THE FANDOM FLANDERIZATION MEME

[elfstoned]

We all know how fandom flanderizes characters, but what if Save the Earth were a television show?

How would fandom get it wrong?



HOW IT WORKS:
Post a comment with your character journal explaining generally what the twisted and horrible fanon version of your character is. What less significant personality traits do they fixate on? How do the thirteen-year-olds on fanfiction.net write them? Who are they shipped with ad nauseum? What are they like in Omegaverse?

OPTIONAL: Reply IC to others' comments as your own flanderized fanon character, or feel free to have the real version express horror and disgust (or vicious amusement).

Have fun!!

Comments

REGINA | BLUESTAR

[sacrifice_everything]

Because she's a cat the fandom likes to play on the fact that she doesn't understand anything about humans to the point where she doesn't understand what food is half the time. Aww what a precious lil baby she probably doesn't even know what a bed is. She probably doesn't understand that Karson's father is not named Kar. Sounds like a certain actual fandom...

She is shipped ad nauseum with Gomez because they are the only two actual cats to ship, but Regina x Fay had a spark of popularity too for some reason. Regina has also had a fanfic or two dedicated to her creating a cult with Fay as their messiah and Karson as his disciple. Everyone was confused by this.

She's been given a few horrible pasts due to having started out in an animal shelter, about how she was tortured by the veterinarians or her mother died slowly from being hit by a car. The fact that she's convinced vets are called "cutters" does not help this.

The fandom also seems to be convinced that she's a goody-two-shoes kittycat who can't get her paws dirty because she was raised in a house and that of course leads to her acting like a Disney channel celebrity. Which is honestly pretty hilarious to watch.

GUNTHER MAAKE | GAMZEE MAKARA

[coulrage]

The fandom doesn't know what the fuck to do with this boy so most of the time he's shoved into the corner and a bunch of 420 references and swearwords are jammed into his mouth. Ironically he's almost never portrayed as a bad influence; more as a poor defenseless soul whose family was horrible to him and who never meant to hurt anybody ever. Even if he kills someone it's not his fault ever there's just voices telling him to and it's not under his control.

On the other hand there are those fans to enjoy his possibly insanity and stretch it as much as they can; to the point where it starts to seem like the echoes mean nothing, and he was just a manipulative freak from the beginning. They seem to have a real thing for giving him sadistic tendencies toward Karson in particular. They make it so that he's not scared of going crazy at all, he's just playing victim so people will be easier to grab.

And oh man do they love shipping Gunther and Karson, that is the king ship. Since Gunther is taller and stronger and has all the disturbing nightmares, he gets to be a sugoi manry seme who completely ignores Karson's boundaries for some reason or another and a lot of the fanfics are really uncomfortable reads. Also, kinks aplenty because the fandom has kindly forgotten how upset hurting someone makes him.

Hikari x Gunther, Dr. Strider x Gunther, Colette x Gunther and even Jack Valenti x Gunther have all been spotted on FF.net. Most of Tumblr's fanbase is very confused by this.

Since half the fandom don't actually know how mental illnesses, drugs or clown obsessions even work, a lot of fanwork portrays mostly stereotypes with Gunther's face dumped on them. If they're not convinced he's a glorified teenage Joker, they're sure he's a lazy crybaby who does basically nothing but lay on Karson's floor and whine/sleep.

Once upon a time some obscure writer wrote a fanfic where Gunther moved in with the Valentis and ended up with Jack acting as his grudging father figure, along with a whole lot of sexual tension with Karson happening. The fandom clings to this as part of canon despite the fact that basically all of their personalities are way too forgiving of triggers in the interest of making the AU work.

[peacefulwinter]

The fans have decided they're not entirely sure about Winter. Everyone seems to get this impression she's too shy to actually say anything, that she's clinging to that damned stuffed animal so she can actually talk. Or there's the fact that her parents have ignored her and she needs affection in her life, and that's why she's trying so hard. Or maybe she's even a secret internet nerd because it's the only way she can talk to real people without freezing up!

...Yeah. Rumors and speculation abound.

Fanfic of her's even worse. A good chunk of the fandom seems to think that because she has no force of personality, she's safe, and so she's friends with everyone and generates no jealousy when potential love interests talk to her, because there's no way she could ever be a threat. Then there's the ones where she leaves home and finds someone else she can live with, and slowly discovers the joys of life she couldn't find while she lived in a relatively-often-empty home. This is quintessentially the "ship it with a luxury cruise liner" solution.

