Trevor's Box

hhhhammy:

skrtomg:

Maybe I’ll write about this in more/better depth on my LJ later, or something, but since people seem to be talking about it, allow me to outline my position:

I don’t ship 10-year-olds. I really don’t think the kids on the show are gay for each other. I’m pretty convinced if Cartman were actually gay for Kyle he would not be demonstrative about it like this. When he had crushes on Wendy and that Patty Nelson chick in those past episodes, he was not making pronouncements about it at basketball games. Cartman’s interactions with Kyle in this episode were a function of his insane racism. The only reason it was Kyle he was fake-gay for was because the girl he was trying to set up with Token was into Kyle. (Lord knows why, Kyle sucks.)

As a Stan/Kyle shipper I really enjoy seeing them interact but it’s not because I think or even hope they’re going to start making out onscreen. A few times this season I’ve said to Negs that I think Stan and Kyle’s interactions aren’t a good focus for the show because they’re neither a source of humor nor conflict, unless Stan and Kyle are fighting, which has an insane effect on the fandom and people start pissing themselves. This is not a show about people being friends. It’s a show about the absurdity of collective human experience. And inevitably whatever Trey Parker was watching on Bravo and eating out of a paper sack at 4 a.m.

So, like, what am I doing here? Writing fan fic, I guess, about these kids later, like, when they grow up. I’m thinking about them 10, 20, 30 years after South Park. I try to base what I write or what I think on who the characters seem to be onscreen, but I think this fandom has a really difficult time separating out what we’re doing here from what’s on television. I guess part of me’s sad that this and every episode doesn’t end with Stan being like “I will fuck you in the butt” and Kyle being like “kay” but that is the tiny animal part of my brain that also wants to eat hot fudge and foie gras for every meal and lord, we can’t have that.

I guess I understand why people are sad or gloating or whatever, but I just don’t know what effect the things on television should have on the fandom. It seems like we have to detach a bit more.

wow yes this is so perfect.  everyone should read this and take a step back because, wow guys.

I understand that people wanted to squee about stuff (despite it not actually supporting their ship when looked at logically) and I get disappointment from the style fans (I get disappointed when I don’t see my favorite characters for episodes at a time) but really people need to take off the shipping glasses for one second, at least when looking at the actual canon.

and just so I’m not picking on the shippers exclusively, fandom as a whole has a problem with this.  guys, stan’s alcoholism probably isn’t coming up again.  nor is Cartman’s ‘conversion’ to Judaism, or a whole host of other one-punch jokes that were either put in there to make a point or because they were really, really funny. we don’t have a serious world to work with, as fans.  and we don’t have much continuity, and we’re working with a canon that will absolutely sacrifice character not just for story but for a joke.

and it’d probably just be a lot easier if fandom could recognize that, and be happy going off and doing their own thing, without frantically trying to rework the entirety of the show through a serious lens of interpersonal drama and high-realism high school AUs or whatever we’re doing.  like go ahead and theorize and fanwank and develop headcanon and all that good stuff but the idea of legitimately getting upset because your ship isn’t happening on screen is pretty much the definition of futility.

/blah blah blah feels about story construction

This exactly, basically all my feelings on the matter here. I strongly disagree with a few points in the original post in aspect of their interpretation of belief in general canon, and I do believe Trey and Matt do a *relatively* good job at slow, progressive background development alongside the genius humor,  but dude, you seriously couldn’t have put all of this better, honestly. I absolutely feel the same in all respects, completely, and do wish more people would take the time to recognize this and maybe take this a little less seriously from looking at it from Trey and Matt’s perspective on the actual show.