The Rec Center #92
Happy Friday, Rec Center readers! This week we’ve got multifandom casefic recs, some thoughts on Harry Styles and Tolkien (not connected, although we’d love to read something that achieved this crossover), and more. — Gav
new stuff
“Harry Styles and the uninhibited joy of being a fan” by Sacha Judd at The Spinoff
“So it’s a lie, really. Of course I’ve been a true fan. Or, rather, the concept of a true fan is bullshit. We all care deeply about different things at different times and in different ways.”
“When is exclusion a valid design choice?” by Ben Kuchera at Polygon
An interesting piece about whether it’s exclusionary to make games so hard that many consumers can’t reach later levels, meaning they’ll never experience the complete art and storytelling experience of the game. Should game designers add easier settings to make their games more accessible, and are fans being elitist when they oppose that idea?
“Where the Stars Are Strange: J. R. R. Tolkien and Me” by Austin Gilkeson at Catapult
“The best books show us who we were when we first read them, who we are now, and who we may yet become.”
older stuff
“‘Let’s talk about genre’: Neil Gaiman and Kazuo Ishiguro in conversation” at the New Statesman
Kazuo Ishiguro has long been one of my favorite writers (SHOUTOUT TO REMAINS OF THE DAY!!!!) and yesterday he won the Nobel Prize for Literature! I’ve had his conversation with Neil Gaiman, part of the issue of the New Statesman that Gaiman and Amanda Palmer guest-edited, bookmarked to share in the newsletter at some point, so now feels like the ideal moment. A very long and wide-ranging conversation on, amongst other things, the (possibly artificial) genre boundaries we construct. — Elizabeth
tumblr & beyond
Avatar: The Last Airbender fanart by raphodraws
“cs lewis: here’s my OC, it’s jesus but he’s a lion”
Mesmerized by this Always Sunny In Philadelphia observation.
“commodore james norrington in 2003 hit film pirates of the caribbean: curse of the black pearl did nothing wrong”
“Anne Rice is going to sue everyone on this post.”
fanfiction
This week we have fics that our readers have labeled either “casefic” or “mystery,” definitely terms that vary depending on the fandom, the writer, or the reader, but I think generally mean “kinda plotty/the characters solve something”?? Thank you to our guest reccers! — Elizabeth
“Excerpts from Carver Edlund’s Magnum Opus” by twentysomething. 27K words, rated Explicit.
Fandom: Supernatural; Ship: Dean/Cas
Recced by: Karen
Backstory: A Dean/Cas Bones AU.
Rec: When I found this I was delighted that someone shared my specific love of both Deancas and Bones/Booth (and recognized how many similarities the ships have!). It’s a magical fandom moment, when you feel like someone else is just as passionate about your niche need to see a certain pairing thrust into a certain world. Also this fic is a bit old-school (way back in 2010) and is on a platform that isn’t used much anymore, and it’d be a shame for it to fade into obscurity.
Content warnings: N/A
“Silver and Blood” by night_sentinel. 17K words, rated Mature.
Fandoms: Hannibal, The Witcher; Ship: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Recced by: Maddie
Backstory: A Hannibal AU set in the universe of The Witcher. The Witcher is both a book and video game series (there may also be a TV series?) about Fantasy Europe where monsters are real and “witchers” are the generally despised semi-superhuman people who hunt them. That’s all the background you need to read this.
Rec: Tonally, the Witcher is a great fit for Hannibal because it’s a universe centered around morally grey decision-making and actual, often flesh-eating monsters. I’m dedicating this rec to Gavia because AUs in which Hannibal is a literal monster seem right up her alley.
Content warning: Violence at levels typical of the source material
“Come Back to Me” by CMackenzie. 81K words, Not Rated (would estimate Explicit).
Fandom: Veronica Mars (post-movie); Ship: Veronica Mars/Logan Echolls
Recced by: Claire
Backstory: This picks up shortly after the end of the Veronica Mars movie, and is entirely canon-compliant to that point (though not with the books that followed).
Rec: CMackenzie not only writes the hell out of some perfectly characterized LoVe (her characters sound more like the show/movie than the actual canon books do!) but she writes the hell out of a really good mystery, too. First in a series of three stories (so far), but stands on its own.
Content warning: Character death (not Logan or Veronica)
“An Afternoon’s Adventure” by Persiflager. 3K words, rated Gen.
Fandom: Lord Peter Wimsey series/Miss Marple series; Ship: Honoria Lucasta Wimsey/Jane Marple
Recced by: Gav
Backstory: Am I familiar with either Wimsey or Miss Marple? No, and it didn’t matter when reading this fic. Miss Marple is an elderly detective; Honoria Wimsey is (apparently) the mother of Peter Wimsey from the detective novels by Dorothy L. Sayers. That’s it.
Rec: A sweet and distinctive tale of two older ladies reuniting to solve a (mostly harmless) crime.
Content warnings: N/A
“Freeport” by Maldoror. 220K words, rated NC17.
Fandom: Gundam Wing; Ship: Duo Maxwell/Wufei Chang
Recced by: Effex
Backstory: Gundam Wing is about five (very pretty) teen boys with giant robots who're sent to fight, on behalf of humanity’s space colonies, against an increasingly tyrannical Earth. It was *the* anime fandom of the late 90s, and the pilots were shipped in almost every permutation...except for Duo/Wufei, the pairing I inexplicably gave my preteen heart to. Duo’s a smart mouthed street rat who calls himself the god of death! Wufei’s a seething volcano of honor, idealism, self-loathing, and vengeance! They barely interact in canon, if I remember correctly, but like that ever stopped anybody.
Rec: Freeport’s a full-fledged scifi novel, set years after the series ends. It’s a murder mystery and a conspiracy thriller. It’s a deep exploration of anarchy in a closed society, when said society is closed in a tin can floating in space. It’s about two competent, traumatized people moving from begrudging cooperation to trust and loyalty (and sex). I love long, smart, tightly-written fanfic, and this is one of the best.
Content warnings: Depictions of violence and death
BONUS REC from Gav (not really a casefic, but Whatever)
“Audience: 822,000 and Homeland Security” by WerewolvesAreReal. 2.7K words, rated Gen.
Fandom: Leverage; Ship: Gen
Recced by: Gav
Backstory: Alec, Parker and Eliot are Ocean’s Eleven-style criminals. Alec is the hacker, Parker is the cat burglar, and Eliot is the muscle. If you’ve seen even one episode of Leverage, you know enough!
Rec: I laughed out loud multiple times during this deceptively short fic. It’s about Alec accidentally becoming an internet sensation because people tune into his video game livestreams to watch Parker and Eliot’s weird behavior in the background. A clever and very plausible usage of the ~antics we see in the show!
Content warnings: N/A
FINAL THOUGHT
In two weeks I will be speaking at a conference in London! “Episodic” will bring together a bunch people from different media who tell episodic or serialized stories, from comics creators Kieron Gillen & Jamie McKelvie (The Wicked and the Divine, Young Avengers) to podcast producer Starlee Kine (S-Town, Mystery Show). Plus me! I’ll be there to talk about fandom, which is kind of an episodic double-whammy—we love a lot of episodic content and we often express that love by creating our own episodic content, fic in particular. Get excited, I’m gonna make some informative slides.
If you’re on that side of the Atlantic and especially if you’re interested in serialized media and you straddle that fan/creator divide, please consider joining us! And students can use the code “Student050” to get a third off the ticket price. — Elizabeth
Have a favorite one-off rec? Please send it our way! We’ll use it in a future list. Other fanworks—comics, vids, etc—are strongly encouraged as well.
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)