mhalachai: (Default)
So, a crack!theory about Doctor Who and the last 20 seconds of that episode:

Cut for spoilers for Impossible Astronaut, Day of the Moon, and the crackiest theory every! )

Next week: Pirates! It'd be even better if it were zombie pirates but oh well.
mhalachai: (Default)
This post has three things: An important safety tip on LJ, an Anita Blake/Buffy the Vampire Slayer summary, and a rambling dissertation on why I find it so damn hard to write Anita Blake these days.

Don't Cross the Streams



Important news tip about LJ - they are running a heavy cache on the site if you're not logged in, so new posts may not be showing up. Try refreshing, dumping your cache, and make sure you're logged in.

Summary



I think I finally figured out a new take on an Anita Blake/Buffy the Vampire Slayer crossover. More about that after the epic summary.

from [personal profile] averzierlia: The Darkness Inside (Anita Blake/Buffy)

In the Buffy-verse

Everyone in St. Louis knows who she is.  )

Meta: And now, some thoughts on Anita Blake.



Those of you who have been around for a while will have noticed that I lost the enthusiasm for writing in the Anita Blake world a few years ago, soon after the Dear Negative Reader situation. I haven't been reading the latest AB books and have no idea what's happening in that world these days.

Unfortunately, this can happen at anytime, in any fandom, when the creative team behind your show/book/movie of choice decides to take the source material in a direction that doesn't gel with your take on things. I'm not saying they are wrong; it's their baby, they can do whatever they want with their stories. But as a fan, I retain the right to not be interested in change of direction. And more on this subject. Seriously, there's lots more )

So oh my god tl;dr - it's interesting how our interest or disinterest in source material can influence how engaged we are in fanfic.

I'm going to stop now.
mhalachai: (Default)
yeah, so, this happened:

Criminal Minds Cuts A.J. Cook, Will Add New Cast Member, Source Says.

The producers essentially fired AJ Cook (JJ) and are trying to cut Paget Brewster to a limited number of shows. All the male actors are coming back.

Oh no they didn't.

There are a bunch of reactions from fans and even the actors on Twitter (ajcookofficial, Pagetpaget, JoeMantegna, Vangsness, Gibsonthomas) but the reason I broke my LJ radio silence (which I have been maintaining because of a severe case of creative block) is because I'd like to share the following:

An open letter to the Producers of Criminal Minds

Sirs,

In a show that features, at its very core, extreme and sadistic violence against women at nearly every turn, it is vital to the balance of Criminal Minds to have strong female characters. For five years, Jennifer Jareau has given Criminal Minds a strong centering influence, a level of humanity, that consistently provides a balance against the violence in the show. It has been recognized more than once on the show that JJ is the first one to filter all cases and all the violence sent the BAU, and she works as a grounding point to the team by virtue of her character and actions. What AJ Cook has built with a character that could have been little more than a puff piece is astonishing, and I urge you to reconsider your decision to not bring her back for the next season of Criminal Minds.

Emily Prentiss portrays a strong, capable female character who is action-oriented, pragmatic, and also capable of a level of empathy with female crime victims that cannot be realistically taken on by any of the male characters in the show. Paget Brewster has taken a character that, in other hands (and even 10 years ago) could have been a shrill caricature, a woman trying to get in the "boys club", with a chip on her shoulder and something to prove, and made Prentiss into an incredibly strong character who adds tremendous value to the show. Sadly, characters like Prentiss are thin on the ground even in 2010, and to lose her presence on the show would be a step backwards for Criminal Minds and CBS.

It is my opinion that the background and history that both Emily Prentiss and Jennifer Jareau have built on the show, and the incredible acting that Paget Brewster and AJ Cook have brought to the ensemble over the years, are invaluable to the success of the show. The loss of JJ, and the reduction of Prentiss's role on the show, will hurt the show beyond what may be sustainable on the long-term, in terms of both gaining new fans and keeping existing ones.

