Okay, see, I almost always assume that bad fanfic that includes goofy stuff like those euphemisms is written as parody (or crackfic, as everyone likes to call it). I take it for the slapstick laugh-fest I think it's meant to be UNTIL I see other indications that the writer was taking their story and themselves far, far too seriously
Sadly, these were *entirely* serious, in one case the fic hadn't actually been too bad up until then and I just... my reaction was much like yours. Completely threw me out of the fic and I just couldn't continue reading it after that.
I do think as a general rule of thumb if you can't write cock (or prick, dick or even, depending on context, penis) you shouldn't be writing slashfic.
I have a certain amount of flexibility re: characterisation. My English Lit teacher endeared herself to me enormously when she once said you could argue whatever you wanted about a character (IIRC, it was Claudius and Polonius in Hamlet) as long as you could back it up and I have played with it myself just to see if I could show a character in a certain light and still make it reasonably believable. I'm not ever going to be happy with weepy!Sherlock or weepy!John (or weepy!anyone thinking about it), but in certain contexts, if the author plays it right I will accept that they might cry. When it's inconsistent within a fic, or the worst and sadly most common scenario, when they just seem to burst into tears at the drop of a hat - can't be having with that at all.
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Date: 2012-06-23 06:28 pm (UTC)Sadly, these were *entirely* serious, in one case the fic hadn't actually been too bad up until then and I just... my reaction was much like yours. Completely threw me out of the fic and I just couldn't continue reading it after that.
I do think as a general rule of thumb if you can't write cock (or prick, dick or even, depending on context, penis) you shouldn't be writing slashfic.
I have a certain amount of flexibility re: characterisation. My English Lit teacher endeared herself to me enormously when she once said you could argue whatever you wanted about a character (IIRC, it was Claudius and Polonius in Hamlet) as long as you could back it up and I have played with it myself just to see if I could show a character in a certain light and still make it reasonably believable. I'm not ever going to be happy with weepy!Sherlock or weepy!John (or weepy!anyone thinking about it), but in certain contexts, if the author plays it right I will accept that they might cry. When it's inconsistent within a fic, or the worst and sadly most common scenario, when they just seem to burst into tears at the drop of a hat - can't be having with that at all.