Holly Lisle vs. RTD

[rabid1st]

Holly Lisle has an ax to grind against what she terms GLS, Genuis-Level Suckitude. She points out that many Pulitzer Prize winning works actually suck. And she's right about that, in my less than humble opinion. But her rules for Suckitude have a particularly telling rule for most of the SciFi "genius" writers out there. She has a rule against hope and one against coherence. There is even a rule against plot. But I immediately think of Rose and Donna and for that matter the Tenth Doctor when I read this rule...

XII. Thou shalt equate self-determination with heresy.

Self-determination is hope on steroids. Self-determination states that things could be better than they are, and believes the individual can do something to make them get better. In permitting your characters to express self-determination, you would be suggesting that your characters -- those malcontent bastards -- might in some way wish to see their worlds improve, or might even take a hand in improving them, or might have confidence in their own competence or the functioning of their own minds.

Read the rest of the rules or more stuff by Holly Lisle at her site...

http://hollylisle.com/index.php/Workshops/how-to-write-suckitudinous-fiction.html

Comments

[phdelicious.livejournal.com]

I haven't read much of Lisle's work and I was only moderately impressed with what I have read, but boy howdy did she nail RTD (and a couple others) with that list.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

I don't know that Lisle is that good myself, but she is a good writing teacher. She knows her pretentious "genius-level suckitude." And RTD and Ron Moore and Joss Whedon are all masters of the art of suckitude.

[phdelicious.livejournal.com]

I had to think about RDM and Joss for a while. I agree that RDM, when you consider BSG as a whole, certainly qualifies in more than half the categories. I'm still undecided about Joss.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

It is possible that Joss doesn't quite qualify in some of these categories. I tend to lump Joss in with the crowd, because he reset Buffy back to 15 years old after all we had been through with her. And I could see that lack of development in his other shows to the point that he became very predictable (for me, at least).

[phdelicious.livejournal.com]

My problem with placing Joss is that I haven't actually seen all of Buffy or Angel and Firefly, Dr Horrible and Dollhouse straddle the lines/categories.