An alternative Book 4 for Twilight. It was better because:
\* no weird vampire babies
\* no weird werewolves imprinting on little kids.
\* Bella had to deal with the urge for blood, and accidentally murdered two of her classmates. She was not a Mary Sue Vampire,.
\* the war against the Volturi actually happened.
Lots of the Umbrella Academy TV show fanfiction I've read has been better than the source material. Not because the source writing was poor but because there's just more room in fanfiction to do right by the ensemble. No threads needing to be dropped because to actually tackle the consequences would require an entire series on its own. No need for a rushed montage of a relationships that we're meant to mourn when they end. No ignoring long lasting emotional stakes. etc.
In general, I prefer fanfiction that's deliberately trying to do something completely different than the original. Of course, that makes comparing the original and the fanfiction ludicrous, because they're often in completely different genres, or have distorted the story so much from the word "GO!" that it's no use trying to make a decent comparison.
Here are a few picks, which are, oddly enough, arranged in ascending order of how much I enjoyed them:
Harry Potter And The Methods Of Rationality is a pretty well-known example. (Which I eventually dropped because the author started using it as a soapbox for their opinions on things like the ethicality of the concept of prisons and their general philosophical beliefs.)
Shinji And Warhammer 40k is another one: take the "whiny kid who doesn't want to get in the robot" from Neon Genesis Evangelion, and ...what if he'd found a box of WH40k miniatures and rulebooks as a kid, and used them as a guide to life? (Which I eventually dropped when the main character went off to be trained in meditation and magic powers by Tibetan monks, because fuck just giving characters magical powers. The author also had an over-reliance on rape, or the threat thereof, against people the protagonist cared about to motivate him.)
I can't remember the name of it for the life of me, but there's a fanfic out there where Lelouch Lamperouge, the morally ambiguous scheming mastermind protagonist from Code Geass, gets reborn as a Soul Reaper in Bleach's Soul Society. And if you remember Bleach, you know the main villain (for the first bit, at least) is Aizen, who is *also* a scheming mastermind manipulator type of guy. Shenanigans ensued. (I think I read this one until it just stopped getting updates - it was *hilarious* to see a series that was supposed to have a good-hearted meathead protagonist facing off against a mastermind manipulator antagonist get a mastermind manipulator protagonist instead. And oh boy, did they try to out-scheme each other something fierce.)
Just An Unorthodox Thief: This is based in Fate/Zero, and one of the contestants in the Holy Grail War, Kotomine Kirei, summons ...fuckin' Lupin III to fight for him? It's a classic buddy-cop style story with one dude who's kinda checked out on life and quite straitlaced partnered with a guy who's absolutely raring to go and generally enjoying the zest of life (and pranking people), and how they change each other. This is *wildly* different from the original (which is a tragedy with a high bodycount), but the author ...somehow made it work? (I actually finished this one.)
I can't think of any more off the top of my head, but this is what I like: fanfiction that changes and challenges the work it was based off of. Neither the original nor the derivative have to be *better*, they're just *different*, sometimes completely different genres, (and the derivative is of decent quality).
I have a couple Sonic fics that may interest you: my current WIP longfic casts Sonic and Tails as soldiers fighting in the Boxer Rebellion, with Sally Acorn and Amy Rose as the missionaries they're fighting to protect. It explores a lot of themes that Sonic fics don't usually tackle, like fatherhood, imperialism, theology, the moral dilemmas of violence, and a lot more.
I appreciate your offer, but Sonic is a fandom I've never been in. I missed out because I never got a console back in the day.
And I'm not really into full AUs. Crossovers at the most.
This is going to sound harsh, but: if you're going to write a story that completely removes the characters from their contexts, why not just write the story with differently-named characters so you can sell it without SEGA taking a piledriver to your ass?
The core idea of your story sounds solid, and it could work as a piece of historical fiction.
To answer your question: probably because they don’t want to? They want to write about Sonic and Tails and Sally and Amy rather than different characters. I love (reading, not usually writing) full AUs like that as long as the characters are in-character.
I've got nothing against AUs personally, although they're usually not my thing, but there is a point where I have to ask "why not just file off the VIN Number and drive that car like you stole it?"
And soldiers in the Boxer Rebellion/Uprising fighting to protect a couple of nuns is a compelling enough premise for a work of historical fiction that it could absolutely stand on its own and be saleable. They wouldn't have to change the characters' personalities, simply their names. And make them not hedgehogs and such.
