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whetstonefires · 4 years

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director's cut top guide? I don't have a section in specific pick your favorite I guess I love the whole thing

Awwwww thank you. 💗😊 For the compliment, the interest, and the guidance. Additionally thanks because I just discovered I didn’t update this fic in October like I thought I did! It’s still in the status it had in July. So uh. I’ll be getting right on that. ˋ( ° ▽、° )

I think I’m gonna go with a passage back near the start, in the first half of chapter 4, the one where Tifa’s getting Vincent out of his coffin. I like how it came out and it’s pretty important, and if I’ve rambled about it at all, it wasn’t recently.

There’s a push-pull effect fundamental to this scene–first physically, with Tifa moving and destroying actual barriers, and Vincent repeatedly attempting to withdraw. But also on the level of Tifa attempting a series of verbal sallies, which Vincent initially rebuffs and then ignores by vampirically pulling the covers over his head and generally putting the passive in passive-aggressive.

But after telling her to go ahead and set the building on fire with him in it, Vincent gets his lid on and settles on being inert, and Tifa gets to do a monologue.

There are a lot of speeches in this fic, honestly, because of the precedent set by canon/the kinds of characters I’m working with, but most of them are nowhere near this long, and even though Tifa’s trying to achieve a specific rhetorical objective here, they’re generally not quite this honest.

“It’s easy to decide to die,” she told him, at length. “It’s easy to stop fighting when there doesn’t seem to be any hope. I know.

“But you’ll always regret it. You know that. If you’d been brave enough to choose Lucrecia over the Turks before Hojo got his grubby claws into her, maybe none of this would ever have happened. If she’d been brave enough to choose you sooner, it might have been okay. Not choosing is almost always a bad choice. If you come out of hiding, more things will happen—things that can’t unhappen. I know that’s frightening. But things happen without you, too. When you’re not there. When you do nothing.”

Tifa rocked back on her heels. “You can’t make the world go back to the way it was before, get back the same happiness or hope from your memories…not even if you could wind back time.”

Here Tifa is combining her intimate knowledge of Vincent’s circumstances with her own situation to create a sort of…weaponized empathy.

She can’t afford for Vincent to not listen to her, because she refuses to either give up on her mission or kill him, so when the normal approach fails she falls back on contingency and proceeds to run absolutely roughshod over all his personal boundaries.

Now, being able to wield future information against people this way is one of the major features of this general genre of time travel story, particularly when (like Tifa here) the traveler had level-ups, but didn’t get to carry them into New Game Plus. Tifa later uses it against Tseng with no artfulness whatsoever.

But that kind of blunt, bludgeoning use of intimate knowledge is a power game; it’s not how you treat a friend. So Tifa spends a lot of this speech, especially the opening, drawing connections between her experience and Vincent’s, exposing herself emotionally as much as can reasonably be managed without going off on any Tifa-centric tangents.

Being displaced in time and separated from everything you cared about is relevant, here. And she’s also able to bring her personal experience with feeling helpless and trapped–not by the sort of clear antagonistic obstacle you can batter down with your fists but by the certainty that every possible course of action is Terrible and Wrong and so you can’t act, because you can’t choose–she specifically frames it in terms of having to decide between binary options, because that’s how we’ve seen her experience it wrt i.e. ‘talking to Cloud about how his brain is weird.’

The experience is similar enough to Vincent’s, especially his not-initiating of important relationship conversations with Lucretia at the beginning, for these terms to work for communication purposes, but it’s very definitely Tifa’s experience being mapped onto Vincent’s here, and proffered to ameliorate the inherent violence of what she’s doing.

Her coping mechanism for that trapped feeling, though, is to distract herself with Doing Something Constructive that allows her to avoid the issue without feeling like she’s stuck.

There’s a certain extent to which allowing time to process or grieve is important, and Tifa is bad at allowing it, largely I think because she’s very aware of the danger of getting mired in paralysis and ruminating on the bad thing until it’s all that exists. Vincent more than anyone else in the cast is defined by his choice to identify with his trauma, and while Aerith is the one most defined by trying not to do that, Tifa’s far enough to that end to create a conflict in viewpoint even when nothing vitally important is at stake.

I also included a dialogue ping to the place where she talks about this in the Advent Children movie, though if you’ve been following my opinions on ffvii any time at all you probably know I have so many problems with thedecisions made with Tifa in that film. Even the parts that areconsonant with her established characterization require her to have rolled back mostof her development from the OG.

The part where she doesn’t come with Cloud on the rescue mission shebullies him into is so utterly backward and the opposite of her establishedbehavior and values and just basic logic that I have to sort of write around it,because I can’t accept that it happened. But if we ignore that bit, and the amount of self-centeredness in the harangue, some elementsof the interaction have potential.

