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Where No Man Has Gone Before

Discussion in 'Fan Fiction and Writing Resource' started by Inara, Oct 29, 2005.

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  1. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 30, 2005
    Does this androgynous gender thing still allow for marriage? TPM and Darksaber do seem to indicate a Hutt family unit...though that leaves for some interesting possibilities.

    A really confusing family tree that doesn't answer any questions.


    Jabba's wife: "I had the baby last time. Now it's your turn."
    Jabba: "But I hate being pregnant."
     
  2. Darth_Elu

    Darth_Elu Chosen One star 7

    Registered:
    Jan 2, 2003
    Jabba's wife: "I had the baby last time. Now it's your turn."
    Jabba: "But I hate being pregnant."


    [face_laugh] [face_laugh] [face_laugh]
     
  3. SakuraTsukikage

    SakuraTsukikage Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 24, 2005
    Interesting thread! I think my favorite aliens, to write or otherwise, are Wookiees. I mean, what's not to love? But they are difficult to write, especially when you have a variety of characters around, not all of whom can speak Shyriiwook.
     
  4. Borgchild

    Borgchild Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Oct 13, 2005
    That family tree makes it look as if they mate with themselves, but that's not how it works. They do, usually, take mates. (Then again, I'm using six pages in NJO as my source material, sooooo....) But seeing as Hutts are pretty much overgrown earthworms, which have been known to mate with themselves in the event of there being no other earthworms around, it's not entirely impossible.
     
  5. dark_jedi_lover

    dark_jedi_lover Jedi Knight star 1

    Registered:
    Dec 25, 2004
    I love writing Shi'ido--shape-shifters reputed to having the exact same personality otherwise...Although I tend to argue that they do change slightly, with a few major changes.

    As I am in the process of reading Star by Star, I find the Barabels very interesting. That battle-meld thing is cool.

    Yuuhzahn Vong are fascinating in their own strange way...

    I also like making up my own planets and species, though so far I've only done humanoids.
     
  6. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 30, 2005
    Okay, folks, time for a new topic:

    ~~~~~~~~~

    What are some common mistakes people make when writing about aliens or their cultures?

    ~~~~~~~~~


     
  7. SakuraTsukikage

    SakuraTsukikage Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 24, 2005
    I'd say the biggest mistake is to fail to take into account the fundamental differences inherent in an alien's worldview simply by nature of the way they are, such as a longer lifespan. Too many aliens just end up being humans in a funky costume, instead of something truly different and strange. For example, a Shi'ido's sense of identity might be far different than the norm for a human. A Gran or Talz probably sees the world quite differently through multiple eyes.

    As a related aspect of this, aliens probably think and speak differently than the norm even for Star Wars humans. Chewie might use a lot of tree metaphors in his thoughts. A Hutt might think slime is a desirable thing. Who knows?
     
  8. Vongchild

    Vongchild Jedi Grand Master star 5

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    Apr 2, 2004
    I've seen a lot of people try to write the Yuuzhan Vong and turn them into senseless killers. What I like best about using them as protagonists is that it defies the norm. The Yuuzhan Vong are not warlike by nature - there was a very good example in NJO: A Yuuzhan Vong raised among humans would behave like a human, and a human raised among Yuuzhan Vong would behave like a Yuuzhan Vong. It all has to do with the culture you're brought up in. A Yuuzhan Vong born post-war would behave differently than one who fought in it, but so few people seem to realize that...
     
  9. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 30, 2005
    I see a lot of stereoptypes in fan fiction when it comes to aliens.

    On one hand, there is a group of fallback villains, such as the Hutts, Chiss, and Bothans. In terms of the Chiss, I see them written negatively in most fan fiction (especially when people need a reason to get Jag Fel out of the Ascendancy and into Jaina's arms :rolleyes:). Perhaps because people don't understand their culture, whatever negative traits they have (xenophobia, a sense of superiority) become magnified by most writers. It annoys me to no end, which is why I really enjoy hammering out their culture in a more canonical, fair way.

    Another race that this happens to are the Bothans. Thanks so Borsk and a few others, their entire race now is synonomous with deceit, underhanded trickery, and the phrase, "Many Bothans died to bring us this information."

    But the flip side of the situation is when people tend to idealize an alien culture. All Wookies are loyal, all Mon Calamari are honest, decent people, all Twi'lek women are insanely good looking, all Ewoks are adorable, etc., and for comic value, there are Squibs and Sullustans.

    It's one of the reasons I like Denning so much. He did a great job with aliens like Saba, Juun, and Tarfang (though the Killiks are pretty strange, I will admit). So far, in TJK and TUQ, I didn't see as much evidence of stereotypes that slip even into most profic (another great author with aliens is Zahn, who brought so many races to light).


     
  10. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Interesteing thread!

    I like writing aliens protagonists, though they seem to be mainly Twi'lek, Rodians, and recently, Jawa.

    Jabba could have been pregnant durring ROTJ for all we know

    I once did a trilogy of ambulance stories, and we - me and the paramdics :p - delivered a pregnant Hutt to the hospital after her water broke. [face_sick]
     
  11. JadeSolo

    JadeSolo Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 20, 2002
    Ewwww... [face_laugh]

    I think one of the most common mistakes I make is to give the aliens too many human-like attributes. Granted, there are bound to be a few, considering the way everyone mixes together in the melting pot that is Coruscant. But once, I was going to make a Shistavanen whistle. And then I thought to myself, well, there is such a thing as a wolf-whistle, but can wolfmen really whistle? How would they eat with silverware? Would they even use it? And various other questions. :p

    The aliens in the OT, they were all humans wearing masks. And most of the time, the features on the mask didn't really move. Maybe some eyes and an eyebrow, but you didn't see all the muscles working. In the PT, so many of them were either humans wearing masks designed to have movements (Nemoidians), or they were completely CG and thus could do just about anything.

    So yeah, all those itty bitty little things that humans can do. I think I, and other authors as well, unknowingly graft those onto aliens.
     
  12. Thumper09

    Thumper09 Force Ghost star 4

    Registered:
    Dec 9, 2001
    Great thread idea. :)

    I'll admit to also being one of those people who tends to write aliens as humans in costumes, though I am making an effort to try to get away from that. It's awfully hard, though. :p

    When I do use non-human characters (something I should also do more often :rolleyes:), I very rarely use the more "common" ones like Twi'leks, Wookiees and Hutts. I think the most "common" one I use is a Rodian. I just like to see a little more variety, so I've had a Gran and a Duro, and I've recently started developing a Devaronian and Nautolan. The d20 RPG book "The Ultimate Alien Anthology" has been a great source of information for me in terms of species background and general personalities, so it's a good springboard.

    I'm also developing one species of my own, which is a lot trickier than I originally thought it would be. After coming up with their physical appearance and attributes, I tried to figure out what kind of evolutionary history would have caused those features to develop like they did. Why does the species have extra arms and eyes? Well, they can use the extra arms as a set of legs to help them run fast, and the extra eyes help in spotting danger from behind, almost like a herd animal on Earth. That leads to other instincts (fight or flight, claustrophobia, etc.). I guess it's similar to the approach Seldes_Katne takes. (One thing I really want to explore is that this particular species doesn't enter REM sleep and as such doesn't dream at night, and they can't understand what humans are talking about when humans mention a good dream or a nightmare.)

    I tried roleplaying a Gand, too. It would have been tons easier if I'd reread the Rogue Squadron books first, but I didn't. That was also a challenge: getting into the mind of a bug-type creature with strange (but fascinating) language patterns and who identified herself with the group she was with rather than herself as an individual. :p

    Probably the thing that has helped me the most when writing nonhumans was to write something from that character's first-person (first-alien?) perspective. Whether it was just a small part of a story or an entire one, that really forced me to look through their eyes and come to better terms with their lines of thinking--I couldn't ignore them and make them blend into the background like I can with third-person perspectives. This tactic was greatly influenced by the Animorphs book series. (Yes, I'll admit, I was well out of the intended age group when I read those books, but I enjoyed them.) Each book was told from a different character's POV (which was great for someone like me who gets way too fascinated by POV's :p ), and one of those characters was an alien living on Earth. Every fifth or sixth book was told from the alien's POV as he was trying to come to terms with understanding Earth culture and comparing it to his own. In addition to that, every single book had multiple instances where the characters morphed into another animal, and then you'd get something of the animal's viewpoint as well. This ties in more with Seldes_Katne's approach, I believe, but it's fascinating to see how the animal's physiology and nature influenced how it looked at the world.

    Okay, this was my huge, neverending post for the month. :p And I think I'm done, yay! *the crowd cheers at this news*

    One of these days, though, I'm going to figure out how to write a nonhuman who cannot see in the visible spectrum. ;)

    -Thumper
     
  13. SakuraTsukikage

    SakuraTsukikage Jedi Master star 4

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    Oct 24, 2005
    An alien who cannot see in the visible spectrum . . . . hmmm. Like a Miraluka, who sees everything through the Force, or something that can only see in ultraviolet or infrared?
     
  14. Vongchild

    Vongchild Jedi Grand Master star 5

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    Apr 2, 2004
    An alien who sees in Ultraviolet essentially sees heat rather than objects. Their speech would probabl involve a lot of temperature-related words and phrases and they'd probably think of sight as an extension of touch. For example, rather than "I saw the ship," try "I sensed the heat from the ship, concentrated around the hyperdrives. The captain was in the cockpit and there were two rats in the cargo hold."
     
  15. TheCrazyRodian

    TheCrazyRodian Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 3, 2004
    My favorite alien to write about is Jacen....

    No, kidding. I suppose it might be obvious, but I have a special fondness for a certain species of non-human that is almost entirely vilified and despised by the rest of the galaxy, or stereotyped as a group of idiotic, savage, smelly lowlives.

    The tricky thing here is that there just really isn't much to go on besides the negative stuff. When I was younger, I used to write all sorts of Star Wars stories using a pair of Rodians I yoinked from the Greedo tale and developed on my own. Let me just say, ah, that you couldn't get much more human-projected-on-non-human than those stories.

    My biggest struggle, in trying to write a good Rodian story, is dealing with the established limitations of the species, while inventing other stuff on my own. We all know that Rodians are either bounty hunters, spicers, smugglers, bodyguards, thieves, pirates, or slavers (or all of the above), and that they are really terrible at shooting blasters from two feet away.

    However, in my youthful oddness, I became determined, at the age of like ten, to redeem the Rodian race. I invented so much stuff about them that even now I have to remind myself that it's all make-believe. And all that extraneous garbage makes it that much harder to actually get into the deeper psychological and behavioral patterns of the species.

    And I vote Andoorni Hui for Chief of State. Wait, she's dead. D'oh!
     
  16. SakuraTsukikage

    SakuraTsukikage Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 24, 2005
    Ah hah, now your username makes sense!

    I'm sure there's another Rodian you could nominate for Chief of State. Somewhere. After all, you can't get much worse than Borsk Fey'lya, can you?

    Which brings up another set of stereotypes for what I think is a very interesting race. There are good Bothans and bad Bothans, but I always wish there were more well-developed Bothans in which the effects of their culture of espionage and politics was explored.
     
  17. Vongchild

    Vongchild Jedi Grand Master star 5

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    Apr 2, 2004
    Greedo. He might be dead, but he'd get a heck more done than most people. :p
     
  18. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

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    Aug 30, 2005
    Okay, here is my late but gigantic reply. :)


    I totally agree here. There are some actions that we as humans do without thinking, something for us is multicultural on Earth (like whistling, holding hands, winking) that wouldn't necessarily be the case with aliens.

