ratherastory | Oh, ff.net, why do you treat me so?

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Oh, ff.net, why do you treat me so?

Don't get me wrong. Fanfiction.net is where I started out as a fledgling fanfic writer, and I have a soft spot for it.

That being said, the people on there constantly flummox me with their inability to grasp what I'm driving at with my fic. It's a small percentage, maybe 10% max, but their reviews eat at me.

So mainly what I was trying to do in that last coda-thing-whatever was to demonstrate that in all the effort to give Dean a happy ending (no matter how stupid the notion is that Dean can possibly be happy while Sam is dead/in hell), no one at all took Lisa's feelings into account. No one asked her if she wanted a psychologically damaged alcoholic with abandonment issues and no valid means of supporting himself to land on her doorstep and basically try to insert himself into her life.

In short, I was trying to convey that she as much as Dean is lost in this situation. Lost and frightened and not a little angry at having this dumped in her lap when she's worked so hard to get her life together and make a good life for her son. It's not that she doesn't care, not that she doesn't want to help. It's just too big for her, and so she's doing what she can with what she's got.

What the ff.net reviewers got out of the story, however, was that Lisa is MEAN and CRUEL. Or, in a complete 180 from that, that OMG how dare I imply that Lisa wouldn't be thrilled and totally awesome and understanding and 100% supportive of Dean no matter what?

Eesh.

I am fine. I have to go answer all the nice comments I got in the last few days (I am SO behind!), and answer the not-so-nice ones. Well, the not-so-nice ones that actually deigned to give me the option to reply. :P

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*sigh* I do plenty of reading on ff.net because not all of the h/c writers I like have moved over to LJ, but damn. Nobody ever accused the ff.net crowd in general of being particularly smart or good at grasping nuance.

Yeah.

Funny how over here at LJ people pick up on the more subtle things I put in my fics, sometimes picking up on things I didn't even realize I did. ff.net folks, however, seem to not be nearly as discriminating. I really don't understand why.

I think it's because, generally, people on FF.net are younger.

Could be, but a lot of the people on my flist are in their early twenties and sometimes younger, and they seem to get it just fine. Unless I'm seriously overestimating the ages on ff.net (are they teenagers, maybe?).

Also, hi there! :)

Any h/c writers on ff.net you would rec? I never read anything unrecced on ff.net, but I'm sure there have to be some good stories I've missed.

Sympathetic to your reviewing woes, rather. I'm trying to wait to read more finale codas until after I finish the one I am working on. :)

I'd also love some h/c ff recs! I have NO IDEA how to navigate that site.

I'd also love some h/c ff recs! I have NO IDEA how to navigate that site.

:) You're the actually one I've gotten the best ff.net recs from in the past! I don't even know where to start.

I've gotten comments at ff.net that I couldn't even read, they were so badly written. I wonder how they could even read and understand the fic in the first place.

Oof. I've never had that problem. The closest I've come to is one girl who wrote all her comments in Spanish.

There's a Brazilian girl who comments on a lot of my fics and she doesn't have a perfect handle on English, but I can usually tell what she's trying to say. Sometimes I resent English for having such arbitrary and nonsensical conjugation rules.

I have such a love-hate thing with ff dot net -- like you, I started there (though not in SN, a different fandom) and while I initially had a wonderfully positive experience there -- and still do, for the most part -- I don't know. It's just such a different vibe than at LJ. Like the people at FF feel -- entitled? Maybe because many of them are younger and aren't capable of picking up the things you -- me -- are trying to get across and just want to see the fics go a certain way or whatever? I don't know. I have much better luck with my 21 Jump Street fic than my SN fic as far as readers "getting" what I'm trying to do, and I know it's because it's a smaller fandom and my readers there are a little older, a little more "mature" -- so I often wonder if it's that fandom, the SN fandom, that makes things difficult over there. I just know that I consider LJ my fic home and while I post stuff on FF still I -- really am ready to say goodbye to it once I get done with this 21 JS thing I'm posting right now. I really only post SN stuff there now because a couple of readers have told me they don't have access to LJ but then again, I've not had a review from them so really, what's the point? Anyway, we all know you're a brilliant writer so try not to let the peeps on FF get under your skin. . . : )

I'm a bit more blasé about the ff.net folks now than I was even a few months ago. I'm not nearly as upset as I was the first time I got an anonymous review telling me I was Doing It All Wrong™.

I still post there because I have a few readers and faithful commenters who don't appear to be on LJ, and I do enjoy the extra feedback when it's positive. :)

I know -- it's hard to leave it completely, especially when you have readers that don't have an LJ or whatever. . .I just don't want you to be upset is all. And I'm sure the reviews are more positive than negative or whatever. . .it's just that one crapper review that always stands out against the gazillion awesome ones, hey?

