Help me, I can't friggin stop!!!!!!!!
Jul. 6th, 2014 04:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dmxratedFeeling a lot better than I was last post, but I still can't quite get the frickin fic out of my head. Chelle did tell me before, regarding the first fic on this list, just to ignore its existence, because that's the only way she was finally able to overcome her issues with this anime called Shinzo. Right now, though, my muse is still down, I don't want to play anything because I don't need any aggravation, I don't know what else to do with my time, and I would like to make sense of why certain Lucky Star emo-fics I've read before bother me so much in order to come to terms with things.
Mind you, not all depressive fics I've read have bothered me so much as the ones I'm listing here. With Lucky Star alone, I did enjoy The Loss of Innocence, Broken Dreams, I Was Kagami Hiiragi, An Otaku's Dilemma, Love Lived and Love Lost, Stars Above, and Lucky Apocalypse Stories.
This entry contains unmarked spoilers, due to the whole list itself being covered by one big cut. Not gonna hyperlink to any of the fics in question either, because I just wanna keep things moving as I write this. Obviously NOT for the faint of heart.
1) No Birds, No Bees
The world is dead. At least, the male half. The other half is fighting over the scraps. Morality, ethics, kindness; they're all relics of an age gone by. The only winners are those who instill their will...for everyone else to take a permanent dirt nap. Or perhaps, those who have died are the true winners, and this is just a cruel game to be the first place loser.
Premise seemed interesting enough at first. First of currently two chapters ends with Ayano (initially unidentified) firing from a rooftop at the main characters with a bow and arrows, before being shot down by Yui. Ayano is still alive upon landing, says something, and then gets a spasm in her arm. Konata finishing her right off is not a mercy kill; she narrates afterwards that if you don't trust someone with your life in such a world as this fic presents, you kill them. I know she just did try to kill them, and it's not like they'd be able to catch up on things in such condition as she's in, but it was only after she lands that she recognizes Tsukasa and Konata; I'm sure she would have made a perfectly good recruit had she not been injured.
Making this even worse, is that this makes everything that happens in the anime, the manga, or anyone else's fanfics that the unexplained male holocaust supposedly could take place after. If this is what would become of everyone after such an event, one will not re-read or re-watch anything canon and see it the same way as before with that on mind.
Chapter 2 only cements things further, that the only reason Konata didn't simply kill herself is a desire to outlive her friends, rather than to help them survive. According to author Arkytal, she became that way basically due to an overload of despair from wanting humanity's better days back, and having had to be a total animal just to survive past the point that her psyche is warped beyond repair.
Turns out (fortunately, maybe, though I only learned in a PM exchange,) that this actually branches off after episode 6 of the anime. That explains perfectly why the main four are with eachother, Nanako, and Yui, but not Yutaka (who came to live with Konata and met Minami in episode 14). But, that's not the only plus (if you even count that as one).
Oddly enough, I had brought this up in a comparison to my upcoming sumo fic. Months earlier, Chelle stated that she'd probably hate the fic due to how little sense things make based on the premise alone. I thought until I mentioned it recently, that it had to do with whatever force that killed off all human males but none of the females being a wallbanger in and of itself. Turns out that her real gripe with it is some misogynistic Fridge Logic as to why the remainder of humanity is reduced to acting barbaric towards one another just to survive, instead of trying to rebuild society, complete with certain Unfortunate Implications that only men have actual morals while women need guidance throughout life. (To be fair, the author did intend this as a reflection of the horrific things soldiers did to one another to survive during the Vietnam and Gulf Wars, but I'm sure Chelle would find differences between that and this.) The premise of both this fic and my own planned one could be done well enough, according to her, but can also easily alienate people if done wrong.
2) StarCrossed
Seven years have passed since their graduation from high school. Our main characters have all grown up and are living their own lives. But they don't seem to be quite happy with their current circumstances.
This whole fic is about the four main characters' lives crashing down, all of it being their own fault for not seeking help from one another. The fact that this fic focuses primarily on the main four is what makes this really depressing. Granted, Minami fails the same test by God in the epilogue by running away from her problems and dying in a plane crash, but while her problems have gone unspecified, the fact that Yui is said to have been fired from the police force due to her cousin Konata's acts of killing Patricia (accidentally) and Soujiro (said to be "unconscious") implies that her problems stem from the actions of the main four. So, that actually makes it a little better, but not much.
