up my OTP 2. Made one (or both) of them gay 3. Put them with a new partner I get sad. I take my Show romances very srsly & I take canon very srsly. Canon tells me who these pppl are & I need them to stay in character even if in fic u put them in different scenarios.

+ Do you have fangirl friends in RL?

No alas, none as rabid as I, tho I do have 2 friends I can call about Bones & Chuck.

+ Who did you always want to meet and what would you talk to them about?

Thomas Alva Edison. He's been dead a while though so that's impossible but I'm intrigued by the way he never gave up no matter how badly the odds seemed stacked against him. He viewed every failure as a stepping stone (now he knew what not to do). I'd just want to hang out with him & figure what made him tick cuz I could use some of that unstoppable mentality IRL.


+ Which small niche fandom should have more fans? Convince me why.

Chuck. Srsly. & this may be because every season fans have to get creative with the campaigning to keep it from cancellation. I don't understand why though, cuz Chuck gets better with age. Chuck has it all: drama, love & family r'ships, spy drama, comedy, OTP that eventually gets to RST & is 100% adorkable along the way. Chuck has some of the best character development I have ever seen & is the only fandom I'm in where TPTB did not drag out the UST to unbearable lengths. They had hiccups, yes, but when they got all those things resolved it was magical. & I love how every cast member is so interestingly written. If Chuck & Sarah disappeared for a few eps I'd still tune in. & their bad guys r ALWAYS excellent ( Volkoff, The Ring, Fulcrum, Roarke).

ALTERNATIVELY

Leverage. I have no idea how many fans this has but I wish more of my friends would watch it so I'd have company. Leverage takes criminals who are at the top of their games & uses their skills to fight for the little guy. There's a hacker who once hacked into the national bank of Iceland & wired money to himself to pay off his Nana's medical bills, a retrieval specialist who hates guns but never loses a fight, a terrible actress who can con anyone, anywhere (including a US ambassador whom she convinced that she was royalty & he gave her a hefty cheque towards some cause in her supposed nation, a slightly insane thief who is really a child at heart who spends her weekends running thru in her head how to break into various banks and an insurance investigator who used to hunt them all who now plans their cons.

They do a lot with very little. I mean there's only five of them, they shouldn't be able to wield so much power. (In one episode, to bring down an international arms dealer/mercenary/Satan's apprentice they take a nobody in the presidential race, build his self-esteem, pit him against a guy who has never lost, make him a sensation with the ppl & before you can say "press conference" Mr. Nobody is the Hope of His Nation, is 100% confident in his plans & policies & takes a stand against the corrupt government of the day & is elected President.) The pull of Leverage is mental: how are they gonna get the various ppl involved to do what they need them to do in order to bring justice to this week's bad guy? But while they're busy doing the impossible, there is wit, romance, snarkiness, humour, character development & 5 ppl who swore they would always work alone melding into a real family, sticking their necks out for each other & refusing to leave anybody behind. AND they help each other heal from the wounds of their past along the way. PLUS in every con they have different roles so it's always fresh & every now & again one of them ends up in a role that is waaaaaaaaaayy outside their comfort zone. & then they grow some more. AWESOME.

Comments

[simply-taken.livejournal.com]

+ Do you like/prefer het or slash and why?

I prefer het. I can't see slash. If the characters were gay on Show then it'd be different--this is how the creators drew them & so the Q for me would be do I want to watch that? But when I get invested into a Show & start shipping ppl & then I see in fandom where u have A. broken up my OTP 2. Made one (or both) of them gay 3. Put them with a new partner I get sad. I take my Show romances very srsly & I take canon very srsly. Canon tells me who these pppl are & I need them to stay in character even if in fic u put them in different scenarios.

THIS THIS THIS.

[tinny]

Hodgela

I really like Hodgins, too. Geek, baby. :D For some reason, the relationship never clicked for me, in the fannish sense that it would have made me obsess over it. I'm really monofannish per show. I have my OTP and I'm sticking to it. :) It might change over time, but it's only one at a time. In Bones, it's Booth/Brennan for me, because I just adore Brennan.

But you're making excellent points for why Hodgins and Angela are wonderful together. It's a shame that usually only secondary characters can get a fulfilling lovelife. Chuck's a huge exception to the rule. I can't remember when that happened last. X-Files? Nah.

Het.

It's wonderful to hear someone say that with conviction. I agree. My experience is that all the really big fandoms are slash fandoms, and also crack fandoms. I would much rather have *good* shows with *good* het relationships *and* tons of fic. But my flist is full of slashers and I just can't find much het fic around. Maybe I just need more het fans on my flist who will point me to the good stuff!

Vampire diaries is a good one, too, btw. It has that vampire thing going for it, which seems to attract a bigger fandom.

I take my Show romances very srsly & I take canon very srsly.

Me too! I always go for the canon pairings if the characters are good. Usually, I latch on to one character and then follow his canon pairing. (yes, it's almost always the male characters that interest me. Exception to the rule: Brennan, Buffy.)

That said, when the canon pairing doesn't interest me (or doesn't exist, like on Merlin - because that show for me is *all about Merlin*), I'm okay with shipping slash, because then at least he gets some love there and I can think more about my favorite character that way.

I am very visual, though, so relying solely on fic doesn't work for me. Always pretending that things exist between certain characters that just aren't there is very frustrating. I want, no I need, happy-end resolution on-screen!

I have nothing against homosexual pairings per se. In fact, I find them quite interesting. I have a few good gay soap recs, if you're interested. The only english-language one is from Hollyoaks. One can watch it on youtube, here's the link to my rec post: http://tinnny.livejournal.com/tag/tv-unsortable?skip=9

Canon tells me who these ppl are & I need them to stay in character

I think I am at a disadvantage here, because I am really bad at social interaction. I often don't notice when characters in fic are OOC. I catch the blatant stuff, but most nuances go over my head, sadly.

Thomas Alva Edison.

Very cool answer and very cool reason.

Chuck. Srsly.

Heee. Preaching to the choir.

[Chuck] is the only fandom I'm in where TPTB did not drag out the UST to unbearable lengths.

YESYESYES that! It may not have been their intention. I think they were so close to cancellation so often that they simply didn't dare postpone anything. But it turned out perfect!

Leverage.

Oh, cool. This is one convincing post! You just made me want to watch it. I watched the pilot ages ago (and actually liked it) but then didn't stick with it, I don't know why.

I do have quite a few people on my flist who watch it, though, and it's always been on the back of my mind to get into it once time permits. Hopefully before it's cancelled. ;) It's not cancelled yet, is it?

My most notable Leverage flister is astridv, who posts tons of Leverage recs (all het that I'm aware of, but I didn't check closely). Might interest you, too.


Thanks for answering the questions, I hope it was as much fun for you as it was for me!