Cam's Open Letter to Doctor Who Fanfic Writers

[misscam]

Oi! Doctor Who Fanfic Writers! A moment of your time, please.

(Not all of this will apply to all of you and indeed, some of you may be utterly brilliant and not bugger up on any of these issues and if so, I probably kiss your feet and leave nice reviews for your stories. If I don't, remind me I should.)

Spoilers for the 2005 series. Rather fandom specific, but a lot applies to fanfic in general. Loooong rant.

For the love of the Doctor, mind your bloody English! Spelling and grammar does matter. If a reader spends more time trying to understand what a sentence is trying to say than you spent writing the whole chapter, that's not a good thing, okay? You might not notice spelling and grammar when it's done well, but you sure as heck do when it isn't. It can ruin the flow of a story, yank readers out of the images you're trying to put in their mind and just plain annoy them away. Spellcheck. Proofread. Get a beta. Spare a little love for the language. It is after all the tool of the trade. If you break it, you ain't getting a new one.

Doctor, the Shagmaker. Whether you believe the Doctor is asexual, heterosexual, bisexual, homosexual, just Rose-sexual or kinky, please do remember his sexuality or lack thereof isn't the only aspect of his character. Also, he's not a teenager. He does not declare his TWUWUB for Rose with Evanescence. He does not weep while giving Rose the best she's ever had. He is not an utter idiot with no brain-fuctions but hormones. He's a 900 year old (++) Time Lord from Gallifrey who's lost his entire people and still manages to care for the Universe and attempts to make it better. He can be silly and dark and flirty, but he's still not walking sex only. Thank you. (To quote lotus79, "depth is sexier than sexiness".)

Ten is not the anti-Christ. It's still the Doctor. Regeneration has been an aspect of Doctor Who since very early on. In fact, if not for it, you probably wouldn't have been able to enjoy the show as you do now. Hey, I adore Nine too, but change has always been the name of the show. You don't have to love it, but let's keep the bashing out of fanfic, yeah? How you feel about the Ten is not how Rose feels about Ten, mmkay? Also, did I mention he's still the Doctor? Because he still is. (See: Nine talking about events previous Doctors have had as "I", Ten talking about taking Rose's hand for the first time as "I".)

Oh, look! It's a plot-hole the size of Norway! Oh yes, most love a good smuterrific story. But sometimes, a story does have a plot too. And when you opt for a plot, try not making it an inane trip of mindboggling stupidity, yeah? Use your brain (it's such a wonderful thinking tool). What would be the consequences of the actions in your story? Does the plot have such holes the draft is like winds of a hurricane? Do you spend more time describing Rose's outfit than thinking over the plot? Does the Doctor appear to have a case of stupidgitis? Consider your plots before you write them. If they fail a kindergarten intellegence test, maybe it's time to replot.

Muhahahaha! (Aka Villain Motivation Factor) Okay, so Doctor Who is a show where the bad guy was once a cactus and the most beloved villains are pepperpots with plungers. But still. If your villain exist merely to laugh evilly and make Rose and the Doctor shag for their lives (and everyone else's perverted enjoyment), it might be just a liiiiiiitle thin. Did baddie have a bad childhood? Does blue really offend him? Is world domination all he's ever wanted and the Doctor is in the way? Is he in it for the money? Is he in it for the chicks? Is he in it for the outfits? Motivation matters. And hey, sometimes having a baddie with a cause might even help with the issue of plot (see above).

Rose, why are you riding a My Little Pony? Crossovers can be fun. But look at the compatibility factor of the different Universes before you plundge wildly into it, hmm? Just because you love both things doesn't mean they're destined soulmates.

