The SGA Project, a.k.a., "Flavor Of The Year."

[icarus]

Hello. I've been working on this off and on since October. School's just started again (Sanskritsanskritsanskrit...) so I probably won't have much time to reply to comments. *takes a deep breath* Okay, I hope I have enough disclaimers.


The SGA Project, a.k.a. "Flavor Of The Year."

The goal: Give readers a taste of 2006 Stargate fandom, provide a rec-list with context, a description of intertexts, and explanation.

Why: Coming from the Harry Potter fandom, I find myself constantly explaining stories we wrote and read two-three years ago, "yes, yes, well… canon was like this, you see, and there was this story and then someone wrote that other story in response and…." Fanfiction is interdependent, relying what happens in canon, in mainstream media, and in between other stories in fandom. Stargate Atlantis is just in its second year of fanfic, new enough that we can still trace these connections. Well. More or less. I mean, how do you trace the connections between over 2,000 writers and 7,000 stories?

Caveat: I don't speak for fandom, I only speak for my own limited view. Picture it as a fish-eye camera in the room: it's just "a" perspective but not the only one, and a different camera mounted at a different angle, pointed somewhere else, will capture a completely different picture. Anyone who wants to create their own analysis, or write more based on other pairings, please go ahead. I regret I can't cover everything. A particular bummer is that I can't do Het (don't know it) and I'm only touching on Gen. Any volunteers? Bueller-?

Methodology: I could just arbitrarily pick stories based on my personal feeling -- it is ultimately a rec-list after all -- but I've tried to have a method to my madness.

- Most of the stories I've considered have at least 150 reviews (preferably 200+), demonstrating statistically they reached a large number of people in the fandom. (This number is arbitrary, by the way.) This is not a hard and fast rule. Obviously I didn't do this for minor pairings.

- Most of these stories appear on at least two rec-lists, some as many as nine, demonstrating statistically they're considered good enough to be recommended by someone.

- Most of these stories are included based on the date they were posted. Sometimes writers begin stories based on one canon but it's a year before they're finished. Since I'm considering their impact on fandom, the final publish date is more important than the start date. I've tried to avoid WIPs for this reason, though a couple have sneaked in there. WIPs are a huge problem because those are the novels, the big behemoth stories that have leave an impact crater on the fandom, but are almost never finished the year they're started.

- Stories are picked as an example of a trend or reaction to canon (or fanon). This means that lots of popular stories that I enjoy are skipped, and some less popular stories are included. If I've left off your favorite story and included one that makes you go "what the heck…?" this is almost certainly the reason why.

- I used the Stargatefanawards and the mcshep_awards to locate popular fics, but I found that fan awards don't track when a story was written (two thirds of the 2006 SGA fan awards were written in 2005), and the nominations for the Stargatefanawards closed by June, which left off half the year's stories. That said, I picked the stories at the beginning of December, and looking at the mcshep_awards after the fact? I'm rather relieved that many of these stories were your picks as well. It makes me feel like I'm on the right track.

Acknowledgements: This snapshot would not have been possible without the wide reading of Amothea, and the early direction and insights offered by Toft Froggy (who does not know I included her stories). I'd also like to recommend the ever-helpful people at sgastoryfinders: I can't tell you how many times I was scratching my head with some vague recollection of "that story with the music and stuff" and you guys would find it. Lastly, thank god for all those who maintain rec-lists. It's a lot of work, we depend on you, and you don't get a lot of awards and accolades, but hopefully a thank you will suffice. The whole fandom owes you dinner and a movie.

This is not a fan award or a top ten list. It's a rec-list with a particular angle that attempts to capture a snapshot of the year. Obviously I'm going to choose stories I like, but what I'm interested in is intertextuality, context, the conversation that frames the stories.

Canon Synopsis, Let Us Take You Back: 2006 began halfway through season two of SGA. To recap, the Atlantis expedition had been rescued in the eleventh hour, re-establishing regular ties with Earth. Ford fled, making barely a blip in the fanfiction world, while Ronon was found (and immediately embraced by fans like a lost puppy). Thanks to some fine arm-twisting from Elizabeth, John Sheppard was reluctantly given the command of Atlantis over Colonel Caldwell. In fandom, Caldwell quickly replaced Sumner and Kolya as John's nemesis. Rodney had Cadman's consciousness stuck in his brain which resulted in him smooching Beckett, and the fans rejoiced.

2005's search for a ZPM and home gave way to a furtive game of cat and mouse with the Wraith and the Genii, as the cloaked Atlantis attempted to continue to explore, continue their trade contacts, while pretending "we're not here." (Like that was ever gonna work.) Of course they were busted, though Elizabeth and Carson's meddling hurried it along, with the questionable ethics of turning a Wraith into a human.

It was a year of dumb and morally queasy decisions: Rodney blew up a solar system (spawning countless hurt/comfort fics), John got turned into a bug, John and Elizabeth foolishly let themselves get taken over by deadly aliens, Ford forced John's team to attack a hive ship, in a shivery case of scape-goating Elizabeth ordered the torture of Kavanagh… and then there was Michael. Oops. Turns out a Wraith is a sentient being. Season two ended with Atlantis in big trouble of their own making. There was precious little sympathy from the fans.

