Stop Airbrushing My Dudes!

[cimorene]

Fic peeves: you know how most people look sort of normal? Of course there's a bell-curve of normal, and movie stars don't map out along the bell curve and tv stars don't either. Some shows are eerie to watch because everyone's really attractive.

But: blockbuster movies do that more than your average weekly primetime show. I mean, yeah, Emily Deschanel and all the women on the CSIs and all the women in the Stargate shows are... pretty hot. But nobody's perfect even so, and there's a wide sample of dudes on tv who are downright funny-looking.

Even when you're in love with someone, and are perfectly convinced that their crooked little nose or their funny lantern-jaw are perfect and would be inferior if they looked more average, you are not under the illusion that these things are perfect. And especially if they're pudgy you're unlikely to think their abdomens look like a washboard, okay.

It's not an insult to say that Blair Sandburg, Duncan MacLeod and Methos, Bodie and Doyle, Starsky and Hutch, etc look knobbly, lopsided, dopey, unibrowed, soft around the middle, or a bit cross-eyed if it's true and it certainly doesn't mean they're not slashy. I mean, it's not like people from all along the bell curve don't fall in love and hook up and have all sorts of sexual preferences!

So, you know, it really, severely throws me out of a story if a pov character who doesn't seem to be unreliable in other aspects, and has a firm grip on reality, suddenly starts saying that someone's hairless when they're hairy, tall when they're average, flawlessly or classically handsome when they're squinty and lopsided or knobbly or hawk-nosed or unibrowed (they might be extraordinarily handsome, of course. Just not classically or flawlessly so), or amber-eyed when their eyes are incontrovertibly green or hazel, or green-eyed when their eyes are brown, or golden-haired when they're a brunette, or milky-pale when they're kind of pleasantly tanned and olive.

I mean, you're not blind, and your readers aren't either. If you have to recast the show in your head, or airbrush the hell out of everything like stretchmarks and love handles on a swimsuit model, before you can get off on the characters getting off - well, okay. I think it's sad, but I can't do anything about it. But what in Bob's name makes you think it's a good idea to change random easily observable visual facts about canon in your fanfiction?

Comments

[emmuzka.livejournal.com]

This isn't an issue for me in band slash since generally people are described as just "sexy" or "attractive", or short or tall. And I can suspend my disbelief with Panic ;)

It irked the hell out of me in the X-files fandom, though. Because if Fox Mulder is in his early forties, yes, let's write him as soft skinned and bright eyed and generally looking like a twelve year old girl.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Yes, I find the younger fandoms and RPS fandoms have less problem with this for some reason. It's like airbrushing has gone out of fashion a bit. If so, thank God for small favours.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

HP is pretty bad for it, though. Which...sure, it's just books, so you can imagine them however you want, but I think it's pretty unlikely they're all the hottest people anyone's ever laid eyes on, especially ones like Snape and Draco who are described at least somewhat as not that great. And it's one thing when it's the stuff on FFN by really young authors, where character X comes back from summer vacation with a makeover, which is at least acknowledging they weren't all that to begin with, whereas your typical slash story on LJ often assumes they're drop-dead gorgeous from the get-go.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Oh, agreed. I'd forgotten about that one. I feel it's legit to go with the books - and describe Hermione's bushy hair and buck teeth for example - or to go with the movies, and make Draco clearly based on Tom and Harry on Dan. Or, of course, to go somewhere in between. But Draco being super-muscled and - well- like fanon Draco is just too much. As for Snape... yeah, what can you say about fanon Snape? Nothing but "LOL", pretty much.

[jennaria.livejournal.com]

I've seen this in anime fandoms as well -- although given the doujinshi tradition, wherein artists feel free to render anyone and everyone as sweet-faced teenagers, maybe it's a little more explicable.

Still. Blair Sandburg is observably not so small he can practically fit into Jim's pocket, to choose a story example I still haven't forgotten after ten years. If you're changing so many things about the characters that the only resemblance to canon is the names, wouldn't you be better off just writing original fic?