Because if nothing else it’s the most explicit verbal treatment in the Compilation of the recurring theme of people being ‘stuck.’ Not by bars and walls and certain death, but by the prisons inside their heads.

“But…there are still possibilities. Still things you can do to make the world better. Her choices…they weren’t your fault. But whatever you’re blaming yourself for right now…lying here until you die won’t make it better. The biggest sin of all, to me, is not trying to make things better.

“You aren’t a monster, Vincent. Nothing Hojo did to your body, nothing Lucrecia did to bring you back, could make you one. As long as you have your mind, you decide. And it’s what you decide to do that makes the difference between a human and anything else.”

She’s hitting hard, here: call to action, absolution, extremely targeted personal affirmation, clarification that she really does know what’s up with him, new information that Lucrecia was involved with his current status, and finally, optimistic conceptual framework imposed on the situation, since Vincent certainly isn’t capable of that himself.

This treatment of Vincent’s situation vis-a-vis humanity is, of course, also very relevant to the ensuing plot-central question of what Sephiroth is, and whether he has the power to make good life choices. Which Tifa is not nearly as sure of as with Vincent, since while she stands by the principle that it’s a matter of choice she knows for a fact that Vincent can make good ones, but has certainly never seen evidence with Sephiroth.

And then of course there’s Genesis, who would love to get everyone to accept that his sins are a function of what rather than who he is, and drag down with him anyone he can reach, and who by his very effort to sell the idea makes it seem less likely.

I’ve excerpted only Tifa’s dialogue and some of the tags from the rest of the passage, because her narration gets lengthier and isn’t what I’m focusing on for this commentary.

She waited. But the man in the box didn’t move, and he didn’t speak. “Lucrecia is still alive,” she told him. “Preserved in crystal. Hidden away. You two really are a pair, aren’t you? And maybe you’re both right to be concerned—she’s got Jenova in her, and you’ve got those things that replaced your Limit Breaks. But they don’t control you.”

[…]

“They don’t control you,” she repeated. “Hojo doesn’t control you. You can choose to do nothing for the rest of your long life if that’s what you really want. But it’s not your destiny. And it’s not what’s right.”

‘It’s not what’s right’ is an interesting line in retrospect, because Tifa’s saying it within a framework of denying Vincent’s reasoning that there’s something somehow virtuous about closing himself off from the world, so he can’t do any more harm. Specifically in the context of assuring him that he has control over his actions, and his Limit Break things don’t.

But in the overall argument, about how his power of self-determination relates to responsibility to the world, it can also be read as a moral condemnation, the suggestion that there is a specific thing that’s right, and Vincent isn’t doing it.

“Sephiroth is an adult now,” she said [….] “They put him in the Shinra military. Made him a General.”

[…] “If Hojo and Jenova have their way, he’ll become a monster soon,” she confided in the coffin. “Maybe there’s no way to change that. Maybe it’s too late for him. Maybe it’s his destiny. But it’s not too late for the rest of the world, not yet. I know that much. Everyone who has the power to fight him has a responsibility to try.”

That’s where her speech winds up–rather abrupt return to her earlier, blown-off argument about Sephiroth imminently killing everybody and how Vincent should help. He doesn’t do anything. He continues to be a box.

So then she punches her way into the coffin.

“What are you?”

She knew it wasn’t her feat of strength that had impressed him, though he probably appreciated the rhetorical force of it.

I really like this line. Describing ‘punching open the box someone’s hiding in at the climax of an inspirational speech’ as a rhetorical device is the kind of thing I find very funny, and I got characterization of both of them and story advancement into the sentence too.

“Tifa,” she said. “Tifa Lockhart.” She held out her right hand. “Get up, Vincent Valentine. The world isn’t done with you yet.”

He let her pull him up onto his feet.

Some obvious symbolism there, fitted into the very important fact that this worked.

Getting Vincent out of his coffin has been the only thing Tifa’s attempted so far in the story that has turned out more or less exactly as planned. Not entirely easily, and not following a step-by-step plot because that’s not Tifa, but without random factors interceding and requiring her to recalculate wildly, make decisions entirely on the fly, and draw up a new set of plans in the aftermath, either.

In a way, the Vincent recruitment section microcosms the fight Tifa’s having with the universe throughout the fic, in her efforts to make things line up so she can get a better outcome to this nightmare scenario she’s been pitched back into: direct, physical actions are persistently vital and necessary, but her real success must always hinge on her particular knowledge, and ability to apply it.

Apply it specifically, thus far, mostly to getting people to take her seriously and do as she says. Because she’s been placed in a position where as useful and important as her personal power is, it’s not the right tool to rely on for her central task. That has to be tackled via community building, in a context that intensely disinclines her to attempt such overtures.

