Even aside from that, there's the fact that I normally don't like romance stories in general. But I have to admit, this one is just generally very well written. It somehow manages to take that blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment from the movie and use it as the foundation for a very compelling story.
It also does a very good job exploring the overall state of the city during the crisis, which is something I haven't seen many other works do in any depth, and rarely so well as this one does. Even as something of a background element compared to the love story, it's handled very well with a lot of depth, and I'd almost say it's worth a read for that alone.
Overall, it takes a tiny thimbleful of canon events and manages to use them to weave a complex story with likeable characters that feels really authentic to the world shown in the movie.
Meetings
This is probably the first time I've enjoyed a shipping fic. As I'm not accustomed to looking at characters with Shipping Goggles on, most attempts to set up romantic pairings, including the ubiquitous Nick/Judy, set off Out of Character alarm bells in my head that make it very hard to enjoy the story. But this sidesteps that issue by using ultra-malleable blank slates that were only in the actual movie for a couple of seconds.
Even aside from that, there's the fact that I normally don't like romance stories in general. But I have to admit, this one is just generally very well written. It somehow manages to take that blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment from the movie and use it as the foundation for a very compelling story.
It also does a very good job exploring the overall state of the city during the crisis, which is something I haven't seen many other works do in any depth, and rarely so well as this one does. Even as something of a background element compared to the love story, it's handled very well with a lot of depth, and I'd almost say it's worth a read for that alone.
Overall, it takes a tiny thimbleful of canon events and manages to use them to weave a complex story with likeable characters that feels really authentic to the world shown in the movie.