[cimness.livejournal.com]

WORD. And the size/height one is the strangest of all when you're talking about tv, where you can, you know, look at the guys standing side-by-side. In the Pros I honestly thought Bodie being "huge" and "lumbering" meant he was like, taller, when in fact, I think the guys are pretty much the same height to within half an inch, and only a size or two apart around the middle.

[suzycat.livejournal.com]

Bodie? Lumbering? Bodie is all spivvy and a wearer of smart jackets. He's practically *urbane*. There's nothing in the least bit lumbering about Bodie. Or Doyle for that matter, even though Doyle at least had vaguely lumberjacky clothing choices.

Back in the day I think we used to girlify Doyle slightly (I say this not in terms of fic but in terms of teenage girl viewing practices) because he had lovely curls and played the guitar and had moments of great sensitivity. But in actual fact he was a violent little Brummie shit most of the time. *swoons*

[klangley56.livejournal.com]

I remember a story--title and author thankfully forgotten--where Doyle was--well, hopefully he was undercover--dressed as a woman, and apparently he made a drop-dead, *gorgeous* femme who turned the head of every male in sight.

Yeah, right. :-)

Picture that face with make-up. He'd make a butt-ugly woman. :-)

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

The height thing was one of my biggest pet peeves in Vampire Chronicles. Lestat and Louis are described as being about the same height (6' for Lestat and 5'11" for Louis), but there was this one author who was really bad about forcing them into these seme/uke-type roles. Her Louis was short, petit, with huuuuuge eyes, and a cloud of curly hair. Oh, and a pixie face.

I mean...what?

(And I'm suddenly reminded of that one Star Wars fic I read where poor Obi-Wan was described as having curvy hips.)

[jezrana.livejournal.com]

...I'm sorry, I'm trying to figure out why anyone would do that to Louis when that's pretty much what Armand is for, like, canonically.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

LOL! But then they couldn't call their fic Louis/Lestat!

It was this huge, long series, too. I wish the old VC archive hadn't disappeared.

[pandorasblog]

They're working on restoring it. If you friend forbiddenvc you can get updates, and right now they're particularly looking for old authors to clarify warnings etc. on their fic, and for any volunteers to copy-edit and provide warnings for fics where the authors are uncontactable (which is most of them).

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Oh, cool! Thanks! I thought it was gone forever.

[tilney.livejournal.com]

Oh, very, very true. I am reminded of someone's fanart portraying the fanon image of Snape with the smooth, olive skin and silky hair and there's this small comment on the margin: 'Doesn't he look like Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Llewelyn-Bowen)?'. I find it hilarious how characters get twisted out of all recognition to become more conventionally handsome.

[miriam-heddy.livejournal.com]

I was going to comment on the main point, but I had to take a moment to say that I adore LLB (who is kickass gorgeous, but definitely has moments of rabbity-ness).

[tilney.livejournal.com]

:))) He's lovely. I love him in 'Changing Rooms'. His deadpan on how horrible this particular shade of puce is always make my day.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

I believe I've even read fic where Harry, with the mature eyes of adulthood, discovered that not only was Snape's hair not oily and his skin not sallow, his nose wasn't that big either.

[tilney.livejournal.com]

He grew up! His perception changed! My family house isn't as big now as when I was seven.

Oh dear. Why even bother with canon at this point.

[snakeling]

Canon vs Fanon Snape :D

[tilney.livejournal.com]

Heeee heeee heeeee thank you. Fanon!Snape kind of really looks like LLB. Amazing.

[saturnalia.livejournal.com]

Oh, god yes. So much word.

[eleveninches.livejournal.com]

ITA. I notice it especially in slash stories where one of the characters is feminized. I recently read an SGA story where McKay was injured and Sheppard picked him up and carried him to the stargate, cradling him like a little kid, and I was like, Um, McKay and Sheppard are the same size and Ronon could barely carry McKay on that one episode.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Yes! Girlifying Rodney is so bizarre. There was this whole huge... trove... subgenre... (I'm not sure what to call it) at Wraithbait full of small, girly, sensitive, fainting damsel-in-distress Rodney. Of course in a lot of those he was insecure because he was fat, though...

[dragonladyk.livejournal.com]

S4 Ep16: "Trio."

