galadhir: Jin Guangyao and Lan Xichen have their heads bent together looking at something out of frame (xiyao)
Getting lured back to Tumblr by all the Untamed content over there. Mostly going through the blogs of Jin Guangyao stans and reblogging everything - basically being irritating to two websites at once. But this time I'm going to post about it here, so I don't just end up fading out again.

The Untamed/MDZS fandom must be the largest I've ever been in, and that includes the Tolkien fandom, and it is absolutely bursting with really great fic. Quite a lot of which is even Jin Guangyao centric. Of course I've done my usual thing of gravitating to a widely controversial character rather than nestling happily in the main pairing, which cuts down my reading choices somewhat. But I don't think I could ever be content shipping a pairing for which the canon had already come through. What is left for the fan writer to fix in those cases? Much harder to give JGY a happy ending, especially if you also want everyone else (except Jin Guangshan, he can die) to live and be happy too. But that's what makes it fun.

I'm currently in the middle of podficcing Shiome's Last of our kind, for which I can just about manage to produce a chapter a week. There are 14 chapters and I've done 8. So that should be finished in February. After which, I'm in a quandary as to whether I podfic Derillarch's Peony to Lotus series, or whether I attempt to finish the story I started writing months and months ago.

(That's 'The Will of Heaven', in which JGY comes back to life the same way WWX did, and must attempt to become Lan Furen while fooling the rest of the cultivation world that he is someone else entirely, or else deal with the consequences.)

There is so much good fic out there that it doesn't seem like the fandom needs mine. But there are not very many JGY centric podfics, so I do almost feel like I can make a bigger difference by podficcing than by writing, atm.

Date: 2022-12-14 06:23 pm (UTC)From: [personal profile] sunshine304
sunshine304: (CQL - Jin Guangyao)
Jin Guangyao has a lot of fans! He’s the quintessential poor little meow meow so of course tumblr loves him! ;D And there’s a lot of dramatic shipping potential, including the tragic ending, so he’s perfect! You could’ve chosen a more controversial character in this fandom (*cough*my beloved Jiang Cheng*cough* XD), I don’t think JGY is on top of that list – higher up, sure… XD

There’s so much high quality fic in this fandom, it’s amazing! I’ve been in bigger fandoms (like, Sherlock…) but it’s still quite huge! Shiome’s fic is fantastic!

And even though there are many fics, there’s still always the need for more! I mean, how many “pining WangXian are getting together post-canon because of a case” fics are there? And I still eat that shit up! XD Never enough of a good thing! :D

 

Date: 2022-12-15 07:01 pm (UTC)From: [personal profile] sunshine304
sunshine304: (CQL - Jiang Cheng)
I just love that story of the CQL auditions where Zhu Zanjin was like, “Oh yes, I’ll make the perfect Sizhui, I’ve got huge eyes and cute dimples, I’m the bestest boy!” and at the casting they were like, “Nope, you’ve got evil dimples, you’re JGY!” XD And he’s perfect for it!

Ahhh Jiang Cheng, my beloved! I was kind of floored when I found out that he’s got such vocal haters? And that they were so indignant that he didn’t stand by WWX? When it was obvious that he was in a very shitty situation politically and that he couldn’t? And he also didn’t have all the information because certain people didn’t want him to? And that he was so super evil and brutal towards WWX when I was like, “This is a rather common sibling dynamic?” XD Like, just, what?

Yes do that! Podfics are cool, too, but don’t hold back on your writing simply for the reason of, “But does fandom need this?” because fandom always does! XD


(BTW I just scrolled through my myriad of saved icons from the LJ days because I was looking for some specific ones - and it seems we must've crossed paths in PotC fandom? Because I've got some icons that you made/used? XD One was with Cutler Beckett about "still proudly supporting the wrong side". ;D so either this was you, or someone else had your name back then! XD)

Date: 2022-12-16 04:40 pm (UTC)From: [personal profile] sunshine304
sunshine304: (CQL - Jiang Cheng)
Yes, I’m glad ZZJ got to play JGY, too! It’s the much meatier role and I’m glad they saw that potential in him! I like to hear about these casting things, like almost everyone tried to get the role of Xue Yang, for example. XD

It feels like many people just forget that JC was missing a lot of very important information so to him it looked like WWX was totally abandoning him after Sunshot (drinking the days away instead of training the disciples etc.) even though WWX had made the promise of always being JC’s right-hand man. And it only gets worse from there, what with WWX suddenly standing up for the Wens and going against all the other sects. JC is still in such a bad political situation at that point that he couldn’t support WWX, not after he’d killed the Jin cultivators. (Also, I think some of those Western fans just... don't understand the world building? And that ancient fantasy China doesn't work like USA 2022?)