It is also being reported that there are decisions to bring in a new female character to the show. By all means, please bring in new characters to complement the existing cast. The hallmark of a great show is the ability to add and grow. But please don't think that the fan base will be willing to accept the firing of AJ Cook, and the demotion of Paget Brewster. A show as consistently violent as Criminal Minds requires a certain level of trust from its audience, a trust that has built up over the last five years by the entire ensemble of characters, of which JJ and Prentiss (and Ms. Cook and Ms. Brewster) are a vital and irreplaceable part.

Sincerely,

[my name]


I'm going to polish this up over the next few days and then ship it snail-mail off to CBS. But the core of my message can be summed up as:

In a show that features extreme violence against women at every turn, you need strong female characters to play the hero, to show/tell that not all women are victims, that sometimes we can be the strong ones.

So yeah, those are my thoughts on this mess. If you're a Criminal Minds fan and would like to send a message to CBS, please do so (in snail mail format - harder to ignore). Or else you can sign the online petition, or pass around the message. (Sending a message of support to AJ and Paget would not be amiss, either).



And if you're not a Criminal Minds fan and you made it this far down... how are things going with you?
mhalachai: (Default)
Hey everybody!
Hi Dr. Nick!

There's a lot of new people who have friended me in the last little while, and it's been a bit since I have talked to a lot of you, so:

IF you recently friended me
THEN Tell me a bit about why you are here, what it is you are reading of mine, and how you found me

AND/OR

IF you want to ask me a trivia question on any of my fics
THEN I will answer.
mhalachai: (Default)
So I was thinking about it, and I'm not going to change the journal's default setting because I actually like my non-lj readers. I tested the "adult concepts" thing out on an old post, and when you're logged out, if you try to access such a post, then you get "14 Adult Content Notice : The content that you are about to view could contain adult concepts which may not be suitable for minors. To continue, you must confirm that you are at least 14 years of age. "

Yeah... no. Since a little clicky button won't stop people from lying about their age anyway, I'm not going to inconvenience those readers of mine who are over 14 (because seriously, is anyone out there under 14?) and who don't want to have an LJ account. Because my suspicious mind is thinking they want more people to sign up for lj.

I'll be changing some of the more riske posts to the age appropriate setting later on. Since most of my fic is gen anyway, and I'm not going to lock up fic for swearing, it shouldn't be that big of a deal.


Thanks to everyone who nominated my fics over at the TTH COA! 19 nominations, compared with last year's 13! So cool. I'll post links and banners once voting begins on Friday! Check back!

!!



And I made a shiny banner for the Rory Gilmore is the illegitimate genius daughter of Rodney McKay (more manageably known as Physics of the Spin) series:

click for banner! )
mhalachai: (Default)
Like I've been saying all day, ignorance is not a virtue.

From [livejournal.com profile] alexcat, inspired by the lovely [livejournal.com profile] sabriel_0405, the most frequently challenged books from 1990-2000

cut for listyness )

I need to look into some more of these books, to see what they're all about, and I'll probably read some more of these too.

(Except for American Psycho. That books creeps me out to no end)
mhalachai: (Default)
Even I, with my head buried in the fandom sand, have noticed the recent mess over FanLib.

So I have dusted off my soap box and have some words. Keep in mind that I'm tired after an 11-hour work day and am pretty much incoherent. So I will let the linky links do my talking.

First off, I can't even begin the backstory on this one, I have some links that I think will nicely sum up my feelings on the matter:

The comm to end all comms: [livejournal.com profile] life_wo_fanlib

101 reasons by [livejournal.com profile] liz_marcs to stay away from FanLib

As proof that we will slash anything: FanLib is already generating its own advertising slash fic: "In Just Seven Fics, I Can Make You A Man" (FanLib slash, rated ... Um.) by [livejournal.com profile] lizbee

And something from a dude named Henry Jenkins who sets out the whole FanLib background in nice plain text and language.



Then, word from on high:

Cory Doctorow: In Praise of Fanfic -- in which a nice level-headed guy says something nice about us fanfic writers.

