geri_chan | 30-Day Fanfic Writing Meme, Day 7

7. Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?

I've definitely had other people's fic make me look at characters in a totally different light, but I'm assuming the question is referring to my own fics. No dramatic changes immediately sprang to mind, so I had to look over my fanfic masterlist to jog my memory and mull over things a bit. There are times when I've deliberately changed a character, like having Sirius survive long enough to gain some maturity, for example, but there aren't too many times when I've had a spontaneous change of heart about a character.

Petshop: Can't really think of any characters that I've changed my opinion about. Maybe occasionally they've expanded and grown in directions I hadn't quite foreseen, but I can't say that I've changed my basic opinion about the characters.

Snupin: If an OC counts, then writing the Always series did change my opinion of Selima, Snape's mother in my AU world. I didn't really put much thought into Snape's parents when I began the series--I made them cold and stern and unloving in order to partially explain Snape's bitterness and the way he keeps other people at a distance. It was so long ago that my memories are a bit vague, but I don't think that I intended to bring them back later in the series, other than perhaps a casual mention in passing, and I hadn't given them any redeeming qualities. But as I mentioned during Day 5, I decided to have Snape encounter his mother in Phoenix Rising. She lectured him about doing his duty (providing the Snape family with an heir), and when he refused, she dropped hints that she had sacrificed love for duty when she married his father, and at that point I began to think of her as more than just a villain who was a bad mommy to Snape. I let the plot bunny simmer for awhile, and in the next story, Aftermaths, I created a history for her and developed her character further. It didn't change the fact that she was a bad mother to Snape, but I began working out the reasons why (her parents were just as cold to her, and she had to give up her first love to make an arranged marriage to a much older man that she barely knew), and I found myself sympathizing with her more. And as I wrote more about her, I began to see how much Snape took after her (as little as either of them would like to admit it), and she became one of my favorite OCs to write. I didn't develop Snape's father as thoroughly as I did Selima, but I humanized him a bit more from the cold, semi-abusive figure in the first story--he also put family duty ahead of his own wishes, though in a different way than Selima. I still don't really like him, but I understand him better and don't view him as just a villain.

Haru: I really hated Miyasaka after I read the scene in the manga where he tried to rape Iwaki. Even though he eventually felt remorse and Iwaki and Katou forgave him, I couldn't forgive him and found it hard to understand why they did. Intellectually, I get it--aside from Katou and Miyasaka's longstanding friendship, Snapelike and I had a discussion about the need to preserve group harmony in Japan. But on an emotional level, I just couldn't buy it. However, Miyasaka and his reconciliation with I&K play a major role in the manga, and because he and Onozuka are best friends, I couldn't really just ignore him, especially when I started writing fic about Onozuka--at least, not without drastically changing Onozuka's character. So it wasn't like writing fic about Miyasaka suddenly made me like him, but since I had to write about a character who cared about Miyasaka (while still being aware of his flaws), I had to try and make myself see him from Onozuka's POV, and try to understand what Onozuka liked about him and why he's so loyal to Miyasaka. So gradually the character did begin to grow on me, though it was a struggle. And it helps that he's done a lot of maturing during Unmasked. So I guess writing about him did change my opinion of him, but I had to make a conscious effort to do it.

Kikuchi is the one character where I can say that I did have a spontaneous change of heart, although it started slightly before the writing process began. I had first read the Haru manga years ago when it was published in the US as "Embracing Love," and at the time, I really hated Kikuchi for trying to break up Iwaki and Katou out of sheer spite. Then the publisher went out of business and I kind of forgot about the series until I discovered the Youka Nitta IJ Asylum and went back and read the earlier volumes of the manga again. And the second time around, I sympathized with him a bit more and understood why he was so bitter--seeing his own career destroyed because of a gay scandal, while Iwaki and Katou are celebrated for it. I still didn't precisely like him, but I started to get a little curious about happened to him after the story ended--did he stay in Japan or go back to America? And what was his career in America like? And did the scandal involve a one night stand or a serious lover? Thinking about those questions led to me writing my first Haru fic, Comeback (Part 1 and Part 2). And as I started writing Kikuchi, I found myself understanding him better and liking him more, and that first fic led to an entire series about him and Onozuka, and now he's one of my favorite characters. So it was more taking a closer look at the manga that got me to see Kikuchi as more than just a villain, but writing about him made me come to really love him.

Previous days:
Day 1
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Day 4
Day 5
Day 6