2006 ended mid-way through season three, which I will not detail here because it has not been shown in the U.S. yet, and also because fandom hasn't quite digested the new canon, though certain episodes have made a huge impact: "McKay & Mrs. Miller," where we meet Rodney's sister and his alternate self, and "Phantoms," where we learn what happened to John in Afghanistan. The early part of the season gives us much welcome character development.

Affect of Canon on Fanfiction: As a result of contact with home, the desperate darkness of 2005's season one fanfiction (Exigencies, The Taste Of Apples) disappeared since the expedition was no longer trapped. But some of the carefree silliness or "crack!fics" (penguin fics inspired by March of the Penguins, the gleeful madness of Pegasus B, 2005's infamous Harlequin Challenge) also dispersed once the expedition was more closely tied to the "real" world of Stargate Command.

Absurd crack!fics (in which, say, Rodney is turned into a 6" dinosaur) for which the SGA fandom had grown famous gave way to long, richly developed and realistic "alternate universes" or AUs, with Stargate characters taken out of the SGA world and dropped into entirely different circumstances. Slash writers, previously able to blithely ignore "don't ask, don't tell" when the Atlantis team was cut off from the military, were suddenly forced to address military regs, or at least give them a nod.

The AU trend allowed slash writers to continue to cheerfully ignore military regs because characters such as John [had left the military / was a dance instructor / was a musician / was a grad student / was an international playboy / was a stripper / fill in the blank here]. Challenges like reel_sga, which re-wrote classic movies like Hitchcock's "Notorious" with Stargate characters, encouraged the trend.

Affect of Pop Culture on Fanon: In the mainstream media, the critical success of the movie Brokeback Mountain whet fans' appetites for more real-world AU romances, particularly those in a western setting like the Farm In Iowa series. (In 2005 the big influence was March of the Penguins, which makes more sense if you remember SGA started in Antarctica. I didn't say it made a lot more sense.)

Taking the Military Seriously: For stories set in Atlantis, slash writers began to deal with military regulations head-on in stories such as Scenes From A Lesser War and DADT, Damyata, Damyadvam, giving slash romances a serious edge. SGA slash writers still have more latitude than SG-1 slash writers because of the iconoclastic personalities of John and Rodney (we believe they don't care about regulations, least of all the military's), the physical distance between Atlantis and Earth (someday Atlantis shall be a colony and we all know it), and the widespread belief Elizabeth would gladly cover for gay soldiers (yay, Elizabeth).

Effect of Current Events on Fandom, or Stargate's Usual Delight in Politics: The second half of season two focused on the ethical mistakes and bad moves of the Atlantis team in episodes like "Trinity," "Michael," and the season finale, "Allies." Many fans were outraged and frustrated with their un-heroic heroes, while others loved the moral complexity that echoed the growing cynicism and sliding support for America's Iraq war. (The Stargate franchise has always borrowed themes from current events.) Either way, fans felt it was an open question whether the expedition and Earth even deserved Atlantis.

It's unusual to have one story utterly dominate a fandom, but without question the story of the year was Synecdochic's Freedom's Just Another Name For Nothing Left To Lose. Posted when the fandom's frustration with their tarnished heroes was at its peak, it resonated not only as a great story in its own right, but also because it dealt with the mistakes of Atlantis team, what they learned, the shaky ethics of Earth (in the form of the NID), and it took Atlantis away from our side, beginning as it does after the Atlantis team's return to our galaxy.

The comedic take on this feeling was the smirking belief that the Atlantis team must be made up of people the SGC wanted to be rid of , i.e., "Stargate Atlantis: Saving the galaxy by accident since 2004." Danvers' A Team Is Borne* sums up the sentiment, where Lorne is sent to the Pegasus galaxy for blowing up valuable artifacts ("I'm being promoted to Atlantis." - "Sure, let's call it that.") and Elizabeth fails the "Great Big Idealist" test as she green-lights an obviously doomed plan.

The Natural Growth of a New Fandom. The Joys of Minor Characters: Speaking of Lorne, as SGA has grown in popularity, like any fandom, minor characters have taken on more importance. It's fun to see which minor characters. Zelenka is ever-present in fanfiction as a quasi-matchmaker and facilitator with a word of well-timed advice, leading to the tongue-in-cheek Zelenkamatch.com comic. Lorne has his own following and badly needs a first name (so far we have Nick, Marc, Evan…). Caldwell has been slowly less demonized, while Cadman, given she only appears in only two episodes, is surprisingly popular. There was much speculation about Jeannie prior to season three's "McKay & Mrs. Miller" (older sister? younger sister? reason for the split?). She's now moved into the fanfiction universe with a corner penthouse apartment, appearing in virtually every Rodney story that takes place on Earth. Requests for Jeannie-centric fics are beginning to roll in.

"That Kiss," and its Affect on Slash: Season two opened with "Duet," the first (U.S.) gay kiss in a sci-fi series, between McKay and Beckett (it was quickly followed by Torchwood and Dr. Who Many people have corrected this: the Brits were first, and Red Dwarf beat everyone). You'd expect this to create a stampede to the McKay/Beckett pairing, emptying 2005's ever-popular McKay/Sheppard, a.k.a. "McShep." The "McBeck" or McKay/Beckett pairing did increase, but McKay/Sheppard continues to dominate slash (according to Wraithbait, 71% of all slash stories are McShep).