Enough said on the subject of Rodney's physique. ~.^

DragonLady

[arresi.livejournal.com]

Ronon carried McKay? Dang it, how did I miss that?

[eleveninches.livejournal.com]

For about three seconds in the ep where McKay almost Ascended, but he looked like he was really struggling there.

[yduras.livejournal.com]

(here from metafandom)

I always think... "Have you ever tried a princess carry?" Unless you're lifting someone a lot smaller than you, your arms give out pretty fast. You ever notice how mothers rest their kids on their hips, or how firemen sling rescuees over their shoulders? It's because that's how you don't kill your arms.

[grimmhill.livejournal.com]

I see this in fanfic alot, and usually wonder about it. Isn't the fireman carry supposed to be more practical for carrying someone close to or greater than your own weight?

Funny story- I actually have tried to carry some one that way. Back when I was young, and still lifting weights. Picture 160lb female carrying 170 lb male friend. I made it about 5 steps and then my knees went and we both went down.

Anyway, this, I assume, is one of the practical reasons hollywood insists on thin-bordering-on -anorexic leading ladies. And I'm impressed almost everytime some poor leading man has to heft even these relative light weights, since I know they have to do it multiple times to get the take during filming. I guess it supposed to demonstrate what big strong men they are, and as a female I'm supposed to admire/desire/value this trait. And then that romantic image gets pulled into fanfic.

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

One of my male friends can carry me around pretty easily (it freaks me out), but I'm barely 5'3" and lightly-built and he's 6-something. My boyfriend, who's well under 6' and probably similarly strong, cannot comfortably carry me in a princess carry. So there's something about leverage, I think.

And firemen carries are uncomfortable for the person being carried, and consequently unromantic. But I don't get the fetish about carrying people.

[dragonladyk.livejournal.com]

I recently read an SGA story where McKay was injured and Sheppard picked him up and carried him to the stargate, cradling him

I second the baffled on that one. The only slash pairing -- and I mean the only, and that is a "barely" only -- that could get away with that sort of thing is Ronon/Zelenka because Ronon is so Paul-Bunyan-brawny and Zelenka is so, um, well, not (even Lorne is taller, though it's only by an inch or so).

This isn't technically "airbrushing" but it is "girlifying," but there was this one Rodney/Radek fic where Radek said something along the lines of, "I share one kiss and a bed and you think I'll just roll over and spread them" to which Rodney replied in all sincerity that what he meant/was after was "cuddling and kissing, you know, touch."

Words fail me. This is Rodney -- remember all the stuff with Sam? Like, oh, say, the vid where he felt the need to exposit on how he masturbated to her image (granted, he was pretty sleep deprived), but still, "no sex" are you freaking kidding me?

DragonLady

[eleveninches.livejournal.com]

I agree 100%.

[miriam-heddy.livejournal.com]

Word.

I'm having a Spike/Xander renaissance right now, and reading through the archive like an obsessed person, and the sheer number of people who write stories set in the last season of the show but insist on casting a younger, thinner Xander into the role are just driving me batshit. And the people who are writing *post* series stories who insist on giving Xander some sort of horrifying trauma and/or malaria for the sole purpose of justifying their desire to have him be suddenly slender are killing me. Fandom anorexia is just yuck.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

You know, I remember your past posts about that and it's still one of the more sickening examples of this particular problem. I don't know if people realise the message they send by claiming counterfactually that their characters are all slender/muscular/swimsuit-model-ish, but it's the same gobsmacked reaction I get to those airbrushed covers they show of already-skinny and already-gorgeous models, because, I mean, if Nick Brendon the way he actually looks is not good enough, then... who is? It's like that cover where they airbrushed Faith Hill's wrinkles out and actually, like, airbrushed her hands, of all things, which is burned indelibly on my memory. God Forbid a forty-something woman have smile lines.

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

Oh god, yes, that's annoying as hell. Or the old standby of Xander doing more construction work so that he got all fit once more.

But I've always cringed that most Xander writers seem to write s2 Xander, when the actor was unusually thin, into seasons 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and beyond.

