About romance, slash, lusting in no general direction and Pretty Woman

[silversolitaire]

I see to find myself in a state of... romantic disillusion. I'm really eager to read and watch romantic stuff. Not that I'm very successful with that... mind you. Anyone got fics by any chance? I'd especially like erotic fiction involving James Bond. I'll take anything, even het, provided it's not a horrible Mary Sue. I'd also like some slash involving Joaquin Phoenix characters. Or Monk-slash! OMG... does this even exist? Nice Grissom slash would do too. OMG ANYTHING but Harry Potter, LotR and Lost. Nothing against those, but I really want something fresh and new here... Rare fandoms that I happen to know... SOMEthing... *desperate*

What I'd really like... is gentle kisses. Somehow I find those the most erotic. In movies, when you can hear the kisses... and soft sighs and moans. Oh yes, I find that really erotic and arousing, so hear it when people feel pleasure. And I'm not talking about fake porn moans here, but honest sighs of heartfelt pleasure. Ah... This is one of the reasons why I really like the sex scene in Die Another Day. Because you can see how much. When Bond sleeps with Jinx it REALLY affects him. You see how it shatters him, to feel a woman close again after such a long time of being locked up and tortured. I love it how he groans and sinks into the pillow and then he pulls her close to his body again, wanting to feel her all over. I like it when men show pleasure.

Because of that romantic disillusion I have watched Pretty Woman again. Not that I need an excuse to watch it, mind you, I really love that movie. But... I just felt like watching it again. I love that scene when she kisses the sleeping Edward and he wakes up, embraces her and then they start making love... *fans cold air* Yes, that is a romance scene to my liking. Although, if I really could make a request I would make the scene longer and slightly more graphic. Not talking about anatomic shots here of course, but a little bit more of those kisses and moans and a bit more moving action. That would be the sweetest.

Anyway, upon watching it I realized once again that now that I'm grown up and no longer a simpering 12 year old I find the ending little satisfying. Sure, Edward arrives in his limousine like a knight in shining armor and sweeps her off her feet! But... what changed? I didn't see any change. Did you? She told him that she doesn't want to come with him and have him set her up with a nice condo because then she'd still feel like a whore. She'd be the kept woman and she doesn't want that. She wants more. And Edward makes it quite clear that he's not willing to give her more. Maybe he could give her more later, but not now and Vivian is unwilling to give him time. So, it's not looking good. Then we see him moping around a bit, regretting having let her go... and that's supposed to change it all? We know he has a history of losing interest in women quickly. He may express mild regret when his girlfriend tells him she's moving out but other than that he doesn't really care. What tells us that it will be different with Vivian? What tells us that he won't grow tired with her after a while too and kick her out? Certainly, the romantic in us tells us that of course it'll be the perfect happy ending and they'll live happily ever after yaddayadda and Edward would never do this! But let's be realistic, shall we? So, in gist, I feel unsatisfied with the ending of Pretty Woman. Feel free to disagree of course.

And now... I shall go find some nice fics maybe... Hahaha... *grimace* Where do you FIND fics nowadays? I'm so out of it, no more central archives, Slash Database hopelessly outdated... it's a pain in the ass. *grumbles*

Comments

[meadowgirl.livejournal.com]

okie...i've seen this "Mary Sue" thing a couple of times in the last few days...wtf does this mean??? i'm not in the fanfic or fandom realm really...but i've seen it mentioned...

heh.

[silversolitaire.livejournal.com]

A Mary Sue is a term from fanfiction that basically means self-insertion. Some people consider it the unforgiveable sin of fanfic writing. Somehow a Mary Sue (usually) is the first thing an author comes up with when starting writing. The invent an "original" character that basically represents themselves. Or what they'd like to be. The characters are annoying because they always have the same traits (or a selection thereof). They are somehow special in a way. In Harry Potter they have a freaky new power that nobody heard of before or similar. They have a striking physical feature nobody else has. Raven hair cascading down her shoulders like a sparkling waterfall, emerald eyes with the depths of a thousand seas, elven ears, mysteriously changing eye color... pick one. They're usually always dropdead gorgeous and the author goes on and on about just how gorgeous they are. They also have really cool and unique (usually sorta Eurotrashy) names like Serafina de la Winterbottom. Sometimes to add a little spice they also have a somewhat disfiguring feature like a limp or a scar with the emotional trauma that comes with it.

Now what REALLY makes them annoying is that they always appear in a special connection to the main character (whom the author fangirls or desires). Suddenly there's a random FBI agent who's Fox Mulder's best friend from college and who's all perky and popular and everybody's sunshine. Or the ever-popular American exchange witch to Hogswart with fiery redhair and the power to kill Voldemort singlehandedly. Oh, or she's the long-lost daughter or whatever of another big character. Usually this character embarks on a passionate affair with the main character, is dearly loved, everybody adores her yaddayadda. That, or she's the only one to realize that canon character A secretly loves canon character B and nudges them both towards confessing their undying love for each other while she's standing aside, smiling to herself. Oh, and Mary Sues also tend to die a heroic death that leaves everyone to mourn her and praise just how great she was.

This is a great spoofy comic about HP Mary Sues:
http://piratemonkeysinc.com/ms1.htm

Oh, there's also a male, albeit much rarer male version of the Mary Sue, sometimes called Harry Stu or similar. He usually stands out by his dark, brooding, lone-wolf-like behavior.

I ran a quick search on Livejournal and found this community:
http://www.livejournal.com/community/marysues/

This is probably very amusing to peruse! XD;

I hope that helped! If you have anymore questions don't hesitate to ask! ^^

[no-ron.livejournal.com]

ehm.. i have to save this somewhere since this is probably the most comprehensive, illustrative and thorough elaboration of the Mary Sue phenomenon i will have read in the medium-distant future.. :pp

"Serafina de la Winterbottom" OMG! LOL!!

[silversolitaire.livejournal.com]

Hehehe glad it helped you! And yeah I was making that name up but it's not that far off, believe me! *g*

[meadowgirl.livejournal.com]

AH HA!!!! okie..i gotcha!!! :D thanks for the explanation...it's been buggin' me...it's what i suspected.

where the hell did the actual term "Mary Sue" come from? *LOL*

i'm going to check all these out...thank you for taking the time and the excellent explanation. you rule!!! *huggles*

[silversolitaire.livejournal.com]

Hehehe, you're welcome! And uh... I don't know! I'll research where the term comes from and let you know! ^^

[meadowgirl.livejournal.com]

hee hee...no big deal..i thought maybe you might know off-hand. i'm suspecting someone named a character Mary Sue. *LOL*

[silversolitaire.livejournal.com]

Well I never questioned it and now it bugs me that I never did! But I asked around and apparently, like everything in fanfiction fandom, LOL, it comes from Star Trek where the first pinned down character of that sort appeared. Some young cadet called Mary-Sue. And then people started spoofing stories like that, always using Cadet Mary-Sue and then it sorta got a life of its own.

[meadowgirl.livejournal.com]

*LMAO* oh that's fucking hysterical. :) thanks for all the research and information...i don't feel quite as retarded now. heh heh!!

YOU ROCK!!!