I tend to think that JC didn’t really want to kill WWX, but he was also so gone on grief and anger at that moment, that he kind of convinces himself that he must want to kill WWX because who wouldn’t, right? That’s at least how I always interpreted the moment of the sword missing, after all. IDK about falling off a cliff, because that seems to be a cdrama trope in itself and usually they don’t die. XD JC didn’t know about the core so perhaps he’d thought that WWX would be fine (if there wasn’t also lava at the ground, because a core likely wouldn’t help much then), but he also didn’t look very hard at any clues beforehand (which I don’t blame him for; boy had a whole lot to deal with himself).

I think that’s what I love so much about the story – everyone makes mistakes and has flaws, nothing is truly black and white, no-one is only good or only bad, though of course characters lean more or less heavily into a certain direction. But I love how may characters are parallels/foils for each other (WWX/JGY/XY for example) and how tweaking some events might lead to a different outcome.

I got the impression (though that might be wrong) that [Western] novel fans tend to hate on JC more as he comes across rather unsympathetic in the English TL and the narration at first happily tells us about how he was the one to kill his shidi and also enjoys torturing anyone who reminds him of WWX… Which, as we know that the narration is quite unreliable, should be side-eyed at least a bit. There also aren't any acting choices we can rely on that might soften the character. Whereas it seems that CQL fans tend to absolve WWX of any and all blame ever, when – even though CQL did tone down all that he did because censorship – that is just not true. *sigh*

Really, when one is also a fan of the villains, one tends to be far more open-minded about these things, that’s true!

 
I checked if I actually saved some of your fic, but alas no - we just silently crossed paths in the comms where I usually only lurked. XD The mean days of sporking comms, anyone? That was huge back then. Looking back, it really wasn't right to mock likely teenaged authors like that instead of just, uhhh moving on from the badfic. XD But those were the wild and crazy times of mass internet fandom I guess.
Sparrington was how I got into slash and I also enjoyed the Gilette/Groves fics that popped up after a while. XD Didn't really get into Norrington/Gillette, though that tended to come up in those fics as well. :D

then I ended up turning it into a novel with the names sanded off 
👀

 

Date: 2022-12-20 05:30 pm (UTC)From: [personal profile] sunshine304
sunshine304: (CQL - Jiang Cheng)
Yes, at the end JC doesn’t have much choice but to try and stop WWX. He doesn’t have the whole picture (through no fault of his own) and to an outsider it really looks like WWX went mad through his cultivation method. It’s not like some survivors from Qiongqi Pass would’ve gone and said, “Well yeah WWX killed JZX but actually at first he was minding his own business and we attacked him unprovoked” – because in their eyes WWX was evil and had very likely cursed Jin Zixun (because that guy had no other enemies who would wish him harm…) so confronting him was the just thing to do in their eyes.

That WWX would’ve kept out of everyone’s business and lived his life in the Burial Mounds, had lived his life in the BM for at least a year without doing anything, didn’t count and also wasn’t logical for them – he was using evil methods and had that super powerful tool, of course he’d want to overthrow the sect leaders at some point! *sigh*

And it seemed like JC held back for a very long time from actively going against WWX – until JYL’s death. And well, WWX was totally gone then anyway. But I’m sure it was a huge conflict for him and I don’t understand how people can misread all of this so much…

I read a funny meta on tumblr recently, about all of them meeting at Jinlintai for the conference and JC suddenly being confronted with WWX in his mask right there out in the open without his knowledge, and how he playacts through this really well! Like, he tends to be very emotional and this could’ve caused him to break down (it possibly would have in the past), but he acts so well here, which is what they all have to depend on! JC throwing a fit while the Twin Jades and WWX try to investigate a murder would’ve been very unhelpful. XD

I find WWX irritating at times, too. XD And I always wondered how people were like, “What an awful sibling relationship, JC obviously hates WWX with how he acts, always sniping at him!” and to me that was just… a typical sibling relationship. XD Like, I’ve got a friend who acted very similarly with her brother when they were younger, always throwing sarcastic comments at each other or playfully hitting each other or tumbling around on the lawn. They were very close in age and both quite confident characters that loved to do outdoor stuff. So I never questioned that dynamic but it seems people find it… weird? Even violent?

Ahahaha I looked at that title and was like, “Hmmm sounds familiar…” but it didn’t fit your username. Started to read the beginning and was like, “I know that fic!” XD Just under your ff.net name back then, I’ve got that one downloaded from waaaayyy back when. XD

Date: 2022-12-15 03:48 pm (UTC)From: [personal profile] virgosplaining
virgosplaining: (moonrise)
forever grateful that there are others out there who want to give jgy a happy ending :') absolutely my 2022 meow meow du jour lmfao

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