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It feels kind of pretentious to ramble about my personal opinions when I'm not a distinguished person in fandom, because who even cares about what I like? But then again, I'd love to come back to this page 10 years into the future (or something) and see how my tastes have changed over time, if at all, so for once I'm making a post for/about myself!
And, yep, this is the Either/Or Meme that was first posted by @solo here and has been making its way around.
First things first: I have very few "hard nopes" when it comes to fiction, so regardless of which option I pick, a story under the opposite trope still has a chance to not only be read, but also to make it to my favourites, provided it's done well enough. So with that in mind...
Slow burn OR love at first sight: Slow burn. "Love" at first sight strikes me as being primarily motivated by lust rather than love. Lust is 100% okay, obviously, but confusing it with not only love, but eternal, life-changing, earth-shattering devotion? A weak narrative trope which is pretty much akin to cutting corners, imo. This is also why I take so much offence at Guardian's YOHE arc. One day and barely-a-conversation in exchange for a love that lasted 10 millennia (or even a few decades, depending on how you see it)? Total BS.
Fake dating OR secret dating: I don't like either of them, but neither are deal-breakers. Provided the justification is fairly sound (within the limits of believability set by that particular world and characters), I can read both.
Enemies to lovers OR best friends to lovers: Neither. I prefer a good antagonist to remain an antagonist, and even if they were to be redeemed, it shouldn't be through the power of sex or romance, because that makes their original motivations seem like mere tropes used to justify the plot and discarded once they've become inconvenient. And friendship/found family is my #1 favourite relationship dynamic (IRL and out), bar none. In my eyes, there's no such thing as "just friends" and "more than friends." There are friends and there are love interests, and both are important to the character - and the plot - in different ways.
Oh no there's only one bed OR long distance with correspondence: Both, I guess. I find sexting and video-call-sex to be more funny than sexy, though, so I prefer long-distance fics to be smut-free... Unless the smut happens once they meet again after so long apart, of course!
Fantasy au OR modern au: Both, again. I'm a huge fan of total AU's, so if the source material is fantasy/historical a modern AU would be great, and vice-versa for series with sci-fi or mundane settings.
Smut OR fluff: Neither, tbh. While I do read both, my heart will always belong to Plot. But for Guardian, and Guardian alone, I'll gladly take both (with plot still getting precedence). What about plot + fluff + smut, though? The ideal combination!
Mutual pining OR domestic bliss: Domestic bliss. Pining's too melodramatic for my tastes, and I prefer my favs to be as happy as possible, for as long as possible. This goes double for canons like Guardian with tragic endings (and tragic characters like Shen Wei).
Alternate universe OR future fic: Alternate universe. I find future fic to be a pretty hard sell, especially if they're fix-its, because then the need for plausibility and canon compliance overwhelms me and I can barely focus on anything else. Though this won't stop me from reading multiple iterations in the hope of finding at least one that can convince me. Especially if the canon ending was less-than-satisfactory. (Merlin comes to mind very strongly...)
One shot OR multi-chapter: This is the easiest choice I had to make in this post. Multi-chapter all the way.
Kid fic OR road trip fic: I like kids in pro fic just fine. (To wit, Yotsubato is one of the only two manga I've rated 10/10.) But I'm highly unlikely to read kid fic in fandoms where there were no important canonical child characters (if there were, I don't mind). My attitude towards children IRL is completely neutral: no dislike, but no particular affinity, either. I remember reading a couple of good road trip fics for Les Miserables a few years back, though I can't recall their titles and am too lazy to wade through my bookmarks right now.
Reincarnation OR character death: Reincarnation. I don't consume fiction to make myself feel miserable... Though given my tendency to fall head-over-heels for the oft ill-fated Second Male Lead, I often end up prey to the Major Character Death trope anyway. And, yes, I would love a good long reincarnation AU for Guardian.
