The Long-Suffering Ladies of LKH!
Jun. 12th, 2011 08:03 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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lkh_lashoutsOk, so, no need to point out how the ladies of the Anitaverse get the short stick in so many ways. However, there are some that we love and are rooting for no matter how much their creator wants us to dislike them. Who are your favorites, and why? Feel free to include characters from the Merry Gentry series as well!
These are some that I can remember being fond of and intrigued by...
Melanie: I thought she was neat, and was glad when she ended up sticking around in the circus instead of getting axed by Anita. I was intrigued by her snakeman harem, and, as DWG pointed out, it's pretty hilarious how she pointed out to back-in-the-day Anita that a girl needs more than one guy and offered to share and Anita was all EW NO. Plus, I'm pretty sure she swore vengeance on Anita for killing said harem, and while I realize an immortal being can wait a long time for getting someone back, I really do wish she'd reappeared by now...but maybe not, since Anita would just kill her and then absorb her lamia-ness like she did the munin with Raina or something like that.
Yasmeen and Marguerite: Okay, in retrospect, they're just signs of all the bullshittery to come, but I was a barely-in-high-school kid who was still in the closet myself, and there were no lesbians in any of my fandoms except Uranus and Neptune in Sailor Moon (who were rewritten as cousins in the US dub to boot) and so I was just like...omg?! Are they in love?! Are they gay?! Omg! I love them! Awww, no, Yasmeen died, will we not be seeing more of them? Noooo, I liiiked them! In hindsight, though, it's kind of easy to see now that Yasmeen is just "anyone who doesn't look totally Aryan = 'exotic' " + "Anita is so hot even those icky lesbians want her!' while Marguerite is "blue-eyed blonde women are evil" and "ugh, women are jealous of Anita!' but I am still fond of them.awww omg marguerite clawing her eyes out over yasmeen dying ;__;
Cherry: My first Anita Book was Blue Moon and I was in middle school, and Cherry was the first female shifter I was introduced to in its pages. I was just oh so struck by her going ~*topless*~ which I took to be such a mark of sexy grown-up badassery (which, by extension, would of course make me more grown-up and badass for reading about it) but I was also kind of intrigued by how she was noted to do it as a fuck-you statement against a society that had rejected her. Instead of conforming and hiding as best she could, as probably might have benefited her, she pushed back and emphasized her shifter status brazenly...though come to think of it, I'm not sure how skimpy attire tells people you're a shifter. Maybe it's the equivalent of flouncy Byron shirts guaranteeing that you're a vampire? In any case, her mode of reacting against bigotry, her confidence only emerging when her medical skill is needed, her willingness to not only feed vampires but travel to do so, and her teasing relationship with Zane all seem like they would have been fun to flesh out in terms of hows and whys and what nows, but I haven't heard much about her and what's she up to since I quit reading the series.
Dr. Lilian: I really liked the idea of a shifter doctor who sets up a shifter clinic. I like the aspects of an oppressed group that come together community that builds its way to becoming as self-sustaining as it can be instead of just floundering, with members using their individual skills to help others and such. I wish there had been more stuff like this.
Sylvia: Okay, we all know she's awesome. She has so much power and determination, and she came off to me as being a Good Guy who also wasn't strictly on Anita's side at all, and that's a quality that would disappear from characters later in the series--now if you don't love Anita and everything she does, you're a Big Evil Meanie Pants. I also really wished that she would maybe, instead of just accepting that oh you can't be a lupa cuz then you'd have to sex the male alpha stuff, she'd maybe challenged that, and called out/critiqued how so much of pack structure and pack activity seems to revolve around screwing, and how her capability as a leader isn't impacted by who she's having sex with and what gender they are, and it shouldn't. I mean, I don't totally recall, there may have been some REASON that the Lupa has to have sex with the Ulfric that's all mystical and magical and does Good Things for the pack, but even if that was the case I still think she could have had a good something to say about it. She just seems, to my memory, so fucking perfectly qualified to reign, certainly more so than Anita and Richard are now. Her journey of healing through two rapes would also have been interesting to read about, though it kinda leaves a bad taste in my mouth to type that because it reminds me of the overuse of rape rape rape in the series and because I think Sylvie has plenty to offer as a character without that just fine as well, which is more than can be said for a lot of others in the series, including a lot of Anita's "sweeties" who are defined by their abuse and the damage it has left them with.