...There was that one author that insists that Winter isn't just painfully quiet, she's actually mute, and she's broadcasting her thoughts psychically. His stories are surprisingly popular because, despite how much canon disagrees, they're well-written. It's probably the only reason they're still popular after recent canon reminded viewers that, yes, Winter can talk.

The shipyard mostly seems to try to pair Winter with Banagher and Toushiro, though occasional other options are out there. And there's an odd habit of trying to set her up with almost anyone as the adorable psuedo-little-sister that depends on them for advice to get her through the day and idolizes them.

I'm not gonna lie, I'd enjoy writing some of these myself.

[not_good_not_wicked]

Marisa hasn't been around SUPER long and I don't even know what Omegaverse is, but I'm gonna say Flanderized Marisa is an over the top texan redneck. Cowboy hat, drawl, boots with spurs, thousand mile stare, talks about rodeos and hogtying and shit, the whole nine yards. Also, totally obsessed with video games to the point of maybe having a quarter dispenser on her belt.

I don't know, I feel like I'm kinda half-assing this without having something to weigh in on shipping. Maybe in fandom's imagination, this thread went to a really weird place. Maybe her high scores rivalry with Bakura gets totally out of control into some foe-yay thing.

Hajime Aikawa

[chalicejoker]

Fandom is divided on how it prefers to interpret Hajime. He's been there from the beginning, and most signs are pointing to his becoming a terrible bug monster. He's either severely woobified to the point of being mopey and emo or decides to embrace it and enjoys running around rawring and things and doing whatever it is giant bug monsters do. There is a great deal of fanfic making heavy use of Linkin Park lyrics where this is concerned.

Because the giant bug-thing he thinks he might be is fairly roachlike, fanon suggests that he's a terrible slob who doesn't know the first thing about cleanliness. His apartment occasionally shows up in fic as a heaping trashpile, and fluffy fics may have whoever he's being shipped with (usually Al) bemoaning his lack of housekeeping skills and showing him how to properly clean it up.

Plus, since he's had the name "Joker" pop up in many of these memories and is fairly certain it applies to him, fandom seems to have decided that this means he's going to develop a goofy sense of humor, despite there being no evidence to that end. Fanfic will occasionally turn him into a happy-go-lucky goofball just because that is apparently what jokers do.

Mort Yokugawa | Kiyoto Maki

[talktothedoll]

Since Mort's first Echo was a weird little doll and a later Echo involved plans for a small robot, fandom is convinced that the doll is really some robotics project Mort was working on and that it will eventually become Mort's Pinocchio-like son after a few more Echoes or after Mort gets enough robotics knowledge back. There are many, many fanfics written about this development that is sure to come. Fandom has yet to decide on a name for Mort's "kid," and combing baby name sites for the perfect name with deep meaning is a prerequisite before starting one of these fics.

Mort isn't shipped too often, thanks to his age. Most of the time, he's shipped with Eugene and it can be hard to have one show up without the other. Fandom believes this is clearly the true reason Mort completely failed to launch. Very rarely someone will ship him with Bakura because clearly Bakura's raging hatred for the doctor is a denial of ~twu wuv~, but this is thankfully not a common ship owing to the quiet popularity of shipping Mort with Eugene.

Arthur Curry

[italktofish]

Usually, when Arthur shows up in fanfics, it is mostly to yell unintelligibly at things. Sometimes, this is entirely in song. There's one popular fic where Arthur bursts into a pet store, loudly singing to all of the fish in the store, and eventually manages to whip everyone in the store into his backup singers through the force of SHEER ENTHUSIASM.

Fandom tends to think that talking to fish is a really dumb power and Arthur is an idiot for getting so excited over it (and an idiot for any number of other things, really), so if they need someone to be remarkably incompetent at anything ever, Arthur's a popular choice.

One popular fan theory is that Arthur really is turning into a fish or other sea creature from a sort of Disneyesque universe where communicating through song would be fairly normal. Owing to the nature of his Rousing Song of Heroism, they're guessing he was a plucky, encouraging sidekick, and there's a subset of fics that focus on his being out in the ocean searching for whoever or whatever he was the sidekick to. Mary Sue authors tend to use that role as an author stand-in, and whatever sea creature the Suethor likes is whatever sea creature Arthur ends up becoming. Sometimes, he'll become a seahorse just to make shipping him with Cinderella make more sense...somehow.

Arata "Al" Amagi

[skickpowered]

So, uh, I really can't explain it in detail, but here's the chat to explain it for you instead.

