Look, shade, the criticism is valid, you had Ranma follow basically the same
plotline as laid out in LH for how Naru and Kei meet, that plus this dream
sequence adds to this.
Also, if you're getting a lot of "you shouldn't kill Granny hina" advice
from people that know the LH universe, maybe you should stop behaving like
this and just accept that maybe the people telling you that might have a
point... and that they're telling you it for a good reason...and that it's
not "bias" as you put it.
But, given the tone use used by you from the start... maybe you just aren't
able to handle feedback. Thats what it looks like to me at least.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Shade" <rowan_phoenix@yahoo.com>
To: "Steven Avery" <stevenav@comcast.net>
Cc: "FFML" <ffml@anifics.com>
Sent: Sunday, November 30, 2003 5:42 PM
Subject: Re: [FFML] {C&C) Re: [Fic][Ranma/Love Hina] Chasing Dreams Chaps
1-2
First, I agree with Dave. Akane was handled poorly
in this fic from the
getgo. Yes, she is hard headed, judgemental, and
leaps to the wrong
clonclusion about Ranma frequently in the Manga, but
as has been pointed out
many times, she is not the mallet happy "I gotta
make Ranma's life hell"
biotch that many fan fic authors fall into the trap
of representing her as.
Mallet-happy? "I've gotta make Ranma's life Hell"?
Mallet happy, meaning that many BAD writers of Akane tend to write her
whacking Ranma with a mallet repeatedly in a fic, something that rarely
happens in the manga. I remember Gary Kleppe counted the number of times she
used a mallet in the Manga and mentioned it at some point... it turned out
to be a rarity.
But the point is that you wrote her as the "sterotypical" Akane that
Anti-Akane folk like to paint her as.
Now me, I don't like Akane, I'd rather Ranma ended up with Ukyou... but
that's my bias, I like Ukyou because she's willing to let a grudge of a
decade go, that says a ton about the maturity of the person. It also tells
me that if she and Ranma got married that she'd be patient enough to put up
with the social damage his father inflicted on him, and help him become a
more socially balanced person. But hey, that's just me.
Are we talking about the same fic I wrote here?
Please, where the heck did you get that idea from what
I wrote? Please, show me this "Evil Akane" I allegedly
placed in here.
I actually went over it again to see if you two had
anything to your claims, but as far as I can tell you
just appear to have skimmed the lines and made your
own judgements.
Happy to oblige
David gave his honest opinion, one that I concure on. To be honest, I'd read
your first run through on this fic, and wasn't going to read it again given
the quaity of it the first time through, until I saw his post, then I
decided to give it another go to see if it had improved.
I still concure with him, Akane's actions were not at all the reactions of
the character that I'm familiar with.
Ranma is an emotionally open book, and as david put it,
...But still, it bugs me every time Akane's personality
is erased to make it happen. Would Akane verbally abuse Ranma
when he's standing there with a letter informing him that his
grandmother is dead? I don't think so. Akane may be bad-tempered,
and unreasonably suspicious, but in scenes like this she is being
written as devoid of the capacity for human sympathy and concern,
a capacity that she has repeatedly demonstrated when Ranma was
on the skids.
And as I just said, Ranma wears his emotions in plain sight...and his
emotions would be all over his face from the letter, she'd see that and
inquire what was wrong not verbally abuse him like she did.
I was going to be nice about it and not just hammer on this, but now, given
your tone, I'm not. This was poor writing on your part, and an example of
you just taking the lazy way out. So instead of writing her as the character
she is... you write her as something that would drive ranma away.
LAZINESS!!!
Look, you're fond of the "logic" arguement huh?
Fine.
The Tendou's and Genma get the mail for him and we have the scene with all
the money, someone would wonder where it all came from .
They'd see it was from the Hina estate, and they did find out about the
death, We had the whole scene with the priest arriving, and then akane
denoucing him and calling him a jerk and an idiot while he's in emotional
distress... this is all so much bull it's not funny.
Simply put, Akane would NOT do that, instead she'd assume that he was in
some sort of distress...and maybe even be supportive of him... dirrecting
her anger at her father and Genma for trying to force the marriage.
However, in this fic, she exhibits many of the "bad"
fan-fic akaneisms that
just aren't found in the manga.
Again, where?
Just pointed one out.
Think about how the characters act and look and stand and think... then
write. without the physical and visual component in your fic, your
characters stop behaving like people.
Here's an exercise, before writing, think about the scene visually, how the
characters act and react, how they hold themselves, and so forth. Then write
it.
What you wrote felt like the characters were under some alien mind control
device making them behave like puppets.