3) Bonds
Ryouou's last day standing...
The above summary is my own as DMXrated01. The original summary said something about a school shooter, and it sounded interesting enough.
The problems begin, though, when the police arrive, only to establish a perimeter above the school and specify that the Special Assault Team will arrive within two hours. This is explained later by office politics, where authorities want as much credit as possible with as little loss of their own personnel as possible. This is the main reason I kept up with it, especially given how rapidly it had been updated the first time. I wanted to see what kind of comeuppance they would get, but that was left rather vague in the end, where all that was stated about it was that every nation in the world demanded to know what went wrong, and those in charge are still playing the blame game with one another. (Bloodscorpion88 did tell me that in real life crises such as Columbine, people in power tend to get off rather easily for their misaction due to said power. From what I gathered from a certain online document, though, there were at least two successful lawsuits filed against the police after the Columbine massacre; even though most other suits were more or less thrown out, that still says something contrary to BS88's reply to me.)
Then we have the Hunt Club, which is the main reason why antagonist and manga-canon character Izumi Wakase shoots up her entire school in retribution for all the torment the club put her through. BS88 did tell me one time about the possibility of fanfic about the before and after of this one. Obviously, I'm not likely going to read it should it ever materialize; the things Konata describes they did to her at one point are especially not some that I'd want to read in detail.
Worst of all, though, among the many canon characters to die in Izumi's raid, BS88 went blatantly out of his way to sever all the particularly close friendships between the characters, save for that between Konata and Yutaka. Kagami is lost particularly to Tsukasa, Konata, and Ayano, Misao is lost particularly to Ayano, and Minami is lost especially to Yutaka and Miyuki. Granted, this is obviously the reason this fic is called "Bonds", complete with Ayano talking to Konata in the hospital about maintaining friends with those whom they all still have left, but Broken Dreams was more bearable for having several characters killed off more naturally by its antagonist Koichi Shido (and Yutaka dying an unrelated death).
(I made an author's note at the end of the fic, about my dislike for it and my former plans for the Hunt Club during Starbound, exclusively to do justice for this story.)
4) Battle Star Royale
Class 3-B has been chosen to participate in the Battle Royale, the rules are simple: kill everyone. How will Konata and her friends react to this violent game?
Seemed interesting at first, until we learn in chapter 2 that this program is sponsored by the government and enforced by the military. Skimmed through from there, and discovered that Tsukasa inexplicably develops a way to hack the devices they're wearing off, only to die with Miyuki by another classmate.
What makes this particularly suck, is that the good days between the main four are over and most of those students will be lost to their parents and any other family without closure, thanks to a blatant human rights violation by the Japanese government. I have no interest at all in reading any part of this, even just to see what happens in the end.
If anything makes me feel better, it's that I did suggest that it be categorized as a crossover, due to the presence of certain characters from the original Battle Royale. Saharet followed through with that, and I now feel better about it now that at least it's not in the main archive anymore.
5) Cries Unheard
Something new and terrifying has entered the world of four ordinary high school girls. Though this new force affects them in different ways, they will soon be united by the same concept: the fear that haunts them every time they meet this force.
Another fic by bloodscorpion88, who has recently returned as bloodscorpion4ever. Description is pretty vague on its own, so I thought why not?
First chapter starts with a foregone conclusion regarding the fates of the antagonists, after which Miyuki reports herself for killing them and is interrogated by Yui. This sounds interesting so far.
Chapter 2 takes place upon the mains' graduations and the closure of school for the summer. Nevermind that summer vacation and the interlude between school years are shown in the anime at very different points, but okay, maybe the author just wants to tell his damn stories and can't be bothered to get every little fact right, especially if this (like I Was Kagami Hiiragi) is based on an actual experience of his own. Anyway, we meet our first antagonists, Satoshi Fujisaku and his parents Kai and Yukiko. Miyuki is filled in by her parents about a marriage proposal between her and Satoshi. Miyuki and her parents are completely oblivious to their intentions, and Satoshi's first victim becomes Minami's dog Cherry next door, which he kills with a poisoned doggy treat after leaving their mansion. Always love to see who goes down in something dark like this.
