The Fanfiction Interview Thread - Current Interview: Vehn

Millicent needs a new hat. What hat would you recommend for her? Can be from any era or historical period suitable for a grand feline.

What do you think of this bee fly? (Bombylius major). Does this Dipteran bee mimic deserve to be this adorable? Should it be in Star Wars?


What's your opinion of the whale shark? Instead of space whales in SW, should we have SPACE WHALE SHARKS?


Favourite extinct animal?

 

How about the hat worn by the stock STWOR Jedi Consular. That seems like a suitably regal hat for a cat.

It does not deserve to be that adorable; adorable parasites are the nastiest kind. However, since the franchise is called Star Wars, my vote for the Dipteran analogue would go to the genus Octhera, who come with swords built in.

Whale sharks are awesome, and people need to stop hunting them for their fins (seriously, what is wrong with people, shark fin doesn't even have a taste), but I'm not partisan when it comes to sharks versus whales in space. It is interesting, however, that the purrgil have big stumpy sperm whale style teeth, implying they're predators (maybe they eat mynocks?). The whale shark is a filter feeder, and it'd be cool to see some sort of filter feeding space-based organism, maybe one that feeds on tiny microrganisms suspended in space dust and free-floating water molecules (the water part, at least, is an actual thing).

Hmm...tough call. How about Kaprosuchus, a terrestrial crocodylomorph that might be the most draconic animal to have ever actually lived on Earth.

 

Dave Filoni called and he needs your help in creating creatures for a new Earth-like planet for Mando to have another side quest. What real animals would you base your creatures on?

1) Pick 2 adorable but deadly insects
2) Pick 2 extinct predatory reptiles/mammals/and or birds and 1 herbivorous extinct mammal/and or bird
3) Pick 1 lesser known feline that is not a typical big cat
4) Pick 1 deep sea fish or a weird shark
5) Pick 1 lesser known amphibian that is viviparous

 

What now Legend non-jedi, non-sith Force tradition would you like to see in the new EU and why?

What, now Legend, non-humans species that have never gotten any real description would you like to know more about?

Which one/s of the new non-human races we have seen in the ST and the NEU would you like to know more about?

Which background character/s in the ST deserve to get his/her story told?

 

Challenge accepted!

Number one: Ambush bugs, subfamily Phymatinae which are adorable, but strike for great vengeance (seriously, I've been jabbed, it hurts).
Number two: Dobsonfly. The adults are these pleasant-looking broad-winged creatures that bother no one. The aquatic larvae, on the other hand, are terrifying hellspawn (they're commonly called hellgrammites, and they will bite your finger and not let go, personal experience can attest).

Predatory Reptile: Sillosuchus, a predatory South American archosaur that looks a lot like a dinosaur, but wasn't, just to mess with people.
Predatory Bird: Teratornis a genus of giant predatory birds with a wingspan pushing 4 meters. Probably capable of preying on a wide range of mammals.
Herbivorous Mammal: Toxodon, a notoungulate (one of several groups of extinct hoofed mammals unique to South America), that looks something like a cross between a Rhino and a Beaver. Nice and dynamic herd animal.

Pallas's Cat, also called the Manul, an animal that can only be described as "It's so fluffy!"

Xenacanthus, an eel-like prehistoric shark that, wait for it, lived in fresh water. Helpful to avoid needing an ocean scene.

Caecilians. They're just soooo weird. Honestly, I don't think you have to mod them at all.

Tying this together, all of these animals are fairly well suited to an alpine environment with scattered lakes surrounded by a muddy substrate. I imagine a bounty hunting mission in which Mando has to find his target in a lake fortress, but his ship gets knocked from the sky by Teratorns, he endures a terrifying fighting retreat to shore surrounded by Xenacanths and Hellgrammites locked in mortal combat, sneaks in through giant Caecilian tunnels guided by a Manul, has to defeat his enemy's champion in a jousting match with him on a Toxodon and his opponent on a Sillosuchus, and when the bad guy flees to the far shore he's eaten by a giant ambush bug that sucks him dry, leaving the armor for Mando to take back and claim the bounty.

 

After reviewing your work, Dave Filoni decides he wants a chase scene where a giant predatory bird thing chases after either Mando or his bounty. He suggests combining a terror bird and a dromaeosaurid. Which ones do you select and why?

Select a Cambrian explosion animal best fitted for the oceans of this new planet.