Conclusion: Fanfiction relies on canon as raw material, but canon events do not control fanfiction like reins on a horse. The relationship between canon and fanfiction is call-and-response, not cause-and-effect. Fanfiction reflects what the fans want to see. This is why a character who's dead on the show will live forever in fanfic. (If I were writing for the show I would want to know this.)

By the way, the popularity of McShep over other pairings is a mystery. The explanation I buy is that the hero (Captain Kirk, Harry Potter, Frodo, Jack O'Neill) is always the focus of romantic fiction, het or slash, so what we're seeing really is the overwhelming popularity of Rodney McKay.

A New Slashy Interest in John Sheppard: In 2005, Rodney McKay was the undisputed star of SGA slash fanfiction, with John Sheppard predictably the star of the Het fiction. Even John/Rodney stories written from John's perspective tended to use John as a lens through which to watch Rodney.

By 2006, slash fans began to take more of an interest in John. He became more important partially because of the complications of "don't ask, don't tell" on the popular McShep, as well as a natural need to flesh out both sides of the pairing. Unfortunately, unlike Rodney, fans discovered the reticent John gave little clear information beyond the fact that he likes Ferris wheels and doesn't apparently read Tolstoy. Until "Phantoms" in the fall of 2006, fans did not even know the real story behind John's black mark in Afghanistan, and as of this writing we still have no certain information about his family or life before Afghanistan.

Fanon's Affect on Fanon, or, When in Doubt, Make it Up: Where there are blanks in canon, fanfiction writers build and comment on each others' stories, instead of responding to canon. Of course -- I mean, how can you reference canon that doesn't exist?

So with John, necessity has been the mother of invention. Fans have filled in the blanks with wildly different "John childhood" stories and AUs. John was the popular kid in high school… John was scrawny and unnoticed… John could have anyone he wanted… John was the gay-virginal product of rigid Christian conservatives… all extrapolating from thin evidence. Any number of these John interpretations will be killed once the show gives us "the truth" and, outside of a lucky few, these stories -- like the penguin fics -- will not make sense down the road. One universal thread, however, is the belief that John is a "military brat" whose distance and easy charm comes from moving from base to base; many picture a heavy-handed father who's left John uncomfortable in his own skin in social situations. Won't we be surprised if John's father turns out to be an insurance salesman named Bernie? (The fanfic writers have a point though. John's attitude towards authority had to come from somewhere.)

Descriptions of how John is in relationships have a similar range, for different reasons: instead of a lack of information we have too much. John is complex (some say infuriatingly inconsistent); even when he's eagerly kissing the blond in "The Tower" he tells us, "I never see this coming." It's possible Joe Flanigan is pulling John Sheppard in one direction while the writers are drawing him in another, as his behavior says "Kirk" while his words tell a different story. Is he a sexual carnivore who avoids relationships through casual affairs, or is he uncomfortable and shy and disconnected? Other darker, tougher, and less likeable versions of John turned up in 2006 with this expansion of fanon!John. This, plus the tension between John and Rodney in episodes like "Trinity," brought about more complicated portrayals of their relationship in MVP and Your Inevitable Unhappy Ending.

Oh, Cool, A Direct Conversation between Fanfics: The BDSM fans have also had their own interpretations, with both a submissive and a very dominant and possessive John Sheppard. Xanthe's BDSM novels, General & Dr. Sheppard and Coming Home, while controversial, have had an impressive impact on the fandom. As Helen notes, tongue-in-cheek, even Xanthe's detractors seem intimately familiar with both novels. While most 2006 AUs take place in our ordinary world or in a world closely related to SGA canon -- such as the mensa_aus sparked by the brainy Sheppard and Rod in "McKay & Mrs. Miller" -- Xanthe visualizes a unique reality with entirely different BDSM social mores, normalized by the fact that this is a fluffy, pink-around-the-edges romance.

In a rare direct response (normally with fanfiction you have to guess based on timing and theme) Helen's Take Clothes Off As Directed then revisualizes the implications of Xanthe's BDSM world as one where submissives are discriminated against.

On a completely personal note, I can't tell you how fascinating this is, to have first an SGA canon, then an alternate canon, and then an alternate alternate canon. It's like Russian dolls, one inside another. Helen's story can't be understood without reading Xanthe's story, and neither can be understood without watching Stargate Atlantis. Yet the sheer distance between point A and point C… we have a relatively straight John in SGA canon, and end up with a submissive John fighting military bias in a BDSM world where subs have just been allowed into flight school.

I love fanfiction.

This, of course, is how fanon begins to break unrecognizably from canon and in a few years we'll have themes no one will be able to explain.

Wow, you're still reading this long essay? Color me impressed. Moving right along...

A Silly Fandom Taking Itself More Seriously, This Time With Crossgender: In the world of alternate sexuality, playful crossgendered stories like 2005's It Stops Being Funny At Skirts (where John is turned into a girl and very upset about it) gave way to more serious takes on gender-benders. You see how a deliberately cracked idea leads to writers thinking, "hmm… but what if--?" and we have fics dealing with issues in offbeat topics in stories like You're Pretty Good-Looking (For A Girl), Second Skin, Like Heisenberg Looking In, Uncertain, and Ardhanarishvara. Instead of light-hearted comedy, they tackle the struggles and gender confusion of a John, Ronon, and Teyla temporarily switched into female versions of themselves; a Rodney and Cadman who've been switched into each other's bodies and have to accept that they can't change back; and a John recovering from very severe torture.