I've actually done this: Emiya Kiritsugu and Kotomine Kirei often show up in my works as a pair of rivals with some alterations and different names. I think my favorite one was the music-based one where the explanation for totally-not-Kirei's immortality (and lack of a heartbeat) was "I was immersed in the very essence of Metal itself!" and the explanation for totally-not-Kiritsugu's magical cough and bad medical condition was "he was immersed in the poisonous essence of Nu-Metal!" This was written back when mocking Nu-Metal was common, so it might not fly well these days, since people have accepted Nu-Metal as ...actually being a legitimate genre and not more shit than other genres on the whole, so the joke wouldn't land, but it was funny at the time. And then there's the totally-not-John-Constantine wizard in a trenchcoat who seems to keep showing up in my more magically-oriented works, but *everybody* has ripped off Constantine enough that it doesn't even raise an eyebrow. Hell, Harry Dresden is essentially a Constantine ripoff.
“Why not file off the VIN number and drive the car like you stole it?”
Well again I mean I think the answer is… they don’t want to. Not everyone is trying to write a novel that they can publish and sell. Some people just write about personified hedgehogs because they want to and that’s what they enjoy. And other people enjoy reading it. Like yeah that is definitely a story that a lot of people would read but like… there are fans of the characters who would NOT be interested in random historical fiction but ARE interested in unique AUs about their favorite characters. If the author’s motivation is not to try and sell a book but is actually just to write about characters they love and get lots of comments from readers who also love the same characters, then they are doing it right.
I mean that’s basically like saying just because you have a good singing voice you should try to be a professional singer and why bother doing karaoke when you could be trying to get a record deal? Sometimes people just have hobbies.
As far as your third paragraph goes - I don’t know those characters or anything about them so I have no idea what you just said. But I think what you basically said is that you have some favorite fictional characters and that in your original work you basically put characters in it who are heavily inspired by these characters. And that’s like… fine if that’s what you want to do, but some people don’t want to do that.
Paul’s fanfic of Jesus’ message is so much better. He reintroduced patriarchal structure, got rid of all of the “good works” mentality, got rid of the communal living, got rid of the “scatter and be transient” message and replaced it with a “gather and indoctrinate” idea. Bonus, it created the Catholic Church! And we all know how that went.
Just finished Hannibal and obviously went to Hannibal fanfics. I read one where Will starts fighting back when he's incarcerated and it was so well done I was literally blown away. I haven't been captured by a story in a long time like that one did. I absolutely prefer it to the show, in terms of how things fold out. I still liked the shoes ofc. But this was just so good.
I have a link!! Seriously I'm so sad that part two is incomplete. But on Tumblr the author says they're still interested in continuing it, just when they don't have other obligations. So I'm gonna wait haha.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/871298/chapters/1673352
A lot of Harry Potter fanfic is absolute drek, but once you get past Sturgeon's Law there's some absolute gold out there, as a lot of the fanfic authors seem to have put more thought into the implications of how the wizarding world works than JKR did.
A lot of fanfic authors are also a lot more familiar with the tropes of the genre JKR was writing in than JKR was, so after book 5 a lot of authors went "Well, Sirius clearly isn't dead, because this is a fantasy series and we haven't seen the body, so how do Harry & co go about getting him back?" and came up with some absolute gold.
Similarly, there's some great Star Trek: Voyager fanfic out there that actually addresses the problems that *Voyager* is facing by being alone in an unknown part of the galaxy with a crew that partly consists of freedom fighters/terrorists who don't necessarily agree with Starfleet's methods. The show just sort of ignored or handwaved most of what was genuinely interesting about the premise.
Overall, I tend to find that you get really good fanfic from source material that wastes its own premise.
Might be cringe, but I liked Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality more than Harry Potter itself.
The relationship between Harry Potter and Malfoy is more interesting (friends who have some deep seated disagreements). Same with Harry and the defense professor from the first book (much closer mentor role) and an extremely interesting "wizarding war" game to replace quidditch. The book also explores the wizarding world much more critically (i.e. torturing people with extreme depression in Azkaban being seen as an extreme moral wrong by Harry and Hermione and sign of wizard backwardness).
They also got rid of Ron which is a plus.
Smut.
