Novelty

[ithildin]

How weird is it to see a story by me of all people listed as the only non xover fic on the hl_flash newsletter? It's one of those rare cosmic events [snicker]

Comments

[unovis-lj.livejournal.com]

Hasn't that happened before?
Sadly, I think the preponderance of crossover fic is an indication of a dying fandom.

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

I don't think so :) Though I may have missed it if it did. I just so rarely write non crossovers, I don't expect to be the only one when I do!

[elistaire.livejournal.com]

It makes you stand out! :)

It is weird to see so much crossover fic, though. I love crossovers, but usually that means I need to know *both* fandoms!

[elistaire.livejournal.com]

Sadly, I think the preponderance of crossover fic is an indication of a dying fandom.

It's an interesting theory (and sad if true for us HL'ers!) but how can we check to know if it is a viable theory or not? How dying is dying? Maybe we're just going through a rebirth?

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

I usually do too, though if I know an authour and like their work, I'll sometimes take a stab at a xover where I only know one. Like recently, I've been reading a SPN/Magnificent 7 cross. I have no clue about M7, but I'm enjoying the story immensely!

Which really makes me appreciate comments from someone who braved one of my xovers not knowing one of the fandoms and they enjoyed it anyway. It's always a nice thing :)

[unovis-lj.livejournal.com]

Highlander may be unusual, if not unique, since the great majority of the crossovers focus on one character, Methos, and export him to other universes. It's not like the AU or crack fads that have hit other fandoms -- this is for the most part a sub-fandom of one character. The wider resources and identity of the source universe, to say nothing of its title character, are discarded in favor of the Methos "doll" who can be dressed up in other clothes and transplanted to newer playhouses, leaving the fandom behind.

I have seen at least one crossover take HL's version of Immortality and the Game to another universe and some crossovers that use Richie as the doll instead of Methos. Still, there's the feeling that the source universe is being scavenged or looted instead of renewed.

I haven't seen this occur in other fandoms of a similar age -- for one character to be abstracted from, say, The Sentinel or due South or Starsky & Hutch or even Star Trek. I don't know if you can compare it to anything else. There doesn't seem to be a corresponding flow of influences and interest *into* Highlander, exploring its universe or its other main characters, so yes, it seems to me like an indication of failing health.

ETA: Heh, and having said that, lithiumdoll/halcyon_shift's Sweet Charity story is a x-over taking Numb3rs into Seacouver

[elistaire.livejournal.com]

I always thought it was just more about the set-up of the Highlander universe. Because the characters live for such a long time, and the majority of any character's life is not spent with another character (for example, Duncan and Methos meet in season 3, so all of Methos' life before that has nothing to do with DM and Dm's life has nothing to do with Methos, except what we write in fic, of course) it makes more sense for them to get inserted into the other universe.

Scavenged the HL-verse might be, but if a writer's main fandom is something else, it says that HL has some staying power if they're pulling characters into their world.

But I agree-- HL doesn't seem to work like those other older fandoms. They seem much more consistent over time. Our writers seem more fluid.

[unovis-lj.livejournal.com]

We'll have to see if the vampires from Buffy and Angel are abstracted in a few years. I don't think one particular vampire was taken from Forever Knight to appear in other fandoms' settings to the extent that Methos has traveled, but I'm not as familiar with that fandom. I don't think, however, that Methos is borrowed for historicals very much. He and Richie appear in sf universes set in the future, though.

Did earlier incarnations of Dr Who appear in a lot of crossovers? If ever there was a flexible character, and a fandom of one, it's he/they.

I think that Highlander has had some very talented writers, though maybe not as experimental as in other fandoms -- or former writers from HL have gone on to experiment in other fandoms with larger and more active groups.

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

FK is virtually dead in terms of any kind of fic these days. Back in the day though, FK characters would appear in a fair share of crossovers. Actually, the first fic I ever posted 12 years ago was a Highlander/Forever Knight crossover. The universes work well together for me. And I know it was a popular xover pairing for a lot of FK fans.

As for Doctor Who, one of the very first zines I ever bought was an amateur press type book that was called "The Doctor Meets the Hobbits" or something along those lines. I remember he used the sonic screwdriver to free them from Old Man Willow. I still have it packed in a box somewhere. I remember a fair amount of B7 crossovers to, back pre-internet.

[elistaire.livejournal.com]

Forever Knight wasn't ever that big a fandom, is my understanding. And the characters worked more when together, cutting one free of the others is a bit more difficult -- even their flashbacks have the other vampires in them constantly!

We will have to keep and eye on Buffy and Angel; but they have more source material than HL, so that might be a factor too.

I don't follow Dr Who that's older than Nine, Ten, so I don't know about the propensity for crossovers there.

And we have lost a lot of our writers to other fandoms. Which makes me sad. :(

[ithildyn.livejournal.com]

At the time FK was on the air, its fandom was comparable to Highlanders. I was in both fandoms at the time. But HL got three more seasons than FK did, and there was a lot of bitterness about how the PTBs screwed over the show, which didn't help once the show ended.

[elistaire.livejournal.com]

At the time FK was on the air, its fandom was comparable to Highlanders.

Well, crap, that doesn't bode well for HL, does it? *sigh* I came along much later, when it wasn't being aired, so I'd always had a different impression of it in fandom.

Plus, there's always season 3, which is almost like a totally new show given that the entire focus of the show *changed*, and then they ended it the way they did. No wonder all the fans were upset. At least with some more open ended finales, one can write more fanfic. *is also bitter about season 3*