An Avengers Rant

This was meant to be a tiny rant for the morning, but it turned full-blown. It's not a popular opinion, as far as I can tell, but it's been nagging me for a while.

For anyone who didn't know, I'm an 'Avengers' fan. The movies, not the comics (sorry, real fans). Because even though I grew up all sorts of geeky and on comics, every single one of the core Avengers was so far at the bottom of my list that I cringed when I heard their names.

Captain America? Meh...Superman for a different publisher (why I'm not a Superman fan is a story for a different day). Iron Man? Guy in a metal suit. Big deal (yeah, yeah, I know, big guy, metal suit, take that away what are you? Genius, millionaire, philantropist playboy). Thor? (comic Thor) Blond dude with a hammer. The Hulk/David Banner? What kind of super hero spends half his time out of control and the other half moping about how to not be?

This was my opinion of the original comic book characters. Hate me for it if you'd like, but Spiderman and Batman were the only heroes for me.

And then I saw the Iron Man movies and...*sigh*...I was hooked. (It wasn't Thor that pulled me in, Loki was just a bonus). I know a lot of women who like these movies. What's not to like? Realistic people stuck in comic-book like situations and....lots of hot guys. I had this confirmed this morning with a borderline (thanks to innuendo) offensive conversation on Facebook. I <3; my writer friends.

Seriously. I still think Captain America is a little too Superman, but Chris Evans?

*ahem*

Anyway...here's my point, because I usually (though not always) get there eventually. The banners above came out about a month ago for the Avengers movie next summer. The internet fanbase exploded, shared, sighed, drooled...myself included.

And then people started pointing out the Scarlett Johansson/Black Widow picture. Cuz...if you noticed...total butt shot in that skin tight body suit. And all I heard for the next couple of days was how sexist that banner was (it's my favorite, btw, because...well...Loki). Would people feel the same if the guys were showing off their junk?

Here is were I have the unpopular opinion. They are. Those guys in those posters, every single one of them (except maybe Captain America, *pout*) is angled to show off their physical assets, whatever they may be. Did you see Hawkeye right next to her? One, in a similar pose, and two, bare arms, all muscle definition. Iron Man? That freaking suit is posed so he looks as buff as Thor. And Thor...

So, ladies, we got to sit through five movies with hot, sexy heroes. All of whom fell for the intelligent, grounded woman in their lives. Every single one of those movies. And in case you missed it, Black Widow completely pwned about every single guy in Iron Man 2 and it wasn't her movie. And we're going to whine because Black Widow's butt is on an Avenger's Banner?

Don't misunderstand (which someone probably will anyway), I'm not being all gung-ho about the sexualization of this character. Exactly the opposite. What I'm saying instead, is if you'd like to see her dressed conservatively, that's fantastic. Make sure all your male leads are as well. Lose the form-fitting rubber and codpieces.

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TLIF - What I Did With My NaNoWriMo

AKA - a tiny snippet from 'Apathy's Hero'

It seems like everyone who participated is doing their NaNoWriMo wrap-ups, after-thoughts, crashes...and I'm a trend follower (but not really), so I wanted to as well.

I wrote a lot of words. A lot more than I've ever written before in a single month. Two full novels. So my version of a wrap-up is a snippet from one of these unedited beasts. (Language warning. Conner and Lexi don't have the cleanest vocabularies)

Apathy's Hero

Six hours, three sets, and fifty dollars later, I waited outside the dressing rooms. During that time I had managed to glean that the new girl’s name was Lexi and that no one knew anything else about her. Or at least that’s what they were saying. Tony had frozen when I’d asked about her, reinforcing what I’d seen on stage. She had something to do with Umbrifer.

“Are you the welcoming committee?” A teasing lilt interrupted my thoughts.

I smiled, doing a quick comparison now that we stood on the same ground. In heels she was taller than me, but I didn’t suspect that would be the case without. “I’m Conner. Security. You ready to leave for the evening?”

“I don’t know.” She chewed on her bottom lip. “It’s kind of nice here. Do I have to?”

Sarcasm. I liked it. I bit back my amusement and decided to go for the dim-witted response. “You do. But you can always come home with me if you’d like.”

She started walking, turning so she could see me. It was brighter back here than in the main club, illuminating more of her features. “About that. Listen, thanks for all the money tonight. Now I can afford those sexy-but-tacky heels I saw on clearance at the outlet mall.”

All right, so ignoring the sarcasm wouldn’t be an option. The corner of my mouth pulled up against my will. She was attractive and at least a little witty. I could handle an entertaining grudge fuck. “Stiletto, I hope.”

She snickered, biting her bottom lip and raising an eyebrow instead. “Chunky. Stiletto, really? How tacky. At least now I know you’re not gay. Your girlfriend dresses you, then?”

