The Rec Center #302
Hi folks! This week we’ve got articles about Succession and Tony Stark, posts about Venom and Sherlock Holmes, our third Halloween-adjacent list of paranormal fanfic recs, and more! — Gav
new stuff
“Did I Want Tony Stark Or Want to Be Him?” by Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya at Catapult
“‘Iron Man’ is far from the origin story of my sexuality, but it’s an inescapable part of the multiverse that is my queerness.”
“‘Succession’ Questions: Can the Twisted Roman-Gerri Partnership Actually Succeed?” by Katie Baker at The Ringer
To get everyone in the mood for the return of Succession this weekend, here’s a little celebration of (and some IRL backstory for) the show’s best pairing.
https://twitter.com/BonerWizard/status/1447723293130117122
older stuff
“Dear Tolkien Fans: Black People Exist” by Christina Warmrbrunn at The Public Medievalist
“This sense of ‘ownership’ some Tolkien fans feel might seem innocuous. But in feeling such entitlement to Tolkien’s world, they force out Black fans and create a space fuelled by white supremacist ideologies.”
tumblr & beyond
https://twitter.com/wordsandsense/status/1447605306305957894
“marvel villain who wants to provide clean drinking water for everyone in the world”
“What moment in Star Trek had the most profound impact on your life?”
congrats to the people organizing this Venom/Eddie event lmao.
literally nothing will stop these AO3 writers from updating!!
“fucking losing it at the concept of a reverse Holmes and Watson”
“bruh the new lululemon line looks straight out of odo’s closet”
fanfiction
Paranormal month continues! If you missed the last two issues, we started off with a general paranormal list, and then we did one devoted to ghosts. We’re back to a general list this week! Thank you very much to everyone who sent in a rec. — Elizabeth
“Longhouse” by Philomytha. 17K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Rivers of London; Ship: Peter Grant/Thomas Nightingale
Recced by: Sychaeus
Backstory: Officer Peter Grant takes a statement from a ghost and ends up apprenticed to Thomas Nightingale, detective chief inspector and wizard. They solve magical crimes and presumably destroy a lot of London.
Rec: This is a spooky, haunted house casefic that’s atmospheric, tense, and exciting. Philomytha makes great use of the desolate location and Peter’s interest in architecture, and the fic is filled with the kinds of casual asides that help to build a fully realised ‘magical’ world in the books.
Content warnings: Past murders, canon typical violence
“when i call, you come home, a bird in your teeth” by jeannemarythefourth. 6.4K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir; Ship: Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Recced by: Li
Backstory: The Locked Tomb series is an SFF series where necromancers live in outer space. Gideon Nav is a foul-mouthed jock with a heart of gold, and Harrowhark Nonagesimus is the nasty little bone witch she despises. (Or does she...?) In this AU, Gideon is a werewolf, and Harrow’s a Frankensteinesque scientist. And oh my god... they are roommates.
Rec: The details in this AU make it feel like a fully-fleshed out universe, one in which werewolves exist, one can be a scientist of death, and the McRib didn’t get taken off the McDonald’s menu.
Content warnings: N/A
“confirmation bias” by novembersmith. 14K words, rated Explicit.
Fandom: Integrate - Thea Hayworth; Ship: Sezin/Gavin Hayes
Recced by: descents
Backstory: A retelling and expansion of Thea Hayworth’s delightful alien-human romance/detective story, from the POV of the alien instead of the human.
Rec: Loved Thea Hayworth’s original story and this is an adorable lens into the alien’s perspective as he figures out he’s attracted to a human and what that really means.
Content warnings: Possessive behaviour, tentacles
“A Dreaming Art” by Sinope. 5.4K words, rated Gen.
Fandom: Piranesi (Susanna Clarke); Ship: Gen
Recced by:Chestnut_pod
Backstory: Piranesi is one name for a man who lives in the House, its Beloved Child. The House speaks of universal archetypes, universal memory, what it means to be human—except its idea of universal is, uh, Greco-Roman statuary and CS Lewis.
Rec: I find Piranesi, the novel, both entrancing and frustrating for this myopia—Sinope answers all my questions. This fic casts a deeply researched, compassionate postcolonial lens over the House, and sees other spaces and other universalities and other people in its world. The fic is beautiful and intertextual and uses epistolary, “oral history,” and narrative voices with equal delicacy and grace. Counter-hegemonic history and loveliness, what more could you want?
Content warnings: Depictions of real-world wars, racism
“New Monster Stories” by kathkin. 20K words, rated Explicit.
Fandom: The Witcher (TV); Ship: Geralt/Jaskier
Recced by: barrett
Backstory: In canon, Geralt is a mutant monster-hunter and Jaskier is a bard. In this modern AU, Geralt still hunts monsters and Jaskier is a struggling musician who lets Geralt crash at his apartment sometimes.
Rec: This fic is incredibly funny, and it does a great job with weaving canon monsters and fantasy elements into the modern setting!
Content warnings: Gore/violence (of a fantasy swordfighting variety)
“the whole estate of mortal man” by Amiril. 43K words, rated Teen.
Fandom: Black Sails; Ship: John Silver/Captain Flint
Recced by: fredfinch
Backstory: AU—Silver is a demon who makes deals with people in order to consume their souls. After assuming the identity of John Silver, he joins Captain Flint’s crew.
Rec: Silver’s point-of-view is very clearly not human, and it feels like a ghost story in the best possible way.
Content warnings: N/A
https://twitter.com/sk8kojiro/status/1448348390170021899
FINAL THOUGHT
Wrapping up this week with a fanworks auction we’ve featured here in the past: Marvel Trumps Hate! In case you don’t know how fanworks auctions generally work, you place a bid on a creator, and if you have the highest bid, you donate the amount of that bid to a charity, and the creator creates a work for you. Marvel Trumps Hate is just wrapping up preview week and bidding opens on Sunday; if you’re in any Marvel fandom, check out everything you could bid on! — Elizabeth