Seraphina: Honestly, there's just so much perfect about her as a villain to pit against Anita. I mean, if you're going to give your heroine a ton of mommy issues, I'd think it'd follow that pitting her against someone who really, really screws with them and uses them against her. I think she could have definitely lasted as a very potent bad guy for more than one book, possibly for several, and it would have been a very big, symbolic step for Anita herself to be able to destroy her. The fact she was burned in her hideout by others just feels cheap, and robbed a lot of opportunity for character development of Anita, making her face her issues, and maybe even gain some kind of closure ultimately. But then she couldn't whine as much, and I guess we can't have THAT. I also really liked that she was an older vampire, that is, was turned at an older age. I'd never encountered a vampire before who had gray hair and wrinkles, and to be honest, a grandma-vampire seems easily as scary to me as a little kid vampire, and, as just mentioned, a lot less often done. One thing I will say against her is that her ability to call ghosts, while neat, does not really make sense as an animal-to-call ability. I mean, how did that happen?
Raina: She should have been around longer, and not just as a spirit. She could have been a terrific character to explore in so many ways.
Dorcas Bouvier: Um, I think I just liked her because she was a fairy.
Ronnie: I admittedly didn't have much interest in her until I saw (right here on Lashouts!) that part about her asking Nathaniel "How's tricks?" and calling out Anita on all her hypocritical bullshit. Almost makes me wish I'd kept reading far enough to get to that part in the books!
Itzpapalot: She was so fucking intense. She fascinated me. The idea of a woman whose people were colonized and raped getting revenge forever on some of the men who did it was just full of whoa. I mean, it just raises a fuck ton of questions over Does she have a right to exact justice on this man if she was not one of the women he raped? and How much is enough for those crimes? When does this stop being a justified act? Was it ever? and all sorts of shit, and instead it seems like it really just turned up for shock value and not much else. Plus, she kills any vampire or human servant that comes in to her territory, and instead of the Council kicking her ass for it, they instead forbid anyone else to set foot there. Damn. That means they don't want to go toe to toe with her, doesn't it? Also, the idea that she can't sense lies because she is lying to herself is an interesting one, but if that can happen I'd think there'd be a lot more vampires out there with this problem, since lying to oneself is not a rare trait.
I would also like it to be answered on how she can have "milk-pale brown skin" since wouldn't something milk-pale be, well, white? Not brown?
Narcissus: Okay, Narcissus is not a woman, and I do not mean to infer that his biology in any way makes him one if he does not identify that way, which he does not seem to. But I wanted to include him because he really spits in the face of Anita's gender essentialism, and who I want to see MORE MORE MORE of. He's someone who must have a womb and ovaries (given that he was able to become pregnant) but who identifies as a man (and not just in the posturing "one of the guys" superiority complex way that Anita does, but as in his actual gender identity is male) yet seems to be fully comfortable in defying male gender roles as well--effeminately (if I recall right, but I'm not sure) gay, crossdressing, etc.--rather than being the Manliest Man Ever and making a big point of it so that no one questions whether he is "really" a guy at heart regardless of his genitals, as is frequently done to trans folk who don't adhere to the strictest of stereotypes in terms of their gender (ex: you're a trans woman but you prefer slacks to dresses? YOU ARE REALLY JUST A GUY nevermind that loads of cis women feel the same way!). He doesn't feel the NEED to lapse on about how he is a guy the way that Anita does, nor does he feel the need to excuse or rationalize how he can have the bits he does and be a man and still also like to wear dresses. He's just an awesome crossdressing femme(?) dude who doesn't have the same junk as men are typically expected to have in our cissexist society, and I don't see how that CAN'T just blow the mind of someone with a mindset around gender like Anita has. Not to mention that unlike her, his not wanting any females around actually some decent justification, and is in fact an interesting mirror to Anita's own insecurities about/demonization of other women as dangerous, jealous creatures. I really want to know about his life and his character, both before and after NiC, I really do. Like, say, what's the story with his apparent fondness for Greek names, for instance?
(also in my little fanfic head canon, his baby lived and is a little girl named Echo and she is friends with Angel, who is the little boy that Anita would have had if she had been right when she thought she might be pregnant)
These are some that I can remember being fond of and intrigued by...
Melanie: I thought she was neat, and was glad when she ended up sticking around in the circus instead of getting axed by Anita. I was intrigued by her snakeman harem, and, as DWG pointed out, it's pretty hilarious how she pointed out to back-in-the-day Anita that a girl needs more than one guy and offered to share and Anita was all EW NO. Plus, I'm pretty sure she swore vengeance on Anita for killing said harem, and while I realize an immortal being can wait a long time for getting someone back, I really do wish she'd reappeared by now...but maybe not, since Anita would just kill her and then absorb her lamia-ness like she did the munin with Raina or something like that.