Pulling a pack of smokes from my front pocket, I watched as she navigated the dark hallway without ever looking behind her. Impressive. “I think a girl bought me clothes once. The jeans wouldn’t stay up, and the shirt was two-sizes too big.”

Lexi laughed. “I can’t picture you in jeans, and I’ve only known you a few minutes.”

She was prettier when the expression was genuine, and my smile grew. “You’re observant. Most people aren’t. That’s why I don’t date.”

We pushed into the night, cool air and bright moonlight rushing in around us. Keeping the glow off my skin was second nature after thousands of years. She didn’t do as good a job of suppressing what little power she had, but she also wasn’t the daughter of the goddess of the moon and hunt. Her glow was dim in the faint natural light. It gave her a soft sparkle.

“But you’re willing to tap the new dancer at work because…why?" she asked. "I’m a pity lay or a notch in the bedpost?”

I stuck a cigarette to my lips and lit up, remembering at the last minute to use the lighter in my front pocket and not the moonlight pulsing through my veins. The banter was energizing, and as much as I hated to admit it, I was having fun. “Who said I wanted to sleep with you?”

She shoved her hands in her pockets, pulling down the waistband of her ultra-low-rise jeans another notch. “You can always come home with me if you’d like,” she mocked.

Damn, she was good. I took a drag and let the smoke drift into the night, watching it vanish in the shadows. It took some will-power not to stare at the smooth skin exposed between where her shirt ended and her jeans started. “I never said anything about sex.”

Her lips twisted, not completely hiding her amusement. “Nice. Can I ask you something?”

I shrugged. Might as well have some more fun. “About six inches.”

She looked like she was struggling to keep the smirk off her face. “So, one that’s it? And two, what makes you think I care?”

Perfect. I kept my expression innocent. “It’s bigger than average. And, I mean, it’s your job, so I thought you might have noticed.”

A pink tinge crept over her cheeks and her joy faded. “My. Job?”

Finally, I had one up on her. I hid my smugness and took another drag of my cigarette. “Well yeah. The pole on the main stage, it’s got a bigger diameter than most. It makes it awkward for some of the new girls. It didn’t look like it threw you off though.”

She bit her bottom lip, rocking her her heels again. A short laugh slipped out. “Awesome. Can I actually ask you something?”

“Sure.” This was more fun than I had expected.

“How is it you can deck the bar owner and not get canned? And for someone who claims to be the devil, he sure did take a lot of damage from your fist.”

Any plans for the weekend?

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But...Why? Good vs. Bad Questions

It's taken me over a week to write this blog post. It's been in my head, and I got as far as clicking the 'New Post' button and writing a title and then...I open it every day and stare at it and don't finish the thought.

It's not because it's a difficult or contraversial subject. It's pretty far from it, at least in my opinion. It's because my state of mind doesn't support being verbose right now.

I'm going to publicly state it's because I wrote too many words last month and have run out. It's not the real reason, but it sounds good on screen ^_^

Anyway...questions, right? I've been thinking about this, because it's something that's nibbled at the back of my sanity lobe in my brain for as long as I've been getting critiques on my writing.

On the one hand we hear that questions keep someone reading. They turn the page because they want to see what happens next. If all the questions are answered, there's no reason to move forward.

On the other hand we hear things like "I had too many questions, it was confusing. This kept me from reading further."

And my poor little gray-matter would melt because on the surface, the two statements so completely contradict each other.

Because so rarely does anyone giving this advice stop to point out there's a difference between good and bad questions. People have tried to explain this concept to me, but it's taken a long time for it to click. I'm kind of slow sometimes.

It's finally coming together in my brain, though. Which is recongealing even as I type. Sort of. I've been trying to put some structure around this concept to make it easier to grasp...let's see if I can.

A bad question is the kind that confuses the reader. When they say "Wait. The snurble just flarked the rankle with a gorb? WTF?" That's a bad question. If the message conveyed is so completely out of context to your reader that they can't even picture if the scene is good, bad, sad, happy, funny, romantic, etc, they can't get into it. They won't know if they need to keep reading, because they don't know what they're reading.

I read a first chapter yesterday that had this effect on me. I wish I could say otherwise because it was a published book by an author I enjoy. I decided to try a new series of theirs and...two paragrahs in I was confounded by the rankle and the gorb.

So a good question would be the opposite of that. Right? I think that makes sense. A good question would be "okay, Maryanne just decided to talk to Jake because they're having relationship issues. How will Jake respond?" There's enough information about the character and the situation to know what has happened, and that makes you want to see what will happen next.

I think this is something that's always an issue in my writing. I assume (not consciously) that the reader sees the subtext that is my thoughts and therefore can draw logical conclusions. It never occurs to me to explain the snurble until I've already lost them during the flarking.

So I'm making a conscious effort to keep the snurbles in my narrative flark free until I place them in context.

What's your thought on the whole thing?

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