Which in turn invokes one of the several great dichotomies of Tifa’s in-game characterization–the periodic tension between her social impulses, to bind and soothe and promote bonding, and her…reactive impulses, to seize the world in both hands and find something to fight and do and change, so she doesn’t feel helpless in the face of all that is evil.

The parts of her character arc in the game that aren’t actively about Cloud seem to center around being forced to face that both these behavior patterns (especially in their role as coping mechanisms) are capable of being not only inadequate but actively, harmfully inappropriate to particular situations.

And then coping with this fact, and continuing to inhabit these parts of her identity in ways that turn out constructive. E.g., choose caring for Cloud over leading party to do anti-Shinra things that have only the vaguest prospect of actually averting the apocalypse; successfully retrieve his mind from the Lifestream. Help punch Sephiroth to death and stop him from holding back Holy; world saved.

If you try really hard to get a personal moral for Tifa out of the OG that isn’t pretty sexist, it might come down to something like: realize that you might be acting wrongly; then, act. Stay afraid, but do it anyway.

And, optimistically: perhaps you do not have to choose between your faces. Perhaps they are both allowed. Perhaps all of you is allowed. Perhaps you are enough.

One of the things Tifa and Cloud share is needing so desperately to be enough.

In a way that’s a feeling that unites the entire party, in their various ways, except maybe Aerith, depending on how you interpret her relationship to the obligations of being the Last Ancient. But Tifa and Cloud are about the same age and come from the same context and share a major trauma, so it looks particularly similar in them.

And of course there are also ways it looks especially similar between Tifa and Vincent, because they’re the most hopeless romantics in the party. 😆

#this is too long #but i'm tired of trying to cut it down #it is what it is #ask meme #director's commentary #my fic #ffvii #meta #tifa lockhart #vincent valentine #top guide #hoc est meum #a nonny mouse #ask

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smuthuttpodcast · 4 years

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Name/Handle/Alias

rlogarbagech1

About how long would you say you’ve been rooting for Reylo?

I tend to dive into things intensively, so while I knew there was an intriguing dynamic to Rey and Kylo's TFA interaction and I enjoyed what was teased in TLJ when it came out, I think it was a random wading into Reylo fanfic circa Aug 2019 that really got me into the fandom in a deep way. (Throwback to me thinking: eh maybe I'll give Reylo oneshots a try? And BOOM four months later I'm in a daze wondering how I've read like 80 fics, ended up in a writing discord - shoutout to The Writing Den! - and have five stories cooking in my head at one time.)

I like that the fandom takes what was on film in TLJ and expands the contours of that universe, stretching it into all sorts of configurations that somehow still made sense thematically for what Rey and Ben were going through. Whether that's in the context of warring lawyers (eversoreylo), Kyril Ren and Irena (voicedimplosives), archaeology Rey and Ben (disasterisms), a Harry met Sally AU (slipgoingunder), or Canadian politics (saint_heretical)... the creativity of the fandom and how it grapples with SW themes through all these different lenses of interpretation blows my mind. IMO it shows how SW's story themes can be individually interpreted, yet utterly universal.

What did you think of the way Rise of Skywalker handled Rey and Kylo’s relationship?

It felt like a backstep/retcon to what had happened in TLJ. I think CT and JJ wanted to make certain narrative choices but couldn't fully commit to them for whatever reasons, and the story suffered overall in a big way 'cus of that.

TRoS clearly went into the enemies -> lovers arc but leaned way too far into 'enemies', making the arc to 'lovers' within 2.5 hours way very weirdly paced, so it didn't feel like it was earned. The reaction of the audiences I was in for both screenings validated that. At the first screening, there was awkward laughter because it felt so left-field in the context of the film. In the second screening, the GA people I was watching it with felt 'this is really unnecessary' which I can understand because of the lack of buildup in TRoS to that moment.

Reylo in TLJ was at its best because there was time for it to breathe. I rewatch the force skype scenes often and the complete silence, the subtle acting, and the framing of those scenes, is so unusual and bold for a blockbuster at that level. There was also so much gorgeous subtext in what was going on, you could read into it what you liked, but there was definitely an attraction or a pull there for both characters.

You could tell that Adam and Daisy were delivering equally layered acting work in 9, but it was extremely rushed and weirdly edited. The ensemble could also have been a greek chorus for the audience/a bellwether for how we should be feeling towards Rey and Kylo in 9 but they didn't really utilise them that way and Palpatine ended up overshadowing the entire story as the big bad. The more interesting choice obviously was Kylo as the conflicted big bad and a redemption arc, but maybe Disney just isn't ok with that or was pushing for a different direction.

Overall, 9 made me wish we had more time to live in the push-pull dynamic between these two characters and the longing they have for each other despite all the odds, but luckily we have fanfic and art for that, which is why it's so great. Just a shame the film couldn't line those pieces up well enough for a satisfying landing.