Yasmeen and Marguerite: Okay, in retrospect, they're just signs of all the bullshittery to come, but I was a barely-in-high-school kid who was still in the closet myself, and there were no lesbians in any of my fandoms except Uranus and Neptune in Sailor Moon (who were rewritten as cousins in the US dub to boot) and so I was just like...omg?! Are they in love?! Are they gay?! Omg! I love them! Awww, no, Yasmeen died, will we not be seeing more of them? Noooo, I liiiked them! In hindsight, though, it's kind of easy to see now that Yasmeen is just "anyone who doesn't look totally Aryan = 'exotic' " + "Anita is so hot even those icky lesbians want her!' while Marguerite is "blue-eyed blonde women are evil" and "ugh, women are jealous of Anita!' but I am still fond of them.
Cherry: My first Anita Book was Blue Moon and I was in middle school, and Cherry was the first female shifter I was introduced to in its pages. I was just oh so struck by her going ~*topless*~ which I took to be such a mark of sexy grown-up badassery (which, by extension, would of course make me more grown-up and badass for reading about it) but I was also kind of intrigued by how she was noted to do it as a fuck-you statement against a society that had rejected her. Instead of conforming and hiding as best she could, as probably might have benefited her, she pushed back and emphasized her shifter status brazenly...though come to think of it, I'm not sure how skimpy attire tells people you're a shifter. Maybe it's the equivalent of flouncy Byron shirts guaranteeing that you're a vampire? In any case, her mode of reacting against bigotry, her confidence only emerging when her medical skill is needed, her willingness to not only feed vampires but travel to do so, and her teasing relationship with Zane all seem like they would have been fun to flesh out in terms of hows and whys and what nows, but I haven't heard much about her and what's she up to since I quit reading the series.
Dr. Lilian: I really liked the idea of a shifter doctor who sets up a shifter clinic. I like the aspects of an oppressed group that come together community that builds its way to becoming as self-sustaining as it can be instead of just floundering, with members using their individual skills to help others and such. I wish there had been more stuff like this.
Sylvia: Okay, we all know she's awesome. She has so much power and determination, and she came off to me as being a Good Guy who also wasn't strictly on Anita's side at all, and that's a quality that would disappear from characters later in the series--now if you don't love Anita and everything she does, you're a Big Evil Meanie Pants. I also really wished that she would maybe, instead of just accepting that oh you can't be a lupa cuz then you'd have to sex the male alpha stuff, she'd maybe challenged that, and called out/critiqued how so much of pack structure and pack activity seems to revolve around screwing, and how her capability as a leader isn't impacted by who she's having sex with and what gender they are, and it shouldn't. I mean, I don't totally recall, there may have been some REASON that the Lupa has to have sex with the Ulfric that's all mystical and magical and does Good Things for the pack, but even if that was the case I still think she could have had a good something to say about it. She just seems, to my memory, so fucking perfectly qualified to reign, certainly more so than Anita and Richard are now. Her journey of healing through two rapes would also have been interesting to read about, though it kinda leaves a bad taste in my mouth to type that because it reminds me of the overuse of rape rape rape in the series and because I think Sylvie has plenty to offer as a character without that just fine as well, which is more than can be said for a lot of others in the series, including a lot of Anita's "sweeties" who are defined by their abuse and the damage it has left them with.
Seraphina: Honestly, there's just so much perfect about her as a villain to pit against Anita. I mean, if you're going to give your heroine a ton of mommy issues, I'd think it'd follow that pitting her against someone who really, really screws with them and uses them against her. I think she could have definitely lasted as a very potent bad guy for more than one book, possibly for several, and it would have been a very big, symbolic step for Anita herself to be able to destroy her. The fact she was burned in her hideout by others just feels cheap, and robbed a lot of opportunity for character development of Anita, making her face her issues, and maybe even gain some kind of closure ultimately. But then she couldn't whine as much, and I guess we can't have THAT. I also really liked that she was an older vampire, that is, was turned at an older age. I'd never encountered a vampire before who had gray hair and wrinkles, and to be honest, a grandma-vampire seems easily as scary to me as a little kid vampire, and, as just mentioned, a lot less often done. One thing I will say against her is that her ability to call ghosts, while neat, does not really make sense as an animal-to-call ability. I mean, how did that happen?
Raina: She should have been around longer, and not just as a spirit. She could have been a terrific character to explore in so many ways.
Dorcas Bouvier: Um, I think I just liked her because she was a fairy.
Ronnie: I admittedly didn't have much interest in her until I saw (right here on Lashouts!) that part about her asking Nathaniel "How's tricks?" and calling out Anita on all her hypocritical bullshit. Almost makes me wish I'd kept reading far enough to get to that part in the books!