Multimedia. Yes, It's a Buzzword, but it's Also True: This next part Amothea insisted on, even though it moves us into dangerous - perhaps deadly - territory. While vids and fanart are far (very far) beyond the scope of this essay (everyone will rush forward with their favorite vid), the explosion of what I've nicknamed "fanfiction haiku" on postcards for the Post Secret challenge marked a fusion of fanfiction, art, and music.

Art crossed into fanfiction with the Post Secret challenge, and then into comics like Zelenkamatch.com, the Illustrated Rodneysaur, and The Exceedingly Sad And Very Touching Story Of How Elizabeth Weir Died Saving Atlantis which was later turned into a graphic novel.

Meanwhile, writers moved from overtly mentioning specific songs in Atlantis off-hours rave fics to including entire soundtracks ranging from Johnny Cash to the Scissor Sisters. Meanwhile, fans developed multiple soundtracks of beautiful world, Arab and Indian music for Auburn's popular sex-slave WIP In The City Of Seven Walls. Then there's Zoetrope's Missed The Saturday Dance which combines a fanfiction AU set in WWII with trailers, music, a podcast, art, postcards, and letters. In the most unique contribution, Lim with her Enya-esque voice played Teyla in Mission Report, composing, singing, and accompanying herself, as well as producing a music video (though this is less a trend and more a one-of-a-kind event). Very cool, guys.

The Backbone of the Stargate Atlantis Fanfiction: Of course, I have no intention of ignoring themes that have existed since the inception of Stargate Atlantis, especially since they happen to be the bulk of our stories: alien technology stories, return to Earth fics, Wraith-centric stories, Stargate SG-1/Stargate Atlantis and other wacky crossovers (like how I managed to throw in Shalott's Star Wars story?), all very fun and interesting fandom staples. To catch a thorough listing of fanfiction by type or theme, check out Amothea's Master rec list and Double Treat's Thematic Lists.

The Lure of the Meme That Ate Fandom: Rounding out the year was the pervasive and irresistible Five Things meme, with such titles as Five Impossible Things Rodney Did Before Breakfast and Five Ancient Devices They Really Shouldn't Have Initialized and Five People John Slept With After Leaving Atlantis and, and-and, it's so addictive I started reading even more just now. Everyone wrote at least one, and I think compilation of these stories could act as a fandom census.

Finally, I'm getting tired and I haven't been able to work in Ladyflowdi's Class 6. So here it is for no particular reason except that it was my favorite fic of the year (and, yes, pure porn). The image of John padding around in flip-flops in an Antarctic shop is priceless.

Writing this, I come to the conclusion that overall Stargate Atlantis fanfiction took itself more seriously this year. Since this is being posted at the turn of the year with all these new year's resolutions, I'm tempted to make predictions as to what can we expect in 2007… but I give that up as soon as the thought occurs to me. Your guess is as good as mine.

The Recs:

2006 AUs
A Farm In Iowa by Sheafrotherdon
Waltz, Tango, Foxtrot by Out There
String Theory: A Concerto For Violin in D Minor by Toft Froggy
Bell Curve, or Ladies Night at the Boom Boom Room by Pru
An Affair To Remember by Tira Nog
reel_sga
Entanglement by Linaerys

2006 DADT
Scenes From A Lesser War by Amireal
DADT, Damyata, Damyadvam by Trinityofone

2006 Frustration with not-so-heroes
Freedom's Just Another Name For Nothing Left To Lose by Synecdochic
A Team Is Borne by Danvers

2006 Minor characters
Zelenkamatch.com by LillyJK and NewKidFan
Downthrow by Zoe Rayne
New View, Same Old Scene by Miss Porcupine
Retromancy by JiM
Rodney and Cadman Go Down,
Rodney and Cadman Get It On,
400% by kormantic, aka Pares
Rave Atlantis by Smittywing

2006 The vast array of John characterization
The Best Things In Life Are Free by Smittywing
(shh, I know this is a WIP started in 2005)
Experience by Resonant
Do I Know You From A Frat Mixer, Or Another Galaxy? by Tzi and Zaanthi
Lost In Waiting by Lacey McBain
Cartography By Touch by Pru
MVP by Cesperanza
Four Quarters by Trinityofone
Your Inevitable Unhappy Ending by Helen

2006 BDSM Intertexts
General & Dr. Sheppard by Xanthe
Coming Home by Xanthe
Take Clothes Off As Directed by Helen

2006 Mensa AUs
mensa_au
The Numbers by Trinityofone
Irony by Trinityofone

2006 More serious Crossgendered fics
Ardhanarishvara by Auburn and Mona
Second Skin by Toft Froggy
You're Pretty Good Looking (For A Girl) by Trinityofone
Like Heisenberg, Looking In, Uncertain by Gaia

2006 Multi-media
Post Secret challenge and Post Secret postcards
MVP by Speranza
and postcard
Zelenkamatch.com by LillyJK and NewKidFan
The Illustrated Rodneysaur by Spaggle and Moonloon
Neither Death, Nor Exile, Nor Pain by mirabele_dictu
Rave Atlantis by Smittywing
Four Quarters by Trinityofone
and music
In The City Of Seven Walls by Auburn,
world, and Arab and Indian music
Mission Report by Lim
The Exceedingly Sad And Very Touching Story Of How Elizabeth Weir Died Saving Atlantis by Lavvyan and
graphic novel version by Smuffter
Missed The Saturday Dance by Zoetrope

