Discussion Fan Fic Pet Peeves?

You could always use that handy writer's trick I mentioned in the violence thread. It works when characters are acting "out of character." It works for any situation. Unrealistic? Yes. Keeps those readers satisfied now that they have the flimsiest of explanations? Oh hell yes.

This peeve is more art-related, but I've seen the written equivalent. When children are drawn as miniature adults. Children have different proportions than adults, they're not simply tiny grown-ups. In fics, I've seen this written as children with weird quirks that no child would ever have, or children acting like miniature adults. Children have different thought processes, their brains are still undeveloped, and thus they will cope with things in a different way. They are thus not one-note characters, nor do they act like little adults. You can have mature children and well-disciplined children, but there will still be something inherently childlike in their mannerisms.

 

That is my profic pet peeve. Wasn't Allana around eight years old and blasting people? I guess the Jedi have no qualms about having child soldiers.

 

or maybe Anakina, Anaki or Anakini if we use West-European endings for female names

The problem is that not all languages or cultures follow the same naming tradition, f.ex. for all we know Obi-Wan could be gender neutral

A little bit related: gender-flipped Star Wars and Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! fusion characters –
Faster, Empire! Strike! Strike!

 

Nine, but that doesn't make it much better I suppose.

If the instance that you're thinking of is the same thing of which I'm thinking, then I can actually understand why the scene unfolded as it did and why Allana doing what she did was necessary. And while it might not seem realistic, she has already been groomed for years to someday take the throne of a multi-system consortium that is known for its cutthroat politics. Nature of the beast and all that, and yeah that's quite a bit young. I'd imagine that Allana should really feel it later, once everything's calmed down, but we're never shown such a scene, so we're left to assume it all works out. And yes, this all falls back to the "darkening" of the EU as of late, which is something I don't really care for.

This leads to another peeve regarding fan fiction: when the author takes a normally upbeat and hopeful saga and puts as much of a downer note on it as possible or, inversely, takes a dark and gritty saga and tries to breathe carefree optimism into it. This is usually carried out by the author's personal Fixer Sue...

 

I'm somewhat guilty of the former, particularly in a Pokemon RP I'm in. However, it's justified in that there were numerous points in Pokemon that were pretty damn dark. I'm trying to rectify the situation, but right now, we're strapped into a plot that is progressing pretty slowly. I may throw in a time-skip and get to more of the plot.

Though, the former particularly bugs me when it is applied to a character, rather than a story as a whole. Again, I cite Superman. The big, blue Boy Scout is the embodiment of hope and peace. He is truth, justice, and the American way. He is childhood wish fulfillment personified. At the end of the day, he makes us smile, he makes us happy, and he makes us feel safe, knowing that we have this godlike protector watching over us.

What Superman is not is grim-and-gritty dark-and-dreary moody-and-broody. If you want that, use Batman.

 

Guilty as charged. And I am unrepentant.

 

Mischaracterization of the Solo children is one thing that turned Bryg off from many of the books.

Bryg who went to school for early childhood education and development said that while many four year olds may still pronounce their "Rs" with a slight "W" sound at that point many of them can make the sound close enough to an "R" sound. Some writers would then have this four year old speaking "below" their age because of that slight "W" sound when they are trying to make the "R" sound. So instead of "very" they would put "vewy".


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"The Starman and Moon Goddess." Han Solo - Dark Angel

 

Jus becawz youwah kawicktuh tawks wike dis duzzint awtomahtickwee make dem a widdle kid.

There is a difference between pronunciation and vocal nuances. Children tend to have different mannerisms and vocal nuances than adults. They will often use simpler sentence structures, their thoughts will be more declarative, and they will use less idioms.

 

Children also usually see things in black and white, if they are taught certain ways, and at times disobey from either boredom or curiosity. In Anne McCaffrey's book "Damia" after a certain point has parts of the story told from the point of view of a small child. The majority of the characters have telepathy but in the first scene Damia is in and "talks" to another telepath it is basic. Once she learns how to talk it's how a child under the age of three wound talk and acted like a child of her age.

Zura or Zuka for a female Prince Zuko from Avatar: The Last Airbender?

 

That one does irritate me. I know if I am going to have to translate kid-speak throughout the entire story I don't want to read it.