    I think a lot of writers tend to ignore these considerations simply because it's easier to humanize aliens. And it makes them more identifiable. If a wolfman whistles, the readers know what he is doing and what it means. Also, it's hard to come up with an equivalent. It's easier to say a Shistavanen uses a spoon than to say he sips from a bowl - though the latter may be more accurate, it sounds too inhuman. It's a catch-22 of writing, perhaps.


    It's funny because I didn't notice the weirdness of OT aliens until I saw the PT. The one thing I liked about the PT was that there were so many aliens, even if they were backgrond characters. The Old Jedi Order was comprised mostly of nonhumans, whereas Luke's Order is mostly human.

    I guess this can be attributed to the Jedi purges, and that aliens were more hurt than humans, but still...I'd like to see some of those races brought back, like Nautolans and so forth.



    You're at the right place! This is a rehab clinic of a sorts. :p


    [face_dancing] Yay for using Nautolans! After seeing Kit Fisto, I'm their biggest fan. And kudos for using lesser known aliens. It's great to read a fic and see another alien race that we haven't already seen bunches of time in profic.


    That's really fascinating. It's hard enough to operate within the boundaries of existing features, but to make up your own, believable species is impressive. It's fun to come up with reasons for why a race is the way it is because the reasons are just so interesting (like the head tentacles on Nautolans, the distinct pigmentation of the Chiss, etc.). If I may ask, what sort of race are you creating?


    It's hard to get into an alien's head when a human writes them. B
     
  19. Vongchild

    Vongchild Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Apr 2, 2004
    Minnie Bothans died to bring you this post... [face_laugh]

    How about interspecies? Who here has tried that (within the board regulations of course.) And I don't mean really basic flirty stuff. I mean like the deep true-love stuff I tend to work myself into. (pathetically, of course.) Who here has tried writing interspecies?

     
  20. SakuraTsukikage

    SakuraTsukikage Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 24, 2005
    I haven't. I'd like to, though. I always thought the story about Corran Horn and Chertyl Rolowoor was really painfully funny. [face_laugh]
     
  21. Lovely-in-Orange

    Lovely-in-Orange Jedi Youngling star 3

    Registered:
    Apr 21, 2005
    I don't think any civilization could survive without people in a variety of jobs. So I think you can go against what you typically see within reason. I can't see a Hutt being completely selfless, but there are other motivations for philanthropy than that like attention and prestige. And a Bothan can use their skills at being sneaky and manipulative for things other than spying or politics. And atypical characters can exist too if it's explained well.

    Vongchild I started a story that was supposed to include a Zabrak/human romance, but I didn't get far and set it aside for a while (I may go back to it). I figured that was actually more normal than some of Wes Janson's previous canon flings with Bothans. [face_laugh] Sakura, I liked the Corran story too. There's a lot of humor and drama potential with interspecies romance. I really liked Gavin/Asyr too.
     
  22. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 30, 2005
    I guess this is a new topic, so...


    ~~~~~~~~~

    New Topic: Writing an Interspecies Romance. How do you write something believable without humanizing the pairing?

    ~~~~~~~~~
     
  23. Pandora

    Pandora Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Apr 13, 2005
    Since I just finished a story that featured interspecies romance, I'll take a crack at this. (It's as good a time as any to enter the topic, and I'll probably touch on a few other things as well.)

    I think one of the main things to remember in depicting an interspecies relationship would be the cultural differences. The two beings involved might not, because of their cultural conditioning, or biology, or social structures, want the same thing out of love, sex, & one night stands.

    You see these differences even amongst humans, or you should. For example, a Hapan woman and a Corellian man may be the same species, but they come from very different cultures. Hapans are (if I've heard correctly) matriarchal. Do you think the Hapan woman is going to take her husband's surname, as seems to be the norm for the GFFA? I don't think so. (If she does, then Hapes ain't no matriarchy.)

    Obviously, in order to have a relationship, the two characters must not be so different, so alien to one another, that they cannot connect at all.