Select a prehistoric amphibian best suited for this apline environment. This is going to be the enemy of the giant ambush bug.

 

The Ember of Vahl, partly just because I like the idea of Force-using pyromancers, but also because I think there's been a bad tendency to undercut the religious aspects of the Force at times and that an explicitly religious faction, that worships the Force as a goddess, would be a useful corrective.

The Sarkai, both because Nadia Grell is awesome and because the species apparently had developed strategically significant technology as part of predator management which implies a pretty kick-ass ecology, but we have no detail about their world or any of their social systems beyond a presumed monarchy.

Kessurians. A species that looks like a Zelton/Togruta cross? Tell me more. Right now! They appear only as dancers and a pilot in TROS, so almost nothing is known. Do they represent a blending of Zeltron and Togruta genetic heritage? Because that has great potential.

To the credit of the new EU, a lot of the more interesting (or at least interesting looking) background characters from the ST have received significant expansion, so I'll spread my vote, with equal priority, across any of the New Republic Senators appeared in the one shot where they looked up only to be summarily annihilated along with Hosnian Prime. Any sort of explanation as to how the Senate came to that particular juncture would be worth knowing.

Terror birds and dromaeosaurs are pretty convergent as it is. So I'll go with Titanis, because that is an unbeatable scientific name for a deadly predator on the Terror Bird side, and Luanchuanraptor on the dromaeosaur side, because it was cool-looking and because Star Wars needs to use all possible methods to increase Chinese market share, so prioritize Chinese dinos.

Hallucigenia, because everything is better with bizarre, spike-backed, tentacled, lobopods.

Diplocaulus, because if we're doing giant bug vs. giant amphibian, I'm going with the original - by about 300 million years - Captain Boomerang.

 

Star Wars absolutely failed to increase the Chinese market share by creating things like boring seal-bird Porgs instead of Changyuraptor-like things. The missed adorable merchandise opportunities

 

Do you know about the Rokuga breed book to Werewolf the Apocalypse?

Agree

that pic is a noshow for me

O nice, you don't even need to change it, just make it big and thrown on a belt and they would look perfect as the fast-talking smuggler's heavy

Cool.

 

Best dressed in PT?

Best dressed in OT?

Best dressed in ST?

Best dressed in the old EU?

Best dressed in the new EU?

SW culture with the best fashion sense? And why?

 

Best dressed cat?

Best dressed insect? (can include best exoskeleton, or fuzzy, or something weird)

Best dressed feathered dinosaur?

What do you think of insect-themed clothes for SW fashion (see below example)?

 

Assuming you mean the Rokea breed book, then yes, I'm very aware of it, all, I'm quite thoroughly on the record as considering it a heinous abomination of a gaming product (warning, link contains strong language).

The patrons of the Outlander Club, collectively. An amazing amount of costuming power was deployed for a mere few seconds of background shots.

I think it's gotta be Lando, doesn't it? I mean, he's putting in a whole galaxy of extra effort compared to everyone else.

Ugh, that's a brutal question. The ST really dropped the ball in the costume department. Trying to find an answer to this was depressing. I guess, Bazine Netal, the character who calls the First Order on the crew at Maz's place in TFA, her dress is at least interesting. Honestly though, I think Solo absolutely annihilates the ST in this zone.

Jarael. She rocks a considerable number of outfits throughout the KOTOR comics, including an absolutely killer green dinner ensemble.

Well, I don't have a lot to go on. Characters in Rebels and the Mandalorian have been rather lacking in the high fashion department, honestly. However, I recall the Queen of Ktath'atn, who appeared in one of the Dr. Aphra arcs, wore a killer (literally) red and black dress.

The Empire, with 'best' meaning 'best fit' in context. The costumes created for ANH perfectly exemplify the 'space fascist' look that was so necessary to make the Empire work. I mean, the costumes are good enough that Peter Cushing rocked Tarkin while wearing slippers.

Clouded Leopard

Pick a treehopper, any treehopper.

Microraptor gui (and the color is not an artist's impression, they've actually figured out how to gauge fossil color from fossilized organelles in the feather fossils).

Star Wars fashion is sufficiently flexible to accommodate basically anything an artist can come up with, so why not?[/QUOTE]

 

Ops. Yes, that's what I mean.

 

Is this still on? Of so:

Best sentient insect people in SW?

