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01/17/2002 Entry: "Welcome To The House Of Smut, Detective Tsukikoushi."

WARNING: As is specified in my blogging contract, the quarterly pseudo-scholarly essay about yaoi. Also contains minor spoilers for Suikoden II, as I am using it as a ridiculously handy example. I will attempt to be vague about major plot points, or black them out as necessary; however, be warned.
DISCLAIMER: This essay is not meant to tell you how things should be done, rather, how I, personally, do them. It is not my intention to harangue, but rather to muse aloud. And, secondly, every point I make in here could just as easily be applied to heterosexual smut as well. I'm just using yaoi because, well, it's my blog and I can.

Okay. So you want to write yaoi, or male/male smut. Don't argue with me, you do. At least for the purposes of this essay, you do.

Fine and dandy! But before you start limbering up the more esoteric third of your vocabulary, you know what you need? That's right, you need to pick a couple of characters to smut about! (Well, technically, any number of characters is theoretically possible, but single-character smut is not germane to this discussion and three or more is for Advanced Students Only. So, I shall assume two for the time being.)
Furthermore, let us assume that you are greatly concerned that the couple in question make at least some sense within the game, and care more about plot and characterization than prettiness. Therefore, you can't just pick two cute characters and dump them into bed. (Damn.)
Also, you have decided (shut up, you have) to write relatively friendly sex between two consenting adults, instead of rape or nonconsensual sex or any of the other stomach-churning alternatives.

Therefore, the question on our minds today, and the question that I shall address, is this: how do you pick your happy couple?
Well, okay, that's not quite true. The question that I shall address is really 'how do I pick my couple?'. Because I'm terribly self-centered.

The way I do it is a crime.

Well, no, I'm lying. Sort of. Incoming metaphor alert: if yaoi is a crime hidden deep within the game, then the way I ferret out the yaoi and make my arrests is akin to detective work.
In other words, to expose the yaoi to the light of day, I look for opportunity, motive, and evidence (both hard and circumstantial).

Now, to explain.

Opportunity:
Did the two characters in question spend enough time together for something to happen?
This is the first, easiest, and most basic of detections, and by itself is generally not enough to carry a fic unless you have mad skillz or don't care what kind of masturbatory crap you're cranking out. Generally. People can always surprise you.
Using Suikoden II as my example, quite frankly, almost everyone has opportunity. There are a hundred and eight of them, and they all spend months, if not a year, living in the same castle together. That works out to many free evenings/nights/mornings/whatever spent side-by-side in which something could happen.
Let us take a couple that I saw displayed at great length on a Japanese fanart site: Sheena/Luc. The couple is entirely possible timewise but requires a large amount of work on the writer's part to be convincing. There's no reason involved; they're just considered to be pretty. while they do indeed live in the same castle, the game never gives us concrete reason to believe they ever speak to each other, let alone have sex. It is, however, entirely possible simply because it is never contradicted.
However, if you want to write, say, Culgan/Flik, well, let us hope you are a screamingly talented writer. The only time those two spend anywhere near each other is in the middle of titanic battles, fighting against each other. Frankly, that might make sex a bit rushed.

Motive:
Would the characters in question spend significant amounts of time together, be free to pursue a relationship, and possibly find the other character attractive in the important ways?
If a character has motive, they almost alwaysautomatically have opportunity. Almost always. Again, people can always surprise you.
Klaus is Shu's assistant. As such, they work together for hours every day. There would be plenty of time in which to get to know one another.
Hix is involved up to his eyebrows with Tengaar, and as such is a lot less likely to suddenly run off and sleep with, say, Flik. (God only knows why anyone would choose Tengaar over Flik, but I digress.) Most excuses to extract a character from his official relationship are excuses at best and masturbatory at worst.
When I say 'attractive', I'm not simply talking about looks here, you realize, but attitude, personality, ethics, etc. Kinnison the gentle sweet forest ranger is not likely to be attracted to, say, Sid the fucking insane sewer-dwelling bat-winged psychopath. (And excuse me, I must hit myself for suggesting it.)

Evidence:
Does the game suggest in any way that the characters care for each other?
The third and final detection, evidence is the colander through which couples must pass to become canon, and almost always assumes both opportunity and motive. Usually, it involves happily perverting friendship to your own ends.
Hard evidence would be an absolute and unmistakable declaration of love or demonstration of gay, and as such is not terribly common. (Simone and Vincent de Boule notwithstanding. Ahem.)
Circumstantial evidence, though, is rife. And spoilers follow to demonstrate my point. Hilight the gaping black holes in the blog entry to read the spoilers.
Let's take Viktor and Flik. They spent close to two years living and working together between the first game and the second one, and during the setup of the game happily bicker with each other like an old married couple. And, of course, they have a Unite Attack. Sure, this could just as easily mean they're best friends, and in all likelihood that's what it's supposed to mean. But that is a gaping plot hole into which a crowbar may be inserted.
Or Camus and Miklotov, the Matilda Knights. If you are viewing the game through yaoi-tinted spectacles, Suikoden II does everything but write 'Camus x Miklotov' on a baseball bat and crush your skull with it. When Miklotov runs off to investigate Muse, Camus flat-out begs the party to keep an eye on him. When Miklotov resigns from the Knights, Camus is ordered to arrest him, and resigns his own commission instead, so that they can both run off together and join your army. If Camus falls in combat, Miklotov automatically goes berserk. They also have a Unite Attack. They have rooms right next to each other's, for heaven's sake. Again, purely circumstantial evidence, but an easy easy easy place to crowbar the game open.

