What are your personal "red flags" before reading any fanfic?

Incest couples are also a red flag to me. Yes I won't read a good chunk of Frozen fanfics....

Draco is depicted as being in the wrong (and I suspect it's part of one of those "wizarding society is so backwards" things so whatever), so it doesn't morally repulse me.

The part of the scene I find kind of offensive is that Harry then goes on to posture about what basically amounts to European superiority.

Also, I'm not saying Methods of Rationality is crap, as I haven't read it and thus it would not be fair to the author or the story. I do not, however, have to read the story and the entirety of its context to tell when something is bad dialogue.

edited 8th Sep '15 10:34:53 PM by Pannic

I can at least say I gave it one chance, and then it bored the hell out of me.

And considering I managed to paddle through goddamn Ascencion Book One, which is one of the most boring fics ever written, that's saying something.

Honestly a lot of Methods seemed to be the author saying why they were superior in some way.

I've enjoyed a rational fic before- Luminosity comes to mind- but it just wasn't my thing.

And I second the incest. Even emotional incest gets me.

re incest: my one rule against incest (or pseudo-incest in the case of adoptions, or no relation at all but the canon depiction of them paints it as filial) is no het pairings. Mostly because the thought of Habsburgian babies freak me out.

Anyway, new red flag: Soulmate A Us. I loved reading them at first, but later on it got kinda boring because they're all pretty much the same thing, except for what the soulmate mark or whatever is. I like the artsy tattoo soul marks. The name of your soulmate/first thing they'll say to you/timers are kinda eh. There was one where necklaces spontaneously appear on their necks which sounded really stupid.

I'd love to read deconstructions of it more. I've read one which was super awesome (incompatible orientations, your soulmate was actually an abusive asshole, etc.) but also super depressing (see parenthesis above).

Or platonic soulmates. That would be awesome to see.

Soulmate AU's? I didn't even know that was a thing.

It is. Most common I've seen is the name of your soulmate or a timer countdown tattooed in your body somewhere. Variations of that is the first thing they will say to you, elaborate matching tattoos, etc.

There's also where everything you see is in grayscale until you meet your soulmate, which of course turns everything into beautiful technicolor.

Basically, most of the time the only difference between fics is the mechanics on how, and almost ends happily ever after.

That sounds...incredibly cheesy...

I'd love to read deconstructions of it more.

Have you tried Luminosity? It's not the main focus of the fic, but it does explore some of the troubling implications of the vampire love bond from canon.

x3 As an added bonus, I'm pretty sure most of those concepts came from Tumblr posts. I remember seeing several of them floating around. I know that's where the "first thing they'll say to you tattooed on your body" and "meeting your soulmate means you see in color" ones come from

edited 9th Sep '15 2:08:59 PM by SapphireBlue

Like I always say: Incest is small potatoes given the crap I've seen, and it can also be hilarious. See Island of Death.

In other news, 'love bonds' are pretty much just a cheap cop out so you can have a ship without having to write a relationship forming.

Infinitely more interesting when it's between two people who hate each other.

I actually don't like the Slap-Slap-Kiss romance fanfics. Albeit I have a very personal reason behind that.

In those ones with the "first thing your soul mate says to you" tattoos, you have to wonder how many people are walking around with "OMG, that's what my tattoo says!" printed on their body.

That just became surprisingly meta when I thought about it. Thanks.

re: Soulmates: Yeah, that and mental bonds both.

yeah, i've found myself completely turned off by the whole soulmate thing. it's a relationship fic (which most people are bad at writing, to be honest) without any of the actual character or relationship development!

uhhh... yay?

@storyyeller: I have not. Rational Twilight, huh? Maybe I'll give it a try.

Ugh. Like Shizuo/Izaya in Durarara. That shit just doesn't make any sense to me. You can argue that Izaya "loves" Shizuo in a twisted, fucked-up way, but you'll never convince me otherwise of Shizuo liking Izaya back, ever.

Also Zoro/Sanji in OnePiece. Granted, it's not as bad as the one above, because they're crew, but apparently hot guys bickering and barely tolerating each other is all it needs to constitute a relationship.

Okay, I might be a bit bitter because they're so popular in their respective fandoms

I've seen fics where one of the characters doesn't believe soulmates are true, but of course they're proven otherwise and fall for their soulmate. On longer fics I've seen they don't usually know the pairing are soulmates and fall in love anyway. Although sometimes it just comes off as they fell in love because of fate and shit.

Ooh, kinda related to soulmates, but that life bond thing after the pairing had sex and if either one of them dies, the other dies just rubs me the wrong way.

THAT'S EVEN WORSE

This is something I've never heard of before this thread, and it sounds stupid.

Those would annoy the hell out of me, mostly because I'm asexual and if someone raced up to me and said "OUR TATTOOS MEAN WE'RE SOULMATES!!" I would run for the hills. Do those fics take things like that into account at all?

Wow...I thought people dropped the craze over the concept of soulmates a decade or two ago.

Your avatar is very fitting.

I had no idea soulmate fics were a thing until this thread. Actually, there are a lot of unfortunate things I'm learning about fanfiction from this thread...

You know, I didn't even think of that until you mentioned it. But yes, yes it is. And I always encountered these fics as a particularly stupid form of AU. I kind of have a beef with A Us in general, though

I'd never heard of the soulmate thing either, and yeah, that just sounds pants-on-head idiotic. The whole point of (good) shipping fic is to explore the relationship between the characters and how they overcome their issues, not to bypass the problems entirely for the sake of fluff.

I've heard of soulmates before this thread. The only soulmate AU I'll read is if it involves one of the partners trying to destroy the soulmate bond, or one with an aro/ace person with no marker living in a world where markers are normal.

Actually, an excellent soulmate AU would be in a universe where everyone has markers, except the protagonist.

I agree with everyone else that soulmates are kinda stupid for writing, and not nearly as fun as building a relationship from scratch without a special bond.

Thing about that whole soulmates thing (as xkcd has pointed out): they might not be born yet. Or might have died decades before you. In a world where people have one soulmate, there is an infinitesimally small chance of that person being alive at the same time, living close by at any time in your life, or being of an acceptable age or gender.

What if you're a completely straight male, and your soulmate is an eighty-year old man? What if your soulmate died in WW 2? What if your soulmate is only born when you're on your deathbed?