BadFic: What makes you rate a fic in that manner ?

If an author continuously spells Anakin 'Anikin,' that's a sign to me that they don't know enough about GFFA to write a fic about it.

For me, sometimes it bothers me a little bit when the author doesn't put that "-" in Obi-Wan's name or doesn't capitalize "w". It's one name, it isn't two seperate names. But I don't go crazy over it. If the story is good, I won't make a big deal about it. I'm flexible.

~aeryn

 

I usually give them the benefit of the doubt that it was either a mistake or they were just confused by possibly the most enduringly confusing name in Star Wars Honestly, old usenet posts from the 80s feature people talking about 'OB1', 'Obi One', 'Obi wan', etc. If I see this in a fic, I usually drop the author a polite PM pointing it out and explaining the detremental effect this can have on an otherwise good fic.

Something incredibly ironic on that note is that in the pre-SE versions of the OT, if you read the credits carefully, you will note that they tell you Alec Guinness plays 'Obi Wan Kenobi'. The freakin' credit people couldn't even get it right!

-sj loves kevin spacey

 

I hate like most everyone here mispelling and blatant grammar mistakes. I can take sentence fragments because I'm horrible with 'em, but when people are writing "He. Ran. Towards." you get my point, or when they write "He like ran through the hangar." like they're sixteen year old mall rats that didnt' bother finished school! And using ' instead of " that annoys me because most people use ' for thoughts, but when it's used for both, it's just plain confusing.


Block fics where there's no indentation, or paragraphing. Or where dialogue is "'Come here Obi-Wan' Qui-Gon said. 'NO! I wanna stay here!' The boy yelled back." That's just horrible, read a book, dialogue is never on the same line!

Those are the things that make a badfic to me that I can think of.

 

Very bad grammar annoys me, as does atrocious spelling. But I like to read all types of stories and characterizations, as long as they seem plausible. Of course, what seems plausible in a GFFA is not likely to seem that way in other settings!

A note about "claim her lips" as it was expressed to me by a sociology professor. He said that the phrase originates from the time when for a man to publicly kiss a woman, especially a virgin, was to "claim" her or make his honorable intentions public.

 

When writing a fic, I think you're allowed to bend some of the grammar rules. Starting sentences with conjunctions or having the occasional sentence fragment or run on sentence can make the story more interesting to read. However, those things should only be used in moderation.

 

It spooks me when all the adult male characters in a fic act like teenage girls. Han Solo would not apologize after every sarcastic comment he makes, because he's soooooo worried about hurting his best friends' feelings. Darth Vader would not say, "Oh, whatever." Obi-Wan would not throw a tearful tantrum about being left behind on a mission--quite possibly not even at the age of twelve. Having him do it at the age of twenty-five is *right out.*

I'm as curious as the next fic writer about what lies beneath these guys' tough exteriors . . . I'm just not sure why what lies beneath their tough exteriors is always a 15-year-old girl named Becki.

 

I'm as curious as the next fic writer about what lies beneath these guys' tough exteriors . . . I'm just not sure why what lies beneath their tough exteriors is always a 15-year-old girl named Becki.

LMAO! Or Tiffany, or Buffy, or Kelly... extreme apologies to anyone with those names.

Bad fic = anything without Obi-Wan...not so, I lie!

Hmmm. I'll read pretty much anything, so long as it's well-written by my standards, which can be really high at times or really low, depending on how much energy I have for reading. Bad grammar and spelling I really don't like, because those are more structured things that follow specific rules (and all too often, exceptions). However, I try to keep in mind that English isn't always an author's first language. Run-on sentences, one-word sentences, etc - a lot of times, those things are related either to the author's style, or to the overall tone of the story, so I'm generally more accepting of those.

But I can't stand when paragraphs have no spaces between them, or the story is just one big huge block of text with no paragraphing. Hey, even young people have eye problems.

Characterization: every author has a different opinion on how a certain character would behave, so I try to be accepting of their ideas. However, that author has to make me believe that, using the examples ophelia gave, Han would apologize for a sarcastic remark, or Vader would say, "Oh, whatever." Going by a personal example, I could never imagine Kyp Durron as being a good romantic match for Jaina, except in humor fics where the point was to make fun of Jag. But I've recently read a story where the author took the time to explain why the match worked, why Jaina wasn't with Jag, and did it all without flimsy two-dimensional excuses.

As for OCs, those come completely from the author's imagination, so I expect even more with them. With a canon character, you already have some idea of what the person is like. With the OC, your interpretation depends a lot on what the author gives you. If you want to write about a character who's pretty much your GFFA counterpart and whom Obi-Wan falls madly in love with, by all means, go for it. But I won't really stick with a story like that unless 1) it's hilarious, or 2) it's believable as an Obi/OC fic.

Overall, I'd say a really bad fic is one where I read a post, stare at my computer, and say, "That was 2 minutes of my life I will never get back." I'm happy to say I rarely do that.

 

Coming to think of it, I think I hate pretty much everything you guys named. Here's what I especially hate:
1. Atrocious spelling and grammar
Would forgive if you're:
a. ESL -I moved to the U.S. from China when I was in elementary school, so I can sympathize with that a little bit
b. a child
2. Lack of paragraphing *displays the prescription for my glasses*
3. Earthisms-
a. Not everybody on Earth celebrates Christmas (in fact, I'm a Christian and I don't celebrate that)
b. I don't think the SW characters even know the English cuss words. If you want good insults, pay attention to what Anakin says to Sebulba in TPM.
Will forgive to a degree if the fic takes place on Earth
4. Characters acting OOC without being... say, drunk (better be funny if the charcter is)-Reason's been mentioned by just about everyone here, so I won't bother with it.
5. Bad pairings *points to sig*- PM me if you want to know why I hate bad pairings. I, unlike those before me, don't mind the different species pairing up as long as they're logical (i.e. Gavin/Asyr in the X-Wing series)
8. Mary Sues-will only hate if they're bad to the extremes

 

I'd say that currently, my two biggest pet peeves are substitutions of 'loose' for 'lose' and 'could of' for 'could have' in otherwise good stories.

 

Well, it's usually bad spelling and grammar, but then again, that's how you roped me into being your beta, isn't it?

But aside from teasing Typo, I guess it also has to keep my interest. If the story is well written, it can usually hold my attention even if it's not my usual type of story or topic.

 

I'm the first to admit that i'm a picky reader, and I find myself skipping over stories quite often because small things begin to bug me.

Personally, i'd have to say Pacing is a big turn off for me. If i'm reading a story in which:

-The lead character (OC/Cannon/well written/badly written) comes to a big decision within the space of two sentences...
-We transition from action scene to action scene to love scene to action scene to angst scene to action scene in the space of six paragraphs...
-Big revelations are come to in the very first post (of long fics) only to be reconciled in the next one...
-Powerful emotions are experienced and dealt with in an incredible amount of time...

etc etc etc, I am likely to dismiss it. Characterisation takes time, and it is important! if it is lacking, then i'm a fair chance of skipping it. Not necessarily labelling it a bad fic, just skipping it completely.

 

Top rated pet peeves recap: grammar, spelling, spacing and characterization...

oh man...I suck.

 

Punctuation and spelling. Grammar I can sometimes forgive, specially if the writer is young, but there's nothing I can't stand more than seeing:

'i Am a dark lord of teh sith and i am rulign the galaxy!!" He Said, then wakked over to them. before he took out his red twoblade litesaber.

...it's teh roxor. k3wl!

 

I agree and unfortunately there's lots of those types of fics out there. Not as much on these boards but at fanfiction.net most certainly. For every good fanfic out there it seems you find ten where the author didn't care enough to have a beta-reader first.

 

Even if not a Beta reader, just some good, honest self-criticism can help no end. For my fics i find that beta readers can be a little unreliable in checking my chapters before they are posted, so i rely on my own proofreading. I can't say if it's as effective as an independent Beta reader, but it seems to work okay There are alot of small mistakes that you can pick up on with a simple re-reading of what you've done. Alot of people skip this process in their haste to post the story, which is a shame, but a fact of fandom.

 

Dialogue: if it's out of age range and out of character for people we already know. If it insults my intelligence to read people trying to convince me that that's a plausible line.

Bad characterization: When I can't even recognize the characters after 50 pages of trying to see similarities.

Mary-Sues: nuff said

Appearance obsession: When people are too obsessed with characters who spend and entire post flexing their six-pack, or when there are hallway conversations done entirely in towels.

 

What the hell is a mary-sue if you don't mind me asking

 

A mary-sue (or Marty-stu for guys) is where you take a character, make him/her have superpowers, the body of a god, the entire universe will collapse at the drop of a hat and he/she will save it and not even break a nail, and the boyfriend ALWAYS turns out to be evil.

 

Or, in simpler terms, a Mary Sue is a wish-fulfillment character, an idealized stand-in for the author. The term goes back to 1970s Trek fanfic, in which Ensign Mary Sue would be better at most things than the established characters, but they all love her anyway (usually platonically).

 

Ok, here's my two cents...

1)Spelling & Grammar - I'm so very anal about this in everything that if I see it in excess amounts in a story, I'm unlikely to continue reading no matter how interesting the idea. Generally, I can't consider a story good if it's riddled with errors of this kind. This from the girl who goes around editing signs posted at work....

2)Word choice - Pick your words carefully. Don't use unnecessary words, especially in dialogue. Be succinct ? there are times when detail is great, but over-wording is distracting. Use a thesaurus to avoid using the same word six times in three paragraphs, but on the same note, make sure the synonym you chose is relevant. Check the dictionary definition, to make sure the meaning is how you want it.

3)Dialogue - As above, pick your words carefully. Remember to have your characters speaking like people, not narrators. Don?t clutter your dialogue with unnecessary words (see above). Dialogue is one of the most important parts of a fic, I believe. You want your readers to remember what the characters said, you want their words to stand out. So make them meaningful, and avoid the distracting excess.

As well, have canon characters talking like themselves. Han speaks very differently from Luke, as Jag Fel does from Kyp Durron.

4)Spacing - I usually find that it?s newer posters who have trouble with paragraph spacing. Most of the time it?s because they don?t realize that the tab/indent formatting from their word processor doesn?t transfer when posted to the boards. I usually mention this in my reply, because they probably just don?t know.

5)OOC ? I don?t mind this if the story is AU, although ?character bashing? I don?t like that much. As well, because in life people do change (often drastically), a fic taking place post-NJO where a character has changed (ie, Jag Fel becoming an abusive husband), is plausible. In reality, people who are thought of as good or honourable turn out to be completely different. As long as it?s written conceivably, it doesn?t bother me.

6)Spelling differences ? somebody mentioned this?I?m Canadian, so you?ll see a lot of colour/honour/odour, metre/theatre from me. The only place I change my spelling is for lightsaber. I have an urge to spell it lightsabRE, but because it?s a specific thing, and the books are American, I spell it lightsabER?no matter how much I like the look of sabre better, or how bothered I am from the angry red lines below it in Word.

7)Character Names ? Spell them correctly. Personally, I can?t stand to have my name spelled wrong (Abbie, Abbey, Abbi, and don?t even get me started on my full name, which is certainly NOT Abigail!). Where in any of the books do you see Tenel Ka written as just Tenel? That?s like shortening Mary-Jane?s name to just Mary. The same goes for planet names. If you aren?t sure how to spell it, find out.

Well, that?s about all I can think of just now.

~Abby~

 

LOL! Abby, I'm Canadian too - but I still spell it lightsabre. I see your point on that, but I'd start going into involuntary twitches spelling it the other way. All good points you made, BTW.

Shaindl

 

Shaindl - LOL, too true! You should see me reading some of the notices at work...gotta love them but they can't spell!

~Abby~

 

I lived overseas for a bit when I was younger so my spelling's a mix of American and British. I drive my betas crazy since they keep reminding me to stick one way or the other.

And I do like how lightsabre looks compared to lightsaber.

 

I've met a lot of American adults who're either completely unaware of British spelling or aware of the alternate spellings but not the reason. [That is, they've seen "colour" or "centre" but never thought about why or associated it with the fact that the book was British.]

For myself, I base which system I use on the source material and the target audience. For example, SW or BtVS fic is done in US English, DW fic in UK English.

Has anyone here read Eats, Shoots & Leaves yet?


EDIT: removed an Oxford comma.

 

Spelling and grammar are a big deal for me.

First-person narratives: Only one in twenty is any good. Even if you happen to be one of the few people that can pull off this kind of story, please keep it short and sweet. Don't get me wrong, though... Just because something is first person doesn't make it bad.

Characters: Staying in character is difficult. This is especially true because you may read a character differently than another person, and because each person writes differently. Just because Jaina may have a bit of a temper doesn't mean she has to constantly exhibit a short fuse. It is perfectly fine for a character to go somewhat dry for a while, as long as their personality surfaces every once in a while. The exception to this is Jacen Solo, who cannot possibly be the child of Han and Leia. He and Jar Jar Binks both exist only to encourage creative ways of killing them... Repeatedly.

Swearing/Slang: Some characters must swear. Some characters must use slang. Please make it sound appropriate for the setting. Take the above fantasy for killing Jacen repeatedly: Put him in an orange coat and make him die in exotic ways in every scene. A young Anakin near him should use terms like: "Blaster bolts! They killed Jacen! You Sithspawn!" Keep it in character, though. Threepio would say it more like, "The Maker! They killed Jacen! Beastly things! Shoo! Shoo!" Slang is the same way -- make it fit the setting. Slang should only be used in dialog. "I need to use the 'fresher," is an example. Do NOT use this in narrative. In narrative, don't use slang: Han left the room to use the refresher.

Detail: This is hard to measure. Only use details when necessary. It is not necessary to describe every portion of the room unless the character is supposed to notice these things. If the character isn't supposed to notice it, keep it brief. Secondly, unless you are going to use it, don't put it there. Describing an empty grenade crate in the corner is drivel unless someone is going to use it. Always remember that this is fiction, and that you, as the author, can pull items out of thin air: Han was resting on a plush couch on the other side of the room. See? Han was already resting and *pouf* you placed a couch underneath him. It works every time. This doesn't work so good for living beings, however. It would seem somewhat strange to have Jag and Jaina in a nice, long, steamy love scene and three hours later have Jag notice a dancing Ewok that's been in the room with them the entire time.

New planets/creatures/characters: SW is a big galaxy with an infinite number of possible planets, aliens, and characters. If a canonical character doesn't exist to suit your needs... create one. I'm currently working on a fic where my protagonist was originally going to be Tahiri, but the NJO series ends with her staying on a particular planet for the forseeable future. So I created a new character to use in her place. Be wary, however that you don't overdo it. If you are going to create a planet, make it important to the story. If you are going to create a name for a character, make there be a reason for the name. If you give a character a full name, make sure they are either a primary character, or are related to one. Any new aliens need to be described in detail, though it is very hard to believe that there isn't already one out there for you to use.

Okay, I'll switch off now.