 

My solution is rather simple: don't write kids if you can at all help it. Young teenagers, sure, but no prepubescents allowed.

 

So far in Dark Angel Chronicles I keep Angel/Lady Vader's words simple and to the point. These chapters haven't been posted yet but the point remains that the words are simple and she doesn't say a lot.

 

This, or if the dialect in the story is hard to read and isn't just added in occasionally. There are other ways to emphasise how a character speaks, be it kid or adult. Not every word needs to be cut off with an apostrophe or be changed to match the character's pronunciation.

I also dislike inconsistent children. The ones that flip between speaking like someone at least 5-10 years older and their true age. Thought process also bothers me for omniscience or first person. I've read fics where kids (4-7 year olds, mostly) will have extremely elaborate thought processes that make far too much sense.
(I should clarify that these children are supposedly normal. EDIT: I'm not saying kids aren't intelligent, there just tends to be a difference between their thought processes and an adult's.)
Not only does it pull me out of the story due to the unrealism of it, but it's completely OOC and makes it difficult to imagine the character.

 

I love writing kids!!!! I've worked with all ages and hate to see them written as lame brains with speech impediments.

 

Even with teenagers, there are problems. Too many times have I seen writers pepper a teenage character's dialogue with so much dated slang that it becomes painful to read.

If you're writing teenagers, a good way to learn how a teenager speaks is to listen to them. Go to your local mall's food court, get something to munch on, and sit near a table of teenagers. Take notes. Teenagers use "hip" language quite sparingly, from what I've noticed. Aside from usage of idioms, and some lingering declarative speech patterns, teenage and young adult vocal nuances tend to be relatively similar. Hell, some adults never grow out of their teenage vocabulary.

 

Wizard, woman, just wizard.

 

Even Regional Slang should be considered. In Maine "wicked" can be descriptive in a good way especially if proceeded by "good". But apparently it's used elsewhere as well.

Then you have "soda pop". Where I live it's called "soda" others call it "pop" and still others call it "soda pop". I even heard that some places call it "coke" no matter what they are drinking.


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"The Starman and Moon Goddess." Han Solo - Dark Angel

 

I lived all over the country. I call it soda pop because I would forget what people called it in a particular region. Atlanta is where people appear to call everything Coke. "I'd like a rootbeer coke, please."

I hate having to think of special Star Wars words for earth stuff. I know they have brandy and whiskey, but I never seen bacon. So half the time I am not sure if I should go ahead and use an earth word or not. I try to avoid brand names. So, they won't be eating Frosted Flakes, but they may eat sugar coated breakfast flakes.

 

Mmm... Sugar-Frosted Milk! It stays clumpy, even in cereal!

But, yes, coming up with GFFA brand names can be a pain in the butt.

 

In a fic I am working on one character is eating maggots n' chips another is slurping green noodles

 

In a few fan fics of mine a dish of Blue Noodles with Coreillian Cheese Sauce appears. I am 99% sure I got the blue noodles from someone or wookiee but I made up the Coreillian cheese sause.

 

Sometimes you've just got to create things. Things that won't make others too irritated and too stupid in general.

 

Writing kids for me is fun. I try to keep them as real to life as possible. I use my own kids as references at times.

 

I did try writing a story with children as the main characters, and nobody complained. Then again, the story wasn't all that popular, and it must be five years old by now!

 

I've written the occasional child character, too, so I'm not condemning the use of such characters. What I had taken issue with, however, was the portrayal of those characters. This happens in cinema quite often, with kids not acting like kids.

Back to the peeves...

I'll just come right out and say it. Script format stories annoy the hell out of me. It's one thing to write a script, and I'm in the process of adapting a translation to an audioplay, but I find that when one writes a work of fiction in a scripted format (a very simplistic scripted format, mind you), it strikes me as lazy and amateur. I find fan fiction to be a terrific method of honing one's skills as a writer, in terms of polishing their prose, and script format stories defeat that purpose.

They are also somewhat clunky to read, unless they are treated as actual scripts. Now, if the script were written for the sake of having it illustrated, with camera direction and such, that's fine. But, the simplistic format that I see most often isn't conducive to stage, screen, comic, or audio.