Pretty much. And I'm overly sensitive to the one-bad-review-among-the-good. *shrug* It's a character flaw, what can I say? ;)

I must've missed your coda. *goes to read* Okay, I don't think it's quite in character for Lisa. In 3x02 Dean turning up was unexpected and unwanted and though she offered to let him stay it was only because he'd just saved her son and because he was good in bed, and while I'm sure she's still grateful for that, she's also a sensible woman and I can't imagine she'd really want Dean around her son. He was a bad influence from her perspective in 3x02 and he's only gotten worse. She invited him in in 5x17 because he was talking like a suicide risk and she wasn't about to not try to save someone who saved Ben, and she was glad to see him in 5x22 because that meant he wasn't dead and she invited him in because that made it that much less likely he'd get dead in the near future. But talking people off of ledges isn't something she was trained to do, isn't something she wants to spend any significant amount of time doing, and he's not someone she has an emotional connection to (unless he actually is Ben's father, but strangely enough I stopped believing that after 5x17 aired), and since there are actual mental health professionals in town...so I can't imagine her telling him he can stay indefinitely. Why I'm babbling all this at you I don't know, since it doesn't have much to do with your story, but my point is something like your Lisa is going easier on Dean than my Lisa, so I've no idea where anyone is getting the idea that your Lisa is "MEAN and CRUEL".

I didn't take the story that far, but I think she was pretty much lying to him and herself when she said "as long as you want." She's trying to be a friend, to be supportive, but I think eventually she's either going to kick him out (gently) or he'll leave of his own accord.

In short, I agree with you. Dean is way too damaged for her, as a responsible mother, to keep him around her son.

Ever check out ratemyprofessor.com? I've viewed my own ratings a few times. My personal favorite is the person who bitched and complained about my class--and got the name of the course completely wrong.

Sometimes, criticism is great. But some people's opinions just aren't worth listening to.

LOL

No! I never even heard of that! I might check it out some day.

My father has some GREAT reviews from his students that he actually posted on the bulletin board outside his office. My personal favourite is the one who compares his course to suffering through the Calvary.

lol, THIS. I mean, I'm a fairly hardcore Dean-girl, but... Dean as he showed up at Lisa's door is not the guy you want to have crashing at your place and spending time with your kid. The people who don't get that, even after reading your wonderful fic? Not the type you're writing for anyways.

Pretty much.

I love Dean with much love, but he's not in any shape to be around a ten-year-old boy. He needs more and better help than Lisa can give him, poor bunny.

Love your icon, too. :)

hee, thanks. Its not appropriate very often, but when it is I love using it :)

My best friend for the last 30 years got a rating on that site that said she was the worst person in the entire world. Uh, helpful. And somehow I suspect the rater got a grade that he/she actually deserved.

So yeah.

That's a classic.

Somehow I doubt the worst person in the world is teaching college. Though I want to meet them, if they are!

Your icon is perfect for this post! And ff.net? Please. I may be generalizing here, but most of the stuff there is crap. I don't even go there without a rec because trying to find anything worth reading is hopeless. If authors post both places I'll read them on LJ. I said it last time and I'll say it again. Your readers here can appreciate and understand good writing.

Thank you!

(I try to use appropriate icons where I can, I'm OCD that way)

I love my LJ readers. They understand me. :)

I haven't read your coda yet, but I'm a little behind on fic right now. However, what you're describing is something that I've never understood. People are never all good or all bad, and just because someone is a Big Damn Hero(ine) doesn't make them perfect, or mean that they should't be held accountable for their actions around others.

Of course, maybe some people need to see their heroes as infallible or alone against the cold world, but the demonizing of (female) characters who disagree/don't indulge the hero or who are in the way of someone's OTP is something I've seen in fic for multiple fandoms, and it annoys me quite a bit, so I try to steer clear of it. For a space that I've always considered to be female dominated, media fandom is sometimes very unsupportive of female characters.

I don't really get it, myself. I actually like Lisa quite a bit. She's a strong, independent woman. I just don't think she's going to want to put up with Dean and his issues permanently. She'll help, because she's a kind person and she's grateful, but I don't think she loves him or wants him to stay forever and host barbecues with her.

Yes, exactly. Remember how the gossipy neighbor women said she'd referred to Dean. She called him Best Sex of My Life Dean, not The One I'm Waiting For or My True Love. He saved her son, she is grateful and thinks he's a good man and shows him compassion.

I still need to read your coda. But, yeah, that's totally typical of ff.net.

Bizarrely, I'm mostly okay about these reviews this time. It still makes me shake my head and wonder if I wrote the same fic they read. ;)

Am reading your email now. I have to print it, and I now have TEN THOUSAND MORE QUESTIONS to ask. Prepare for an onslaught!

Onslaught away! Woo!

I get what you're saying-- FF.net confuses the heck out of me. I'm now posting a tag/AU to 5x22 (which isn't as good as yours!!!) which in my mind focuses on Sam but has got one-shots of Dean.

OK so I get more than 2 reviews (O_O for me that's HUGE on ff.net) but a few of them have I'm loving the Dean angst- when I had posted already two one-shots about Sam versus a single one-shot of Dean.

The one that made me go WTF was a review stating that Dean is treating Lisa so nicely and making friends! I laughed when I read this because I don't think that he is really being nice because hey he's not really functioning, he's trying but no.

Oh, no, I don't see that Lisa is mean and cruel at all! Lisa is a single mother, and she has to be practical about things. I would also begin losing patience after a week or so. Ignore the comments.

Oh dear lord...some people need a clue bat to the head don't they??

Lame.

Don't let the haters get you down love.

I have a friend who refers to that as a "clue by four"

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Oh, ff.net, why do you treat me so?

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