He's even so well liked that Tanya Huff/[livejournal.com profile] andpuff (my new saint, after having watched the first several eps of Blood Ties -- omg a fun show) points everyone in the essay's direction, without mentioning FanLib directly.




Then why I'm not too worked up over it:

My fandom has already been put on notice.

I speak, of course, about the Anita Blake books. If you follow my fics, you'll have noticed that no matter how annoyed I get with current canon, I can't stay away. Dawning Light, Inevitable, Switchback, etc., etc. Anyway, Laurell K. Hamilton has made some noise in the past about fanfic being disallowed, and to this day most mainstreamish fic archives won't allow Anita Blake fic in. That's fine. I can pretty much guarantee that my fandom's never going to bcome part of the mass of FanLib (Can't tell if the "Lib" here stands for Liberation, Liberty or Libel). I like it like that. Ignore me and I won't hurt the canon.

And that's not even beginning with the crossover angle to all this.

To make a long story short (too late!) I'm going to stay as far away from FanLib as possible, as it's not the sort of place I want my writing.



In unrelated news, I'm fascinated with the song Fulsom Prison Blues. I miss Johnny Cash.
mhalachai: (Default)
You may not have noticed the little dust-up in Laurell K. Hamilton land in recent days, and all I can say is oh, lucky you. The gist is this: Something happened on the LKH boards (not sure what as I don't go because I can't find anything worth my time, and I never post because they won't allow gmail addresses for registration), and so LKH posted a blog entry entitled, Dear Negative Reader.

I'll wait until you go read that.

Anyway, there's been quite a little dustup in fandom. Fandom Wank weighed in, as did a few authors.

But this post was supposed to be about me, so here is the me part:

I'm done. The more I read her blog, the more uncomfortable I feel. She may be expressly talking about the posters on her board, but I feel that really, she's talking to me, someone who dislikes the way the series is going. I feel as if I'm being uninvited from the party by the person who's throwing it. After I read the blog entry, I sat back and really thought about why I was still buying her books.

The cons list outweighed the pros list, so it's basically it. Why am I reading her books when a) I'm not really enjoying them and b) the author is basically telling people like me to get lost?

The end result is pretty clear from this point -- I'm out. Not interested in reading any more of her stuff, be it blog or book, and especially not paying money for it.

That said, I'm not going to stop my AB fanfic WIPs. They're all going to get finished. Including, somehow, Switchback.

You may notice that I disabled comments on this post -- I'm not really interested in having this become a free-for-all in whatever way. If you want to chat, feel free to email me -- mhalachai at gmail dot com.
mhalachai: (Default)
A couple of fics, and a realization about me.

Okay, first: Two additions to teh AB/HP fic list, just in time for Danse Macabre to come out on Tuesday.
Author
Story
Ashalrospeak Holiday: A medium-sized group of Hogwarts students (plus one professor) are going on a field trip . . . to St Louis. WIP
[livejournal.com profile] killingcorvis Silver Bullets: Remus Lupin has been advised to call for some unlikely help. He contacts Anita Blake and her werewolf pack to help him in the fight against the Dark Lord. WIP


Another is in the wings, but I wanted to ask the author about it first.

THEN: the realization, about me and writing fic and how pairings aren't all they're cracked up to be and how writing sex in fic is not a thing I can do unless it's dysfunctional sex then someone bring the whip and handcuffs. plus a Secrets postcard. )

I'll start on those summaries for dummaries tomorrow.

AGH

Nov. 8th, 2005 06:25 pm
mhalachai: (Default)
Let me sum up my evening:

Bus ride home: $2.25
Man-hours in cleaning up the kitchen: 2.4
Calling the plumber after he's 2.5 hours late, only to be told that someone at the office was supposed to have called me to cancel, and it will take a much longer time than originally planned for them to dig up my floor to replace the pipes: Priceless.

For the little screaming frustrations in life, there's Mastercard.
(Actually, there's my landlady to deal with that.)