2006 Ongoing Themes (alien technology, visiting earth, Wraith-fic, SG-1/SGA, crossovers)
Interface by Resonant
Predatory by Frostfire
Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead by Cesperanza
Here Is No Water by Frostfire
The Dark Side Shalott

2006 Five Things Meme
Five Impossible Things Rodney Did Before Breakfast by Lacy McBain
Five Things John Didn't Want Rodney To Know about His Past And Why Rodney Does by Lilas
Five Ancient Devices They Really Shouldn't Have Initialized by Miss Porcupine
Five People John Slept With After Leaving Atlantis by Auburn
Five People Who Don't Tease Rodney About Citrus by cypher
Ad infinitum….

No reason in particular, I just liked it
Class 6 by ladyflowdi

2005 Playful and silly Crossgendered fics
Skirting The Issue by thisisbone
It Stops Being Funny At Skirts by Svmadelyn

2005 Darkness
Exigencies by Rivier
The Taste Of Apples by Auburn

2005 Silliness
Mating Rituals by Author? (available on the black market, cheap; email me)
Pygocelis (or, A Gift Of Pebbles) by Leah
Pegasus B
Harlequin Challenge

Rec Lists:
Amothea
Creative Machinations
Double Treat
Danvers
Gaia
Isis
McShep Awards
Paian
Paper Pilots
Sekhmet
Seperis
Stargate Fan Awards
Stargateficrec
Svmadelyn
Theantimodel
Threnodyjones
Cathexys recs (Cathexys, I hope you don't mind)
*Technically "A Team Is Borne" was written December 2005, but oh well.
**One of the links doesn't appear in the rec-list because it's my story. It was at the center of debate so I used it as an illustration, but I'm not going to rec my own fic.

Appendix A: My team of fandom lawyers in the blue suits suggest I make even more disclaimers:

- This list is slanted towards fandom big wheels because of my methodology. Certain writers do have a greater than average impact on fandom because they're very active and involved, and they tend to garner more reviews. The price I pay to be able to back up my choices with stats is that lesser-known writers do get short-shrift. I acknowledge that shortcoming right off the bat.

- This list is slanted towards slash, is in fact almost entirely slash, because that's what I read. Originally I wanted to include Gen and Het and all the slash pairings, but I found I couldn't discuss, say, John/Elizabeth because I don't know much about the pairing. Likewise, non-fanfiction (such as vids) are not included unless they have a direct connection to a fanfiction story. I gotta draw the line somewhere.

- I'm just glancing over this and I've noticed that Trinityofone turns up time and time again. I can't claim to be unbiased, I am a fan. But in this case I think that she just took a lot of risks and this sort of essay zeros in on what's new and different and she was always out there on the skinny branches. Other than Trinity this is pretty balanced.

- This list is slanted towards John/Rodney. SGA slash is slanted towards John/Rodney as a whole, but this project overemphasizes the pairing because, again, that's what I read.

If you maintain a rec-list, drop me a note and I'll add it here for everyone's reference. (P.S. I won't be including del.icio.us lists, however. There are too many to include and the description field del.icio.us gives us is too small to describe stories well.)


ETA: By-the-way, feel free to disagree and add/or things that I missed (wickedwords has already brought up elsewhere that I didn't include the reel_sga plagiarism discussion, which is very true, amothea does feel that "Your Cowboy Days Are Over" should be on the list, liviapenn has added John/Teyla trends outside the scope of the essay). This is meta. Go for it.

Comments

[enname.livejournal.com]

Huh. Class 6. Dammit, that is the one of the two McMurdo ones I had been looking for for ages. Thanks!

*slaps self* Way to go on the totally shallow comment to the completely non shallow post. Uh, I'll come back when I am not thesisthesisthesis and say something marginally less.. stupid.

goodluck with the sanskrit

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I love that fic and just had to shoehorn it in. The other McMurdo one was recc'd in threnodyjones' journal back in January, February? I've actually never read it and should.

Shallow? I just praised John's flip-flops. I'll call your shallow and raise you. :D

Icarus

[moojja.livejournal.com]

Just a quick correction: Bell Curve is by Pru, not Cesperanza

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oooooops. Thank you. *corrects* That's the second correction (so far). I'm not saying what the first one was. ;)

Icarus

[smuffster.livejournal.com]

"That Kiss," and its Affect on Slash: Season two opened with "Duet," the first gay kiss in a sci-fi series, between McKay and Beckett (it was quickly followed by Torchwood and Dr. Who).

I think you'll find the Doctor Who ep you're referring to actually aired before Duet.

Also, in the mid 90's the British sci-fi sitcom Red Dwarf had a gay kiss between Dave Lister and Arnold Rimmer.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Alas, I am wrong. That'll teach me to believe the Stargate folks about their own gay kiss.

Is it superficial of me to smirk over the fact that the very first gay kiss was with a guy named "Rimmer"? Perhaps I read too much porn?

Also, wow, you found this quick. I was vastly amused by your Elizabeth comic. I never sent feedback so I hope this'll suffice.

Icarus

[01100100.livejournal.com]

*Technically "A Team Is Borne" was written December 2005, but oh well.

*bg* I won't tell if you don't ;-)

;)

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Okay, I won't-- (re-reads end note)-- oops.