[miriam-heddy.livejournal.com]

Damn, yes. I've been rewatching the eps, and, watching S2, I keep wondering what was going on. Was he under pressure to try to look like a high school guy and worried about that? And if he was, I feel sort of awful for him, and like it was a wasted effort, because really, none of the guys on Buffy looked right for high school, but you just had to ignore the fact that there were no spotty adolescents in Sunnydale as just another product of the Hellmouth magic *g*.

As for the slash, it's gotten to where I find myself shocked if I read a story set in later seasons or after S7 in which there isn't a line or sentence in which Xander's reset.

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think during s2 the actor may have been having some issues. He struggled with various addictions at later times, and...that was quite a weight loss, between s1 and s2. So it's hard to imagine there weren't some poorly-chosen behaviors attached to it. I do not know for sure; that's all speculation on my part. But I think it likely, unfortunately.

Ha, I hear you. I had so many weird fannish interactions with people during s7 when I would say that I thought Nick Brendon still looked good, and there was just so much disparaging of his weight gain that was more evident end of s6 and in s7. Still, on Ats I think David Boreanaz got worse criticism during the last season of Angel for weight gain. Never mind the poor guy had a bum knee that had to be operated on, and so of course he gained weight in the interim while he had to be less active.

You know, there is one fic I know of focusing *on* Xander's weight gain, kind of a h/c in which Spike basically instigates Xander's loss of confidence over how he looks and then helps to build it up once they become romantically involved. It is one of the very few fics I know of which does such a thing -- if you're at all interested, here's the info: Going Soft (http://sinandcinnamon.livejournal.com/6984.html) by sinandcinnamon (Spike/Xander, hard R, roughly 3,000 words).

[miriam-heddy.livejournal.com]

I will read that tonight. Thanks for the link! I've been looking and looking, thinking that there simply had to be something else--something that challenges or at least questions the pattern. But I'd wondered if perhaps it was a pattern too embedded in commonly held prejudice to be noticed.

And yes, I had wondered whether the addiction issues figured in, and on what timeline. It's odd but I guess I just wasn't tuned into the fandom at the time enough to read boards or hear the crit (which is probably good, as I would've been tearing off people's heads left and right).

Just in terms of Angel vs. Xander, while it seems reasonable that Xander should change (because, y'know, human), the vampire thing suggests an unchanging body (which can make any change seem all the weirder), though of course anyone looking at Spike over the course of Buffy and Angel has to notice that Spike changed as well.

In terms of rationalizing or explaining it, I'd be happy to see someone arguing that somehow, vampires' bodies change in relation to blood supply (though much hand-waving has to be done there).

But for the humans (and I haven't yet read that story you linked to) my first impulse is to say that I'd rather it not become a h/c issue, because that's making too much of it--pathologizing it rather than accepting the mutability of the human body as a part of human life.

[malfeasanceses.livejournal.com]

Now I'm kind of creeped out by Xander "trying to work out more" ("Have you lost weight? It suits you!" -Dracula) in the Buffy S8 comics.

[miriam-heddy.livejournal.com]

I haven't yet read the comments, but y'know, it just figures that the comics would have the same damned line.

I was reading something last night (Road Coveredwith Blood), actually, where Cordelia asks Xander about his weight loss and he snarks that it's the "grief and grapefruit diet" and Cordelia tells him that grapefruit are so last year, and it was the first time I actually enjoyed one of those lines, because within it was at least the suggestion that, y'know, it might not be a good thing and that maybe, if Xander were happy, he might not be so thin, y'know? Because the logic in a lot of stories isn't carried through in stories where suffering=erotic thinness.

[norah.livejournal.com]

I know this is no longer your fandom, but when people wrote bandslash and gave the tenors "deep" voices I was always like O.o WTF. THE PATRICK STUMP OF WHOM I AM AWARE DOES NOT SOUND LIKE BARRY WHITE, NOT EVEN A LITTLE, FANDOM.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

That one's particularly funny because of how presumably their voices are the, er, salient features of the dudes in question.