Basically, (sigh, incoming metaphor warning) if opportunity is the lot on which the house will be built, motive is the concrete foundation, and evidence is the roof. Put them all together and you've got a nice little house of smut.
And, you know, it's such a narrow little house. You see, after all that, I'm going to at least partially repudiate it. There is so much more that you can do with a smutfic than what I have listed above. And it can be done well, too. But, you know, as a place to start, the criminologist approach isn't that bad, I guess.

Exit Mooncalf, singing 'The House Of The Rising Smut': it's been the ruin of many a young girl, and God, I know, I'm one...

Replies: add your comment: currently 12 comments

Well, if nothing else, it ensures some vague amount of logic in said smutfic, and I am firmly of the opinion that logic is a commodity that should circulate in higher supply in this world. (Perhaps someone should open a logic manufactory and market it? Erm. Nathan. Shut up before you embarass yourself more.) *Anyhow*, as I was saying before I adventurously embarked on idiotic digressions, fiction written with a logical, coherent, and believeable plot and/or set of circumstances (as I grant a brief nod to tiny little fics that are essentially character sketches. Wait. *Idiotic digressions*, Nathan...) tend to appeal to me *so* much more than surrealism, incoherency, or stuff that just screams: "FK REALISM! FK BELIEVEABILITY! IT'S MY FIC, AND I'LL HAVE GARR SLEEPING WITH TEEPO, LIKE IT OR NOT!" (Apologies to those who have never played BOF3, who therefore have the reference lost on them.) Dear gods. I just suggested a yaoi pairing, albeit a *really really* crappy one, both in terms of plausibility and in terms of the total population who would derive any pleasure whatsoever from the thought, in my admittedly fuzzy estimation as a heterosexual male. It must be too much time spent hanging about on your blog, Mooncalf. And *I'm* evil?

(P.S.- That reminds me, the thing where you resolved to do some fic/parody/whatever involving Momo still hasn't materialised yet. Not that I intend to push you or anything, just a gentle reminder.)

(P.P.S.- Mmmmm... Momo...)

Posted by Nathan @ 01/17/2002 06:38 AM EST

How exciting. A double asterisk in this blog engine marks a start or end to bold type. I never knew that. Let's just say that the bit where I used bold type in my last entry was an accident, and meant to be an exercise in character substitution.

Posted by Nathan @ 01/17/2002 06:41 AM EST

Do you mean Criminalist?

Posted by Father Moon @ 01/17/2002 11:39 AM EST

Oh, probably, Dad. But criminologist is more fun to type!... okay, okay, so my vocabulary has a few holes. Ahem.

And go ahead and type 'fuck' all you want, Nathan. Hell, if people get this far without being offended half to death, one little obscenity is barely going to matter... and Garr x Teepo? Boy, that one even fails on Opportunity...

Posted by Mooncalf @ 01/17/2002 10:36 PM EST

Yeah, that was more or less my point. That's where our friend Logic packs up and waves 'bye-bye'. And am I correct in assuming that even should we abandon any pretense of continuity and logic, that pairing is just disturbing, wrong, and not at all what any sane person would find appealing?

Posted by Nathan @ 01/18/2002 12:47 AM EST

Well, "Rocky Horror Picture Show" calls it a criminologist... depends on whether you want to cite that as gospel or not.

As for the blog, having heard ahead of time that Camus x Miklotov was popular, I just about died laughing at the frequency with which they call each other's names. "Camus!..." "Miklotov..." Ahhh, evil.

Posted by StB @ 01/18/2002 03:54 PM EST

I would hardly think that "Rocky Horror Picture Show" can be regarded as a authority for the use of any word. -ology = generalist and -ist=specialist. Who knows?

Posted by Father Moon @ 01/19/2002 03:17 PM EST

Well, -ology doesn't actually refer to generalism, but rather 'the study of'... however, for the record, according to my Webster's Unabridged, criminalistics (practiced by criminalists) and criminology (practiced by criminologists) are two different fields. Criminalistics is the science of detection of crime and apprehension of criminals, whereas criminology is the sociological study of factors related to crime and criminals. Thus, in this context, criminalistics is indeed the relevant field of study.

Posted by Nathan @ 01/19/2002 06:59 PM EST

I was kidding...I yield, of course. :)

Posted by StB @ 01/19/2002 11:03 PM EST

Heck, I'm a straight guy, and, yes, Suikoden II does mallet you in the head with Camus x Miklotov.

*snerk*

Now, BoF3 Garr x Teepo ... no. Uh-uh. That's like, say, SO2 Dias x Leon. No freakin' way. Or Precis x Opera, for that matter.

No, no, no, no, no.

Yaoi Tantei Tsukikoushi no Jikenbo, the new mystery anime from TV Tokyo. Ohh boy.

Posted by Carlos @ 01/27/2002 03:15 AM EST

Carlos, I hope you know that you have made Opera weep with those examples.

You've almost made Dias weep too, for that matter! Actually, if you'd said "Leon x Dias" instead of the other way around, he would be bawling. And he does not cry. Congratulations. ^_^

Posted by chaobell @ 01/27/2002 05:12 AM EST

You're welcome. ^_~

Actually, I'm pretty cynical about fangirlish yaoi musings, having been the sole male member of a fannish household for several years now. It's just scary knowing the amazing things grown women can do with Leon D.S. Geeste. Literarily speaking. Really.

Blahhhhh.

Actually, my wife is the world's foremost proponent of Disato, so ... not all is yaoi in the pairing world. I'd squee, but I'm a guy. Ha.

Posted by Carlos @ 01/27/2002 02:52 PM EST