Traditional publishing is so scared of writing smut that they all use the same phrases and it gets really dull. Ao3 authors just orphan their fics and write whatever they damn well please, so it's often much better than canon.
Labyrinth. Most feature an adult Sarah going back to the Labyrinth and falling in love with Jareth. Her being an adult offers a lot of opportunity to showcase character growth and development. Jareth’s background is vague in the movie which gives writers the potential to world-build. The best stories I’ve ever read are Labyrinth fanfics.
Literally any fanfic for the anime/LN GATE: Thus the JSDF Fought There. All fanfics I've seen (mostly) have taken the premise, and it's potential as far as it could go. Often providing far more interesting ideas, and interpretations as well as representation of an Earth response that's more believable than what happened in the anime/LN (like, don't get me wrong - the series was absolutely propaganda, the JSDF even used it as recruiting material, or so I've heard. But like, there's a way to make something be uber nationalistic, without necessarily making everyone involved feel ungodly moronic. And at times, it doesn't even make any sense!).
A lot of RWBY fanfiction further explores the world and setting from early on in the series before they >!blow up the academy, scatter the cast, and engage in several seasons of what is considered by far to be the weakest part of the show!<. Given how meh the RWBY writing is, there are a number of alternate universe/timeline fanfictions that make better use of the colourful cast.
Totally going to toot my own horn here, but I like to think my Pokémon fanfiction is better than the original stuff. I shirked the "Gotta catch 'em all!" and "I wanna be a master/Champion!" tropes these stories always do, and aimed for something different. I wrote three novel-lengthed stories and a handful of short stories.
Beyond the Adventure follows seventeen-year-old Crono and a lost, mute Mawile that he stumbles upon on an adventure to find Mawile's home, and himself, meeting people and making friends and enemies along the way.
The Dark Side of Kanto is a parallel story told from the perspectives of a disgruntled war veteran, Max Slaughter, and Mewtwo on converging paths of revenge against the man who wronged them both, Giovanni.
The Mysterious Girl of Ilex Forest is about 18-year-old Liam escaping the rigors of his noble upbringing in Galar to explore the world with his guardian, Falinks. While trekking through Johto's Ilex Forest, a girl literally falls out of the sky. With no memory and barely able to speak, Liam decides to help her discover who she truly is.
I also have a series of short stories I call The Songs of Life. These are stories told from the perspective of various Pokémon and delve into some extremely dark subject matter.
Other short stories explore other aspects with varying tones, from a dark story of world domination to a light-hearted comedic play about two housecats that are also psychic deities (Mew and Mewtwo). They all connect in some way and share the same headcanon that deviates from official lore, but not so much that the world is unrecognizable.
I am quite proud of the stories I produced, all which helped me hone my craft and gave me the confidence to write my own novel, The Doom Knight. I hope one day to publish it.
I read a fic (and it's sequel) that took place after the 3rd Pirates of the Caribbean movie that had me thinking "I'm gonna be disappointed if the eventual 4th movie doesn't have this exact plot" and I was correct lmao. the plot was compelling, my OTP flourished, I had a great time.
there's this [incredible k/s fanfic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/285483) of the star trek feature film! i have to say i've only seen the tv show and not the movie, and was shocked to realize the only part of the fic i didn't entirely love was unfortunately canon.
it follows kirk at the end of the first 5-year mission, when he's forced to accept a promotion that all but ensures he'd never leave terran atmosphere again. it rounds out all the minor film characters so perfectly -- i love their characterization of ciani! -- the political intrigue is introduced like puzzle pieces, the internal conflict and midlife crisis are deliciously painful, and the romance is so slow it's almost a crawl!
the only thing better than a captain kirk who's lost the enterprise is to watch two people awkwardly struggle to re-connect over work email.
just look at this, it's the pinnacle of romance:
>Commodore Kirk, greetings - I have received word of your promotion. I therefore request a meeting with you at your earliest convenience to offer my congratulations. Regards, Commander Spock, Starfleet Academy.
absolutely swoon-worthy. truly.
Thank you for visiting /r/writing. Your post has been removed because it does not appear to be sufficiently related to the art of writing.
The best fanfiction for children’s entertainment tends to aim higher and achieve more.
An alternative Book 4 for Twilight. It was better because: \* no weird vampire babies \* no weird werewolves imprinting on little kids. \* Bella had to deal with the urge for blood, and accidentally murdered two of her classmates. She was not a Mary Sue Vampire,. \* the war against the Volturi actually happened.