[almostnever.livejournal.com]

Reading SGA fic is always funny to me in that respect, because I got into the fandom first and the show a distant second, and though I can see how he's good-looking and all, Sheppard's not my type. So I read a lot of breathless fic descriptions of him as flawlessly smooth-skinned and golden tan and incredibly gorgeous to everyone who witnesses his charm and beauty (while thinking that he should be pretty scarred up by now, his tan varies, and c'mon, he's a nice-looking guy but he's not everyone's type; pleased to meet you, I'm exhibit A).

Then I watch the actual show, and I like Shep a lot in all his kind of nasally laconic obnoxiousness, but charming and beautiful and universally appealing... not so much.

On the other hand, I also hate SGA stories that seem to make excuses about people being attracted to Rodney even though he's supposedly physically oh-so-average or "overweight" or whatever.

Holy shit, what? I know the show makes fat jokes at his expense too, and that's fucked up also, because imo, having a barely-visible stomach and a fleshy chin at forty is not "fat". And it bugs the crap out of me when stories feel like they have to give elaborate other reasons for people to think Rodney is hot because of course they would never find his body sexy. Despite the fact that legions of fangirls demonstrably do find everything about the guy sexy.

So uh... yeah. Rantage, sorry about that. I agree with you, and it goes both ways. The airbrushing sucks, and IMO, making excuses for characters that aren't airbrushed also sucks.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah. ._. Word to all that too. "It's actually all muscle!" and "But it's his MIND that's attractive" are actually to my mind guilty of the same sin and both labouring under the strange delusion that the way he actually looks is fat and unattractive. I've always found those positions hard to understand when usually other parts of the story tend to imply the author does find him attractive, and if she doesn't, at least you'd think she'd realise that her POV character kind of has to for it to make sense.

[marinarusalka.livejournal.com]

Heh. In Hercules: the Legendary Journeys fandom, many of us used to complain about "the cult of the pale hunter," in which fanfic writers kept portraying Iolaus as incredibly pale, slender and child-like. Not to mention weepy, helpless, prone to tearful temper-tantrums, and totally vulnerable to any random thug who decided to jump him in the street. Mind you, we're talking about a character who canonically looks like this:



I have never been able to figure this out...

[metal-dog5.livejournal.com]

weepy, helpless, prone to tearful temper-tantrums, and totally vulnerable to any random thug

What!? Did these writers not watch the show, ever?

[marinarusalka.livejournal.com]

Damned if I know. The guy regularly beats up gangs of armed bandits single-handed, but you certainly wouldn't know it from the fic.

[delurker.livejournal.com]

Fanon!Iolaus: So slender he can hide behind canon!Iolaus's bicep?

[marinarusalka.livejournal.com]

Hee! He could and he would!

Here via Metafandom

[sniggs.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to say YES! My main fandom is BtVS with a focus on Giles and it is amazing how many people can look at an actor who's pushing fifty and then write about some buff dude with a six-pack and an unlined face.
Love how you made your argument eloquent and short and avoided rantage, I really enjoyed reading it.

[misslucyjane]

Off-kilter beauty is the best kind. So, big giant HELL YES.

Here via Metafandom

[xjestx.livejournal.com]

I've lost count of the number of times I've made this exact complaint. Well, perhaps 'exact' is the wrong word for it. I've never used the expression 'bell-curve of normal' before but, if you don't mind, I might start. :)

Re: Here via Metafandom

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. Just don't credit it to me in front of any statisticians, okay? ;)

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

That is so annoying, when people disregard canon appearances or descriptions to make the characters fit their mold of what's attractive.

In line with what I commented to another respondent above, I get particularly peeved at people who do story-focused makeovers, like Xander losing weight because he's working more in construction, or Snape suddenly stumbling across a range of haircare products, so that everyone around them thinks, "Okay, *now* he's handsome and worthy of desire!"

Thank goodness I've never seen fics in which people get actual plastic surgery (though I'm sure they exist; just... *shudders*).

[invisionary.livejournal.com]

Does magical body alteration count? Because I've seen that (albeit only a few times, but it was more than enough).

It especially skeeves me because it's usually being done to female characters, and it feeds off of the whole (ugly) societal stereotype that says if a woman doesn't look like a swimsuit model, she's unattractive.

