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ravenI'm bored, sleepy and I have to work tomorrow. Hence a meme, nabbed from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
pinkishmew, in which you name your top six television shows and answer the questions that follow. I think my brain is falling out - I've spent the day alternately reading feminist literature and watching The X-Files, so I'm not to blame for what follows.
1. Doctor Who
2. Firefly
3. SG-1
4. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
5. X-Files
6. M*A*S*H
1. Who is your favourite character from #2?
Mal Reynolds. And River. And all of them except Inara. But above all, Mal, because he is funny and snarky and uses wonderful words and hits girls and wields guns like an extension of himself. And given that those last two qualities I don't often admire in people, Mal is pretty damn special. *g*
2. Who is your least favourite character from #4?
Buffy. And hating the title character of a show is not good. To be fair I didn't hate her to begin with, but only when she got really self-righteous and trampled over everyone else and just, meh. But in the earlier seasons it's more of a case I liked her okay, but less than Willow and Giles and Xander who are all marvellousness.
3. What would a crossover between #1 and #5 include?
Doctor Who and the X-Files? Would be fabulous, I reckon. I think crossovers work - really work - when you can immediately see where the plot is going just as you work through the mechanics of it. The Doctor would just appear in Mulder's basement room, I think, and it'd probably go something like this:
Mulder was on the floor when he heard something, very loud and close at hand, make a noise like vworp, vworp, thud. He stood up in a hurry, pushing bits of paper back into the bottom desk drawer, and stared at the large blue oblong that had just appeared from nowhere into his office.
The door of the thing – Mulder’s brain kicked into gear, flicked through some mental references and informed it was a police public call box, British, all but obsolete – opened and a man wearing glasses and a long brown duster stepped out. "Hello!" he said cheerfully. "I’m the Doctor."
Mulder didn’t say anything. He stared.
"And you," continued the Doctor, "are Special Agent Fox Mulder."
"How did you..."
"It’s on your badge." The Doctor picked it up off the desk and waved it at him. "Er, this is Earth, isn’t it? Is there anything I can help you with? To give an entirely random example, are you having an alien invasion?"
"No," said Mulder wistfully. "Not right now."
"Ghosts? Werewolves? Super-intelligent shades of the colour blue?" continued the Doctor hopefully and so on and so forth, this crossover would write itself.
4. Who is your favourite ship from #6?
Hawkeye/Trapper, still! I remember the Great Divide on the mash-slash list about who slashed Hawkeye/Trapper and who slashed Hawkeye/BJ. It's just at this moment occurred to me that technically that was a ship war, and the thought makes me laugh.
5. If you were to set one person from #3 and one person from #6 on a blind date, who would they be?
Heee. I think Sam and Margaret. Yes, definitely Sam and Margaret! Both strong women who have to cope with macho military crap all the time. I bet they'd get on like a house on fire.
6. If you could meet one person from #4 and spend the day with them, who would it be, and what would you do?
Giles! Heee. Tara a close second, but I do love Giles. He'd be nervous and wipe his glasses a lot, and then warm up and be sarcastic and wonderful and hopefully he'd tell me a bit about Oxford as it used to be and it would all be marvellous.
7. If you could change one thing about #2's plot line, what would you change?
Bring back Wash! Waaah. And Book, too! And let Zoe and Wash have the baby they wanted, because that was one of my favourite moments of the original series and it bugs me that the film just removed so much plotty potential.
8. Explain a relationship between two people (not necessarily romantic) from show #5, and why you like the relationship between them.
Ah, Mulder and Scully. I'm not entirely sure whether I ship them madly or not. I'm not averse to the idea, but nor am I particularly enthuiastic. I guess I just like their relationship in all its platonic/romantic fucked-up-ness. I like how they complement each other so perfectly, and I just love the reversal of gender stereotypes, with Mulder as the romantic believer and Scully the hard-headed sceptic and the way they play off each other so well. It is love, yes.
9. If the lead title characters (first name in the credits) from #1 and #3 were both drowning, and you could only save one, who would it be?
The Doctor or Jack O'Neill? Neither of them need saving, for heaven's sake. They're both far too good at pulling solutions from thin air for that. If I had to pick, it'd be Jack, because the Doctor doesn't need saving from drowning anyway, he has a respiratory bypass whatsit.
10. If you could change the title characters' order in the credits for #4, what order would you choose?
Errr... I don't like this question. Next.
11. If you were able to add a new character, any kind of character you wanted, to the storyline for #6, what would the character be like and what would their role be?
