dekedangle_rpfanon | #26 — Vanek! with a Jurco

This is the twenty-sixth post of Deke Dangle RPF Anon, a community for all your ice hockey anon meme needs.

THE RULES

1. Mods retain the right to delete, freeze, and/or screen threads and comments.
2. Meme rules do not require warnings.
3. Respect flock. Do not repost or share information from private tumblrs, locked twitter accounts, flocked LJ posts, etc.
4. No linking fans to their real life identities.
5. No looks bashing or body shaming. This applies to players and people associated with those players and their clubs, as well as fellow fans.
6. No embedded music.
7. No embedded images.
8. No spamming the meme, whether through repeated comments or other means.
9. No discussing trolling, individual trolls, or their efforts.

Meme rules do not require spoiler cuts. However, this layout does allow for them. Any of the following tags will create a spoiler cut when closed: <div cut>, <span cut>, <font cut>, <font color="white">

If you have any questions or concerns, please direct them to The Mod Post.

Threaded View
Flat View
Top-Level Comment View

Next post opens at 5,000 comments.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I'd like a more serious/darker take. I know the trope is pretty much the opposite of dark, but in general I like the "crack being treated seriously" treatment and I just think there's potential for fucking someone up in animal transformation fic.

NA

Exactly what I was coming over here to say. My idea was of one of those "second form matches the team's form" stories, only with some kind of condition that forced transformation sometimes (full moon?) and some pretty horrific consequences that could happen to those psychologically "stuck" between their old team's form and the new one. (You're 100% fucked and probably dead if you're slow to deal and end up transforming into a half-leaf half-whale, but even the easier transitions could suck pretty badly if your body got confused when it was trying to put your organs back where they were before.)

...which all sounds pretty gruesome, but I was thinking more about a story where someone was panicking about not adjusting quickly enough and the crushing psychological pressure of knowing that he could die if he didn't get with the program fast enough, rather than actually detailing any grisly fallout.

da

But if your choice was change or die, and you weren't changing, why wouldn't you put in a trade request or, you know, quit hockey? And what is the point of team transformations in a universe where they risk injuring or killing the team's assets? I think this is a dark take that would need a fair amount of worldbuilding to be convincing, if being convincing is a goal.

AYRT

It would definitely take worldbuilding, but I think that's a feature, not a bug.

I was thinking all significant life transitions caused second form changes (so quitting doesn't help if your problem is letting go of your old team, and may in fact make things worse as the change is bigger and the adjustment harder to adapt to), or there was a Mirror Universe-type callousness towards the possibility of death (so players were likely to think that other players who died from it were weak and deserved it and it was never going to happen to them because they're better, plus teams factor in the possibility of losing players to death in trades), or both.

I don't think most transformation fics really go into detail on why they transform? I never got the feeling that it was something the team makes them do, anyway. Some handwave it as team bonding, but for some it just doesn't make sense. It's not exactly helpful if players randomly turn into animals when stressed - that seems like the sort of thing that could really disrupt a practice schedule.

Ayrt

Why wouldn't you quit and go work for your old team's FO? I just think it's very hard to justify sticking it out with the new team, which you are not at all attached to (or else you'd transform no problem), when your other option is death. If you might have the same problem just quitting, but you don't know for sure that you will, that still seems better than certain death. I could see being able to pull it off in a certain kind of universe, the way The Lobster pulls off "relationships are based on superficial traits and if you don't pair off you must become an animal," but I do think it risks being dark in the way you kind of blink at later, like, "Emotionally it worked but I have no idea why anyone behaved like they did."

AYRT

Who says you're not attached to your new team at all, or know for sure you're having that much trouble adjusting, or that your old team's FO even wants you? If you don't know whether you'll get stuck until you transform, then a certain amount of it is emotional guesswork.

Idk, I think we just have different perspectives on this, and it would take an actual fic to see if we'd agree or not. People and cultures convince themselves of weird shit all the time, so I could 100% buy a culture that had the mindset that people failing to transform correctly were doing it to themselves and deserved whatever they got, just like I bought into Star Trek's murder-happy Mirrorverse, even though it's a shit way to run a society. I can believe a lot as long as the author does a good job constructing it so it's internally logical for the culture. But I do think that no matter what there's a certain amount of suspension of disbelief necessary to make stuff on that level work, and you're right that it could go the emotionally dark but logically nonsensical way quite easily.

I would actually love to read this! It'd be interesting to read about how the league would deal with cases where players did get stuck, are they blaming the other team? The player? And how that was being treated by the public, too. (Although this might fall under that grisly fallout part...) Does this affect how trades are done? Is it harder to change your mindset if you're being traded mid-season or during the off-season or what?

Maybe I'm thinking about this too much, but "crushing psychological pressure" really appeals to me, lol.

AYRT

Lol, honestly the whole thing is setup for making the poor players squirm. I'm all about that psychological pressure too. Which is why I think there should be cultural pressure too that blames the players if they can't make the change! On top of everything else, it's all their fault if things don't work out. :D

I think there was a K/T fic like that. I thought it was decent but I'm not sure how many "animal transformation as the hurt part of hurt/comfort" I'd be able to read before I got just as sick of them as I am of the stress form otters.

AYRT There are dark options, someone does something horrifying in their animal form and they can't forgive themselves. Getting stuck as an animal forever and not being able to communicate with anyone, but still remembering who they were. Or they keep behaviours when they turn back, so they can't play the same anymore.

ayrt

I'd love to read all of these. I feel like the second one would be best for a proper horror fic, but the first would be fun (... "fun") as well, it reminds me of (more oldschool) werewolf fic which I always liked.

AYRT Yes, I think trapped in an animal form would be a true horror fic. I love some old school wear-wolf fic and those classic horror films. Either with the amnesia where you have to find out what you did, or the being aware but overwhelmed by instincts.

NA

As someone who imprinted on the Animorphs books, I am all for these darkfic options.

That Animorphs fic did have Eichel stuck as a bird, but none of it was from his POV so we didn't really get him mourning the loss of his thumbs.

ayrt

Hah, I couldn't even read that fic because I couldn't get over how ill-fitting Eichel was as a Tobias analogue.

#26 — Vanek! with a Jurco

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation

Re: Trope talk-Animal Transformation