I can't decide if it creeps me out more to see a male or a female author do it, but I've seen both. Ugh. DO NOT WANT.

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

Oh man, that sounds terrible! I haven't seen that at all; I suppose I should be glad.

If you feel like giving more details, I'm curious -- have you seen it more in BtVS, or in other fandoms as well? In any case, that's troubling. And I agree with you there - it's creepy both ways, whatever the author's identity.

[invisionary.livejournal.com]

I've only seen it in Buffy fandom, but I don't read in any other fandoms where magic is part of the canon, so I suppose it's possible that it's out there in other places. I don't know. It's pretty rare even in Buffy fandom; like I said, I've only seen it a few times, and I've read quite a bit of fic over the years. I just mentioned it because your comment about plastic surgery made me think of it.

I mean, I guess it's just another way to accomplish the "redrawing" of characters that under discussion here, but even so.... *shudder*

[entrenous88.livejournal.com]

It does seem even more creepy, I agree, to make the transformation magic (particularly if *another* character is engineering the transformation -- don't know if that's the case, but I'm imagining scenarios uneasily).

Thanks for the reply!

[phiremangston.livejournal.com]

THANK YOU.

This happens in so many of my other fandoms, and it bothers me so much when people in Crossing Jordan fandom are trying to make Nigel more universally appealing. He does not have six-pack abs and strong hands. He's LANKY and skinny in that Alan Cumming sort of way.

I like my fic realistic, thanks.

[magglenagall.livejournal.com]

Oh, my dear sweet Lord, hell yes in a handbasket. I recently read a fic that described Gene Hunt as "slim." My jaw hit the floor so hard I think I broke it.

(here from metafandom, btw)

[floriatosca.livejournal.com]

Mine would too. I'm more familiar with Philip Glenister's earlier historical stuff than with LoM, but he wasn't a stringbean then, either.

[loz]

You what?

I can understand concentrating on the fact Gene/Phil has long, long legs, and elegant hands, and broad shoulders, and eyes/eyelashes to die for --- lying through omission, one might say. But downright lying? Wow.

[ms-treesap.livejournal.com]

.....

There are no words.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

HAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

[yourlibrarian]

There clearly are a lot of examples where beautifying has been done for reasons of preference, but I think this can also verge into people just being unfamiliar with canon or seeing things no one else is seeing. For example, if I didn't know what James Marsters looked like I would probably rarely guess through reading fanfic alone. Two descriptions I remember in particular are of his long legs and elegant hands.

In SPN, where you have two incontrovertibly tall and good looking guys I've seen a few odd things said as well. The one I've seen most often is how Sam is dark-skinned. Granted he probably tans whereas Dean burns but he is anything but dark skinned. In one fic he was in disguise and his skin described as cinammon toned and I did not figure out it was him until he was revealed because I couldn't square that description with the character.

[stefanie-bean.livejournal.com]

Fanfic writers aren't the only ones who do it. I have to laugh at The Tudors and The Other Boleyn Girl, because by the time Henry VIII got around to marrying Anne, he had been married to Catherine for 20+ years before the divorce, and was already starting to put on weight. Catherine was the only one, pretty much, who got to sleep with him when he was slender. But nooooo ... we have to have a "hot" Henry. You can see how attitudes have changed, too: the early 1970s Masterpiece Theater production distinctly shows Henry's physical decline - but then again, they're not romanticizing him.

[trailingoff.livejournal.com]

I think there's kind of a continuum, though, with the fluffy feminised stories you're talking about at one extreme, and ultra realistic stories at the other. I'm not saying it's evenly balanced -- I reckon there are probably fifty fluffy feminised stories for every ultra (and I mean *ultra*) realistic one, but they're certainly out there and I've been coming across them lately with a lot more frequency.

Er ... I guess you're wondering what I mean by ultra realistic ... I'm sure there's a better term but I can't think of one right now. I mean the kind of story where the characters fart (with sound and smell described), burp, barf, scratch themselves, rub their curly-haired hairy (I can't emphasise the hair enough) chests together, go to the bathroom in front of each other because they just don't give a damn, have graphically described medical things done to various bodily orifices, etc.