However, giving the amount of trouble that Ranma has
weathered in the past,
it's hard to picture anything being bad enough to
FORCE him to leave,
Force him to leave?
Er, he's running away from a problem that has nothing
to do with martial arts. Its something he and Genma
do.
Ranma Saotome doesn't run away from nothin. Sorry had to say it since he
couldn't . If he did run away all the time he'd have left the tendou
residence within a week of arriving. In a fight he'll use the Saotome secret
technique then come back and tackle the problem. That's Ranma. Ranma never
once ran away from a problem. When I say "force him to leave" I mean drive
him away. If by the point in the Manga you're basing this on, he hasn't
left, the current stuff going on wouldn't make him give up and leave.
a result I think that the author would be better
served going for a "softer"
introduction of Ranma into the LH storyline,
bringing him in as one of the
orbital characters who circle the main story of
Keitaro and Naru.
Why? That would sorta invalidate the whole point of
the premise, wouldn't it? Focusing solely on "promised
couples", isn't my thing. I'm trying something
different.
example. Ranma's mother and Haruka-san (aunt Haruka
from LH) could be
sisters and hence she hears about how the Granny
Hina needs a manager for
the Hinata-sou.... (Managing an all girl dorm while
Newphew Keitaro is
away?... Why it's just the perfect job for my manly
son.)
....
And like that idea HASN'T been done to death already?
It'd have the benefit of feeling like you were bringing Ranma into the story
plausibly, rather than just bringing in this character that Ranma has had no
ties to before otherwise and just plunking the situation down without
preamble.
Now onto the major issues I have with this fic.
First off... I am A-okay with crossovers, provided
the author first, takes
the time to do the work needed... and second, makes
the effort to maintain
the spirit of the worlds that they are crossing
over. Simply put I find this
fic disturbingly lacking in a number of areas. First
off... killing off
Grandma Hina like that set off alarm bells and
whistles immediately.
....
Grandma Hina was a Deus Ex Machina plot device used
sparingly in the Manga by Ken Akamatsu, and yet why do
people keep telling me "You can't kill Grandma Hina,
she's a major character!"
Yes, in the original Love Hina universe she makes some
waves, but this ISN'T the Original Love Hina Universe.
Maybe because people who know the LH Manga and Anime know that she's there
for a reason, and does play a vital role as the shadow of the old manager
against which Kei is being measured. She is the catalyst for Kei's
introduction, the person that reaffirms the that Naru is the girl, the
person that took care of Kei's adopted sister , and a fun character all
around. Maybe you should listen to the people telling you this, they MAY
have a point you know.
It's a
sign that the author is doing one of two things...
either he or she is
cleverly tricking the character (Granny isn't dead,
she just sent you a copy
of the will to look over, Ranma-kun. She wants
everyone to know what they
are getting when she passes on and wants to make
sure you're okay with it.)
into coming there, or they don't have the skill to
write the fic with that
character involved... and therefore took the
easy-way (read; lazy) out, and
just kills off the character rather than put forth
the effort to deal with
them.
Or C. That death is part of the whole story plot.
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/false-dilemma.html
*Yawn*
Oh, most impressive, trying to back up poor writing by arguing that the
reviewer is engaging in faulty logic.
Okay, you've just gone from being a "bad writer" to being an idiot.
Reviews are based on an opinion of the literary merit of a work, and
opinions on such can neither be right nor wrong, they only ARE.
My opinion is this... given your bad handling of Akane, inability to see
that if a number of people are telling you "Killing Granny Hina is a bad
idea in a LH fic" is for your own good... you've shown that you are not able
to handle honest criticism or take advice.
Next, IMO casting Ranma in the role filled by
Keitaro is a BIG mistake.
Their personalities are simply too different for
Ranma to fill his shoes
properly.
And who said I wanted Ranma to be Keitaro?
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html
Hmm... why do I feel like I'm writing back to some middleschooler who
engages in "Am too, Am not, Am too, Am not" reasoning. Believing that just
because he repeats something endlessly that he's making points in an
agrument.
Look, the staging, the dream, the grope in the bath, all of these are
basically replays of LH intro, so it's pretty obvious the role he's being
cast in...Oh and as to how you laid the scenes out... Akamatsu would cringe
at reading the heavy handed handling of them.
Now, I may be waving a lightnign rod in a
thunderstorm in saying
this... seeing as how there are many die hard Ranma
fans out there...
but,Keitaro is heads and shoulders a better man than
Ranma has EVER shown
himself to be, and it's his heart that makes him
what he is... which is
something Ranma is just not suited to match.
Sigh, and again.
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies
*sigh*
*mumbles*
Baka!
