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Annoyances within whump
Sep. 4th, 2007 05:34 amMust... vent...!
A few of my pet peeves when it comes to whump
Injury, what injury? - Sheppard is injured in one chapter and yet you never hear about the injury again. I will admit that this is sometimes a bane with my own writing, mostly in the aftermath if Sheppard has quite a list of extensive injuries. I understand that the more injuries there are, the more easily some of them are to forget. But if it's a single injury then there's no excuse.
I'm bleeding out my ears, but I still have time to talk - Sheppard is injured, bad, and yet still has strength to stand there and say a long good-bye to someone.
Turns out it wasn't that bad after all (or, as I like to call it, skimping out on what could have been good whump) - basically, it's just when a writer has great whump, H/C or angst potential and doesn't use it.
He's injured. But more importantly he's a security risk! - I wasn't actually quite sure what to call this one. What it really is is more along the lines of Sheppard having gone through something bad, and me getting the feeling that the gang isn't helping him the way he needs to be helped. More forced demon purging, for example. Another example is Sheppard having been brain-washed or cloned, his brainwashed-self or the clone wreaking havoc, and normal Sheppard getting the blame for it. It's usually not that obvious, just the way the story was coming across to me. The flip side would be the gang too caring and not cautious enough, so it's kind of a very fine line. Still, I have read stories that have left me thinking, "I really don't think they should have handled it that way. It didn't seem fair to Sheppard."
Stomach/abdominal wounds - this is simply just a personal injury dislike of mine, not so much something annoying the writer does. I prefer wounding to the chestal area, not the gut. To each their own when it comes to whump but I do tend to like a story less when it's McKay getting the broken ribs and Sheppard the one getting shot in the gut. I like it even less when a purposeful wounding (like being cut for torture purposes) is to the belly region. I was just reading a story where that very thing happened (McKay has the broken ribs, Sheppard being sliced in the gut). I knew it was coming, I don't know how, but it still bugged the snot out of me. I just think the chest region offers more angst potential since it contains the more vital organs.
So, uh, just where was he injured exactly? - This frustrates me beyond words. Sheppard is injured but the author takes several paragraphs - even chapters - to say where. All you get until then is "he was bleeding badly and it hurt." I'll be thinking he was shot in the shpulder only for it to turn out he was shot in the thigh. "He was injured in the side." Okay, which side? In the ribs or above the hip? I like details in a story as they make a fic more three dimensional. Being vague about where a person was injured flattens the story and even makes me stumble a bit during reading, especially if the wound ends up being not where I had first assumed.
And that's pretty much it. It really does help to voice (or write) such things and get them out in the open. I tend to let too many little, unimportant things get to me too easily. I try not to, try to ignore it, but it remains like an obnoxious tickle at the back of my mind. Venting like this helps, it really does. I have been able to let so many obnoxious, piddly things go so much more easily by voicing them.
A few of my pet peeves when it comes to whump
Injury, what injury? - Sheppard is injured in one chapter and yet you never hear about the injury again. I will admit that this is sometimes a bane with my own writing, mostly in the aftermath if Sheppard has quite a list of extensive injuries. I understand that the more injuries there are, the more easily some of them are to forget. But if it's a single injury then there's no excuse.
I'm bleeding out my ears, but I still have time to talk - Sheppard is injured, bad, and yet still has strength to stand there and say a long good-bye to someone.
Turns out it wasn't that bad after all (or, as I like to call it, skimping out on what could have been good whump) - basically, it's just when a writer has great whump, H/C or angst potential and doesn't use it.
He's injured. But more importantly he's a security risk! - I wasn't actually quite sure what to call this one. What it really is is more along the lines of Sheppard having gone through something bad, and me getting the feeling that the gang isn't helping him the way he needs to be helped. More forced demon purging, for example. Another example is Sheppard having been brain-washed or cloned, his brainwashed-self or the clone wreaking havoc, and normal Sheppard getting the blame for it. It's usually not that obvious, just the way the story was coming across to me. The flip side would be the gang too caring and not cautious enough, so it's kind of a very fine line. Still, I have read stories that have left me thinking, "I really don't think they should have handled it that way. It didn't seem fair to Sheppard."
Stomach/abdominal wounds - this is simply just a personal injury dislike of mine, not so much something annoying the writer does. I prefer wounding to the chestal area, not the gut. To each their own when it comes to whump but I do tend to like a story less when it's McKay getting the broken ribs and Sheppard the one getting shot in the gut. I like it even less when a purposeful wounding (like being cut for torture purposes) is to the belly region. I was just reading a story where that very thing happened (McKay has the broken ribs, Sheppard being sliced in the gut). I knew it was coming, I don't know how, but it still bugged the snot out of me. I just think the chest region offers more angst potential since it contains the more vital organs.
So, uh, just where was he injured exactly? - This frustrates me beyond words. Sheppard is injured but the author takes several paragraphs - even chapters - to say where. All you get until then is "he was bleeding badly and it hurt." I'll be thinking he was shot in the shpulder only for it to turn out he was shot in the thigh. "He was injured in the side." Okay, which side? In the ribs or above the hip? I like details in a story as they make a fic more three dimensional. Being vague about where a person was injured flattens the story and even makes me stumble a bit during reading, especially if the wound ends up being not where I had first assumed.
And that's pretty much it. It really does help to voice (or write) such things and get them out in the open. I tend to let too many little, unimportant things get to me too easily. I try not to, try to ignore it, but it remains like an obnoxious tickle at the back of my mind. Venting like this helps, it really does. I have been able to let so many obnoxious, piddly things go so much more easily by voicing them.