Personally I think the explanation for the fluffy feminised stories is that some fanfic writers like to ignore all of the gritty things that men (and human beings in general) do and are. There's a convention in the romance genre ... er, probably in most genres, really ... where women never so much as break a sweat because it's not 'ladylike' or 'angelic' or whatever. Ladies don't sweat, they *glow*, and so forth. They're "perfect", "gorgeous" and "adorable", and they have "creamy alabaster skin" and "sparkling emerald-green orbs" (instead of eyes). So I think a large portion of slash writers are just applying this convention to men, which is, you know, not exactly productive, but it's never really been done before (except in yaoi anime and manga, I guess), so it's kind of interesting. It happens in het too, it's just people don't notice it so much because women are often depicted that way in mainstream culture.

Meanwhile, there's a backlash from writers who are getting as graphic as possible with their descriptions, often to the point that the narrative is superseded by the physicality of their characters (imo and all that).

I can see why people write and read both kinds of stories, but I'm definitely a middle-of-the-range kind of girl. Actually I prefer as few physical descriptions as possible, because I like just enough to get my imagination going.

[bluerosefairy.livejournal.com]

WORD. I completely agree with this entire post. And really, I never noticed it until I recently got into House fandom, and discovered that various fanbrats feel the need to insist that James Wilson is:

a) supernaturally-thin with glowing eyes and cheekbones and silky hair. And just - no. He was awkward-looking in S1 of House (the lighting did absolutely nothing to help, either), and really, if you want to see RSL with flowing hair and cheekbones that could cut glass, rent Dead Poets Society or Much Ado About Nothing.

b) a huge fatso because Robert Sean Leonard finally grew into his height around S3. Seriously, the man is perfectly normal-sized. Putting on a few pounds =/= "fat". EVER.

c) a flailing effeminate drama queen whose only hobby is pining after House, who is the only person he's ever loved. In fic, this is usually achieved by him having hideous fashion sense. Um, have you seen what he wears? With the color-coordination and lovely cut? (Okay, lavender shirts nonwithstanding). Look, I admit, the man does blow-dry his hair and apparently wears toenail polish, but seriously. He likes monster trucks. He plays practical jokes. He kicks all kinds of ass at poker. And he's a serial divorcee who's variably described as a "slut", who "loves everybody", and "always told his wives" when he did and didn't love them. It's fairly safe to say that he likes women and fell in love with other people.

I don't think anyone even wants to start me on the prettification of Greg House, whose stubble magically does not hurt when rubbed against sensitive body parts, whose leg scar is magically "not nearly as bad as you'd think" (um, we've SEEN it, it's pretty bad), and if I hear one more description of piercing or glowing or penetrating "indigo/cobalt/azure/navy/sky/etc orbs", I will scream. Yes, Hugh Laurie has drop-dead gorgeous eyes. No, we don't need to hear about them every ten lines.

[c425cc33.livejournal.com]

Yes, absolutely, especially for this fandom! Couldn't have said it better. Plausible H/W fanfic appears to be challenging to write for a variety of reasons and respecting their physiques is just one of those. Finding the good ones can make the hunt worthwhile, though.

[bluerosefairy.livejournal.com]

Oh, definitely. That's one of the reasons I do love H/W - they're so far from physically perfect, and yet both still extremely attractive. Besides, the authorial gymnastics required to write plausible H/W are WAY more difficult on the personality side of things. You have a grouchy misanthropic bastard who genuinely is smarter than most people in the room, and a boy wonder oncologist who eats neediness for breakfast and can actually hold his own with House.

[pandorasblog]

Re: House's scar - I don't read House fic but that would strike me as downright offensive, given that it implies nobody could ever love or have sex with someone with a noticable, unpleasant scar. Which, in my personal experience, is untrue.

[ms-treesap.livejournal.com]

Seconded.

