Writing Meme of Undeniable Coolness (stolen mercilessly from dukesfreers)

[eponymous_rose]

Name a character that you know I write or have written, and I’ll tell you:

a. What initially prompted me to like the character enough to write about him/her
b. One of his/her best traits
c. One of his/her worst traits
d. How easy/difficult I find it to write the character
e. The story/chapter/paragraph/phrase where I feel that I truly captured the character
f. My plans (if any) to write the character in the near future

I'm hoping this'll help kick-start me on some of my projects that've been neglected as I did the whole back-to-school thing. And it looks like fun! :D

(Feel free to mention characters I've only drabbled about/written in the distant past!)

Comments

[imsanehonest.livejournal.com]

*ponders* Well, I don't really know if you've written him yet, but if you have... Nine!

And if you haven't, how about Eight? Or, if you're feeling particularly daring, both!

Because I'm always feeling particularly <s>dashing</s> daring!

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

I shall do both of these the next chance I get! But tonight, my brain is shutting down.

And you will hear back about that fic shortly! :D

Nine!

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

a. What initially prompted me to like the character enough to write about him

For one thing, he was my first taste of the Doctor - and he really came across to me as a sort of reluctant hero. I knew next to nothing about the Doctor going into this thing, so the whole "His one constant companion - death" schtick really had an impact! I knew from the word "Go" (or rather, "Run!") that I wanted to write about him.

b. One of his/her best traits

It's something that never ceases to boggle me - that despite everything he's seen and done and lost, he still wants to go out and see everything and mess around with the universe just to get things back on track. It feels like sometimes he's got this terrible impression that he'd do it all again, just because that's what he does. He saves worlds as before, but now there's this regret - if he could save this one, why not any of the others?

c. One of his/her worst traits

That alien arrogance/weight of the world on his shoulders thing. He's extremely good at masking emotions, at shutting people out and feeling guilty, and when he should be mourning... well, it's not particularly healthy. But it makes for excellent fic fodder! That moment in "Parting of the Ways" when he's prepared to let the Daleks kill him and rule the earth, rather than be personally responsible for the destruction of another planet, sums it up perfectly.

d. How easy/difficult I find it to write the character

Not terrible if I've been watching first season Who directly beforehand. Otherwise, pretty dang difficult. I tend to slip into "safe ground" - i.e. lines directly from, or approximating, ones spoken in the series - and I never like having to do that. Need practice! *grins*

e. The story/chapter/paragraph/phrase where I feel that I truly captured the character

That first draft of the "Anywhere but Cardiff" ficathon entry. Y'know, the 4,000 words that I actually finished and then decided to discard and haven't really started again since. *grumbles about implausible plotlines* The, um, Eight/Nine conversation worked out pretty well - this is the bit of the fic I had to cut out, since it just messed around with everything a bit too much even for Doctor Who-level continuity. Plus, it was just a little side-plot in what was actually a pretty short fic! I didn't have time to do it justice - or to rationalise it properly, come to think of it! The idea is that Eight, amnesiac, regenerating, and yet ignorant of both of those facts because he's in shock, has just lost Gallifrey. He gets a wee bit reckless and decides to start messing with personal timelines - and for reasons I hadn't quite worked out yet when I scrapped the idea, the Ninth Doctor pokes his head in to interfere, and they have a bit of a chat.

The younger Doctor is staring, the little smile half-frozen on his lips. His hands, now out of his pockets, now back in, are shaking. “Tell me,” he says, and he’s suddenly intense and very still. “In my future, where you are-“ He swallows, then speaks quickly, almost in embarrassment. “Am I alone?”

For a moment, the Doctor can do nothing but gape at the vulnerability in those words, but eventually he feels himself shudder out of his surprise and leans back against the TARDIS. “You know what? I think that’s what I’m meant to tell you. That the Web of Time isn’t gone, isn’t obsolete. Don’t muck about with it just because you’re-“ He pauses, wonders how much to say to the wide-eyed figure before him. He’s fairly sure his younger self has to work through this alone, has to remember for himself to start grieving properly. “You have to maintain the timeline,” he continues lamely. “You have to guard it, guide these stumbling aliens through the right steps. See justice done. Someone has to do that.”


Really silly idea, but it was fun to write! :D

f. My plans (if any) to write the character in the near future

Look for Nine in the Anywhere but Cardiff ficathon entry, coming soon(ish) to an e-mail inbox near you! Currently, my notes have him foiling a blackmailing plot via time-travel, but who knows how that'll turn out?

Tune in next time!

*cue applause*

*announcer wanders offstage, grumbling about jelly beans*

Eight!

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

a. What initially prompted me to like the character enough to write about him

Well, unlike most people, my first impression of Eight was from the audios and not the TVM! This in itself did a lot to endear him to me. ;)

Really, I adore the idea of infinite plotlines stretching out from this one traumatised-and-slightly-nutty timelord and leading eventually to Nine. The possibilities are limitless - he's the Doctor who's been almost completely defined outside of canon. He's insanely fun to write!

b. One of his/her best traits

Insert-first-chapter-of-"Vampire Science"-here, really. Eight's having a small-talky conversation with someone named Carolyn:

She nodded. 'Yeah. A tiny change in a person's genes, and they get cancer. Or blue eyes.'

'It's stunning, it's something I could never come up with in a million years.' He grinned suddenly.
'Why not get enthusiastic about it?'

'I dunno,' she said. 'You just don't get overjoyed about things like lipids.'

'A pharmacist on Lacaille 8760 once gave me a half-hour lecture about lipids. Did you know
that if you suddenly lost all of your lipids, your cell membranes would disintegrate, and your
whole body would melt into a puddle? Think about that – isn't it just bizarre?'

'Guess so,' she said, feeling the beginning of a smile. She hadn't thought about things like that
for a long time.

In large doses, it's... well, it's really a bit obnoxious. But little glimmers like that? Awesome. It's the ability to see the world with new eyes - and the way you can twist that and see darkness even in beauty. Knowledge comes at a cost - seeing something differently works both ways.

c. One of his/her worst traits

It's a real sort of Doctorly attribute in general, but it seems a lot more startling coming from Eight than any of the others - the absolute inability to comprehend the way he affects everyone else's lives. Audio!Eight gets royally pissed at Charley for putting herself in danger by sticking with him when he expressly told her to stay out of his way. Book!Eight develops several very intense relationships, but still can't understand why they'd do horrible things to save him (see poor Karl in "The Year of Intelligent Tigers" - which is probably the closest thing to canonical Doctor-slash since Captain Jack!). He's unforgiving when it comes to people putting his welfare above their own.

He's also a bit of a jerk when he does things like in "Vampire Science", after pulling Carolyn into a big adventure:

Maybe, when she was ready to remember it, she'd remember the magic. Maybe she might
even get a little overjoyed about it.

'Wait,' she called. 'Maybe I can see you tomorrow?'

He grinned hugely. 'I've no idea. We don't even know if we'll be around tomorrow.'

And they weren't.

d. How easy/difficult I find it to write the character

Actually, not too bad in terms of dialogue! But that would be, of course, because I'm so used to just hearing his voice. I draw a lot more on audio!Eight than on book!Eight when I write him. Physical mannerisms get a bit tricky, though, because there's only the TVM to work with and all the really obvious ones from the movie have been done to death in the books.

e. The story/chapter/paragraph/phrase where I feel that I truly captured the character

Probably still more cut scenes from the Anywhere but Cardiff ficathon. Way too angsty, most of 'em, but some make me happy and then disappointed that I won't get to cram 'em into the final product.

*waits impatiently for special edition DVD*

f. My plans (if any) to write the character in the near future

Yup, he's still in that ficathon piece! My notes have him... looking for a young boy's lost pet Wallatick, whatever that may be. How suspenseful. Ahem.