Chapter 3 introduces Riku Kitamaru, introduced to Tsukasa and Kagami by Satoshi, and whom Kagami becomes intimate with while barely knowing him.
Chapter 4 breaks from the main story and continues with Yui's interrogation of Miyuki, until a thrashing Kagami is brought to the police station for having stabbed one of the boys to death and then some. Both Yui and I myself have a sinking feeling that Tsukasa and especially Konata have also killed someone or another.
Chapter 5 is where it becomes painful to read, particularly the scene involving Satoshi monitoring Miyuki having a shower through his laptop, where we also learn that his own father is a Yakuza boss who is in on this whole thing.
Skipped chapters 6 and 7. Read chapter 8, which is the third post-slaughter chapter so far, because at least those are still interesting. That is the chapter that was uploaded just last night, and cost me any real sleep all night long, due to the extent Miyuki describes of the boys' atrocities. It is at this point that I am not even gonna touch those chapters until this fic is concluded. Not that the actions of Koichi Shido in Broken Dreams or Yuka Miyakawa and Ryuji Katsumoto in I Was Kagami Hiiragi are any less vile, but their roles stem entirely from Kagami alone. Here, the torment Miyuki describes is mostly upon all the main four, though Yutaka is also said to be held hostage in order for Konata's exploitation to be enabled.
Considering Yuka's single-handed reign of terror even after she disposes of Ryuji (yes, her own cousin and cohort), it's just about guaranteed that others besides them are also suffering. Satoshi offing Minami's dog is evidence enough, and several reviews also mention something being done to Minoru. However, whether they're also suffering just as horribly or simply being held hostage might be a different story. Let's look at the facts so far:
Miyuki mentions that Satoshi demands security facts from her about the loading docks of her father's company, at the threat of posting nude screenshots of her all over the Internet. The purpose behind this is so that Kai can smuggle do-I-want-to-know-what? through them, with clear enough intent to kill people. Satoshi's friends antagonizing Miyuki's is a method to keep them from interfering with their plans, so it seems likely enough that Minami, Yutaka, Hiyori, Patricia, Ayano, and Misao are not gonna be one bit better off than Konata, Tsukasa, or Kagami.
Well, on the plus side, whether Miyuki and Kagami get acquitted or not, what Kai plans to do doesn't sound like anything he'll be getting away with once he's brought to court and the girls' stories are all put together, if he's even still alive then.
Whatever all happens in the end, I do not want to read any of the boys' abuses of the girls in their actual detail at any point. I am not going to even touch this fic until it ends, when I can check the last chapter or two to see what happens (if I even remember to) and especially whether those two girls get acquitted and can at least move on with their lives, rather than spend the rest of their lives in prison basically for terminating such oppressive circumstances as they and their friends are in the only remaining way conceivable to them. (And if The Rainmaker is anything to go by, there might just be hope.) The only other place I'd want to read about what those boys do would be in TV Tropes & Idioms: Complete Monster: Fan Works: Anime & Manga (where I have also once attempted to have the site's administrators list Shido before).
Well, that pretty much wraps things up here. Here's hoping this actually helps me overcome this negative obsession of mine, and I regain my writing muse tomorrow.
Mind you, not all depressive fics I've read have bothered me so much as the ones I'm listing here. With Lucky Star alone, I did enjoy The Loss of Innocence, Broken Dreams, I Was Kagami Hiiragi, An Otaku's Dilemma, Love Lived and Love Lost, Stars Above, and Lucky Apocalypse Stories.
This entry contains unmarked spoilers, due to the whole list itself being covered by one big cut. Not gonna hyperlink to any of the fics in question either, because I just wanna keep things moving as I write this. Obviously NOT for the faint of heart.
