I shouldn't criticize Lady Rosesong.

[betweensunandmoon]

Sure, her stories are boring, she writes everyone OOC, her character-bashing tendencies anger me, and her modus operandi is using Phantom characters to retell stories that aren't remotely related to Phantom. But I'm no better at writing Christine in character than she is and my ideas are all just as terrible, so what right have I to judge her? And I can't help envying her dedication--she wrote forty-three chapters out of what was to be a forty-five-chapter fic, and they weren't short chapters! Had she not vanished off the face of the Internet, I have no doubt that Erik, the Date Phantom and The Mask and the Slipper would have ended up being of similarly epic length. I, on the other hand, tend to lose interest after a few chapters, if I start writing at all. I almost wish she'd stuck around, if only so I could make a few sly crossover suggestions of my own and witness the results.

Oh, yeah, I'm back. Hi. *waves*

Comments

[igenlode]

Hi :-)

You've discovered one of the unspoken truths of fanfiction -- it takes a lot of determination to get beyond the first few chapters of a story. (Of course, this is one of the advantages of basing your story on someone else's plot; at least you know where it's going. But even then it's rare for them to get to the end.)

Speaking of character-bashing... this one managed to get right up my nose with the first chapter. I mean, if you want Christine to be an unmarried mother bringing up Raoul's child named (wince) Aria, there have got to be more plausible ways of doing it than having him seduce her with a line like "A final proclamation of my love for you, my Little Lotte" and then have him randomly jump into bed with a girl called Sierra (for no apparent reason other than that the author finds it convenient to her desired plot). Also, see lecherous drug-addict Philippe as the arbitrary villain of the chapter...

[betweensunandmoon]

That was disgusting. I don't understand how anyone can enjoy writing this stuff, let alone reading it. Poor de Chagnys.

[igenlode]

The irony is that Philippe snorting cocaine is lazy shorthand to show that he's a villain; Erik ingesting industrial quantities of morphine in the next chapter just makes him romantically flawed...

But the readers LOVE this sort of stuff -- 17 reviews on two chapters. "It's refreshing to see Raoul and Philippe being such jerks. Your descriptions and characters are nicely vivid and believable" *boggle*

[betweensunandmoon]

*grinds teeth* I hate double standards both in fanfiction and original fiction.

...Do people even use morphine anymore?

"Refreshing" implies Raoul and Philippe aren't often portrayed as jerks in fanfiction, which is sadly incorrect. What fics has this person been reading? I might want to check them out...

[igenlode]

The annoying thing is that it wouldn't actually be that difficult to write a set-up in this modern-day AU where Christine is a single mother bringing up Raoul's child alone. Assuming that she and Raoul are teenage sweethearts (written with rather more attention and credibility) and that he goes off to college without either of them realising that she is pregnant, it's entirely plausible that big brother Philippe (written as an over-protective authority figure rather than a louche pimp) would be absolutely appalled by the idea of Raoul throwing away his future by embarking on a teenage marriage in his first term at university (or worse, abandoning his degree for some dead-end job to support a wife and child), and would deal with the situation by taking measures to split them up and get the girl an abortion while convincing himself that this is all for the best for everyone concerned.
Raoul doesn't even need to know about the baby. He can find out later, if that's what the plot requires, or if necessary he can believe that Christine got rid of it and be estranged from her as a result.

You could have your same E/C plot where Erik fixes Christine's broken heart and Christine cures his drug addiction by convincing him that he is worthy of love (I'm assuming that's the way the story is meant to head....) You could reintroduce Raoul as the little girl's long-lost father and have a tug-of-love scenario which he inevitably loses in favour of Erik (as I suspect the author has in mind, or she'd have bashed him even harder rather than laying it on Philippe). I can't say that I'd have any pleasure in reading the result, but it would at least be both plausible in terms of characterization and compatible with the desired outcome.

Writing Raoul and Philippe randomly out of character because you can't be bothered to pay any attention to them while setting up the scenario you're really interested in -- that's just plain lazy.

"Refreshing" implies Raoul and Philippe aren't often portrayed as jerks in fanfiction, which is sadly incorrect. What fics has this person been reading? I might want to check them out...

You can't tell what she has been reading -- only what she has favourited :-p
She's normally pretty discriminating, which is why I'm amazed to see her actively enthusing over OOC portrayals.
https://m.fanfiction.net/u/322185/?a=fs
But there's practically no R/C in there, bar some pieces from LittleLonghairedOutlaw.