    I don't think I did anything special in my story. (For example, there were gender roles issues around this relationship that I didn't get into, though I should have.) I'm not sure the non-human (who I'll call C. here) was alien enough. But since the story is told through a first person narrator, it's possible she doesn't quite understand it, or interprets him in human like ways.

    But since he's humanoid--and very similar, physically & etc to humans--he probably would have many similiarities to humans. I was never quite clear what exactly he is, but it's clear that his species is very closely related to humans.

    Originally, I made him up because I wanted to have a character from a race that is made up entirely of scientists or engineers, every last one of them, so I could comment on that sort of generalization. (Am I the only one who looks at Omwats or other background races of physists and thinks, Asian stereotypes?) Generalizations are easy. It's easy to characterize a race, whether for good (Mon Calamari) or ill (Bothans), instead of individuals. And sure, if you're Bothan, you have probably been encouraged towards espionage... but I'm going to stop before we reach the nature vs. nurture sand pit over there.

    Anyway, I didn't have my characters clash that much--and maybe they should have. The narrator (V.) has no interest in marriage or life bonds or any of that--so little, in fact, that she never even brings it up as a consideration. C.'s culture, though I didn't mention this, doesn't have the sort of traditional marriage we see most humans having in the GFFA. The men in his culture can be possessive--but not in the same way. I guess you could say that they're different--but similar enough so they can still connect and understand each other.
     
  24. Vongchild

    Vongchild Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Apr 2, 2004
    Wow. I made the new topic AND brought Pandora out of her shell!

    he non-human (who I'll call C. here)

    [face_laugh] Crix Lu!!! Niiice.

    I have go through the trouble with humanizing a lot. Not to mention I find it irresistable to humanize Nen Yim a little more than she is (and everyone says I'm good at writing her. Pshaw, I'm just the only one who writes her.) I want to shoot myself over several chapters of a few fics for her behavior.

    When My Mother was a Yuuzhan Vong, on the other hand, I liked how Torre came out. He seemed very human, and he wanted to fly, but there was still a lot of mystique to him. I guess it's just the Yim family Heresy combined with post-war, but he's not typical Yuuzhan Vong. He's a young man who's fallen in love with his best friend, which only complicates matters.

    More later (after school, that is.)
     
  25. Inara

    Inara Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 30, 2005
    Writing believable romances are always difficult, especially between two different species. I think that to make a relationship a good one requires an author to take into account the backgrounds and personal habits and beliefs of their characters. For example, as cute as the Aayla Secura/Kit Fisto pairing would have been, it also would have been hard to write because Kit is amphibious and liked spending most of his time underwater while Aayla is definitely a land creature. So writing such a romance has to take in those considerations and needs a reasonable explantion/alternative.

    It's always struck me as interesting that while there is interspecies attraction in profic, you rarely see established couples. Wedge was attracted to both Qwi and a Twi'lek dancer, but he ended up with a human. Leia was attracted to Xixor but ended up with Han. There was Gavin and Asyr, but then Gavin ended up with a human, as did Corran Horn. There was Face and Dia, but I don't know if that was ever resolved (As a side note, notice how most of these relationships are from the Stackpole/Allston books...).

    And as mentioned above, there was also some mention of romance between Kit Fisto and Aayla Secura, but it was vague, and they died before anything happened.

    So yeah...while profic is really open to the idea of interspecies relations, you never see it happening in the long term. Do any of you think this is deliberate on the part of profic authors? Are the worried that readers might be squicked if they did pair a main character with an alien? Jacen and *gasp* Alema?

    To bring this to a personal level, I'm currently writing an interspecies romance between Jag Fel and Shawnkyr Nuruodo. It's hard because Chiss and humans are so different, and I want it to be as realistic as possible. For me, that means exposing the darker parts of such pairings, like racism and prejudices while still trying to maintain some optimism.

    But it's also fun because the lack of rules means I can make my own, and the prospect of playing around with cultures and customs makes writing interspecies more interesting.
     
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