[11:25:22 PM] dot emcee: i guess if in Al's case
[11:26:51 PM] dot emcee: fangirls would probably make him a wuss due to his derp and throw the most unusual and awkward relationship between him and hajime
[11:27:33 PM] Airdra: yes
[11:27:38 PM] Airdra: calls the guy boss
[11:27:47 PM] Airdra: clearly the relationship is there /o\
[11:27:58 PM] Airdra: he can help Hajime clean his impossibly messy apartment
[11:29:20 PM] dot emcee: so Al is definitely at the botto--I MEAN
[11:30:47 PM] dot emcee: like
[11:30:52 PM] Airdra: asdfa
[11:30:54 PM] dot emcee: hajime's the boss and all
[11:31:02 PM] dot emcee: of course he'd top--MC STOP

IN SHORT THEY MADE AL UKE AND HAJIME SEME

im crying at this

Shuji Kiyokumi | Eiji Hino

[controlsdesire]

In fandom, Shuji's usually seen as a lot more emotional than he happens to be in canon. Fans take his family issues and separation from his parents as fuel for him having a really hard time in his everyday life. (Theories about abuse are prevalent.) The fact that his first echo was about someone he feels close to and that he's desperate to find has the fandom sort of stumbling over themselves in attempts to find out who his reincarnated One True Love is, as though finding that person will suddenly help snap Shuji out of his depression. (And boy, does the fandom ever love writing sadfic and there's a few people out there convinced that he's barely hanging on.)

The past-life lover theory has him shipped with nearly everyone he comes in contact with, at least in theory. Some fans like pushing him with Hajime because of their annoyance with each other, thinking it would be ohsogreat for those who hate each other to have been together in a past life. This is further fueled by reading into the fact that Shuji has been looking out for him from time to time. He was also shipped with Al at times for cute crack shipping, which has actually ended up with a small cult following.

Aside from that, Shuji is usually shipped with Shou (despite them being cousins -- when has that stopped anyone?) because Shou is the only person Shuji has ever really shown concern towards. Their early life together isn't covered much in canon, so fandom goes a bit nuts with making up stories about their past together and enjoys writing side stories about what the pair gets up to in their everyday lives now that they're back together.

However, fandom seems to be leaning heavily so far on Hajime being the person Shuji has been having the strange feelings about, whether it's romantic or not, purely because they've interacted so much and have the most interesting dynamic. This is discounting the fact that most of Shuji's memories associated with the person are dealing with a bird motif and Hajime's has been more leaning towards bug.

The ties Shuji has to Mort and Eugene aren't clear so far, though the shared technology among the three of them have led to some interesting theories about a sci-fi related past, or the three of them having been involved in the same industry. Fanart enjoys featuring them with their respective can types -- Shuji with hawk, Mort with octopus, and Eugene with grasshopper. The broken medal he received as an echo is noted as never leaving his side because he feels such an attachment to it (which is true in canon as well, just never mentioned.)

Aside from the cute and fluffy side of Shuji's fandom, there's an equal number of people believing that he's going to end up as a traitor or that he was a villain in his past life. His emotional detachment is sometimes interpreted as him being a sociopath and fandom has a number of fics about him where he's dark and particularly violent. The chest pains he has have been interpreted as him fighting down his darker, evil side, and being barely able to hold it in. (Though other fans interpret this as him getting a Life Threatening Illness that will plague him for the rest of the series once it manifests.) There are theories about him being a spy on the Network and playing off his involvement with the police. A number of fans are waiting for the moment when he announces his intentions or manages to kill someone without the rest of the characters catching on.

Thomas Akagi | Nobuo Akagi

[wannabered]

The fandom isn't that keen on Thomas, mostly he's used as a support character for others since his echos haven't been that interesting. Mostly being used to fill in for fics involving Chris, Hajime, Sho, or anyone else associated with Locke's college or Japanese population.

Thanks to what few echos Thomas has; his scarf, his gun, and his knowledge of a shoujo anime Thomas is often used as a stereotypical gay best friend character for whomever is staring in the fic he's involved in. Alternatively, he's used to get between Hajime's or Sho's relationships as the friend who had feelings despite Thomas not really having interacted with either that much yet.

Thanks to the worst bits of the fandom also focusing on his fondness for the color red and his gun, it is often thought Thomas was also a murderer in his past life with that coming up more and more often as though it were canon. This at least has the benefit of moving him up from a support role, but often into an antagonist role in the shitty fanfictions where he's getting in the way of other's romances and is used as an excuse to kill him off.