[wychwood]

This is awesome, and must have taken absolute ages! Thank you! Very interesting to read.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Well, I started in October. It really couldn't have been done without amothea's help. She really knows the fanfic in SGA. :)

Icarus

Thank you.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

That's a good point. In fanfiction we build on the emotional heat between characters. There was more emotional heat between Rodney and Cadman than Rodney and Beckett.

[psycho-tabby.livejournal.com]

Very awesome post. Well done for going to all that effort, it was wonderful to read and I love finding the odd fic that looked awesome but that I hadn't read yet. Thank you!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I started working on it in September/October and amothea did a lot of the fic gathering. I'm really glad this brought some new stories to light. I kept thinking of a particular Jack/Ba'al fic while I was writing this: there's always that new idea, that story, that's just one of a kind and you don't forget it, even a year or two later.

Icarus

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

Awesome! Thanks for all the effort; lookin' very good, and I can't wait to peruse it!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Interesting fandom fun fact:

Stargate SG-1, after 10 years, has roughly 15,000 stories.
Stargate Atlantis, after 2.5 years, has roughtly 7,000 stories.

*eyebrows raise*

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

What an utterly amazing post/list. As someone who's nearly sick of arguing the intertextuality of source text, fantext, and context, I love the way you address all three and sho the various intertextual influences.

I'm not fully convinced by your context argument for AUs (both the BBM or the penguins), but then it's always nearly impossible totrace those easily (i.e., even if Leah says she had never heard of march of the Penguins when she wrote the first fic, she may have forgotten and/or whomever continued the trend had, etc.)

Anyway, very impressive and quite useful!!! Thank you!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Ah, I was wondering if someone would call me on the context.

Next year I hope to be able to talk to some of these authors and get more information -- for example, sheafrotherdon volunteered in an earlier post about this that she wasn't inspired by Brokeback Mountain but rather missed Iowa.

I think you can't argue context from the point of view of the individual author, but that a certain story or type of story becomes popular in response to context. Like statistics, it works in the macrocosm but not in the microcosm.

So A Farm In Iowa hit a note for fans (who aren't from Iowa) after Brokeback Mountain, and a number of 2005 western AUs were also popularized suddenly for the same reason. A lot of 2005 western AUs were rediscovered and recc'd in 2006 after Brokeback Mountain (a fact that frustrated me at first but now I see what was going on). It's not a matter of direct cause and effect -- not this movie inspired this story (I wince because I did say that about the penguins, didn't I? Oops.) -- but rather this movie created an opening in the popular consciousness for this story.

More later, gotta run to school. I think I'm on shakier ground when it comes to the connection between "Freedom...," season two canon, and the Iraq war, frankly. Chiao.

Icarus

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

Wow. OK - wow. I think that's the most amazing meta post I've ever seen, and pretty much my experience in the fandom as well.

Last year at I-Con, during a panel on the future of science fiction as a genre, there was one old-timer on the panel (who’d shown himself the previous year to be the most bitter man alive; the result of decades of reading slush, I suspect) who lamented at length the loss of the dialog in the genre.

Apparently, back in the day, when science fiction was mostly in magazines, you could see the dialog between stories; how ideas would propogate, how authors would be inspired and antagonized by each other, how they would write directly in response to each other, and how they would respond to their fans, whose letters were printed at the back of the magazines. But now, cries the old timer, everyone’s writing in a bubble! It’s horrible!

One of the other panelists, an established sf author, tried to point out that there still was a dialog, but it was severely slowed down by the fact that sf is mostly in book form now, which take years to produce rather than months, and it’s a much larger genre, making it more difficult to see the threads between authors.

All this to say: at the time I realized that that sort of dialog goes on all the time in fanfic. And I am so thrilled to see someone has done all the work for me in picking out the intertextual relationships. Very cool.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I'm running to class so I can't give much of an intelligent response at the moment except to say that's a very interesting story.

[dubhartach.livejournal.com]

Wow, this is fantastic. Interesting reading, some great fics and at a superficial glance a good few I haven't read, including Class 6. So much work, go you.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

You haven't read Class 6? Go, go forth and read! Great story, very masculine, especially that observation about how men feel about taking it in anal sex.

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

What an interesting approach! I think really every fannish story (and some more than others) could be viewed as a crossover between the source material and fandom itself.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Thank, and I think so too, or at least they can be interpreted that way. :)

Icarus

[liviapenn.livejournal.com]

- This list is slanted towards John/Rodney. SGA slash is slanted towards John/Rodney as a whole, but this project overemphasizes the pairing because, again, that's what I read.

I don't think there's anything wrong with that, certainly-- everybody likes what they like! but it does seem as if the stated goal of your meta is somewhat misleading. As it stands, this is not "a taste of 2006 Stargate fandom," it's a taste of 2006 Stargate fandom (1) with a tight focus on slash stories, (2) within the subset of slash, a tight focus on John/Rodney stories, and (3) when not actually explicitly John/Rodney, a tight focus on John and/or Rodney as the main characters in the story.

(For instance, "Rodneysaur," which is gen but still heavily focused on John and Rodney as the main characters, or "Rodney and Cadman Go Down," which features Rodney/Cadman sex but still features John as a main character thinking about how hot Rodney is and is therefore still at least somewhat slashy.)