I'm going to find some dinner.
mhalachai: (Default)
What have I been doing recently?

I placed in an icontest: See?

I wrote six BtVS crossover drabbles. The elements from last week, and and two fluffy ones from this week.

I've been watching a lot of Firefly. I love Joss.

Still writing Inevitable. Not starting any more epics. I'm also contemplating taking down "The Me In Team," or maybe making it into a one-shot. I don't think I'll be able to track both it and Candlelight. Any recommendations? I'm hesitant to outright remove the chapter from TTH... I've never done this before. Please advise, oh Flist.

Does anyone have any recommendations for a freeware or shareware program so I can get screencaps from my DVDs? I want to make Earth2 icons. I love Earth2. Yay for DVDs.

GOF WTF

Jul. 24th, 2005 09:36 am
mhalachai: (Default)
A polite rant to the makers of the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire movie:

Cut for rant and for a promo image of the movie. Also, might be construed as tiny spoilers for HBP )

ETA to rant: According to my math from the tombstone, Voldemort's father was 28 when he was killed? That makes him ELEVEN when he sired his son. RAR!
mhalachai: (Default)
No, not a HBP post. I've read it and have no comment at this time.

No, this is about my Creative Zen 5gb mp3 player. All I can say it, thank god it's under warranty. The headphone jack is starting to lose channels, and it's not the headphones. This is a common problem with the player, I find out *now*. I did not buy the extended warranty from Future Shop because they are useless with the one-piece mp3 players. They break, and Future Shop says you did it can't fix so sad.

But my machine's got a 1-year warranty from Creative itself. I got it back in the beginning of January of this year. I hope I can just exchange it at the store and don't have to ship it off to where the hell ever.

PO.

Also, I suspect I'm getting a cold.

ETA: I'm using my So!Angry!Harry! icon a lot. I think I need another.
mhalachai: (Default)
Yeah. Remember that comment I made a few days ago about a new chapter of Inevitable? Well, here's the thing. I'm covering a huge libel trial at work, which looks like it might be going on for well over a month, and it's taking up all my energy.

My resolution is thus: I will endeavour to write when I can, but things are being shuffeled around in light of work.

I repeat: I am not stopping writing, but until the trial is over I'm not sure how much time I will have to write.

(don't kill me plzthnx)

*annoyed*

Jun. 15th, 2005 01:22 pm
mhalachai: (Default)
Sometime in the last 10 minutes, lj decided to delete the three new styles it implemented less than a month ago. This also deleted all my customzations and threw my lj into an unknown style.

Am not happy. Anyone know what happened?

ETA: From status:
Known Issues:
At this time, S2 users may see their styles revert to Generator. This has been reported to LiveJournal developers and will be fixed as soon as possible. You do not need to open a support request about this issue. Thank you for your patience.


*grumble*

ETA2: My customizations are back. How odd.
mhalachai: (Default)
*headdesk*

No, those are the pyjamas Anita "slept" in, not the ones she "spelt" in. Rar.

As an aside, a [livejournal.com profile] weasley100 drabble: Scrapbook

*Grump*

May. 25th, 2005 09:13 pm
mhalachai: (Default)
Garraghg!

I'm all stymied. I'm five lines in to Inevitable 17, and I'm stuck on how to show a fight scene between Richard and Micah. I'm at the point where I just want to have them throw themselves at each other and declare their undying gay love for each other and be done with it. Gah.

I've got the rest of the next chapter of Candelight and Me In Team ready, all I need to do is write them. Yeah, right.

More icon spam: here (new ones).

I should have a fic update of some kind by Friday.

WIP meme

May. 11th, 2005 08:17 pm
mhalachai: (Default)
WIP meme: Take any currently unfinished fics you have and write the first line/paragraph from each. (Gacked from [livejournal.com profile] beren_writes)

Cut to save your flists )
*counts* Nine? NINE? *faints from the strain*
mhalachai: (Default)
Today's most interesting euphimism for vagina in a fic: "nether mouth"

So many kinds of wtf.

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