Itzpapalot: She was so fucking intense. She fascinated me. The idea of a woman whose people were colonized and raped getting revenge forever on some of the men who did it was just full of whoa. I mean, it just raises a fuck ton of questions over Does she have a right to exact justice on this man if she was not one of the women he raped? and How much is enough for those crimes? When does this stop being a justified act? Was it ever? and all sorts of shit, and instead it seems like it really just turned up for shock value and not much else. Plus, she kills any vampire or human servant that comes in to her territory, and instead of the Council kicking her ass for it, they instead forbid anyone else to set foot there. Damn. That means they don't want to go toe to toe with her, doesn't it? Also, the idea that she can't sense lies because she is lying to herself is an interesting one, but if that can happen I'd think there'd be a lot more vampires out there with this problem, since lying to oneself is not a rare trait.
I would also like it to be answered on how she can have "milk-pale brown skin" since wouldn't something milk-pale be, well, white? Not brown?
Narcissus: Okay, Narcissus is not a woman, and I do not mean to infer that his biology in any way makes him one if he does not identify that way, which he does not seem to. But I wanted to include him because he really spits in the face of Anita's gender essentialism, and who I want to see MORE MORE MORE of. He's someone who must have a womb and ovaries (given that he was able to become pregnant) but who identifies as a man (and not just in the posturing "one of the guys" superiority complex way that Anita does, but as in his actual gender identity is male) yet seems to be fully comfortable in defying male gender roles as well--effeminately (if I recall right, but I'm not sure) gay, crossdressing, etc.--rather than being the Manliest Man Ever and making a big point of it so that no one questions whether he is "really" a guy at heart regardless of his genitals, as is frequently done to trans folk who don't adhere to the strictest of stereotypes in terms of their gender (ex: you're a trans woman but you prefer slacks to dresses? YOU ARE REALLY JUST A GUY nevermind that loads of cis women feel the same way!). He doesn't feel the NEED to lapse on about how he is a guy the way that Anita does, nor does he feel the need to excuse or rationalize how he can have the bits he does and be a man and still also like to wear dresses. He's just an awesome crossdressing femme(?) dude who doesn't have the same junk as men are typically expected to have in our cissexist society, and I don't see how that CAN'T just blow the mind of someone with a mindset around gender like Anita has. Not to mention that unlike her, his not wanting any females around actually some decent justification, and is in fact an interesting mirror to Anita's own insecurities about/demonization of other women as dangerous, jealous creatures. I really want to know about his life and his character, both before and after NiC, I really do. Like, say, what's the story with his apparent fondness for Greek names, for instance?
(also in my little fanfic head canon, his baby lived and is a little girl named Echo and she is friends with Angel, who is the little boy that Anita would have had if she had been right when she thought she might be pregnant)
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Date: 2011-06-13 01:00 am (UTC)http://www.makeandtakes.com/making-a-rainbow-connection
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Date: 2011-06-13 01:05 am (UTC)And the great part about this is that Kissaphina has plausible deniability given that Anita's been...Anita. So she can destroy Team Hero from within.
I'm also choosing to believe Gretchen and Melanie are now BFFS and heads of the We Hate Anita club and are simply biding their time.
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Date: 2011-06-13 01:08 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2011-06-13 01:20 am (UTC)I gotta say, I agree with this whole list, most especially Itzpapalotl. Coolest name in AB:VH, period.
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Date: 2011-06-13 01:24 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2011-06-13 10:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-16 05:46 am (UTC)Raina DID posess Anita when the marks were married at the beginning of Narcissus in Chains.
Raina's been lurking in the back of Anita's head, that little voice that keeps pushing Anita more and more away from the woman she wants to be and more and more into the woman that Raina wants her to be, until one day she'll look up in a bed stained red by the blood of her lovers, spilt by her own hands, and hear Raina's laughter echoing in her head as she's able to think clearly for the first time in YEARS. Then slowly, to stop the laughter, she picks up her browning and points it at her temple...
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Date: 2011-06-13 02:30 am (UTC)I'll be honest, when Yasmeen and Maurguirite first showed up, I rolled my eyes. Not over them, per say, but because it was another "Every person wants to jump in Anita's bed" ordeal. They were in what, the third book, and I saw that pattern emerging quickly. Other then that, they were cool.
And I'd like to add Gretchen to the list. Whatever happened to her? The last I remember, they let her out of a casket covered in crosses and she's practically a husk. I'm sure she's healed by now.