Again, I don't think there's anything wrong with a tight focus on your particular likes and dislikes, but I think it's not quite right to call this "a taste of 2006 Stargate fandom" when so much is missing.

Just at a glance, I don't think you've actually listed a single (pairing-focused) story here that isn't John/someone or Rodney/someone. (Something like Hth's Ronon/Teyla "The Bee-Charmer" or Isiscolo's Carson/Ronon "Androcles and the Lion," or Tielan's Elizabeth/Ronon "To Serve A Queen.")

Other trends I have noticed this year would include:

- The dramatic, near-total shift away from Elizabeth/Lorne and consistent popularity of Parrish/Lorne, thanks to "Lost Boys" (which aired in Sept '05)

- A lot more BDSM and kinkfic just in general, as well as stories including elements of D/s or kink in otherwise "typical" First Time or established relationship stories

- Trends in "Earth AU" stories that I've noticed-- (1) more kidfic, (2) longer stories, (3) *total* AUs, where neither John or Rodney has anything to do with the Stargate program or even the military, and (4) stories where John and Rodney are the *only* transplanted characters, and the rest of the AU "cast" is made up of OCs instead of AU versions of SG1/SGA characters

- A noticeable shift towards stories where Kavanagh is a sympathetic character rather than an evil bastard, thanks to "Critical Mass" (Jan '06)

- More OT3 and OT4 *relationship* stories, as opposed to PWPs featuring a threesome-- "3 Lovers," "Headbangers Ball," 30toseoul's foursome universe snippets, the continuation of "Alpha Centauri," etc.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Point. My original intention was to involve great numbers of people and encompass the entire fandom, though at this point I hope that the repeated disclaimers, and then more disclaimers, and then more disclaimers after that, should make it clear. I do make the point that I didn't do anything with Het because it's not something I read.

Caveat: I don't speak for fandom, I only speak for my own limited view. Picture it as a fish-eye camera in the room: it's just "a" perspective but not the only one, and a different camera mounted at a different angle, pointed somewhere else, will capture a completely different picture. Anyone who wants to create their own analysis, or write more based on other pairings, please go ahead. I regret I can't cover everything. A particular bummer is that I can't do Het (don't know it) and I'm only touching on Gen. Any volunteers? Bueller-?

Actually, you seem very familiar with the Het end of the fandom. I really regret not being able to justice to Het and Gen. I wonder if you'd be interested in writing an analysis from your point of view? *flutters long lashes at you* I'm not tossing the ball in your cocurt for the sake of argument, it's just that there's only so much one person can do, and, wow, even just doing John/Rodney was biting off quite a bit.

The point is to document these textual relationships, and so more people hard at work doing just that would be helpful. (Besides, it's fun.)

Icarus

[raiining.livejournal.com]

First: thank you for writing this meta. Now I have something to quote when people ask me about fanfiction. I've been *looking* for something like this for a while now, and an end-to-2006 is the perfect place for it.

Second: excellent writing and summarizing. I love the way you incorporated the different fic recs into the meta, and I adore the wide range you covered. As a relative new-comer to SGA fanfic (I wondered over from the world of HP, with a decent dash of BtVS - about three months ago: and wow, it sure feels a lot longer than that!) and have been catching up with the fanfic ever since. I've read most of the Big Fics by now, and have learned to differentiate between season one and two, and now three. After several weeks of fumbling through fics and trying to figure out what happened during season two, I finally accessed the episodes and dove into fanfiction once more.

SGA is the first series I have concentrated on slash fanfic, and I really appreciated the way you divided out the time-line of fics. It was wonderful to see it all laid out like that. Again - something to quote! :-D


I want to write more, but I've got to dive into your rec list and ferret out those fics I haven't yet read (I adored the McShep Award site: what a great summary of the best fiction). Thank you again for assembling this - as a reader I appreciate it!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping that someone will write a 2005 version.

Icarus

[siegeofangels.livejournal.com]

Wow, amazing meta, and very cool to see how trends go through fandom and how stories are read within the context of the entire fannish conversation.

It'd be way interesting to trace one genre--I'm thinking it would be very interesting to see how people portray, say, slavefic, and how the attitude toward it changes over time.

Great job, and incredibly interesting to read.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Wow, amazing meta, and very cool to see how trends go through fandom and how stories are read within the context of the entire fannish conversation.

I'm hoping to preserve that conversation since fanfiction grows and changes sometimes in unpredictable ways.

It'd be way interesting to trace one genre--I'm thinking it would be very interesting to see how people portray, say, slavefic, and how the attitude toward it changes over time.

That would be very cool. Are you thinking multi-fandom?

Icarus

[azarsuerte.livejournal.com]

Season two opened with "Duet," the first gay kiss in a sci-fi series, between McKay and Beckett (it was quickly followed by Torchwood and Dr. Who).

Actually, the Jack/Doctor kiss on Doctor Who predated the Beckett/McKay kiss in "Duet," it just didn't air in the US until after.

[viciouswishes.livejournal.com]

Actually, if we count gay girls, Dax on Star Trek: DS9 wins with the first gay kiss on Sci-Fi and second on major network tv.

[viciouswishes.livejournal.com]

I'd add the femslash is peeking it's head out with sg_femslash and girlgate.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm curious: was there no (or little) femmeslash in 2005?

