The Rec Center #242
Hi folks! This week we have an interview with the showrunners of She-Ra and Steven Universe, some awesome Pride & Prejudice fanart, a truly extraordinary Black Sails academic reference, some multifandom fic recs on the theme of animal transformation, and more! — Gav
new stuff
“In Conversation: Rebecca Sugar and Noelle Stevenson” by Matt Moen at Paper
On Steven Universe, She-Ra, and queer representation in media for younger audiences.
“J.J. Abrams Won’t Stop Telling Sandwich Guy at Bodega to ‘Surprise Him’” by Giovanni Colantonio at The Hard Times
“I see lunch as a sort of mystery box.”
older stuff
“The Friends Who Listen to BTS Together Stay Together” by Julie Beck at The Atlantic
We’ve included a few fandom-related pieces from this great series on friendship in past issues. In this installment from last summer, two friends rekindle their relationship as they fall together into BTS fandom. “Fans are often prone to saying, ‘This band saved my life.’ BTS made us realize we have to save ourselves.”
tumblr & beyond
Black Sails makes an extremely unexpected appearance in an academic article.
“but also I drew Darcy as a butch lesbian with her tits out so like …….. this wasn’t really meant to be accurate”
A thread of stunning fanvids for Jiang Cheng’s Guanyin Temple entrance in The Untamed.
So this cutaway floorplan of Frasier’s apartment is... alarmingly impressive? And possibly very useful if anyone reading this is a Frasier fanfic writer, who knows!
fanfiction
The return of the most dignified of fanfiction tropes: characters getting magically turned into household pets. (Or at least this is what we asked for—aside from dogs and cats, we’ve got an octopus, a horse, and a penguin, which, I mean, yes.) We ran the first half of this list back in April, and we’ll possibly have one more, because you really sent in a lot of animal-transformation fics (and you are strongly encouraged to send more)! Thank you v much to everyone who sent in a rec. <3 — Elizabeth
“The Heart May Be A Lonely Hunter, But The Cat Isn’t Anymore” by BarlowGirl. 4.6K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Teen Wolf; Ship: Derek/Stiles
Recced by: abuseofreason
Backstory: Derek Hale adopts a kitten, and Stiles wants the kitten to like him. (Stiles has absolutely no ulterior motives for that, of course.)
Rec: It’s a very soft fic, in which Derek “Tragic Backstory™” Hale gets to have something nice, for once. Stiles’ kitten interactions also make me laugh. It’s just a short, sweet fic about two boys and one kitten with opinions.
Content warnings: N/A
“What Has Eight Tentacles and Isn’t Allowed to Eat Pie?” by Annie D. 16K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Supernatural; Ship: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Recced by: Ladylark
Backstory: A common set up of Supernatural fics is one of the characters finding a cursed object in the ancient mystical bunker where they live. Here, Dean gets turned into an octopus. A story where the author’s note has legitimate reason to reassure that there is no tentacle sex.
Rec: This is an adorably cute story involving aquarium tanks, youtube videos of octopus behaviour, and use of the word ‘blorp’. But by the end it’s also a thoughtful contemplation of what transformation entails, in several senses of the word. A classic of the fandom, for good reason.
Content warnings: N/A
“I’ll Cater with All the Birds I Can Kill” by Chash. 16K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: The 100; Ship: Clarke Griffin/Bellamy Blake
Recced by: anon
Backstory: Clarke wakes up as a cat. She ends up getting taken home by Bellamy, who thinks she’s just a stray cat in need of a home.
Rec: It’s super cute and fluffy and feel good!
Content warnings: N/A
“On A Pale Horse” by leveragehunters. 25K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Captain America; Ship: Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes
Recced by: epicstuckyficrecs
Backstory: In a fantasy medieval setting, Steve gets transformed into a horse by an evil magician and is subsequently found and adopted by Bucky, knight of the royal Horse Guard. The only way to lift the curse if for someone to figure out his true nature, but Steve cannot, by action or deed, reveal what he truly is.
Rec: Super interesting setting, love the relationship building and evolving between Bucky and Steve (in horse form... or not!)
Content warning: Brief animal death
“Try to map the ocean” by flights. 14K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Hockey RPF; Ship: Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin
Recced by: helenahjay
Backstory & Rec: Sid Crosby, Pittsburgh Penguin, gets transformed into an ACTUAL penguin.
Content warnings: N/A
“The first eight don't count” by storm_petrel. 9K words, rated Mature.
Fandom: The Losers; Ship: Cougar/Jensen
Recced by: casapazzo
Backstory: The Losers are an ex-Special Forces team who got burned by a rogue CIA agent. Jensen (played by Chris Evans at his most Dorito-esque proportions) is their hacker, a die-hard fan of his niece’s junior soccer team, and also, sometimes, a cat.
Rec: I love the Jensen/Cougar dynamic (constantly quipping, motor-mouthed goofball and the patient, deadly sniper who gives new meaning to “laconic”). And while not a long story, it efficiently slips in a decent amount of Cat world-building, family backstory, and character work.
Content warnings: Intense action sequences with lots of (bad guys) dying. Cat does get injured, but is OK.
“Sitz!” and “Come By” by Unforgotten. 5.5K words and 3.7K words respectively, both rated Teen.
Fandom: X-Men: First Class; Ship: Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Recced by: Elizabeth
Backstory: Why transform only one half of your ship into a dog when you can transform both? These stories are unrelated, but they’re by the same author, so I thought I’d combine the rec. In “Sitz!”, Erik is turned into a doberman by underlings who are v tired of his bullshit, and he’s extremely indignant whenever his dog instincts take over. In “Come By,” Charles is a “were-corgi” who transforms for a few days every month, and some time after the events of First Class, Erik dognaps him.
Rec: One of the pleasures of this extremely silly trope is the things characters can do in the distance/communication barriers of “one of them is now a dog.” Both of these fics are from (a very Magneto-ish) Erik’s point of view: where he and Charles bitterly fight in their human forms, both dog/human relationships give him cover to ~feel feelings~. “Sitz!” is delightfully farcical, and I do love Erik’s battle with his dog instincts. But I particularly love “Come By,” which has an absurd premise—a were-corgi!—but somehow makes me cry.
Content warnings: N/A
FINAL THOUGHT
This week we were featured in Aidan Moher’s new newsletter on SFF, fandom, and gaming, “Astrolabe.” If you’re looking for more SFF fandomy content in your inbox, check it out and subscribe! — Elizabeth
Have a favorite one-off rec? Please send it our way! We’ll use it in a future list. Other fanworks—comics, vids, zines, etc—are strongly encouraged as well. And if you have any interest in doing an entire rec list, explainer, or ship manifesto, please get in touch! elizabethandgav at gmail dot com.
If you liked this, please share it with your friends! https://thereccenter.substack.com/. And find us on social media: Gav (twitter/tumblr) & Elizabeth (twitter/tumblr)