Arranged marriage OR accidental marriage: Neither, because I'm not super into marriage. (In TMI time, my mother is once again looking into potential candidates for my husband, so I think my resentment is justified >_<) Personal biases aside, though, I'd go with arranged marriage because it leaves plenty of room for character/relationship development. Accidental marriage is just strange, and I can't really get my head around how to make the circumstances leading up to something like that plausible.
Time travel OR isolated together: Both of these can yield great results in the hands of a capable author. But if they are isolated together, both characters have to be in reasonably good physical and mental health, or else it just becomes awkward and uncomfortable. The charm is in that they could run away if they wanted to, but they don't actually want to, you know? Not that one of them is being forced to stay because they're physically/mentally incapable of leaving.
Neighbors OR roommates: Both, with a slight preference for neighbours because I have a bit of a personal aversion to sharing such an intimate personal space with a virtual stranger.
Sci-fi au OR magic au: I hate to be indecisive like this, but... Both. I just freaking love AU's. That is all XD
Bodyswap OR genderbender: Hell, no to bodyswap if they have sex while swapped, cos that really irks me for some reason. Otherwise I'm game, and the more creative the circumstances leading to the swap and the more convoluted the solution, the better! Genderbender is fine provided it preserves pairing orientation - meaning same-sex pairings have to stay same-sex and heterosexual pairings have to stay heterosexual.
Angst OR crack: Angst, though only if it's at reasonable levels and the characters don't become too maudlin or melodramatic. I suffer from strong second/third-hand embarrassment re: both fiction and RL, so I rarely read crack.
Apocalyptic OR mundane: Apocalyptic. Mundane is fine, but the plot (and action, which I love just as much, if not more) potential of apocalyptic fic is too tasty to resist.
Yikes, but this got out of hand! (What else is new?) I should probably just make the post private, but, eh. No harm in leaving it public, I suppose?
And, yep, this is the Either/Or Meme that was first posted by @solo here and has been making its way around.
First things first: I have very few "hard nopes" when it comes to fiction, so regardless of which option I pick, a story under the opposite trope still has a chance to not only be read, but also to make it to my favourites, provided it's done well enough. So with that in mind...
Slow burn OR love at first sight: Slow burn. "Love" at first sight strikes me as being primarily motivated by lust rather than love. Lust is 100% okay, obviously, but confusing it with not only love, but eternal, life-changing, earth-shattering devotion? A weak narrative trope which is pretty much akin to cutting corners, imo. This is also why I take so much offence at Guardian's YOHE arc. One day and barely-a-conversation in exchange for a love that lasted 10 millennia (or even a few decades, depending on how you see it)? Total BS.
Fake dating OR secret dating: I don't like either of them, but neither are deal-breakers. Provided the justification is fairly sound (within the limits of believability set by that particular world and characters), I can read both.
Enemies to lovers OR best friends to lovers: Neither. I prefer a good antagonist to remain an antagonist, and even if they were to be redeemed, it shouldn't be through the power of sex or romance, because that makes their original motivations seem like mere tropes used to justify the plot and discarded once they've become inconvenient. And friendship/found family is my #1 favourite relationship dynamic (IRL and out), bar none. In my eyes, there's no such thing as "just friends" and "more than friends." There are friends and there are love interests, and both are important to the character - and the plot - in different ways.
Oh no there's only one bed OR long distance with correspondence: Both, I guess. I find sexting and video-call-sex to be more funny than sexy, though, so I prefer long-distance fics to be smut-free... Unless the smut happens once they meet again after so long apart, of course!
Fantasy au OR modern au: Both, again. I'm a huge fan of total AU's, so if the source material is fantasy/historical a modern AU would be great, and vice-versa for series with sci-fi or mundane settings.
Smut OR fluff: Neither, tbh. While I do read both, my heart will always belong to Plot. But for Guardian, and Guardian alone, I'll gladly take both (with plot still getting precedence). What about plot + fluff + smut, though? The ideal combination!
