Various fannish items
Apr. 15th, 2012 09:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magnetic_pole* I've tossed my hat in the ring over at Remix Madness, the free-for-all final round of the yearly event. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to write myself this week--though the quick-and-dirty format is appealing--but if anyone wants to play with any of my fics, feel free!
*![[insanejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/ij-community.gif)
hp_beholder has begun! I'm already behind, but the first two fics, Smudge (Dean/Millicent, 1800 words, rated R) and Under the Surface (Orion Black/Abraxas Malfoy, 1800, PG), are both great. I love fics with Big Ideas, and Beholder always seems to be filled with them.
* I went to see Hunger Games this weekend. I thought I'd be more excited about a mainstream story about state oppression, but somehow it rang hollow for me.
I suppose part of the problem was the way in which the movie, ostensibly about a dystopian future, grounded the class conflict safely in the past--characters from District 12 looked like they stepped out of a Dorothea Lange photograph, heroically smudged with coal, and the futurism of the Capitol was all Art Deco; no postindutrial unemployment here in Panem, no urban poverty, and the informal economy involves spunky sharpshooters poaching squirrels. And while the satire of the culture of reality tv was sharply drawn, the politics of Panem fell flat. Wait: who's wealthy, and how do they justify their privilege, again? The same society that produces the Hunger Games would have much more sophisticated systems of soft power in place. (Though I did love the detail about wealthier Districts 1 and 2 training their young; that situation had the complexity of something that seemed real.) Perhaps the books are better at this? Also: no more saintly Black characters, please. Really. Enough.
*
hp_beholder has begun! I'm already behind, but the first two fics, Smudge (Dean/Millicent, 1800 words, rated R) and Under the Surface (Orion Black/Abraxas Malfoy, 1800, PG), are both great. I love fics with Big Ideas, and Beholder always seems to be filled with them.* I went to see Hunger Games this weekend. I thought I'd be more excited about a mainstream story about state oppression, but somehow it rang hollow for me.
I suppose part of the problem was the way in which the movie, ostensibly about a dystopian future, grounded the class conflict safely in the past--characters from District 12 looked like they stepped out of a Dorothea Lange photograph, heroically smudged with coal, and the futurism of the Capitol was all Art Deco; no postindutrial unemployment here in Panem, no urban poverty, and the informal economy involves spunky sharpshooters poaching squirrels. And while the satire of the culture of reality tv was sharply drawn, the politics of Panem fell flat. Wait: who's wealthy, and how do they justify their privilege, again? The same society that produces the Hunger Games would have much more sophisticated systems of soft power in place. (Though I did love the detail about wealthier Districts 1 and 2 training their young; that situation had the complexity of something that seemed real.) Perhaps the books are better at this? Also: no more saintly Black characters, please. Really. Enough.