1) No Birds, No Bees
The world is dead. At least, the male half. The other half is fighting over the scraps. Morality, ethics, kindness; they're all relics of an age gone by. The only winners are those who instill their will...for everyone else to take a permanent dirt nap. Or perhaps, those who have died are the true winners, and this is just a cruel game to be the first place loser.
Premise seemed interesting enough at first. First of currently two chapters ends with Ayano (initially unidentified) firing from a rooftop at the main characters with a bow and arrows, before being shot down by Yui. Ayano is still alive upon landing, says something, and then gets a spasm in her arm. Konata finishing her right off is not a mercy kill; she narrates afterwards that if you don't trust someone with your life in such a world as this fic presents, you kill them. I know she just did try to kill them, and it's not like they'd be able to catch up on things in such condition as she's in, but it was only after she lands that she recognizes Tsukasa and Konata; I'm sure she would have made a perfectly good recruit had she not been injured.
Making this even worse, is that this makes everything that happens in the anime, the manga, or anyone else's fanfics that the unexplained male holocaust supposedly could take place after. If this is what would become of everyone after such an event, one will not re-read or re-watch anything canon and see it the same way as before with that on mind.
Chapter 2 only cements things further, that the only reason Konata didn't simply kill herself is a desire to outlive her friends, rather than to help them survive. According to author Arkytal, she became that way basically due to an overload of despair from wanting humanity's better days back, and having had to be a total animal just to survive past the point that her psyche is warped beyond repair.
Turns out (fortunately, maybe, though I only learned in a PM exchange,) that this actually branches off after episode 6 of the anime. That explains perfectly why the main four are with eachother, Nanako, and Yui, but not Yutaka (who came to live with Konata and met Minami in episode 14). But, that's not the only plus (if you even count that as one).
Oddly enough, I had brought this up in a comparison to my upcoming sumo fic. Months earlier, Chelle stated that she'd probably hate the fic due to how little sense things make based on the premise alone. I thought until I mentioned it recently, that it had to do with whatever force that killed off all human males but none of the females being a wallbanger in and of itself. Turns out that her real gripe with it is some misogynistic Fridge Logic as to why the remainder of humanity is reduced to acting barbaric towards one another just to survive, instead of trying to rebuild society, complete with certain Unfortunate Implications that only men have actual morals while women need guidance throughout life. (To be fair, the author did intend this as a reflection of the horrific things soldiers did to one another to survive during the Vietnam and Gulf Wars, but I'm sure Chelle would find differences between that and this.) The premise of both this fic and my own planned one could be done well enough, according to her, but can also easily alienate people if done wrong.
2) StarCrossed
Seven years have passed since their graduation from high school. Our main characters have all grown up and are living their own lives. But they don't seem to be quite happy with their current circumstances.
This whole fic is about the four main characters' lives crashing down, all of it being their own fault for not seeking help from one another. The fact that this fic focuses primarily on the main four is what makes this really depressing. Granted, Minami fails the same test by God in the epilogue by running away from her problems and dying in a plane crash, but while her problems have gone unspecified, the fact that Yui is said to have been fired from the police force due to her cousin Konata's acts of killing Patricia (accidentally) and Soujiro (said to be "unconscious") implies that her problems stem from the actions of the main four. So, that actually makes it a little better, but not much.
3) Bonds
Ryouou's last day standing...
The above summary is my own as DMXrated01. The original summary said something about a school shooter, and it sounded interesting enough.
The problems begin, though, when the police arrive, only to establish a perimeter above the school and specify that the Special Assault Team will arrive within two hours. This is explained later by office politics, where authorities want as much credit as possible with as little loss of their own personnel as possible. This is the main reason I kept up with it, especially given how rapidly it had been updated the first time. I wanted to see what kind of comeuppance they would get, but that was left rather vague in the end, where all that was stated about it was that every nation in the world demanded to know what went wrong, and those in charge are still playing the blame game with one another. (Bloodscorpion88 did tell me that in real life crises such as Columbine, people in power tend to get off rather easily for their misaction due to said power. From what I gathered from a certain online document, though, there were at least two successful lawsuits filed against the police after the Columbine massacre; even though most other suits were more or less thrown out, that still says something contrary to BS88's reply to me.)