Another female character. I love Margaret, and she needed someone who wasn't Frank.
12. What happens in your favourite episode of show #2?
Heh! My favourite episode of Firefly is Our Mrs Reynolds, in which a woman emerges out of nowhere and claims to have married Mal the night before. Mal is terrifed and bewildered in equal proportions. The rest of the crew enjoy themselves thoroughly. It really is a stellar episode.
13. If you could kill off one of the characters of #1 who would it be and how would you do it?
Goodbye, Rose. I don't hate you. No, really I don't. I like you enough to have written lots of fic about you, mostly in your POV. But, you know. Enough already.
14. If you got the chance to visit the set for either show #3 or show #5 which would you choose?
Well, as neither show is being filmed any longer...
15. So, I saved the best question for last. If you could date anyone from any of these shows, which show and which person?
All my favourite characters are completely fucked up. Mal - definitely not, he's too hardened and angsty and carryiny too much emotional baggage. Daniel's the same - too fucked-up. Ditto Fox Mulder and Hawkeye Pierce. The Doctor would be a complete trainwreck.
I think it would be Sam Carter. She's smart and beautiful and amazingly, astoninishingly level-headed and sane.
pinkishmew, in which you name your top six television shows and answer the questions that follow. I think my brain is falling out - I've spent the day alternately reading feminist literature and watching The X-Files, so I'm not to blame for what follows.1. Doctor Who
2. Firefly
3. SG-1
4. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
5. X-Files
6. M*A*S*H
1. Who is your favourite character from #2?
Mal Reynolds. And River. And all of them except Inara. But above all, Mal, because he is funny and snarky and uses wonderful words and hits girls and wields guns like an extension of himself. And given that those last two qualities I don't often admire in people, Mal is pretty damn special. *g*
2. Who is your least favourite character from #4?
Buffy. And hating the title character of a show is not good. To be fair I didn't hate her to begin with, but only when she got really self-righteous and trampled over everyone else and just, meh. But in the earlier seasons it's more of a case I liked her okay, but less than Willow and Giles and Xander who are all marvellousness.
3. What would a crossover between #1 and #5 include?
Doctor Who and the X-Files? Would be fabulous, I reckon. I think crossovers work - really work - when you can immediately see where the plot is going just as you work through the mechanics of it. The Doctor would just appear in Mulder's basement room, I think, and it'd probably go something like this:
Mulder was on the floor when he heard something, very loud and close at hand, make a noise like vworp, vworp, thud. He stood up in a hurry, pushing bits of paper back into the bottom desk drawer, and stared at the large blue oblong that had just appeared from nowhere into his office.
The door of the thing – Mulder’s brain kicked into gear, flicked through some mental references and informed it was a police public call box, British, all but obsolete – opened and a man wearing glasses and a long brown duster stepped out. "Hello!" he said cheerfully. "I’m the Doctor."
Mulder didn’t say anything. He stared.
"And you," continued the Doctor, "are Special Agent Fox Mulder."
"How did you..."
"It’s on your badge." The Doctor picked it up off the desk and waved it at him. "Er, this is Earth, isn’t it? Is there anything I can help you with? To give an entirely random example, are you having an alien invasion?"
"No," said Mulder wistfully. "Not right now."
"Ghosts? Werewolves? Super-intelligent shades of the colour blue?" continued the Doctor hopefully and so on and so forth, this crossover would write itself.
4. Who is your favourite ship from #6?
Hawkeye/Trapper, still! I remember the Great Divide on the mash-slash list about who slashed Hawkeye/Trapper and who slashed Hawkeye/BJ. It's just at this moment occurred to me that technically that was a ship war, and the thought makes me laugh.
5. If you were to set one person from #3 and one person from #6 on a blind date, who would they be?
Heee. I think Sam and Margaret. Yes, definitely Sam and Margaret! Both strong women who have to cope with macho military crap all the time. I bet they'd get on like a house on fire.
6. If you could meet one person from #4 and spend the day with them, who would it be, and what would you do?
Giles! Heee. Tara a close second, but I do love Giles. He'd be nervous and wipe his glasses a lot, and then warm up and be sarcastic and wonderful and hopefully he'd tell me a bit about Oxford as it used to be and it would all be marvellous.
7. If you could change one thing about #2's plot line, what would you change?
Bring back Wash! Waaah. And Book, too! And let Zoe and Wash have the baby they wanted, because that was one of my favourite moments of the original series and it bugs me that the film just removed so much plotty potential.
8. Explain a relationship between two people (not necessarily romantic) from show #5, and why you like the relationship between them.
Ah, Mulder and Scully. I'm not entirely sure whether I ship them madly or not. I'm not averse to the idea, but nor am I particularly enthuiastic. I guess I just like their relationship in all its platonic/romantic fucked-up-ness. I like how they complement each other so perfectly, and I just love the reversal of gender stereotypes, with Mulder as the romantic believer and Scully the hard-headed sceptic and the way they play off each other so well. It is love, yes.
9. If the lead title characters (first name in the credits) from #1 and #3 were both drowning, and you could only save one, who would it be?
The Doctor or Jack O'Neill? Neither of them need saving, for heaven's sake. They're both far too good at pulling solutions from thin air for that. If I had to pick, it'd be Jack, because the Doctor doesn't need saving from drowning anyway, he has a respiratory bypass whatsit.
10. If you could change the title characters' order in the credits for #4, what order would you choose?
Errr... I don't like this question. Next.
11. If you were able to add a new character, any kind of character you wanted, to the storyline for #6, what would the character be like and what would their role be?
Another female character. I love Margaret, and she needed someone who wasn't Frank.
12. What happens in your favourite episode of show #2?
Heh! My favourite episode of Firefly is Our Mrs Reynolds, in which a woman emerges out of nowhere and claims to have married Mal the night before. Mal is terrifed and bewildered in equal proportions. The rest of the crew enjoy themselves thoroughly. It really is a stellar episode.
13. If you could kill off one of the characters of #1 who would it be and how would you do it?
Goodbye, Rose. I don't hate you. No, really I don't. I like you enough to have written lots of fic about you, mostly in your POV. But, you know. Enough already.
14. If you got the chance to visit the set for either show #3 or show #5 which would you choose?
Well, as neither show is being filmed any longer...
15. So, I saved the best question for last. If you could date anyone from any of these shows, which show and which person?
All my favourite characters are completely fucked up. Mal - definitely not, he's too hardened and angsty and carryiny too much emotional baggage. Daniel's the same - too fucked-up. Ditto Fox Mulder and Hawkeye Pierce. The Doctor would be a complete trainwreck.
I think it would be Sam Carter. She's smart and beautiful and amazingly, astoninishingly level-headed and sane.
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no subject
on 2006-07-06 12:40 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-07-06 01:38 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-07-06 03:38 pm (UTC)This icon is really damn appropriate.
on 2006-07-06 02:24 am (UTC)Re: 15: I did this meme a little while back, and I came to the same conclusion. All the most attractive characters are also the most fucked up ones. How does that happen?
OMG come to Chicaaaaago.
This has been your daily dose of very biased travel advice.
Re: This icon is really damn appropriate.
on 2006-07-06 01:50 pm (UTC)Re: 15, this is so true and I can't think of a reason. Making the above list, I realised it's not even mild fucked-up-ness; of my favourite characters, three - Hawkeye, Daniel and Fox Mulder - have actually been formally committed. I don't mind that, because I rather think that insanity, or at least mental instability, is my bulletproof narrative kink. I don't know why that is either. Maybe because if they were all stable they wouldn't be as interesting? But why does mental instability confer interest?
Okay, I'm talking nonsense. Moving on.
OMG I want to sooooooo much. Soooooo much. I was drafting an email regarding it to you and Meredith, but first of all I must explain matters to my parents.
Re: This icon is really damn appropriate.
on 2006-07-06 04:04 pm (UTC)Oh, same here. Asked to list a dozen favorite fictional characters, I'd come up with at least three who were institutionalized or had nervous breakdowns, a sociopath or two, a smattering of alcoholics and abuse victims, at least one with a diagnosed mental illness, and a few people who are just so emotionally repressed they can barely function. I shudder to think what this says about me, but I think that it's probably somehow related to my bulletproof narrative kink about misdirection and denial and the indeterminacy of truth. I love seeing slightly unhinged characters confronted with their own little evasions and self-delusions; I love seeing people going crazy trying to navigate crazy worlds.
Anyway, that's why I think mental instability--in a fictional context--is interesting to me.
OMG. Have I said that enough?
*crosses all available digits*
*obsessively checks inbox*
no subject
on 2006-07-06 10:11 am (UTC)I have no time to write it, oh noes.no subject
on 2006-07-06 01:53 pm (UTC)I have no time!
on 2006-07-09 02:41 am (UTC)Mulder shook his head.
"...Androids? Megalomaniac cactus'?"
"Megalomaniac what?" Scully asked as she walked through the door.
Mulder ushered her aside and whispered conspiratorially in her ear. "Scully, it's amazing!" He pointed over to the object in the corner. "He just appeared in that." Deep breath. "I think he's alien."
Re: I have no time!
on 2006-07-09 12:57 pm (UTC)"What?" He frowned at her. "Scully, I'm fine. I'm better than fine. There's an alien in our office, Scully!"
Scully turned her attention to him. "You told him you were an alien, Mr..."
"It's 'Doctor', actually. And no, I didn't, but I can tell him now if you like. Mulder, I'm an alien. To be specific, I'm a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. I'm nine hundred years old, and I travel through time and space" - he pointed at the blue police box - "in that."
Scully nodded, slowly, and said, "Mulder, I think this man is in need of psychiatric help. He's obviously come to you because he knows you'll entertain his delusions."
Oh no! I've been sucked in!
on 2006-07-12 09:59 am (UTC)Expressive, aren't I?It's scary that I can name most of the episodes the piccies come from.)"He's obviously come to you because he knows you'll entertain his delusions."
"Quite the opposite, Miss Scully, I think you'll find," the Doctor said, now standing next to Mulder, conpleting the small circle. Scully hadn't noticed him move at all. "I realise you're an intelligent woman, a woman of science, and you like having proof."
Scully gave Mulder a questioning look. "How did he know my name?" she mouthed. Mulder shrugged.
The Doctor grinned, now back at the blue box. "Would you like that proof?" He opened the door and gestured inside, like a circus conductor showing his greatest act.
Re: Oh no! I've been sucked in!
on 2006-07-13 12:28 am (UTC)Inside the box, she didn't see what she was expecting.
"Well?" said the Doctor, hands on hips. "Aren't you going to say it?"
At her side, she felt Mulder tense, but she beat him to it. "It's bigger on the inside than on the outside," she said weakly, and leaned against the door.
The Doctor laughed. "Precisely! And now, Special Agents Mulder and Scully... do you want to come with me?"
"This thing," - Mulder tapped the box - "moves?"
"Does it ever!" The Doctor grinned at him delightedly. "Say the word and see the world. Or the universe, I should say."
Re: Oh no! I've been sucked in!
on 2006-07-14 12:29 am (UTC)Mulder thought for a moment. "It can go anywhere?" The Doctor nodded. "Paris, France."
The Doctor looked crestfallen. "Are you sure? It's not very out of the way, really. Although last time I went it was quite fun..." He petered off, deep in his thoughts.
"Come on Mulder, this -box- can't go anywhere, and -this-" She pointed to the great expanse that was the TARDIS "Is probably just smoke and mirrors."
She turned to go, but the Doctor was at her side in an instant. He took her hand. "Isn't there anywhere you would like to go?" he said softly. "Anywhere at all?"
Extra-long segment 'cause I've taken so long!
on 2006-07-22 09:37 pm (UTC)"Miss Scully..."
"It's Agent Scully. Or Dr. Scully." She turned to stare at him, trying to get the point across. It wasn't just that she didn't appreciate having her time wasted by some delusional crank, although that was part of it. It was, she realised belatedly, that she didn't appreciate this manipulation, she didn't want to be play philosophical mind games with a complete stranger, she didn't want to be down here, away from the sunlight, at all.
"Ah," he said. "I see."
"What?" she snapped. "I didn't say anything."
"You didn't have to." The Doctor took her hand again and very deliberately pulled her inside the box. Quickly, Mulder followed, and his eyes were shining in the low, golden-green light of the room. Scully looked about her, taking in the plunging rotors and peculiar levers and arching girders, feeling nothing but a certain tiredness.
The Doctor, who had been pulling at handles and pushing at buttons with two-handed enthusiasm, stepped back in satisfaction. "I don't usually do this," he said, as the room juddered and creaked. "Alternate universes are tricky things, generally speaking. But I think I'll make an exception."
With a thud, the creaking stopped. The three of them were standing in perfect stillness.
"Where are we?" Mulder asked, his voice hoarse and guarded.
"Where you wanted," the Doctor said, nodding at Scully. "Another world. The world where you never came down into the basement."
His hands shaking, Mulder reached for the door handle.
I like alternate realities.
on 2006-07-28 11:12 am (UTC)The basement office was dark, the only light was the green glow drifting through the TARDIS doors. It looked the same to Mulder, the ‘I WANT TO BELIEVE’ poster on the wall, gloomy in the dark, the projector currently turned off, slides scattered around. He looked up and saw a couple of pencils threatening to drop any moment off the ceiling.
“It feels…” Mulder flinched as the Doctor slipped past him and out of the TARDIS.
“Don’t worry. Skipping time lines, or realities as the case may be, won’t damage your health.” He stopped at Mulder’s desk and caught his breath. “Oh. Can any of you feel that?”
THUD.
The Doctor calmly picked up the pencil from the floor. “Probably nothing. Let’s go look around, shall we?” He wandered out the office door, absently twirling the pencil in his fingers.
Mulder looked back at Scully, who was still at the console.
“I can’t do this Mulder,” she whispered.
“Why?” he mouthed sympathetically back at her.
A pause, then something changed, and she straightened up. “Let’s get this over with. Maybe then we can get this man some psychiatric help.”
Re: I like alternate realities.
on 2006-07-30 12:18 am (UTC)"Are you coming?" The Doctor's hands were on his hips, in a pose that might have looked somewhat camp on anyone else.
With a glance at each other, Mulder and Scully stepped into the room. Away from the peculiar dim light of the room inside the box, the room at once seemed less alien. Scully was fairly sure that they had been treated to a sequence of light and sound effects, but spatially speaking, they hadn't moved.
Mulder was already walking round the room, picking things up and setting them down, and she noticed all at once that there was a change in his movements against the background of the familiar; rather than his easy gait around a room he practically lived in, he was careful and tentative, with eyes sharp and lingering on detail. He believes, she thought, and wondered why she was surprised.
"So far, so hoopy, as an old friend might have said." The Doctor picked up a paper bag off the desk. "Then again, does this belong to either of you?"
Scully turned to look as he produced a sandwich from the bag. "No," she said.
Mulder shook his head. Slowly, he turned on the spot, eyes skimming every surface, and came to a stop facing her. "The files are in a different order," he said. "There's a new clipping on the board - second one down from the left - which I didn't pin up there. The name plate on the desk has been moved and turned over. As you say, Doctor, that sandwich isn't mine. There are half a dozen other changes, but they're more minor."
The Doctor smiled. "You have a photographic memory, Agent Mulder. Very good. But you've neglected to mention the key point among all this."
"And what's that?" Scully asked, again conscious that she was being pulled into a delusion and a time-wasting one at that.
"This sandwich," - the Doctor held it up - "is fresh. And where there's a fresh sandwich, there's a person due their lunch."
Mulder strode to the door and opened it, pushing it so both Scully and the Doctor could see the familiar name on it. "This is my office," he murmured.
"Mulder," Scully began, but stopped as he froze into stillness.
"Someone's coming," he whispered. Below his voice, they could all hear the sound of footsteps getting closer.
Re: I like alternate realities.
on 2006-10-28 02:00 am (UTC)She switched on the light and sauntered into the room, her black high heels clacking on the floor. She smelled of vanilla, subtle but enticing. The light was switched on, the sandwich picked up and then she gasped. “Mulder! I thought you were in Philadelphia!”
Mulder leant back in his chair, his feet propped up on his desk, all casual air. “Philadelphia?” he said, trying to think of an excuse. “Where did you here that?”
She gave him a perplexed look. “From you. As you boarded the plane.”
“Oh, of course!” He heard a not so well hidden chuckle come from behind the TARDIS and scrambled off his chair. “Of course, didn’t I tell you? They didn’t need me, the sheriff that is, so I’ve come back early! Surprise!”
Re: I like alternate realities.
on 2006-12-24 03:01 am (UTC)"Why didn't the sheriff need you?" she asked as she bit into the sandwich and slid into Mulder's chair.
"Uh, the guy woke up." Mulder cringed as he said it. Worst excuse ever.
"The dead guy?"
Yup, worst excuse ever. "Yeah, him. The coroner was mistaken. You know how they are down south." He heard another muffled laugh and knew it was Scully's. The autopilot went on and Mulder grabbed the lady's arm. "Why don't I tell you about it outside. You might need the fresh air."
She gave him another one of those looks, the I better just humour him until he stops being strange looks and followed him out the door.
---
The Doctor let his hand off Scully's mouth and she let out a giggle. One quick look at him and the grin was wiped off her face, the professional facade back on.
"Who was that?"
The Doctor shrugged. "How would I know?"