Keitaro taught the women of Hinata-sou dorm a number
of very important
lessons that I don't think that Ranma could teach
since he doesn't "walk the
walk" like Kietaro does. Kei , for example, taught
Mokoto about how love for
others was the key to unlocking her own strength
(Something Ranma could
NEVER EVER DO because he can't even begin to deal
with his feelings for
Akane in the first place) He helped Naru deal with
her failures, being there
as a supportive friend, and offering a tender
shoulder when it was needed.
Even shinobu ended up becoming more open during the
series because of the
love and respect that he gave her, inspiring her and
Mokoto both to try for
Toudai later on. Plus, Keitaro fills a number of
roles that Ranma simply
doesn't have the maturity of self to manage in how
the story of Love Hina
developed. Where Ranma harasses and insults, Keitaro
is the polar opposite,
he encourages and praises others out a a genuine
caring about the other
person. Where Ranma is all about dodging
comittments, Keitaro is all about
making them and carrying through on them no matter
what. Unless Keitaro is
in this fic giving a counterpoint to Ranma's
immaturity and bluster...there
is a serious danger of this fic just being a
collection of the less funny
and risque slapstick bits that LH was otherwise...
which I'd have a real
hard time seeing happen in the first place... given
how coordinated Ranma
is. Keitaro's biggest fault is that he's a klutz
with bad luck, he has a
tendancy to trip, fall, and flip up girls skirts
while so doing, basically
giving the artist reasons to draw the female
characters in underwear and so
that the females will overreact and boot him into
orbit,
And I can't let Ranma fill different roles
because....?
Ranma can fill different roles IF he is suited for them. The roles that Kei
filled, he's not suited for. Period.
Ranma, being Ranma would fail in trying to fulfil Kei's roles because he
simply doesn't have the qualities needed to succeed in them, the same way
that Boy George would fail in the role of Othello if he kept up his "Boy
George" act.
Also, frankly, Kei's drive to get into Toudai (tokyo
university) isn't
something that I think Ranma could or would
understand.
Never Assume. It makes an Ass out of U and Me.
No, I think your attitude is making an ass out of you just fine.
For this fic I see no need to have Granny Hina die
just to have Ranma end up there...and in fact I found
this to be a heavy handed Deus Ex Machina,
And the original Grandma's fax is not heavy handed
Deus Ex Machina because....?
As Henny Youngman put it, telling a good joke is all about 3 things.
timing
timing
and timing
Youngman performs his act like a surgeon in the operating room. His timing
and delivery are precise and razor sharp.
Something that Akamatsu and many of the authors on this list understand.
That's what the fax was, it was the punchline to the story in LH. Something
you lack the ability to see it appears.
Just after Keitaro leaves, he's told that he has to come back.
The timing was key to it.
Granny Hina should be kept around for the same reason
she was in the LH manga and anime.
There it is again, what is this "You can't kill
Grandma Hina" bias I keep runnning into?
to be the hidden force that could be brought in to
settle all disputes, and to manipulate things from
the background.
Were you saying something about Deus Ex Machina?
big dif between a deus ex machina and a manipulator.
read some literature kiddo... when you can tell me where Deus Ex Machina
came from, then you'll understand the difference and what I'm saying.
For example this whole "Ranma leaves to go to Love
Hina" scene could be taking place right after Keitaro
broke his leg after getting accepted into Toudai, and
Granny Hina has decided to trick or recruit Ranma to
help manage the place while Keitaro is recovering.
Lovely idea, you should write it yourself.
If I had time.. I would, sorry studying for my post grad engineering degree
in the mean time.
Or perhaps it's at the end of the series, after
Narusegawa and Keitaro leave on their honeymoon...
and again the Hinata-sou needs a manager for a while.
Again, if you like that idea, feel free to write it
yourself.
with the added benefit of not putting the readers
through the pain of an oh so contrived Naru/Ranma
romance. I mean, come on, Ranma has never shown any
romantic inclinations whatsoever toward anyone
really so far, and if we end up going down that path
in this fic... then having him get all excited over
some girl from a childhood memory, when he showed
none of those inclinations toward Ukyou would simply
not fly with me.
Contrived Naru/Ranma romance? Where?
Based on one grope in the hot springs? Where was Ranma
getting romantic?
Based on a dream where he's not the one making the
promise (and that he can't remember)? Er, I am not a
manga writer, I am not restricted into the matchups
set by the original series.
Please, if you have questions about the plot, ASK.
Not really interested at this point...
after giving constructing criticism and getting this sort of response back,
you're on your own.
best of luck...
you need all of it you can get,
Don't just start shoving all these "You're going to do
this and that" when you don't know where the plot is
going.
-Shade
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