Mutual pining OR domestic bliss: Domestic bliss. Pining's too melodramatic for my tastes, and I prefer my favs to be as happy as possible, for as long as possible. This goes double for canons like Guardian with tragic endings (and tragic characters like Shen Wei).
Alternate universe OR future fic: Alternate universe. I find future fic to be a pretty hard sell, especially if they're fix-its, because then the need for plausibility and canon compliance overwhelms me and I can barely focus on anything else. Though this won't stop me from reading multiple iterations in the hope of finding at least one that can convince me. Especially if the canon ending was less-than-satisfactory. (Merlin comes to mind very strongly...)
One shot OR multi-chapter: This is the easiest choice I had to make in this post. Multi-chapter all the way.
Kid fic OR road trip fic: I like kids in pro fic just fine. (To wit, Yotsubato is one of the only two manga I've rated 10/10.) But I'm highly unlikely to read kid fic in fandoms where there were no important canonical child characters (if there were, I don't mind). My attitude towards children IRL is completely neutral: no dislike, but no particular affinity, either. I remember reading a couple of good road trip fics for Les Miserables a few years back, though I can't recall their titles and am too lazy to wade through my bookmarks right now.
Reincarnation OR character death: Reincarnation. I don't consume fiction to make myself feel miserable... Though given my tendency to fall head-over-heels for the oft ill-fated Second Male Lead, I often end up prey to the Major Character Death trope anyway. And, yes, I would love a good long reincarnation AU for Guardian.
Arranged marriage OR accidental marriage: Neither, because I'm not super into marriage. (In TMI time, my mother is once again looking into potential candidates for my husband, so I think my resentment is justified >_<) Personal biases aside, though, I'd go with arranged marriage because it leaves plenty of room for character/relationship development. Accidental marriage is just strange, and I can't really get my head around how to make the circumstances leading up to something like that plausible.
Time travel OR isolated together: Both of these can yield great results in the hands of a capable author. But if they are isolated together, both characters have to be in reasonably good physical and mental health, or else it just becomes awkward and uncomfortable. The charm is in that they could run away if they wanted to, but they don't actually want to, you know? Not that one of them is being forced to stay because they're physically/mentally incapable of leaving.
Neighbors OR roommates: Both, with a slight preference for neighbours because I have a bit of a personal aversion to sharing such an intimate personal space with a virtual stranger.
Sci-fi au OR magic au: I hate to be indecisive like this, but... Both. I just freaking love AU's. That is all XD
Bodyswap OR genderbender: Hell, no to bodyswap if they have sex while swapped, cos that really irks me for some reason. Otherwise I'm game, and the more creative the circumstances leading to the swap and the more convoluted the solution, the better! Genderbender is fine provided it preserves pairing orientation - meaning same-sex pairings have to stay same-sex and heterosexual pairings have to stay heterosexual.
Angst OR crack: Angst, though only if it's at reasonable levels and the characters don't become too maudlin or melodramatic. I suffer from strong second/third-hand embarrassment re: both fiction and RL, so I rarely read crack.
Apocalyptic OR mundane: Apocalyptic. Mundane is fine, but the plot (and action, which I love just as much, if not more) potential of apocalyptic fic is too tasty to resist.
Yikes, but this got out of hand! (What else is new?) I should probably just make the post private, but, eh. No harm in leaving it public, I suppose?
no subject
Date: 2020-02-15 09:39 pm (UTC)From:I have very few "hard nopes" when it comes to fiction, so regardless of which option I pick, a story under the opposite trope still has a chance to not only be read, but also to make it to my favourites, provided it's done well enough.
Yeah, that's true. There's a lot I wouldn't go seeking out, but I won't refuse it if I come across it - and there are very few tropes that are such hard NOPEs for me that there is no conceivable version I could enjoy. Exceptions to every rule! *g*
no subject
Date: 2020-02-16 03:08 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2020-02-16 07:10 pm (UTC)From: