Sides Shmides...that's fanfic!

[rabid1st]

So, a connected buddy of mine is telling me about the latest Angel sides and suddenly the conversation looks like this...(paraphrased for the most part)...

ME: You are kidding?

Her: Uhmm...no, that's what it says?

ME: But...BUT that's a book...

Her: Excuse me?

ME: Seriously (and here I mention all the major plot points again)...that's a book...Spike and Dru...or rather...WAIT...no...NO...it's fanfic.

Her: It's a fanfic? What part?

ME: All of it...okay...part of it is from the novel Spike and Dru...and the rest of it is...wait...mind...WORK mind...yes! It is from an older fanfic...and a really good one, too.




Thinking I MUST be misunderstanding...I attempt to recap what I have learned so far...
rabid1st: There is a sub...and Spike flashback to evil...and for some reason Spike takes 2 gay vamps with him to rescue some people for the INITITIVE...and Angel acts all mopey?
Her: lol
Her: Nooooooooooo
Her: this guy, Mr. something or other, comes to visit Angel
Her: Angel sees him
Her: there is a flashback
Her: to 1942
Her: or 43
Her (paraphrased): and Spike is on a submarine...killing people. And there are nazi vampires. Or the nazis are trying to make vampires so they can use them as weapons.

ME (turns out I did read that right the first time): That's Mustang Sally...hang on...let me make sure...

I go to ask CAIA (she knows everything...if I was on Who Wants To Marry A Millionaire...she would be my "phone a friend" lifeline...the one that OBJECTS TO THE UNION...she never "holds her piece")...and she confirms my suspicions...

JW and COMPANY are using a big chunk of a fic called The Heart's Filthy Lesson by Mustang Sally and Rivkat in an upcoming Angel episode.

Not that I blame them. It happens to be one of the few fics I wish I had written.

Still...it has come to this...they are officially out of ideas of their own...and also...Fury and Petrie are doing a Mary Sue, if rumor is to be believed. There are characters of both of them. Sheesh! Maybe this is just a bad joke to tide us all over the hiatus?



Rae

Comments

[darkwoods.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I noticed the plot similarity too.

I'm a big fan of the brilliant series of fics by Mustang Sally and RivkaT called the Bowiehabarata. You'll recognize the titles are David Bowie song titles.

The first two fics in this series borrow from the Indiana Jones adventure mythos. The second in the series, Serious Moonlight, is set largely in 1920s Egypt featuring(my personal favorite)living Spike.

The Heart's Filthy Lesson does flashback to the Nazis' attempt to control vampires and force them to do the bidding of the Nazi regime. As was mentioned earlier, Spike rescues Drusilla and ships her to Angel in Moscow for safety before kicking the ass of a vampire who then resurfaces in present day Sunnydale.

In the Heart's Filthy Lesson, Spike is rewarded with a soul by a Keshonte demon for fighting against the Nazis. The Keshonte demon, in this fic, is "the Simon Wiesenthal of the demon world. who spends his life..."hunting down demons and vampires who worked with the Nazis."

What appears to me to be shaping up on AtS 5 is the whole issue of who is controlling Angel, and by extension Spike. It seems like everybody wants to. It looks like the game of Go which we saw being enacted in season 7 Buffy is still being played. Are The Powers that Be and W&H the only Players? I don't know, but Angel and Spike are definitely pieces on the board.

That having been said, I think it is understandable that ME would search for other times when powerful entities would try to harness vampire power. If Fury et al ripped off Mustang Sally and RivkaT, they also ripped off a lot of fiction that features Nazis as reliable stand-ins for ultimate evil. Perhaps too, they reckoned that flashbacks are an amusing device to feed us backstory on Angel and Spike's relationship. Pre-Buffy pre-souled evil Spike - always a crowd pleaser.

Well...yes...true...

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

...to both of you! When it was my fic being pillaged I was always on the side of THIS could be a coincidence. It is hardly a stretch. Fanfic writers study the show and try to emulate it. We are bound to cross swords in the marketplace of ideas. And even here I am ultimately willing to give the benefit of the doubt because of the very reason you and ficklemob mention...Nazis are a pretty standard villian.

However, the synopsis: Mysterious man from the past triggers flashback to 1943 and the submarine with Spike on board (this is really one of the MAIN things I remember from S&D) and the Nazis using vampires as weapons.

Formed a direct link in my mind to the fanfic. I don't read a lot of fic actually and, unlike you, I barely recall the details for this story. But this synopsis brought it instantly to mind. I would have had the same reaction if I heard the following synopsis of a story:

Buffy is blinded by a demon and Spike sets aside their differences to undergo a trial to recover her eyesight.

It is open-ended enough to be coincidence and yet...that IS Love is Blind by Avalon. Just as S7 Faith and Buffy are up against Ethan Rayne, the First and a dimension hopping demon so they need Willow to assist with magic...is Ichnobate.

Thanks for all the great info on the Bowiehabarata series though...because it is indeed very good writing. And sure...an Indiana Jones tribute...which again, since JW and Co. love Indy...could be how the synergy happens in this case.

Rae