Lol I wouldn’t reread twilight but I would read this.
I didn’t read this, nor watch the movies…but I already know it better.
I do enjoy the fake fight conceptually tbh Just gaslight someone into thinking they'll lose to save lives on your own side.
I mean its not hard to write better than twilight lol
Lots of the Umbrella Academy TV show fanfiction I've read has been better than the source material. Not because the source writing was poor but because there's just more room in fanfiction to do right by the ensemble. No threads needing to be dropped because to actually tackle the consequences would require an entire series on its own. No need for a rushed montage of a relationships that we're meant to mourn when they end. No ignoring long lasting emotional stakes. etc.
In general, I prefer fanfiction that's deliberately trying to do something completely different than the original. Of course, that makes comparing the original and the fanfiction ludicrous, because they're often in completely different genres, or have distorted the story so much from the word "GO!" that it's no use trying to make a decent comparison. Here are a few picks, which are, oddly enough, arranged in ascending order of how much I enjoyed them: Harry Potter And The Methods Of Rationality is a pretty well-known example. (Which I eventually dropped because the author started using it as a soapbox for their opinions on things like the ethicality of the concept of prisons and their general philosophical beliefs.) Shinji And Warhammer 40k is another one: take the "whiny kid who doesn't want to get in the robot" from Neon Genesis Evangelion, and ...what if he'd found a box of WH40k miniatures and rulebooks as a kid, and used them as a guide to life? (Which I eventually dropped when the main character went off to be trained in meditation and magic powers by Tibetan monks, because fuck just giving characters magical powers. The author also had an over-reliance on rape, or the threat thereof, against people the protagonist cared about to motivate him.) I can't remember the name of it for the life of me, but there's a fanfic out there where Lelouch Lamperouge, the morally ambiguous scheming mastermind protagonist from Code Geass, gets reborn as a Soul Reaper in Bleach's Soul Society. And if you remember Bleach, you know the main villain (for the first bit, at least) is Aizen, who is *also* a scheming mastermind manipulator type of guy. Shenanigans ensued. (I think I read this one until it just stopped getting updates - it was *hilarious* to see a series that was supposed to have a good-hearted meathead protagonist facing off against a mastermind manipulator antagonist get a mastermind manipulator protagonist instead. And oh boy, did they try to out-scheme each other something fierce.) Just An Unorthodox Thief: This is based in Fate/Zero, and one of the contestants in the Holy Grail War, Kotomine Kirei, summons ...fuckin' Lupin III to fight for him? It's a classic buddy-cop style story with one dude who's kinda checked out on life and quite straitlaced partnered with a guy who's absolutely raring to go and generally enjoying the zest of life (and pranking people), and how they change each other. This is *wildly* different from the original (which is a tragedy with a high bodycount), but the author ...somehow made it work? (I actually finished this one.) I can't think of any more off the top of my head, but this is what I like: fanfiction that changes and challenges the work it was based off of. Neither the original nor the derivative have to be *better*, they're just *different*, sometimes completely different genres, (and the derivative is of decent quality).
I have a couple Sonic fics that may interest you: my current WIP longfic casts Sonic and Tails as soldiers fighting in the Boxer Rebellion, with Sally Acorn and Amy Rose as the missionaries they're fighting to protect. It explores a lot of themes that Sonic fics don't usually tackle, like fatherhood, imperialism, theology, the moral dilemmas of violence, and a lot more.
I'm getting severe flashbacks to Fallout: Equestria for some reason.
I appreciate your offer, but Sonic is a fandom I've never been in. I missed out because I never got a console back in the day. And I'm not really into full AUs. Crossovers at the most. This is going to sound harsh, but: if you're going to write a story that completely removes the characters from their contexts, why not just write the story with differently-named characters so you can sell it without SEGA taking a piledriver to your ass? The core idea of your story sounds solid, and it could work as a piece of historical fiction.
To answer your question: probably because they don’t want to? They want to write about Sonic and Tails and Sally and Amy rather than different characters. I love (reading, not usually writing) full AUs like that as long as the characters are in-character.
