Somewhere Different Now

Things I have done in the past few days:


( I Believe in Sherlock Holmes (cut for photo and vague spoilers for Sherlock 2x03) )


-dyed my hair a dark reddish brown.  This marks an improvement over the long roots in dull medium brown, faded chestnut middle, and tips sun-bleached almost blond that it had become in the many moons since I last dyed it.

-saw The Artist.  I was attempting to see The Descendents, but that was sold out, so I decided to see something else at my friendly local independent cinema since I was already there.  I thought The Artist was interesting, well made, and a lot of fun, though I don't understand why critical response has been quite so overwhelmingly fantastic.  It was good but not THAT amazing.  However, I'm not really a movie history buff, so I guess I'm not the optimal audience.

-amazed a sixth grader at work who started singing some of the few clean lines of "I'm On a Boat" by telling him that I knew that song and he needed to stop singing right there.  The fact that I'd heard the song apparently blew his young mind. 

At a concert Friday night (Red Skunk Jipzee Swing Band), I started thinking about musical instruments and how many of them have distinct personality types stereotypically associated with them.  Of course there's plenty of exceptions to these stereotypes–I've known shy trumpet players and smart drummers, and one of the most macho guys in my high school played the flute–but they aren't entirely without basis in fact.  After all, people sometimes choose an instrument because it speaks to some aspect of their personalities.  Then my mind drifted into fandom.  Now I've got a question for y'all.

Which characters do you think play or used to play an instrument, and which instrument?  Sherlock plays the violin, of course, and John says he learned the clarinet (though there's no evidence he's kept it up).  The Doctor has been observed playing the recorder (as Two) and the organ (as Ten in The Lazarus Experiment).  I'd love to hear more canonical examples, but even more than that, dear flist, I want your speculation.  (My examples below are from Doctor Who and Sherlock fandoms, since that's where I mainly hang out, but if you feel like discussing something else, go for it!) 

Does Lestrade spend his off-hours playing electric guitar in a band with some of his mates from the Yard?  Did Amy Pond decide to rub her Scottishness in the faces of the people of Leadworth by learning the bagpipes?  Does Eleven play the banjo, because banjos are cool?  Does Captain Jack like to blow a trumpet?  Does Anthea get the finger dexterity for that Blackberry from playing the piano, or does she let off steam playing bass in an all-woman punk band?  Does Anderson enjoy how his trombone sounds like he's always imagined the call of the noble Parasaurolophus? 

For the record, I played the French horn from fifth grade until I graduated high school.  If any of y'all play(ed) instruments, feel free to share that too. 

One of the lovely things about Sherlock Holmes is that the original canon is out of reach of copyright laws, meaning that established authors can write fanfic and get paid for it.  The BBC's Sherlock is a classic "born in another time period" AU, for instance.  The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a book with an excellent collection of professional Holmes fic that may appeal to the Sherlock fans on this flist as well as others who have read some of Arthur Conan Doyle's stories.

The concept of this collection is that it contains a mix of genres:  some straight-up mystery stories where every bizarre occurrence can be explained away, and some speculative fiction stories where the solution to the mystery involves something like aliens, Cthulhu, or travel to a parallel universe.  In almost all of the stories I was able to tell whether the supernatural occurrences were "real" almost immediately, well before the reveal, but the variety of genres was fun nevertheless.  As in any collection of short stories, some are better than others, but there were a number of stories I absolutely adored and only one or two I truly disliked. Some of my favorites included (with some fairly minor spoilers):

-Naomi Novik does her fanfic origins proud in "Commonplaces."  She directly addresses the question of exactly how deep the connection between Holmes and Watson runs.  I squeed SO DAMN HARD, even though it's a bittersweet story.  Also, I really like Novik's version of Irene Adler.

-Stephen King's descriptively titled "The Doctor's Case," wherein Watson solves the mystery before Holmes.  It turns out that my fondness for super-competent!John in the BBC-verse translates to other versions of our detective duo as well.

-"The Singular Habits of Wasps" by Geoffrey Landis, a brilliantly unsettling take on Jack the Ripper.

-Neil Gaiman's "A Study in Emerald."  If you don't already know why this story is a dark gem, you can also read it on Neil's website.

-"The Adventure of the Pirates of Devil's Cape" by Rob Rogers.  Inspired lunacy with an albino alligator and PIRATES!  Also, BAMF!Watson fights a giant.
 
-For an example of a pro writer dipping into that beloved fandom genre of crack, I loved "The Adventure of the Lost World" by Dominic Green.  Those in Sherlock fandom may be especially amused to note that this story contains a dinosaur.  (Yes, watchalong folks, it is better than the movie with Gareth David Lloyd.) As if the prospect of Sherlock + dinosaur isn't tantalizing enough, I really must share this selection of dialog between Holmes and Watson.