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Date: 2011-06-13 02:55 am (UTC)A lot of folks seem to like Gretchen. I can't recall too much about her except she used to be called Gretel and didn't like being reminded of it, and was jealous of Anita. Can somebody refresh me on her particular awesometude? Not doubting it, just haven't read the books in awhile.
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Date: 2011-06-13 03:06 am (UTC)Gretchen used to be someone special to JC. I think she was his ex-lover or wanted to be his lover. He saved her (and I think turned her) back when she was Gretel, and she hated that Anita was taking her coveted spot in JC's heart. After trying to kill Anita, she's locked up in a coffin with crosses and, a few books later, released. She's weak but vows revenge. That's either by her actually voicing it, or Anita believes that it will happen. She vanished, I think, in NiC.
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Date: 2011-06-13 03:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-13 12:14 pm (UTC)Ronnie, I always feel bad for as she's set up as a "bad" girlfriend because of her issues with shifters - which would be a huge deal if, you know, -can- get infected (unlike Anita, who gets all the power with none of the fur or stigma.)
I never understood the Sylvia reasoning at all. If Narci can me the male(-ish) leader of the traditionaly female led hyenas, why not a lesbian leader of the pack? LKH and gender roles, ugh.
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Date: 2011-06-13 02:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-13 05:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-13 06:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-14 03:07 am (UTC)Oh, that made me laugh.
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Date: 2011-06-14 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2011-06-13 10:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-06-27 03:25 pm (UTC)It was such a vivid snapshot of a very minor character--but just *think* of the potential there would be if she was brought back and her character motivations were preserved! The woman she'd saved from vampires, the woman who had at least tried to save her family... is not just sleeping with the enemy, but is a human servant, and hip-deep in the Church of Eternal Life. A conflict between those two would have been *epic*.
Gretchen was pre-ardurrrrrr, so she had the slightly-more solid character of that time. I remember her standing up to JC when JC was still Machiavellian, and how Anita *admired* her for it. Of course, Gretchen being blonde, strong, and an important part of JC's past, we will never see her again.
At least they got out 'alive', eh?
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Date: 2011-06-29 02:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-04 10:10 pm (UTC)I LOVE Andais. She's my fave character that LKH has ever written and I get the feeling she's going to kill her off, she wasn't even in the last book.
She's crude, funny, clever, a sadist but still manages to be a good queen. She gets a lot of stick from Merry Sue for the torture but this is the UNSEELIE court and lets face it DOYLE has definately done worse- he's been her assasin for 1000 years by choice. A few years ago he would have killed her without a thought if Andais ordered it.
argh I might write some fic about her and essus hehe =]
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Date: 2011-07-10 06:45 am (UTC)Honestly, I'm not being sarcastic. Compare the Anita of, say, Guilty Pleasures or even Circus of the Damned with any book past Obsidian Butterfly / NiC (whichever was last) - they barely read like the same character. If you changed the names, I doubt most people would even realize they were same series.
Original!Anita - a smart-assed, emotionally insecure woman with a normal (for her) day job and bills to pay. She hunted vampires for the law, with proper cause; her darker/stronger necromancy powers were vague and generally unwanted, scared her, and could very likely get her killed. The bad guys were stronger, badder and scarier than she was, often proving it by kicking her ass, but Anita survived because she was stubborn, gutsy and occasionally smarter than the horde. Like a certain "Die Hard" cop, she had the bad luck of being 'that guy' - in the wrong place at the wrong time, with abilities she didn't want, trying to stop the baddies because there wasn't anyone else. And not only did she have to fight for her life, she didn't always win. (Phillip, anyone?)
In addition, she had to put up with Jean-Claude as a Magnificent Bastard; a master manipulator that not only marked her against her will but used her as a pawn to be Master of the City. A vampire who could not only hide things from her, but forced her to question her own humanity, sometimes literally.
UGH!Anita - Snide and ruthless, with delusions of grandeur, rules any supernatural entity that comes into her territory with an iron fist. The power she didn't want (the ardur) is central to her life, and it - along with her 'empty killer' persona - allow her to do whatever she wants, regardless of who it may hurt or how much collateral damage it may cause. Not only does she happily do things she swore repeatedly she'd never do, like screwing Jason/Nathaniel/Peter/whoever's handy at the time, but she does things that go against the 'heroic' creed she's spent this entire time attempting to live by, like sentencing the Rex and his Pride to death because he refused to sleep with her. And she does it simply because she can.
Personally, I think the Raina munin took over Anita's consciousness without anyone noticing, and re-moulded her into Raina's image. It would explain the insane personality shift, and a story with her regaining her body to discover what "she's" been doing would be epic.