Then we have the Hunt Club, which is the main reason why antagonist and manga-canon character Izumi Wakase shoots up her entire school in retribution for all the torment the club put her through. BS88 did tell me one time about the possibility of fanfic about the before and after of this one. Obviously, I'm not likely going to read it should it ever materialize; the things Konata describes they did to her at one point are especially not some that I'd want to read in detail.
Worst of all, though, among the many canon characters to die in Izumi's raid, BS88 went blatantly out of his way to sever all the particularly close friendships between the characters, save for that between Konata and Yutaka. Kagami is lost particularly to Tsukasa, Konata, and Ayano, Misao is lost particularly to Ayano, and Minami is lost especially to Yutaka and Miyuki. Granted, this is obviously the reason this fic is called "Bonds", complete with Ayano talking to Konata in the hospital about maintaining friends with those whom they all still have left, but Broken Dreams was more bearable for having several characters killed off more naturally by its antagonist Koichi Shido (and Yutaka dying an unrelated death).
(I made an author's note at the end of the fic, about my dislike for it and my former plans for the Hunt Club during Starbound, exclusively to do justice for this story.)
4) Battle Star Royale
Class 3-B has been chosen to participate in the Battle Royale, the rules are simple: kill everyone. How will Konata and her friends react to this violent game?
Seemed interesting at first, until we learn in chapter 2 that this program is sponsored by the government and enforced by the military. Skimmed through from there, and discovered that Tsukasa inexplicably develops a way to hack the devices they're wearing off, only to die with Miyuki by another classmate.
What makes this particularly suck, is that the good days between the main four are over and most of those students will be lost to their parents and any other family without closure, thanks to a blatant human rights violation by the Japanese government. I have no interest at all in reading any part of this, even just to see what happens in the end.
If anything makes me feel better, it's that I did suggest that it be categorized as a crossover, due to the presence of certain characters from the original Battle Royale. Saharet followed through with that, and I now feel better about it now that at least it's not in the main archive anymore.
5) Cries Unheard
Something new and terrifying has entered the world of four ordinary high school girls. Though this new force affects them in different ways, they will soon be united by the same concept: the fear that haunts them every time they meet this force.
Another fic by bloodscorpion88, who has recently returned as bloodscorpion4ever. Description is pretty vague on its own, so I thought why not?
First chapter starts with a foregone conclusion regarding the fates of the antagonists, after which Miyuki reports herself for killing them and is interrogated by Yui. This sounds interesting so far.
Chapter 2 takes place upon the mains' graduations and the closure of school for the summer. Nevermind that summer vacation and the interlude between school years are shown in the anime at very different points, but okay, maybe the author just wants to tell his damn stories and can't be bothered to get every little fact right, especially if this (like I Was Kagami Hiiragi) is based on an actual experience of his own. Anyway, we meet our first antagonists, Satoshi Fujisaku and his parents Kai and Yukiko. Miyuki is filled in by her parents about a marriage proposal between her and Satoshi. Miyuki and her parents are completely oblivious to their intentions, and Satoshi's first victim becomes Minami's dog Cherry next door, which he kills with a poisoned doggy treat after leaving their mansion. Always love to see who goes down in something dark like this.
Chapter 3 introduces Riku Kitamaru, introduced to Tsukasa and Kagami by Satoshi, and whom Kagami becomes intimate with while barely knowing him.
Chapter 4 breaks from the main story and continues with Yui's interrogation of Miyuki, until a thrashing Kagami is brought to the police station for having stabbed one of the boys to death and then some. Both Yui and I myself have a sinking feeling that Tsukasa and especially Konata have also killed someone or another.
Chapter 5 is where it becomes painful to read, particularly the scene involving Satoshi monitoring Miyuki having a shower through his laptop, where we also learn that his own father is a Yakuza boss who is in on this whole thing.