[( excerpt behind the cut )

In summary, if you're looking for a fun bunch of stories putting familiar characters in unfamiliar situations or you want some [mostly] gen Sherlock Holmes fanfic you can carry around in book form, I recommend The Improbable Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

I don't know what the folks at Huffington Post are on, but I suggest that they keep at it.  They posted an article on which US politicians ought to be cast as the Doctor.  If you're not going WTF?, you're not paying attention.  The article is moderately amusing for their explanations of why certain politicians are like the Doctor, though mostly I can't possibly conceive of these people in the role (even aside from the fact that they are American politicians).  Hillary Clinton might have regenerated her public persona, but, meaning no disrespect, none of those personas have been very Doctor-ish. 

However, the article did propose one Doctor and companion pairing that won the Internet forever:

Doctor:  Barack Obama
Companion:  Lady Gaga

WORLDS OF YES!  I WOULD PAY IN CASH AND POSSIBLY BODY PARTS TO SEE THIS.  Obama has Nine's ears, Ten's geekiness, and the general Doctorish commitment to hope and idealism with a steely underlayer.  A depressingly large number of Americans are already convinced that he wasn't born in the US anyway...why not Gallifrey? 

The true genius of this, though, is the companion casting.  Obama!Doctor's intellectual calm with side of dorkiness would be well (and hilariously) balanced out by Lady Gaga's total out-there in your face personality.  Anybody who goes out on stage wearing those insane heels she sometimes sports is brave enough to be a companion (though let's hope she takes it down to only two- or three-inch heels when she has to run).  If they wanted to have a companion who wasn't from 21st century earth, viewers could easily believe that she's from the future and/or alien.  (Heck, I like the idea of Michelle Obama as the relatable human companion and Lady Gaga as a second, alien companion, or possibly a personification of the TARDIS or something.)   Cosplayers would be overjoyed at her distinctive outfits.  Every episode could have a musical number. 

Heck, even without Barack Obama, I would be endlessly amused to have Lady Gaga on Doctor Who.  Kylie Minogue was a singer who appeared as a co-star, so there's precedent.  Amy Pond is already pioneering the territory of how to be a companion without trousers.  Lady Gaga could take over the Daleks so instead of shouting "Exterminate!  Exterminate!" they shouted "Puh-puh-puh-poker face!  Puh-puh poker face!"  Who's with me?

I just read an article about females in fandom that brings up some interesting points but also frustrated me.  Media powers are now realizing that women are sometimes interested in geeky things too!  Wow, girl geeks!  Who could have guessed?  *eye roll* 

Some people in the article talk intelligently about things that we in fandom generally already realize:  men and women are sometimes fans of the same things but not for identical reasons, with women typically being more interested in emotional connections with the characters.  As a generalization, this is true, although there is a LOT of variation within both sexes.  I like a tightly written plot and a thrilling action sequence too, I just won't get really into a story unless I care about the characters.

What frustrated me about this article was its focus on Twilight as some epicenter of female fandom, with some idea of males being universally anti-Twilight and females all being screaming fangirls about it.  Women in fandom existed (more commonly than many acknowledged) long before Twilight, and many of us couldn't give a damn about teenage stalker sparkly vampires and the disempowered Mary Sues who love them. 

Also, how can you write an article on female fans (actually, three articles, although the first two really don't add much to the one I linked) and not once mention fan fiction?  They are ignoring a big part of how a lot of women and girls relate to the books, tv shows, movies, etc. that they love.  Instead, the article is focusing on the screaming teens who follow hot actors around at conventions.  Fic's a way that fans are creative, really engaging mentally and emotionally with the original works.

I did like the quote from Kevin Smith in response to his audience's booing of Twilight:  "That's the next generation of fans!  That's what I love about a comic book convention. People will come to a convention, stand there in a Spock costume, look at someone in a Chewie costume, and say, 'Look at that f__in' geek. How dare you pass judgment on those 12-year-old girls who like vampires!"

Oh, interfandom judgment.  Really, as much as I will criticize Twilight and its less sane and/or mature fans, I hope the books' success can ultimately be a good thing.  Some of those girls will go on to a better quality of sparkle-free vampire fiction (Buffy, Robin McKinley's Sunshine, Tanya Huff's Henry Fitzroy books), and from there to the rest of fandom.  At my local borders, they have moved the Young Adult section to the front of the store.  I hope that's an indicator that a lot of younger readers are buying books.  Admittedly about half of it is Twilight and its ripoffs, but surely some of the girls who go there will get into a habit of reading fantasy and sci-fi.  (Incidentally, a RL friend of mine who works in publishing keeps a blog reviewing YA books from an adult perspective, focusing on quality works. Her reviews are excellent reads in themselves.  There are tons of really good books for teens to move to when they start to tire of Twilight.)

Finally, I have a random question.  I know male fans are out there since I see them at conventions.  However, the aspects of fandom I participate in (fic, LJ) are very heavily female.  What do the male fans DO when they aren't at cons?