Icarus

[cincodemaygirl.livejournal.com]

How entirely fascinating! I hope you'll do this again for 2007 (I know that must have elicited a squeal of terror, but a series of these would be fantastic)!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Actually, I'm looking forward to doing one for 2007. Next year I want to get more people involved, like a town meeting. I learned so much from amothea, toft_froggy and sheafrotherdon.

Icarus

[zoniduck.livejournal.com]

This was very interesting to read. You've included several that I've never read, and reminded me of a few favorites I need to reread. Thanks for taking the time to do it!

One housekeeping note, your link (in the body of the essay) for "Freedom's Just Another Word..." is missing the 'm' and the 'l' at the end of the code, so it's broken.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Whoa, good catch on that link -- thank you. amothea checked all the links so I must have messed that up in posting.

You've included several that I've never read

Oh, good. That is the ultimate point of a rec-list, isn't it? *g*

[cofax7]

This is fascinating.

I do think however it might be worth mentioning samdonne's Your Cowboy Days Are Over, which was a fairly damning deconstruction of SGA after season 2, as well as (as I read it) something of a commentary on the fandom. It was, if anything, gen, though, and may not meet your criteria.

[mecurtin.livejournal.com]

Double the rec for Cowboy Days, which was one of the most widely-recced gen(-ish) stories. I think.

Speaking of not-slash, I think ltlj's Retrograde (http://www.ltljverse.com/watergate/seriesindex.htm) series is also extremely popular, even among slash fans.

[miriel.livejournal.com]

I'm actually surprised you don't have trinityofone's Tannhauser Gate as one of the alternate views of John's past - it's about as alternate as you can get (i.e. John grown in a vat), yet still bleeds well within canon. It was written for artword

Just thought I'd mention that one.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I didn't include it simply because I hadn't read it. I have used about five too many of trinityofone's fics for this, so I don't feel too guilty missing it. ;)

Icarus

[miriel.livejournal.com]

Actually, in terms of referencing Lorne's following newly evolved following, you might want to link the Lorne Fic list that kheryn42 runs. It's a bit slow in updating, but reasonably complete (and I know I should have tossed this in my earlier reply, but didn't think of it until now).

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Oh, really? I hadn't heard of that. Good idea. *searches for the list*

Thank you!

Icarus

[tahariel.livejournal.com]

Really enjoyed reading this - it makes a lot of sense of what I've been reading this year :) Good job! I do maintain a recs list - 157 SGA recs so far and counting, mostly McShep.

[tahariel.livejournal.com]

Totally just realised I forgot to put the link in *is a complete dork* It's at My del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us/Tahariel).

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

I did find a link for some of the plagiarism discussion, but only what was posted to the mckay_sheppard community, which is where it started:

http://community.livejournal.com/mckay_sheppard/869615.html

The challenge had had a few posts, but it was a person completely separate from that that sparked the discussion. Then the 'MsScribe' story broke, escalating the plagiarism discussion to intense levels. trinityofone came out and essentially said 'I took a lot of my early stuff from books that I read' (http://trinityofone.livejournal.com/95460.html), and other people followed suit. The two things lead to a lot more citation of sources overall, and suspicion of the standard movie re-write tropes for about half a year. Comparing the reel_sga stories to the movie stories posted to the undermistletoe community, you can see that the newer movie stories vary from the original source quite a bit more.

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

Sidebar to this: It is my feeling that this discussion is what led to helenish citing xanthelj's stories when posting her 'directed' universe, as the post-Scribe, post-reel_sga environment really emphasizes the citing of sources. It was something that may or may not have been done in years past, but in the current version of the world, it is now very important to do.

[neviachiel.livejournal.com]

This was awesome and fun to read! I know I have a hard time keeping track of when things were written and at what point in the seasons they fall, since I came into fandom about 2/3 of the way through S2. (Fan awards don't, erm, help, since they don't seem to consider any sort of qualifying period at all, but that's another post altogether...)

I'm not sure and everyone can feel free to argue with me on this, but it almost seemed to me like more of the AUs and wilder diversions from SGA canon in fic (i.e. the stories not taking place or having anything to do with Atlantis, the kinkfic, more future fic), and also fic based on more minor characters and pairings, all could have been written when they were and not before simply because so much having to do with the main characters, in Atlantis, doing normal exploration-type stuff. Once you get beyond a point where the writers and readers now really know the characters, then you can feel more comfortable making them themselves in an AU setting. Except for John, anyway, who no one will ever know anything about, if the SGA writers have their way. :P

And OMG, the Five Things meme. Is like, the best fic meme ever. For those of us who don't have the patience, energy, talent, or imagination to write out whole long (or longish) stories, Five Things allows you to write that little bit, that plot bunny, and then four other little plot bunnies to go with it. Honestly, when I'm surfing through endless, backed up flist fic links to check out, and a backlog of 5 sga_newsletter annoucements, if I see something for a Five Things story, I'm there in a heartbeat.

[neviachiel.livejournal.com]

...all could have been written when they were and not before simply because so much having to do with the main characters, in Atlantis, doing normal exploration-type stuff.

Apparently, my thoughts were flying a bit too fast for the fingers. I meant to say that when you start in a fandom, when a show begins, there's that time period where there's more fic based around the episodes, and the main characters, in the main settings. Which is how I kinda saw the SGA trends towards AUs. Now that we know the characters a little better, we can expand the settings that we can fit them into.