Best non-sentient insects in SW?

Best sentient insect people outside of SW?

Best non-sentient insects in outside of SW?

 

I guess Blood Carvers, they have a cool look and I applaud the straightforward name.

Underwalkers, because why not have giant lava dwelling scarab beetle monsters?

The Naxids - a centauroid ant-like insectoid (but critically not 'hive mind' or any other absurdities) species from Walter Jon William's Praxis universe. An underappreciated military sci-fi gem of a universe honestly, one more Star Wars fans should check out.

Tricky, surprisingly few out there that aren't just giant versions of Earth insects. The Bugs from Starship Troopers maybe? The film version I mean, for the creature design, not anything story related.

 

All right: I'm a bit late (*wades through a drifting cloud of tumbleweeds on a lonesome highway...*) but I have computer issues to blame, and I'm here in the reply box.

1. Who are your top five favorite Star Wars characters and why?

Honestly--and I realize that is probably a disappointing way for me to answer my first question--I don't have particular characters that I have decided are my favorites, and that I thus prefer above all the others. From that, you can probably deduce I don't care much for the concept of having chosen favorites at all. I can say that the character I most identify with is probably Luke. I grew up in an isolated rural area--though one with a chain of lakes, resorts, and summer people--and when I was eighteen, and unlikeable and cynical and feral and well much worse than Luke at his whining worst, what I wanted most was to leave for the academy/college/Tosche Station and to never again return. (I have betrayed that dream since then, and no, I'm not proud.)

On that note, I have actually written more than a few stories--more than I realize until I think over my fanfictional oeuvre as a whole--set on Tatooine. Maybe the planet of Tatooine is my favorite character?

To finish this, and return to the original question, I will attempt a list of five characters--in this case, five of my action figures. I guess if you can't think of anything to ask me (providing anyone is even thinking of that) this might help:

1. Sabé, Queen's Decoy
2. Shmi Skywalker
3. Breha Organa
4. Ric Olié
5. Naboo Pilot (no name, just title)

2. Apart from Star Wars, what are some of your favorite fandoms?

If by "fandom" you mean movies/tv shows/novels I write fanfiction for, Star Wars is it. Yes, I realize that is another boring answer. I have written adaptations or remixes of Northern European fairy tales, mostly poetry, but I haven't done that for some time now, and (perhaps since folktales are of the folk, and have always been in the public domain) I don't really think of that as fanfiction. I also wrote a chapbook sized collection of "fan poetry" based off The Odyssey for a graduate school class which, probably fortunately, no longer exists.

3. When did you start writing fanfic and what inspired you to write it?

I began writing fanfiction in March 2005, only months after I had graduated from my MFA program with a degree that (without teaching experience or a published novel) couldn't get me a job in fast food, and only months after I moved away from that city, disappearing without a trace never to be heard from again, beginning my exile from the literary community that continues to this minute. I was at a low point with my writing, probably in part because I wasted too much time working on this painfully hard "novelette" length thing I should have just given up on, but also for a larger reason: I had spent much of graduate school breaking writing rules, experimenting, and sadly, not getting away with it. (A visiting writer who I won't name, known for experimental work, asked me what my reasoning was for my failed thesis novel idea, making it clear I should have one, and I didn't have an answer.) I was a postmodern meanie who made the Reader work too hard to get through my work.

So after all that, there was only rule left for me to break: write fanfiction. I knew of fanfiction--and I came across theforce.net once in graduate school, but didn't quite make to the forums before I left--but I had never so much as considered writing it. Then I happened to see Attack of the Clones for the first time, almost three years after it was released, and I was so incensed by the opening scene when Cordé apologized as she lay dying in her mistress's place that playing with seething vaguely original stories in my head to deal with it wasn't good enough.

I never thought that I would still be around, occasionally writing something, today--especially after the truncation issue, and I should just stop there--but here I am. I have gone through periods where I didn't write fanfiction at all, and I probably will again. But I realized at one point years ago that fanfiction is always there to return to when you need it.

4. What are your favorite fanfic genres to read and write?

1000ish word pitchdark prose poems with no plot, but I don't do that often enough.

 

Podcasts! What do you listen to and any you recommend?

Any special favorites among the fairy tales?

Any fairy tale/s that you think is underrepresented in populare medai? (Personally I would love to see more representations of Prince Hat under the Ground)

 

Have you ever watched Firefly?

