Line #5 YMMV/MassVexations


1	* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Is Art a Marty Stu of the bygone Creator/DavidGonterman-esque variety, or is he -and the whole story- a StealthParody[=/=]{{Deconstruction}} of Marty Stus in fan fiction?
2	** WordOfGod has stated that it was intended as a deconstruction of self-insert tendencies. Though later on, he has considered the trilogy an OldShame of his.
3	* AngstWhatAngst: The tendency of this trope to show up in self-insert fiction where the author avatar just teleports into their world is heavily deconstructed. Almost as soon as he realizes he's in the Mass Effect universe, Art begins wondering what's become of every person he's ever come to really care about, and about what they must be thinking in turn. At first, Art brushes off the angst under the pretense that [[PlotlineDeath he can head home via Virmire]]. However, by the time he gets to Virmire he's truly gotten to know the Mass Effect cast, and so he begins greatly second-guessing himself on his desire to go home, torn between losing one group of people that he cares about to gain another. When he finally decides to attempt to go back to his home dimension, [[spoiler:it ends up not happening thanks to Shepard saving him at Virmire]]. After that, the angst comes for him with a major vengeance when he realizes that he'll never see the family and friends that he knew for his entire life. Even worse is that thanks to the cover story he made to avoid suspicion, he can't tell anyone about why he's really angsting and has to hold the real reason for his angst in. As if that wasn't enough, [[spoiler:Ashley Williams, the woman who taught him everything about how to use military-grade weaponry, a reasonably good friend of his, and '''''one of the people he was trying to save from her probable in-game fate on Virmire''''' was the one who died. Art blames her death on himself for not being able to convince Shepard to save her instead of him.]] After the obligatory OneWomanWail, he spends a chapter locked in his room while moaning about his predicament. He gets better [[AFriendInNeed thanks to Tali]].
4	** It gets worse. [[spoiler: In Mass Vexations 2, he finds out that fate would not let him die on Virmire, so he spent all that effort for nothing.]] However, [[spoiler: Ashley didn't die, she went space-travelling the way he did, so it's not that bad... technically.]]
5	** He somewhat expresses this the first time he kills someone, but he stops dwelling on it because it's not really a good situation for him to space out.
6	* CanonDefilement: The Fade arc takes a lot of liberties with Dragon Age canon. Chiefly, the idea that the pilgrimage to the Black City would be able to purify souls when in [[Franchise/DragonAge the actual games]] this is the place that initiated the Darkspawn taint.
7	* CrossoverShip: [[spoiler:Garrus and [[VideoGame/HeavyRain Madison]]]].
8	* DesignatedHero: Art can come off as this, almost bordering on psychopathic, [[PinballProtagonist useless]], and [[IdiotHero idiotic]] in many cases. He mouthed off a number of characters, often for petty reasons. He also ''punched'' Kaidan, a commanding officer, over Shepard's former relationship with him and her relationship with Thane when he met him on the Citadel after Horizon, and was tempted to shoot him in the face. The only form of reprisal was Tali calling him out on his crap in MV2. It was surprising no one else called him out on his behavior. One of the notable contributions he did to canon was playing ShipperOnDeck between Shepard and Kaiden in the first entry and her and Thane in the second, despite knowing the heartbreak it would ensure with the former.
9	** [[http://rp.rpen.us/2011/10/fanfics-mass-vexations-by-herr-wozzeck-mass-effect-life-in-thedas-by-hazza137-dragon-age-origins/ One reviewer]] noted how weird it was for him to be liked by Shepard and the others despite his behavior:
10	-->'''Rogue Penguin''': It’s a strangely uncomfortable situation, actually. The narrative makes it obvious that other characters don’t like this behavior, but the main character persists in engaging it long after he realizes this. For some reason, however, Shepard continues to include Art in the plot of the game and brings him on away missions to allow him to get combat experience. It’s baffling. It actually reeks of an author who is aware that Mary Sue’s are frequently adored by characters for no justifiable reason, and then decides to throw in lines from other characters expressing their hate but NEVER actually following through on their hate to get away from the character. In the end, Art ends up feeling even MORE Mary Sue-ish because he’s an ass, who is NOT liked, but is still not thrown off the ship (or boxed up in crew quarters to be ignored).
11	* FridgeHorror: In combination with FanFic/SpellbindingRadiance: [[spoiler:Art was hoping to use Virmire to get home. However, when Ash dies at Virmire, she winds up on Tellius within FanFic/SpellbindingRadiance's continuity. If Art had been killed on Virmire instead of Ash, he likely would have died, or not been returned home at all.]]
12	** It goes ''even further.'' It sounds like FanFic/SpellbindingRadiance uses the same method of getting the hero to the canon universe in question, aka, [[spoiler: the person dying and entering the Fade in the right area so that they're reshuffled dimensionally. It's outright stated that Art's teacher and Ashley Williams did the same thing, so it's not a unique thing. If this is the case, than ''how many other Self-Insert fan fictions are the result of the death of the author?'']]
13	* OnceOriginalNowCommon: In its heyday, it was considered a big fic, popularizing the SelfInsert genre in the ''Franchise/MassEffect'' archives. But over the years, the glut of SelfInsert fanfics that came after made many look back and and see it wasn't a truly great fic in the first place with the author himself acknowledges there are problems.
14	* PanderingToTheBase: The (occasionally forced-seeming) over saturation of references can be seen as the author trying to rack up some nerd cred.
15	* SeasonalRot: Some fans accuse the fanfic of having this in the later fanfics, citing the over-usage of other characters from other universes and the entire [[VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins Fade]] storyline.
16	* TearJerker: [[spoiler: Thane's death.]]
17	** "I guess what he said is true: It always rains on Kahje."

Context YMMV / MassVexations