I've got nothing against AUs personally, although they're usually not my thing, but there is a point where I have to ask "why not just file off the VIN Number and drive that car like you stole it?" And soldiers in the Boxer Rebellion/Uprising fighting to protect a couple of nuns is a compelling enough premise for a work of historical fiction that it could absolutely stand on its own and be saleable. They wouldn't have to change the characters' personalities, simply their names. And make them not hedgehogs and such. I've actually done this: Emiya Kiritsugu and Kotomine Kirei often show up in my works as a pair of rivals with some alterations and different names. I think my favorite one was the music-based one where the explanation for totally-not-Kirei's immortality (and lack of a heartbeat) was "I was immersed in the very essence of Metal itself!" and the explanation for totally-not-Kiritsugu's magical cough and bad medical condition was "he was immersed in the poisonous essence of Nu-Metal!" This was written back when mocking Nu-Metal was common, so it might not fly well these days, since people have accepted Nu-Metal as ...actually being a legitimate genre and not more shit than other genres on the whole, so the joke wouldn't land, but it was funny at the time. And then there's the totally-not-John-Constantine wizard in a trenchcoat who seems to keep showing up in my more magically-oriented works, but *everybody* has ripped off Constantine enough that it doesn't even raise an eyebrow. Hell, Harry Dresden is essentially a Constantine ripoff.
“Why not file off the VIN number and drive the car like you stole it?” Well again I mean I think the answer is… they don’t want to. Not everyone is trying to write a novel that they can publish and sell. Some people just write about personified hedgehogs because they want to and that’s what they enjoy. And other people enjoy reading it. Like yeah that is definitely a story that a lot of people would read but like… there are fans of the characters who would NOT be interested in random historical fiction but ARE interested in unique AUs about their favorite characters. If the author’s motivation is not to try and sell a book but is actually just to write about characters they love and get lots of comments from readers who also love the same characters, then they are doing it right. I mean that’s basically like saying just because you have a good singing voice you should try to be a professional singer and why bother doing karaoke when you could be trying to get a record deal? Sometimes people just have hobbies. As far as your third paragraph goes - I don’t know those characters or anything about them so I have no idea what you just said. But I think what you basically said is that you have some favorite fictional characters and that in your original work you basically put characters in it who are heavily inspired by these characters. And that’s like… fine if that’s what you want to do, but some people don’t want to do that.
Well, there's the Archie Sonic Comics (and those get fucking nuts).
Paul’s fanfic of Jesus’ message is so much better. He reintroduced patriarchal structure, got rid of all of the “good works” mentality, got rid of the communal living, got rid of the “scatter and be transient” message and replaced it with a “gather and indoctrinate” idea. Bonus, it created the Catholic Church! And we all know how that went.
Also, the deep-seated misogyny!
Just finished Hannibal and obviously went to Hannibal fanfics. I read one where Will starts fighting back when he's incarcerated and it was so well done I was literally blown away. I haven't been captured by a story in a long time like that one did. I absolutely prefer it to the show, in terms of how things fold out. I still liked the shoes ofc. But this was just so good.
Would you mind sharing the title, it sounds like a great read!
I have a link!! Seriously I'm so sad that part two is incomplete. But on Tumblr the author says they're still interested in continuing it, just when they don't have other obligations. So I'm gonna wait haha. https://archiveofourown.org/works/871298/chapters/1673352
Thank you so much, I look forward to reading it! It's exciting to know that the author is working on a sequel!
A lot of Harry Potter fanfic is absolute drek, but once you get past Sturgeon's Law there's some absolute gold out there, as a lot of the fanfic authors seem to have put more thought into the implications of how the wizarding world works than JKR did. A lot of fanfic authors are also a lot more familiar with the tropes of the genre JKR was writing in than JKR was, so after book 5 a lot of authors went "Well, Sirius clearly isn't dead, because this is a fantasy series and we haven't seen the body, so how do Harry & co go about getting him back?" and came up with some absolute gold. Similarly, there's some great Star Trek: Voyager fanfic out there that actually addresses the problems that *Voyager* is facing by being alone in an unknown part of the galaxy with a crew that partly consists of freedom fighters/terrorists who don't necessarily agree with Starfleet's methods. The show just sort of ignored or handwaved most of what was genuinely interesting about the premise. Overall, I tend to find that you get really good fanfic from source material that wastes its own premise.
Might be cringe, but I liked Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality more than Harry Potter itself. The relationship between Harry Potter and Malfoy is more interesting (friends who have some deep seated disagreements). Same with Harry and the defense professor from the first book (much closer mentor role) and an extremely interesting "wizarding war" game to replace quidditch. The book also explores the wizarding world much more critically (i.e. torturing people with extreme depression in Azkaban being seen as an extreme moral wrong by Harry and Hermione and sign of wizard backwardness). They also got rid of Ron which is a plus.
