Fandom Meme, 26

[osprey_archer]

26. A trope which you are virtually certain to love in any fandom.

I am always weak for h/c, particularly h/c with a side order of forced proximity or forced intimacy. Huddling for warmth? Excellent. Sickfic? Bring on the fevers, the chills, the weak hand clutching at the caretaker’s arm because the sick person doesn’t want to be left alone! Or one character has to feed or bathe the other… God, that’s the good stuff.

Cuddling, particularly for touch-starved characters, or characters who are just starved for affection in general. Captivity narratives. Literal dungeons; character A cradles character B’s battered head after the guards beat up B, probably because of B’s incorrigible cheek… which B possibly pulled out to deflect the guards’ attention from hurting A.

But also captivity in a more metaphorical sense (an abusive relationship; a harmful societal belief, like internalized homophobia). A character coming to a place of relative safety and slowly learning how to love and trust. Characters learning to be loved, in general. Characters who think that they can never be loved (they are too difficult/ugly/unpleasant, they have a Past, whatever) realizing that they are.

Comments

[regshoe]

All excellent tropes! Especially hurt/comfort. I love 'characters learning to be loved', as well as characters learning to love when they thought they couldn't/it wasn't emotionally safe—like Keith Windham, of course :D

[osprey_archer]

Hurt/comfort is such a beautiful, versatile classic. And I think learning to be loved/learning to love is such a good combination: a character who thought love was never an option for whatever reason is not sure how to give it but also not quite sure how to receive it, either.

[anna_wing]

Intelligent people making sensible decisions!

People who do the equivalent of sitting down and having a cup of tea and a biscuit before rushing off to do whatever!

Equal, friendly relationships between men and women, whether romantic or platonic.

All of them are rather rare, regardless of fandom, though the Lois Mmaster Bujold fandom is pretty good for them...

[luzula]

See, I was never really into hurt/comfort before I got into my current fandom! But NOW I SEE IT.

Cuddling, particularly for touch-starved characters, or characters who are just starved for affection in general.

Yessss, I love that.

[osprey_archer]

Sometimes you just need the RIGHT character to end up gasping for breath, bruised and bloodied, in the arms of his beloved friend.

[silverusagi]

26. A trope which you are virtually certain to love in any fandom.

For me, it's not exactly hurt/comfort, but "weird moments of intimacy which are not sexual at all but still very intimate, either physically or emotionally."

[philomytha]

I will read fic in fandoms I don't know if there's good h/c in them. Also, I think you're going to like Flight of the Heron :-D

[osprey_archer]

Yes, I think this is definitely something that is easy to foist on characters through h/c (suddenly, character A must bathe character B! or whatever)... but that's certainly not the only way to do it.

[osprey_archer]

I have my fingers crossed for a scene with some tender brow-bathing, but we shall see!