Skipped chapters 6 and 7. Read chapter 8, which is the third post-slaughter chapter so far, because at least those are still interesting. That is the chapter that was uploaded just last night, and cost me any real sleep all night long, due to the extent Miyuki describes of the boys' atrocities. It is at this point that I am not even gonna touch those chapters until this fic is concluded. Not that the actions of Koichi Shido in Broken Dreams or Yuka Miyakawa and Ryuji Katsumoto in I Was Kagami Hiiragi are any less vile, but their roles stem entirely from Kagami alone. Here, the torment Miyuki describes is mostly upon all the main four, though Yutaka is also said to be held hostage in order for Konata's exploitation to be enabled.
Considering Yuka's single-handed reign of terror even after she disposes of Ryuji (yes, her own cousin and cohort), it's just about guaranteed that others besides them are also suffering. Satoshi offing Minami's dog is evidence enough, and several reviews also mention something being done to Minoru. However, whether they're also suffering just as horribly or simply being held hostage might be a different story. Let's look at the facts so far:
Miyuki mentions that Satoshi demands security facts from her about the loading docks of her father's company, at the threat of posting nude screenshots of her all over the Internet. The purpose behind this is so that Kai can smuggle do-I-want-to-know-what? through them, with clear enough intent to kill people. Satoshi's friends antagonizing Miyuki's is a method to keep them from interfering with their plans, so it seems likely enough that Minami, Yutaka, Hiyori, Patricia, Ayano, and Misao are not gonna be one bit better off than Konata, Tsukasa, or Kagami.
Well, on the plus side, whether Miyuki and Kagami get acquitted or not, what Kai plans to do doesn't sound like anything he'll be getting away with once he's brought to court and the girls' stories are all put together, if he's even still alive then.
Whatever all happens in the end, I do not want to read any of the boys' abuses of the girls in their actual detail at any point. I am not going to even touch this fic until it ends, when I can check the last chapter or two to see what happens (if I even remember to) and especially whether those two girls get acquitted and can at least move on with their lives, rather than spend the rest of their lives in prison basically for terminating such oppressive circumstances as they and their friends are in the only remaining way conceivable to them. (And if The Rainmaker is anything to go by, there might just be hope.) The only other place I'd want to read about what those boys do would be in TV Tropes & Idioms: Complete Monster: Fan Works: Anime & Manga (where I have also once attempted to have the site's administrators list Shido before).
Well, that pretty much wraps things up here. Here's hoping this actually helps me overcome this negative obsession of mine, and I regain my writing muse tomorrow.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-17 12:14 pm (UTC)Okay, then. Might you be able to name some examples of stuff you dropped after either reading a summary or watching just the beginning, and explain like I did how the tone differs from heavy stuff you have enjoyed?
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By the way, I should also mention that even though Cries Unheard and I Was Kagami Hiiragi do seem to have the same tone, there was more to the latter than just Kagami giving her family grief and her interactions w/ Yuka and Ryuji during its first half and Yuka's rampage during the second half.
Most notably, shortly after betraying the antagonists, Kagami finds herself in captivity with Ryuji by a rival gang. After its leader, Junichi Orihara, orders Ryuji shot, he then takes her into his care, showing him the much more prosperous neighborhood he lives in and maintains through drug sales. She doesn't immediately trust him, but comes to love him as they get to know eachother, and their interactions comprise half of what goes on from there during the story.
So far, I don't sense anything other than a series of graphic descriptions of rape and torture of the canon characters taking place before the point at which the antagonists are slaughtered. While IWKH's foregone conclusion of Kagami being doomed to die inside a burning building was partly false (she still was going to be inside one, but to have one last interaction w/ Junichi before killing Yuka once and for all and turning herself in to the police), the ongoing pivotal point that CU begins with clearly is true in all aspects. Maybe more stuff will arise, though, once the main story reaches that point, since the first half of IWKH is nothing but Kagami abusing both drugs and her friends and family while being "friends" with Ryuji and Yuka.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-17 12:14 pm (UTC)Bokurano doesn't interest me since the set up seems to be mainly about "everything sucks". There's also a few war movies and fics, but I forgot their names.
I liked Puella Magi and Serial Experiments Lain because while depressing things happen, they happen for the story's outcome and not for the sake of being depressing. There's always this positive undertone that it's worth to keep going ever as it gets rough, and in the end the status quo does in fact improve.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-17 12:15 pm (UTC)