Do you think the film understood why you, and other people, felt like Rey and Kylo had something together? Did it get their chemistry?

I'm sure they understood it on some surface level but CT was the wrong person to write that story imo. And JJ on some level disliked RJ's choices so he was trying to wind it back to the TFA dynamic which was more enemies-enemies with a subtext of them being compelled by each other, but not necessarily with a romantic resolution.

I think it's testament to the intelligence of the fandom that we saw the train tracks being laid in ep8 for a more interesting ending, just that whatever story-wrestling/behind the scenes drama/ego was going on at DLF meant nobody was able to actually able to execute that story with the justice it deserved. Locking out the story group also seems like a huge mistake and would've avoided a lot of the larger plot holes they seem to have ended up with, the dissatisfying Reylo arc in ep9 being just one symptom of it.

What about the handling of Kylo’s redemption? Was it something you had to think through in your stories?

How I envision Kylo/Ben's redemption and Rey's response to it is summarised by a lot of the fic that's already out there! And in the fanfic thread I've pinned on my Twitter. e.g. Starstuff by voicedimplosives, Morning by disasterisms, Astrometric Binaries by pontmercy44, Tactical Surrender by Trebia... there are a lot of ways it could have gone. A recent comic (08 Jan?) by Miss Bliss is also a great example and she distilled it down to 15 simple panels, not to say she simplified the ethics of the redemption arc of course.

The biggest effect that TRoS had on me as an aspiring creator/writer is because the film DIDN'T give me the redemption arc, I'm interested to explore how that looks like in fanfic. So maybe that will become a theme in my writing. Let's see!

I'm still laughing about how they yeeted Ben into the pit though. Can't believe those leaks were actually true.

What did you think of where Rey landed at the end? There had been a lot of excitement around Star Wars having a female protagonist. Do you think she lived up to the promise of her character?

A lot of the discourse has already covered this but my take is: in TLJ Rey was the centre of the story, all of her actions were driving the plot and it was a female-centric story about incredible themes like self-discovery, belonging, loyalty, 'lightness', 'darkness', attraction, sexuality. And TLJ was very nuanced in presenting how Rey's role shaped the overall story, the symbolism in the film (all of which had meaning or at least tried to), and her clear growth through it.

With TRoS it felt like her needs took a backseat and were kind of ancillary to the action of what was happening. Or that she was a lot more of a passenger to the story. I guess that's how I would sum it up. If I think back to how TRoS ended I don't think there was a satisfactory character conclusion for ANY of them... and don't even get me started on how they did Rose completely dirty.

There’s criticism of the movie that argues it’s akin to “fan fiction” and that is has too much fan service. As fans and fan-fiction writers, how do you react to that?

It doesn't actually bother me that much. I think it comes from a place of negative stereotyping and misunderstanding of what fandom is all about, especially for the Reylo community – because apparently believing in romance, redemption, and love is meaningless, simple, and weak.

The people that are in the fandom and know it well know that the fandom has a lot of diverse views in it, different perspectives, and some of the most startlingly intelligent and thoughtful people across the spectrum including creators, readers, analysts, community organisers etc.

The fact that there's a WHOLE ECOSYSTEM with fanfic and fan art and discord servers and gift exchanges and comedy memes and metas and all of this stuff just enhances my enjoyment of it overall. And it's an ecosystem that despite critics' attempts to dismiss it since 2015, continues to thrive.

I challenge those skeptics to look at some of the novel-length Reylo work on Ao3, the detailed sketches and concept art, the hours of thoughtful podcasting and REVIEWS OF FANFIC and say this community's not worthy of credit or attention. Even if you don't like Reylo, there's a discussion worth having about why people want to engage with it on a deep level and the transformative work that's come out of it.

We are doing this for free. Out of enjoyment and fun and discovering meaning. The level of artistry and engagement in this fandom is really astounding in that way.

I wish people would talk more about *that* side of the Reylo fandom rather than dismissing it as 'fluffy romance 50 shades in space y'all are rabid crazy' or whatever.

TLDR the question of whether Rey and Kylo have/had toxic and abusive dynamics is an interesting one to ask and we need to continue having the discussion, because from my POV it wasn't 100% clear cut from TFA, and it evolved in TLJ and in TRoS. BUT it should be situated in the context of the broader fandom and the range of views within it, + the many other interpretations of the Reylo relationship through fic and art, which The Atlantic's article missed.

Are you still writing any Star Wars fanfic? Tell us about it! (Don't forget your Ao3 handle!)

I'm late to the game but am interested in writing SW fanfic as a way of exploring my own capacity to write and create, so yes! Did my first drabble in mid December and have a few ideas cooking, the first which looks like a two-chapter modern AU oneshot. Watch this space…

Thanks to rlogarbagech1!

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