cephalopod

This is my Yuletide letter!

If you have an idea in mind already, you might want to leave this page right now—I'm starting with that because I hope you do, and I hope you'll ride that crazy train right off a cliff and into a beautiful explosion of wonder and glory secure in the knowledge that it's exactly what I wanted, because you're probably right.

However, if you'd prefer a few parameters, possibly even some suggestions? I'm good. You good? I am. Let's go.

A very, very basic overview of my preferences: funny good, angst bad. It doesn't have to be light comedy, mind you—and it certainly doesn't have to be comedy at all! But the stuff I like best is stuff that doesn't wallow, mope, or monologue (unless the wallowing, moping, and/or monologuing are exploited for comic effect, of course :) ). I love absurdism, fourth-wall hijinks, wanton abuse of narrative conventions and the characters themselves, bizarre pairings, and crack AUs. Canon compliance is not a big deal. Cheeky shenanigans are a big deal.

Let's talk about ME and MY NEEDS. ;)

Elder Scrolls: Skyrim

(the Elder Scrolls wiki! http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Skyrim The game is also delightful, but kind of seriously long. I recommend doing research with out-of-game resources.)

Skyrim is chock-full of potential for cracky amusement: by way of example, you may have noticed that one of the easiest ways to cook food early on is to break into the houses of good upstanding citizens and use their kitchens (and read their books, and go through their drawers, and pet their hair) while they sleep. You can eat raw human hearts right out of your inventory in the middle of town and no one bats an eye. If you can't use a Shout to harvest potatoes, then you damn well should be able to.

M'aiq the Liar addresses this meta-game deliciousness directly from a developer's perspective, and Sheogorath's cheerful disregard for questions of bad taste, bad manners, and personal responsibility is a neat in-game approximation of a player's perspective. At least mine. :) I love them both and I'd love to see them or your own character do things that illustrate the vast gulf between what the stories say you should do and what the game will actually let you do.

Gankutsuou: the Count of Monte Cristo

(you can watch the entire thing for free here. Nice.)

The young characters are fine and dandy and have their romances and their heartbreaks and their coming-of-age epiphanies, but I love the Count best. He's a truly dashing bastard, schemey and magnificent and always so, so stylish. He's my favorite character by far. He and his fanatically loyal household rule the show the way a few confused teenagers can't match. He needn't be in the foreground, but him exerting his influence over the other characters is my favorite thing of all. Subtle, over-the-top and comedic, erotic—lots of ways to play it. I'm happy with any of them! (also! Baptistin, Bertuccio, Ali, and Haydee don't get enough love.)

Something I just realized I took for granted: I like the Count as a villain, pitiless and driven by vengeance. Let him be that. A Count redeemed really seems to me like a Count with the best bits trimmed off.

The Supersizers RPF

(You want to watch it or watch it again, maybe? YouTube has the whole thing.)

You, ah, you remember that bit about crack AU? I can't think of a canon better able to accommodate some seriously weird stuff along those lines. I'd love an episode that never actually happened, basically, but you could take that in so many different directions...a different time period? A different planet? Different species? Maybe Sue and Giles are cars or something? Maybe the chefs try to kill them, and it's suddenly all survival-horror? One of the bits most important to the show is how they're so clever at each other while doing awful things; everything else is just cosmetic details.

Please don't pair Sue and Giles romantically. Any amount of their usual couple-roleplaying and jokey harassment is fine, is delightful even, but nothing serious.