And the Doctor's sword of passion plunged into Rose's moist cave of wetness... No. Badly written sex hurts the vagina, precious. Romance novels are usually not your best guide, nor is letters to Penthouse. Before you dvelve into all the naughtiness, know at least these things:
1. The layout. (For instance, the hymen is not the clitoris. Okay?)
2. The mechanics. (Amazing how much people can muck up in-out in-out business.)
3. There is not such thing as InstaOrgasm. (Even teenage boys need a little work.)
4. Simultaneous orgasms are not common. (They can happen, but every time Rose and the Doctor do the deed? Do they teach that at Gallifreyan University or something?)
5. Euphemisms for vagina and penis can be good, since vagina and penis are such clinical terms. But doorbell? Doctorhood? No. (Also in the argh-my-smut-is-ruined-by-the-giggles category: manpole, core, honeyed sweetness, throbbing manhood, throbbing member, love centre.)
6. Foreplay is good. Very good. Goodgoodgood. (Did I mention good?)
7. Not every time is the best ever. (Not even with the Doctor, skilled as he might be with his hands.)
8. Creativity is good, but certain positions are impossible even if you've mastered yoga. (The human body is not play-dough. It does not bend every which way.)

Rose, the WonderWomb. So, so many babies. Rose and the Doctor could have a kindergarten by themselves, it seems. To which I'd like to point out that 1) we don't know if they're compatiable to have babies together 2) you don't need babies for it to be OMGTWUBWUB (for that matter, you don't even need sex) and 3) babies are a lot of work. It would have some major implications for both. Take it into account before you knock her (or him, if you're creative/perverted/evil) up. (As lotus79 says, "the major implications are what makes the idea so interesting".)

"Those would have been terrible last words." Doctor Who has a lot of great dialogue. Don't ruin that love by having the Doctor and Rose suddenly speak like American teenagers, yeah? It's a British show with characters - yes, even the aliens - using a lot of British slang. If you don't know it too well, the Internet is full of Brits who can teach. (A little bribe won't hurt your chances there.)

Once upon a time, there was this Mel Gibson movie... Doctor Who visits a lot of historical settings. The show does not use Hollywood movies for research on this settings. Neither should you.

"Oh Doctor-widdlums, I love you!" "I love you too, Rose of my hearts!" "Let's get married while doves coo overhead and the clouds make out a giant heart!" Too much sugar kills your teeth and leaves you with bleeding gums, you know? Rose and the Doctor are cute together, but you needn't dip it in syrup, sugarcoat it and then serve it with cookies and chocolate and an extra helping of sweet. Sometimes, understated is good. (And also reduces the chances of making your readers barf.)

"Ooooh, Theta!" Try "oooooh no!" The Doctor prefers to be known as the Doctor. Theta is a Canon nickname yes, but he also didn't seem to care much for being called it and it hasn't resurfaced in Who Canon. He's unlikely to tell Rose to use it as her own personal pet name for him to symbolize their TWUWUB. The Doctor, unless you didn't notice, isn't too sharing in the information about himself department.

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! BAD REVIEW! Oh, knock it off, you whinging wailer. You post in public, you get reviews in public. Sometimes, you get a flame, and that sucks. Sometimes, you get bad concrit, and that can feel sucky as well. But throwing a temper tantrum about how meeeeeaaaaan it is to leave a bad review and how your fragile flower of creativity is crushed (CRUSHED!) and you'll never write again? Bitch, please. That's attention-wailing. Moan and hiss in private, consider if maybe the concrit had something of worth (and it can) you can use to write better next time and hey! you might even start getting less bad reviews and have nothing to throw temper tantrums over. Your readers won't have to get annoyed at wah-wah from you and your fragile flower of creativity might bloom into a shrubbery not even weedkillers can destroy.

"It's only fanfic!" Yes. And this is only an opinion and I am a fanfic snob. But see, being a fan of Doctor Who, I like to see it treated with a little respect. In fanfic as well. And I like it to actually have some faint resemblance to the show and the characters in it, you know? Otherwise, why aren't you just writing original fiction?

Whoops. That went on for a bit. Ah well.

Comments

[lotus79.livejournal.com]

I agree. And yeah, you knew that.

Still strangely drawn to babyfics; but for smeg's sake, make them angsty and *realistic*, not "oh, we'll just get married and get a flat in London and keep the TARDIS in the living room and travel on weekends."

Life isn't neat like that, a baby would throw a huge spanner in the works. Sometimes that's fun to explore.

[20thcenturyvole.livejournal.com]

Yay! Kill them, Miss Cam. Kill them ded. And then bring them back to life so you can kill them some more.

There is no excuse for badfic (unless it's "Oops, wrote this piece of crap when I was fourteen and now that I'm older and wiser I cringe and admit it is crap, nothin' to see here, move along..."), and I don't mind long rants on this subject, especially when they are well-constructed like this one and not just whinges. In fact, I endorse them.

[velocityofsound.livejournal.com]

I have so used core in a story. *giggle* But I personally love when people use the word penis over and over in a smutty fic.

She touched his penis, and his penis became hard. She then marveled at how large his penis was, and the little drips of come/cum/scum/beat a drum/semen/seamen/flotsam/jetsam/jizzum that beaded at the tip of his penis. So she bent over and licked his penis. His penis throbbed. The throb of his penis excited her. She wanted his penis inside her. She had to have his penis right now. She never wanted to see any other man's penis again, because his penis was so perfect and she was so in love with him, and it. She wondered idly if his penis could be used for other purposes, like perhaps in the kitchen as a cooking aide. Then she straddled him and rode his penis. Eventually his penis erupted in a voluminous spray of penis juice. She sighed, and cuddled up with his penis and dreamed of his penis all night long.

It makes me almost want to turn my back on the organ completely. I can only picture it with a little face drawn on it, or perhaps a funny little hat, in these circumstances.

[fondued-jicama.livejournal.com]

Very fun. I especially appreciated your section on euphemisims for sex. It reminds me of a story I read once when I was about eleven or twelve, where the odd term used was 'his hand.' I spent more time trying to figure out what was being implied than actually reading the passage. XD

(As lotus79 says, "the major implications are what makes the idea so interesting".)

Exactly. I think it would be interesting and have great potential for drama and kewliness, but not unless someone was a very good writer. Which is why I'm not trying. XD

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Ah, Cam, you cracks me up. So true, and yet so funny. Especially the section on the sex, which made me laugh so hard.

And the Doctor's sword of passion plunged into Rose's moist cave of wetness...
I wailed with laughter when I read this. Mainly because I have actually read fics ( not this fandom, mind) with that sort of bad in them.

1. The layout. (For instance, the hymen is not the clitoris. Okay?)
Oh, ouch.

4. Simultaneous orgasms are not common. (They can happen, but every time Rose and the Doctor do the deed? Do they teach that at Gallifreyan University or something?)
I have the mental image of the young Doctor at his lectures on this at the Prydonian Academy. Safe to say, it is rather mind-boggling.

5. Euphemisms for vagina and penis can be good, since vagina and penis are such clinical terms. But doorbell? Doctorhood? No. (Also in the argh-my-smut-is-ruined-by-the-giggles category: manpole, core, honeyed sweetness, throbbing manhood, throbbing member, love centre.)
*giggles again*

"It's only fanfic!" Yes. And this is only an opinion and I am a fanfic snob. But see, being a fan of Doctor Who, I like to see it treated with a little respect. In fanfic as well.
There was a great quote I read on a forum about this, years and years back. The original source was lost, but it goes like this:

"Fanfiction is written by a fan. My opinion is that if someone completely mangles canon as we know it then they aren't a fan."

Pretty much my opinion of fanfic, really.

But many, many thankies for the rant. I needed it. Especially the "Ten is not the Anti-Christ" thing. I'm enjoying getting hyped up for Christmas, I don't need bashers to take all the fun out of it.

[boz4pm.livejournal.com]

And the Doctor's sword of passion plunged into Rose's moist cave of wetness... No. Badly written sex hurts the vagina, precious. Bwahahahaha! *lol* SO true. And your list of things to remember/be aware of in this category are excellent. Interestingly OSA (scribeoz, or Open Scrolls Archive) have a similar thing somewhere - they have NC-17 smut there and would prefer to have it well written and making sense, thank you very much. The other thing that annoys me about smutfic is when the reader is either too coy to explain properly what is where and who is doing what with which (in which case, don't go there and leave it to the imagination - otherwise explain rather than leave your readers utterly baffled), or else clearly has no experience and doesn't know their arse from their elbow (literally in some cases) in which case, again, best leave well alone and only hint and suggest and let the reader's imagination do the work.

So, um, yeah. Good advice, misscam. :)

[speshulduck.livejournal.com]

If I see one more Ten-bashing fic, I'm really not going to be held accountable for my actions. At least meet the guy before you decide you hate him. Jesus, my mother is still too attached to Nine to like Ten yet, but she's going to give him a try before she decides she hates him. And she'll love him if she wants to keep me for a daughter...

[cantralian.livejournal.com]

Oh Cam, this is a thing of beauty, truly it is. Thank you so much.

I love it all far too much to pick out bits, except: Rose, the WonderWomb. So, so many babies. Rose and the Doctor could have a kindergarten by themselves, it seems. Thank you! Most baby-fic drives me batty, for oh so many reasons, not the least due to plot holes, size of Norway, AND when it becomes Rose's be-all, end-all reason for existence!

Plus I have to agree with speshulduck: one more Ten bashing - or even retconning him out of existence because OMG!!11! he's NOTTEHDOCTOR!! - fic and I'll tear out my hair. Does it never occur to people that one of the reasons the Doctor's so amazing is the weight of centuries he carries?

*adds to memories*

And it almost makes up for all the evil badfic you keep linking to! Evil, evil, evil badfic, it needs to be dead, dead, dead.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Since I test-ran the rant on you, yes I did :P

Yeah. All roses and great shags do get dull after a while.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Oh, hell, I've been in the "wrote this piece of crap when I was a teenager". And really, if no one hadn't told me it was crap, I might still be there. You live and learn - if you're willing. Which is why I tend to post more general rants and be more geared towards helpful for individual writers. Heck, I even beta for younger writers sometimes.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

YOU MADE ME SO HOT WITH THAT!!!!!11

Ew. *cleases self*

Whenever I see core, I just wonder who's going nuclear, I fear.

Penis with Santa Hat, for the season?

[misscam.livejournal.com]

His... Hand? So when did you know what his actual hand was doing as opposed to his penis? And also, how does a penis in any way, shape or form look anything near a hand? Maybe an especially thick finger, but hand...?

*boggles a bit*

:P You write well enough, so you have no excuse.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've read that sort of shit myself, and some almost as bad in Doctor Who fic. It really does burn and it feels like reading some sort of weird LSD trip where giant flowers have colourful sex.

Hehehehe. That sounds like a scene from a porn version of Doctor Who. Eeevil.

Good quote. I quite agree. I mean, I enjoy a good AU fic and all, but the best AU fics know Canon very well and take into account the full consequences of changes in it.

I hear ya. And I truly do love Nine and it still bugs me endlessly. Knock it off before I write giant Ten love fests to make up for it, people!

[misscam.livejournal.com]

There is a fine line between not being explicit (which I prefer) and being so vague it's leaving no hook for the imagination to hang on at all, I suppose.

I think it's because smutfics tend to get more attention than fics without it, so even inexperienced authors try to write it for that reason. Which is a shame, since there's nothing wrong with doing fade-to-black. Some stick with that their whole life and manage to do fine.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

*points to self* Hey, I'm still on the fence on Ten and love Nine like whoa. But good grief, the guy hasn't even had a full ep as Ten yet. A weeeeee bit early to judge, I'd say.

Bashers makes me want to love Ten just to be contrary. Knock it off.

[misscam.livejournal.com]

No. They're too busy checking out his bum.

But if I never linked to badfic, you would never know why I ranted so. Wail, wah, woe. Besides, it's good for your brain. It steels it against the badfic you accidentally read.

I'd almost miss badfic if it died. Almost.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

Yes, bad porn is highly amusing in a crackified way. I've seen some classic stuff show up on various forums, and you can't help but goggle at some of it.

Porn version of Doctor Who...I think you broke my brain.

I love that quote. It always makes me want to throw it at idiot fanbrats. And I agree with you totally on AUs.

Heh. From the sound of it, you seem to be getting they way I was about Ron Weasley. Never cared for him much in the first few books, then hit the online fandom and saw all the bashing, and sort of ended up liking him just because I felt sorry for the poor dear.

Though I wouldn't say no to Ten lovefests. Though, oddly enough, I am so anxious for TCI to get here, I am actually having trouble reading Tenfic at the moment. I just want to see the real thing...

[briasoleil.livejournal.com]

Badfic writers need to be sent away and have their pens, pencils, paper, notebooks, laptops, desktops, etc. removed from them asap. Regardless of the fandom.

Seriously, they make my brain bleed and my mind boggle. And they make the baby Jesus cry.

[speshulduck.livejournal.com]

See, here's the real question: who doesn't love Nine like whoa?

[speshulduck.livejournal.com]

You know what really gets me about the retconning fic that's going on right now on time_and_chips? The author is posting with a David Tennant icon. It confuses me to no end.

[git-the-goddess.livejournal.com]

Yes, like a certain ' sword of passion'. Doesn't he realise he should have a look at a cave before charging right in? Does he not stop to wonder how bat shit got there? What if the cave had teeth? But, noooo, he plunged into Rose's "moist cave of wetness". I hope he gets small blind insects in bad places.

[megpie71.livejournal.com]

Still strangely drawn to babyfics; but for smeg's sake, make them angsty and *realistic*, not "oh, we'll just get married and get a flat in London and keep the TARDIS in the living room and travel on weekends."

Life isn't neat like that, a baby would throw a huge spanner in the works. Sometimes that's fun to explore.

Let's not forget that the TARDIS is canonically *unreliable*. This has been a factor in the show since the very beginning - it's a Type 40 that was in for maintenance when the Doctor "acquired" it. It has malfunctioning just about everything, and there has *always* been a lot of trouble getting parts. This is why the Doctor tended to defeat the Master and the Rani by borrowing bits and pieces from their TARDISes.

Travelling "just on weekends" would be interesting for the first time. Of course, coming back with the child about three years older than when they left might just raise some questions with the neighbours.

However, as an old-time (since the mid - late 1970s) Dr Who fan, I'd point out that the Doctor is not just a different species, he's from a whole different biosphere to Rose. He has two hearts, which is only the begining of his differences from a standard human. (I believe there's a bit of an exam done by medical personnel at the beginning of "Spearhead from Space", or whichever one the first Jon Pertwee story was, which enumerates some of his differences from the human norm).

I'd put it this way: in this fandom, you have something like thirty years of backstory to look up. I'd suggest checking out something like the "Dr Who Discontinuity Guide" for a summary of the canon history (covers all the way from 1 through 7 - the original BBC series of multiple half-hour episode storylines at approx 13 stories per set). That way, as a fan of the whole business, you don't wind up tripping over the canon.

[megpie71.livejournal.com]

Old weirdos like me, who fell in love with the fourth doctor at about age ten, and who haven't seen enough of the latest series (bad TV reception, don't ask) to form an opinion one way or the other.

[drakyndra.livejournal.com]

I just realised, but in that uber-spoiler picture from TCI, Ten is waving around a sword. And it was filmed in some Welsh caves.

...

Argh! *brain go boom*

[highwindpav.livejournal.com]

...

...Doctorhood...?

::snrk:: ::snort:: ::laughs hysterically:: That's...that's at least ten times worse than Elfhood! (Although Elfhood inevitably leads me to wonder if anyone has used Hobbithood, Dwarfhood, Urukhood, or Istarihood...)

My favorite bad description is anything involving the word 'quivering', but that's just me.

Rant on.