[bluerosefairy.livejournal.com]

Oh, it drives me absolutely nuts. I mean, they deal with it in canon quite a bit - it's vicious-looking, but it's not like it stops the man from getting laid (Stacy, various hookers, etc). And it's never going to go away, because we come in five years after the infarction, and the scar's still pretty pronounced and he's popping Vicodin like candy to deal with the pain.

HP Observations

[ritakitty.livejournal.com]

HP fanfic is rife with airbrushed characters, which is bizarre when you consider how very few characters are described as being physically attractive in the series.

Handsome/beautiful: Gilderoy Lockhart, Tom Riddle (as a teenager), Thomas Riddle Sr., Sirius Black, Lily Potter, Fleur Weasley (formerly Delacourt), Bill Weasley (pre-Book 6), and Cedric Diggory.

Pretty: Hermione, Cho Chang, and Ginny Weasley.

I'm sure I've missed a few, but it's a short list. Much like real life, not everyone is drop dead gorgeous.

I still haven't decided which is more annoying: the outright "character makeover" (eg, Snape with a tan and blinding white, straight teeth + blond hair)or the "subtle change that nonetheless contradicts canonical" description (eg, Snape is taller than Sirius Black). I'm suspect that fanfic authors airbrush to show that their favorite character is good/worthy/superior. After all, good = handsome, tall, smart, etc., right?

It's painfully reductive, especially for a series where the author repeatedly points out that "It's your choices that make you who you are." Not your wealth, weight, house at Hogwarts, or your physical appearance. Ergo, Mad Eye Moody is ugly, but he's a good guy. Tom Riddle was a handsome young man who is rotten to the core. Lily Potter -- beautiful and good. Bellatrix Lestrange beautiful but bad. And there's a whole range of people in between in terms of both looks and goodness.

Re: HP Observations

[grondfic.livejournal.com]

"It's your choices that make you who you are." Not your wealth, weight, house at Hogwarts, or your physical appearance.

Word! She actually killed Snape off to DEMONSTRATE this to us!

Re: HP Observations

[malfeasanceses.livejournal.com]

Snape with a tan and blinding white, straight teeth + blond hair

...HAHAHA WHAT. I've seen a great deal of things, but I've never seen BLOND SNAPE.

Re: HP Observations

[ritakitty.livejournal.com]

And you really don't want to see it, either!

[lone-gunfreak.livejournal.com]

Matt/Mohinder (Heroes) fandom is RIDDLED with this. Either Matt (Greg Grunberg) spontaneously generates a 6-pack and 2% body fat, or long stretches of the fic will be devoted to justifying Mohinder's attraction to him. Matt is canonically a bit insecure about his appearance, but not to the "weepy teen girl" extent you see in some fic. Also - dude. Geg Grunberg's hot, and awesome. The attraction is not that big a mystery.

There's also a strange tendency to stretch out Mohinder. I keep reading stories that describe him as tall, which is ... interesting, when IMDB says Sendhil Ramamurthy is 5'9" (and I'm pretty sure that's in some pretty thick-soled shoes - dude's pretty tiny). In comparison, Greg Grunberg and Zachary Quinto are both listed as 6'2", so if your fic is describing Mohinder as taller than Matt or Sylar or even the same height, something is awry. He's nearly half a foot shorter.

I don't read much Peter fic, but the few I've seen describe a guy who's either way bigger or way smaller than Milo Ventimiglia actually is. Sylar also seems to get twinkified in some fic, and Nathan gets a height adjustment similar to Mohinder's. Canon Heroes has a pretty wide range of body types for a TV show (mostly among the men), but you wouldn't know that from reading the fic.

Here via MF

[intheyear2004.livejournal.com]

I think you seriously underestimate the number of writers who a) write fic without ever having seen/read the source material and b) although knowing the source material, value fanon higher than canon, i.e. they like fanon descriptions of character X being this fragile little petal more than the reality of character X being a rather tough dude. ;)

[loz]

Here via metafandom

I so agree with this.

There was one writer in my primary fandom (Life on Mars) who used to do that and I just... what? What what? Aren't they great because they are the other side of ordinary? Doesn't it give them character? Can't you capitalise on that?

here via metafandom

[dustbunny105.livejournal.com]

Word.

That's all I have to say.