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Off thoughts about fanfiction.
Sep. 5th, 2009 11:13 pmOn and off I've been flicking though the infamous Urusei Yatsura: The Senior Year, the fanfic series that so overshadowed Urusei Yatsura fanfic back in the day, that had Sean Gaffney writing for it, and having heard so much about it on and off through my early days on the internet... and I have to wonder... What did people see in this stuff?!
When I started reading the series, there was something off in the character. But in the second or third chapter, where Ataru finds himself locked in a torture chamber, practically all the elements of the original UY are quickly chiselled away and disposed of... Ataru becomes moody, bitchy and downright vicious in some places, shouting at everybody who even gives him an amount of backsass and then starts bashing people's heads in. He gets a girlfriend who has utter contempt for all the canon characters, and says things that would get a canon character in deep trouble. And then his (not mentioned) grandma is revealed to be a half-alien who looks like she's barely out of her 20s, and can authorise the complete wiping out of planetary civilisations if she (or her grandson) wills it. His uncle controls a powerful financial firm that is able to freeze Mendou's assets so he can't even sneeze in Ataru's direction without trouble. And then he gets a Cyborg form that basically resembles the Cyborg Superman, and uses it to practically hospitalise Lum's Stormtroopers. This is just the first seven or eight chapters.
And thanks to the writers having a complete and comprehensive character guide that comes with the series, I know that Ataru becomes the leader/living god of a race of genetically engineered Amazon women who had been wandering in space before he came along, and becomes a paragon of virtue and a feared general.
And that according to the writers, this is apparently supposed to be Lum's growing up story. In fact, her story arc seems to be more like her seeing everything in her life she uses to keep Ataru in line being methodically destroyed by him and his super powerful famiily, and her being emotionally broken to become Ataru's adoring slave.
Urgh. I suppose this looks like something for the <lj user="marysues"> community sometime soon. They already have the Sailor Twins there, anyway...
When I started reading the series, there was something off in the character. But in the second or third chapter, where Ataru finds himself locked in a torture chamber, practically all the elements of the original UY are quickly chiselled away and disposed of... Ataru becomes moody, bitchy and downright vicious in some places, shouting at everybody who even gives him an amount of backsass and then starts bashing people's heads in. He gets a girlfriend who has utter contempt for all the canon characters, and says things that would get a canon character in deep trouble. And then his (not mentioned) grandma is revealed to be a half-alien who looks like she's barely out of her 20s, and can authorise the complete wiping out of planetary civilisations if she (or her grandson) wills it. His uncle controls a powerful financial firm that is able to freeze Mendou's assets so he can't even sneeze in Ataru's direction without trouble. And then he gets a Cyborg form that basically resembles the Cyborg Superman, and uses it to practically hospitalise Lum's Stormtroopers. This is just the first seven or eight chapters.
And thanks to the writers having a complete and comprehensive character guide that comes with the series, I know that Ataru becomes the leader/living god of a race of genetically engineered Amazon women who had been wandering in space before he came along, and becomes a paragon of virtue and a feared general.
And that according to the writers, this is apparently supposed to be Lum's growing up story. In fact, her story arc seems to be more like her seeing everything in her life she uses to keep Ataru in line being methodically destroyed by him and his super powerful famiily, and her being emotionally broken to become Ataru's adoring slave.
Urgh. I suppose this looks like something for the <lj user="marysues"> community sometime soon. They already have the Sailor Twins there, anyway...