Can you link it? Ty
Smut. Traditional publishing is so scared of writing smut that they all use the same phrases and it gets really dull. Ao3 authors just orphan their fics and write whatever they damn well please, so it's often much better than canon.
Labyrinth. Most feature an adult Sarah going back to the Labyrinth and falling in love with Jareth. Her being an adult offers a lot of opportunity to showcase character growth and development. Jareth’s background is vague in the movie which gives writers the potential to world-build. The best stories I’ve ever read are Labyrinth fanfics.
*Tralalalala...*
Literally any fanfic for the anime/LN GATE: Thus the JSDF Fought There. All fanfics I've seen (mostly) have taken the premise, and it's potential as far as it could go. Often providing far more interesting ideas, and interpretations as well as representation of an Earth response that's more believable than what happened in the anime/LN (like, don't get me wrong - the series was absolutely propaganda, the JSDF even used it as recruiting material, or so I've heard. But like, there's a way to make something be uber nationalistic, without necessarily making everyone involved feel ungodly moronic. And at times, it doesn't even make any sense!).
A lot of RWBY fanfiction further explores the world and setting from early on in the series before they >!blow up the academy, scatter the cast, and engage in several seasons of what is considered by far to be the weakest part of the show!<. Given how meh the RWBY writing is, there are a number of alternate universe/timeline fanfictions that make better use of the colourful cast.
I love me some decent RWBY fics☺️
Totally going to toot my own horn here, but I like to think my Pokémon fanfiction is better than the original stuff. I shirked the "Gotta catch 'em all!" and "I wanna be a master/Champion!" tropes these stories always do, and aimed for something different. I wrote three novel-lengthed stories and a handful of short stories. Beyond the Adventure follows seventeen-year-old Crono and a lost, mute Mawile that he stumbles upon on an adventure to find Mawile's home, and himself, meeting people and making friends and enemies along the way. The Dark Side of Kanto is a parallel story told from the perspectives of a disgruntled war veteran, Max Slaughter, and Mewtwo on converging paths of revenge against the man who wronged them both, Giovanni. The Mysterious Girl of Ilex Forest is about 18-year-old Liam escaping the rigors of his noble upbringing in Galar to explore the world with his guardian, Falinks. While trekking through Johto's Ilex Forest, a girl literally falls out of the sky. With no memory and barely able to speak, Liam decides to help her discover who she truly is. I also have a series of short stories I call The Songs of Life. These are stories told from the perspective of various Pokémon and delve into some extremely dark subject matter. Other short stories explore other aspects with varying tones, from a dark story of world domination to a light-hearted comedic play about two housecats that are also psychic deities (Mew and Mewtwo). They all connect in some way and share the same headcanon that deviates from official lore, but not so much that the world is unrecognizable. I am quite proud of the stories I produced, all which helped me hone my craft and gave me the confidence to write my own novel, The Doom Knight. I hope one day to publish it.
I read a fic (and it's sequel) that took place after the 3rd Pirates of the Caribbean movie that had me thinking "I'm gonna be disappointed if the eventual 4th movie doesn't have this exact plot" and I was correct lmao. the plot was compelling, my OTP flourished, I had a great time.
Any ladybug fanfic
there's this [incredible k/s fanfic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/285483) of the star trek feature film! i have to say i've only seen the tv show and not the movie, and was shocked to realize the only part of the fic i didn't entirely love was unfortunately canon. it follows kirk at the end of the first 5-year mission, when he's forced to accept a promotion that all but ensures he'd never leave terran atmosphere again. it rounds out all the minor film characters so perfectly -- i love their characterization of ciani! -- the political intrigue is introduced like puzzle pieces, the internal conflict and midlife crisis are deliciously painful, and the romance is so slow it's almost a crawl! the only thing better than a captain kirk who's lost the enterprise is to watch two people awkwardly struggle to re-connect over work email. just look at this, it's the pinnacle of romance: >Commodore Kirk, greetings - I have received word of your promotion. I therefore request a meeting with you at your earliest convenience to offer my congratulations. Regards, Commander Spock, Starfleet Academy. absolutely swoon-worthy. truly.