Conversations with The Commissioner: How to Get a Non-Fan to Fanfiction the Sh*t Out Of “Supernatural”
How is this an experiment? What does that even mean? Who the hell are you? Do you even go here? Glad you asked.
The Commissioner [they who commissioned the story and who is also acting as the self-appointed commissioner over the areas of glaring canon faux pas] had asked themselves a question:
Could a person who was on the periphery of, but not directly involved in, the world of “Supernatural” crank out an original story that adheres to established plot points and stays faithful to the attitudes, mannerisms, and verbiage of the main characters?
[The rest of the parameters are here.]
The Commissioner’s hypothesis was that it could be done - and specifically *because* the author would be a “Non-Fan”. Fresh eyes, differing perspectives, hopefully little-to-no bias.
- The Upside: interesting concept, well-resourced, challenging but not overwhelmingly so
- The Downside: potentially so, so very many when it came to convincing said non-fan [that’d be me] that this was worth the effort
Upon being asked if I would write something around a plot and setting and general situation that was given to me - because The Commissioner had liked other things I’d written - I initially thought....
Wait. Time out. Tumblr likes gifs. Let’s bang this out with gifs.
So I initially thought [minus the mustache... and the consumption]:
I was then told more. This was to involve a TV show. One close to The Commissioner’s heart. One that had somehow left them feeling:
Not annoyed enough to give up on many seasons’ worth of investment, just perhaps a tad weary. Feeling the need for progress of some sort. Cohesion. A broad through-line. Stop tilting windmills. Start rocking boats. Shake things up. You know. Stuff like that there.
Being most concerned with the portrayal of the characters, The Commissioner first asked what I know of Ackles, of Padalecki.
Now, it turned out I had caught pieces of the show, on whatever that channel is that seems to just rotate between it and “Law and Order” and “A Christmas Story”, even in July, I swear.
It was something to do with insects, I report. The Commissioner found this most unfortunate. The more substantial chunks I’d caught were from “The French Connection”, which The Commissioner found encouraging before telling me I’d made a mistake, and it was “Mistake”.
Plus, I had found it enjoyable despite being:
I asked what time and research they estimated would be involved, which is when the even bigger reveal came regarding a decade of seasons, all clocking in somewhere between a baker’s dozen and twenty-four. At forty-five minutes a pop.
And the websites. And the blogs. And the fanfiction, and the art, and the parodies, and the conventions, and the videos from the conventions, and the gifs - holy godtopus, YOUR MAGNIFICENT GIFS - and the Twitters and the gag reels... and... and... and...
But too many resources are better than not enough, though the main source had to be, clearly, whatever was contained in those seasons. So I buckled down and began to binge your show before giving my answer to The Commissioner.
And nigh onto season five-ish, I had formulated several thoughts...