If you have: Do you agree that the show got totally shafted by the network?

What are a few lines/moments that you find funny/memorable?

If you haven't seen it: Why not?

 

1. I think a while back you posted some songs relating to one of your Tatooine fanfic projects in a music and fanfic discussion thread, and they were really interesting ones. I'd be curious to know if there's any music that you're inspired by and/or reminded of for the latest stuff!

2. If you could visit three places in Star Wars, which would you pick and why?

3. Tell us about a book that's been significant to you (good, bad, otherwise).

4. A while back we were talking about how a couple of your characters would (not) get along. So... dinner party of all the characters that you care to remember at once -- who breaks first and flings a drink in somebody's face, who brings the snark, who is eating popcorn with a megawatt grin on their face watching chaos unfold?

 

Gamiel

Podcasts! What do you listen to and any you recommend?

Since I don't listen to podcasts, I can't really answer this question. Boring, I know.

Any special favorites among the fairy tales?

This is a serious question, and I have had to give it some thought. A few of my favorites--as in the darkest, most messed up ones that got my attention at a formative age, from the Brothers Grimm are: "The Goose Girl," "The Robber Bridegroom," and "Aschenputtel." (Which is far darker than Perrault's well-known version of the "Ash Girl" story, "Cendrillon.") Another I haven't read in years, but remember reading for the first time when I was eleven quite clearly, is "East of the Sun, West of the Moon."

Any fairy tale/s that you think is underrepresented in populare medai?
(Personally I would love to see more representations of Prince Hat under the Ground)

I haven't been keeping track of fairy tale adaptations for a while--as in years--so this answer might well be out of date. But the first one that I thought of is the Brothers Grimm tale "King Thrushbeard." It's a Taming of the Shrew type story, and yes--it's messed up. I knew that when I read it for the first time when I was twelve. But it's the difficult stories, the ones that you need to wrestle with, that work best for retellings. I actually started one years ago, but I couldn't get it to work out.

-----------------------
Cowgirl Jedi 1701

Have you ever watched Firefly?

Yes, I have. Though I didn't see it until after I watched Serenity (and for a quite a while, my signature here was one of Jayne's classic lines from that movie: "Shiny. Let's be bad guys.")

If you have: Do you agree that the show got totally shafted by the network?

It certainly didn't help the show's ratings that they showed the first few episodes out of order.

What are a few lines/moments that you find funny/memorable?

Simon: I'm trying to put this as delicately as I can... How do I know you won't kill me in my sleep?

Mal: You don't know me, son, so let me explain this to you once: If I ever kill you, you'll be awake, you'll be facing me, and you'll be armed.

Simon: Are you always this sentimental?

Mal: I had a good day.

Oh, and that moment when Wash asks the Alliance officer, whilst being interrogated, "Have you ever been with a warrior woman?" You can see just from the officer's expression what his answer is to that.

 

Continued/and apologies for the double post:

Kahara

1. I think a while back you posted some songs relating to one of your Tatooine fanfic projects in a music and fanfic discussion thread, and they were really interesting ones. I'd be curious to know if there's any music that you're inspired by and/or reminded of for the latest stuff!

Thanks. Sadly (and I can probably fairly blame the last two years of computer problems for this) I can hardly write a single word of fanfiction, so I haven't added any more music to the Tatooine soundtrack in some time. Usually these days, I listen to music for its own sake--no connection to or inspiration for any of my stories, whether written or never-going-to-be ideas.

But that typed, I can still share a few songs. Here's the one song that has comprised the soundtrack for my story "The Winter Queen" since December 2018:



And for one for an untitled novel idea that I will almost certainly never write:



---------------

And since it's 1:30 AM and I'm leaving on a short trip tomorrow, I will have to end here. I'll get to your other questions--which I am giving some thought as to how to answer, especially concerning the dinner party free-for-all with my characters--once I return.

 

Best dressed in PT?

Best dressed in OT?

Best dressed in ST?

Best dressed in the old EU?

Best dressed in the new EU?

SW culture with the best fashion sense? And why?

 

More answers to more questions.

But first, a bonus song for the previous question, for a novel I am writing that no one else will likely ever read a word of. This is partly why, even though the book is mostly about classical music, the possible epigraph (and who cares for copyright issues for books no one shall ever read?) is "You're gonna hear electric music solid walls of sound."



--------------------

Kahara (continued)

2. If you could visit three places in Star Wars, which would you pick and why?

Tatooine, Naboo, and Alderaan. I have written multiple stories about the first two worlds, and while I abandoned my interest in Alderaan when I abandoned the one fanfictional story I wrote set there years ago, I needed a third location--and since I am a native midwesterner living in Montana, I really like mountains. I would go visit a few of the places on each planet that did not appear in the movies or the EU (because you can't possibly show everything about an entire planet in one shot/scene) and take pictures. And then I would show them all to you.

3. Tell us about a book that's been significant to you (good, bad, otherwise).

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. It was the last book I read, for a class in Twentieth Century American Literature, in my undergraduate career. I didn't expect to connect with it in any deep meaningful way, but I did--in a way I had already mostly lost with books, and which I have not regained. I'm not sure exactly why. It would be easy to say it's about the Vietnam war (which I have no personal connection with, beyond my father's secondhand stories of his time in the army in El Paso before he got a medical discharge) and that is true enough. But it's also about stories. It's about "Timmy saving Tim's life with a story."

4. A while back we were talking about how a couple of your characters would (not) get along. So... dinner party of all the characters that you care to remember at once -- who breaks first and flings a drink in somebody's face, who brings the snark, who is eating popcorn with a megawatt grin on their face watching chaos unfold?

Well, we already know that Miss Ving and Miss Taafe would not get on (so it's a good thing they live hundreds of years apart). But if they were at the same dinner party at the same time, Miss Taafe would begin to lecture, and Miss Ving would toss off mean witty comments. She might have to call for back-up. Imogen Tarkin could join her, and she would bring the snark in full force. But Miss Taafe would too, and she would get Mellé (a Naboo rebel in Rebel Intelligence in my story "The Wrong Side of History") to fit that bill. Mellé would probably be the one to crack and fling the first drink.

Then Lady Wynestra would show up with her stick, because she can't stand seeing a good drink wasted like that. Take that, whippersnapper. The other Ladies would cheer on from the sidelines.

But Miss Taafe and Mellé would get along--and they even live in the same time period--and might wind up kissing before the night's end. So while they agree on multiple issues, and then move on to flirting, they can't annoy certain other people, so finally things calm down.

Meanwhile, Chastity Fardreamer (who has been mentioned only so far in my 2016 diary) would be watching with the popcorn, though he would have a faint amused smirk rather than a megawatt grin, and on occasion, he would just shake his head. He would be the first to tell you that nothing about human nature surprises him, and this just confirmed it all.

---------------------------------

Gamiel

Best dressed in PT?

The Naboo handmaidens.

I know, I know--the expected answer would be Padmé. But I actually think her infamous wardrobe is so much, so elaborate, that it overwhelms her as a character. (Sometimes, I think most of her character *is* her wardrobe, with a few vague political ideals attached, and oh remember she's Leia's Mother.) It's like--taking the senate scene in The Phantom Menace as an example--this big fancy dress and hairpiece stands rampant in the senate pod, and oh there's incidentally this girl in it.

But the handmaidens' dresses are elegant, with graceful understated lines, without being too much. You can actually imagine wearing their clothes. Oh, and Dormé's outfit from the goodbye scene in AOTC has pockets. Mustn't forget that.

Best dressed in OT?

Lando. Enough said.

Best dressed in ST?

"Oh please--I have 70s vintage clothes in my closet that are more space than the *things* they wore."

But seriously: I haven't actually ever seen the sequel trilogy (well, aside from watching some scenes with Kylo Ren on youtube because I needed to see the much discussed temper tantrums for myself) so I can't really give an answer to this one. But I'm not impressed by the screenshots.

Best dressed in the old EU?

Mara Jade. Or if she wasn't, she should have been.

Best dressed in the new EU?

I'm going to have to excuse myself from this question, as I try to pretend the new EU doesn't exist.

SW culture with the best fashion sense? And why?

Naboo is the obvious choice for having the best fashion, with even the characters out of focus in the background of Padmé's funeral scene looking classy in a Raphaelite meets Victorian meets meadow of flowers way. (Padmé's royal wardrobe has a good deal of East Asian influence, but I don't really see it in the other characters' clothes.) But Kuat--going only by the one illustration of EU character Viqi Shesh--obviously has the most spaced-out 70s fashion sense.