Weekly Fic Discussion

[lachrymosy]

Weekly Fic Discussion

Welcome again to kpop_fic! It's so so exciting to see so many different people joining in this community and sharing fics!

One idea arundels and I also had for this community was to have some regular discussion posts so that people have a chance to chat. So, here is our first Weekly Fic Discussion post!

This post can be used for any kind of fic discussion you want, but will also have a few prompt questions each week. We'll try to target both writers and readers with the prompt questions. You can reply to all of them, one of them, or none of them if you have something else you want to talk about!

Feel free to post WIP snippets, ask others' opinion on characterization, share a clip that has broken your brain, etc.!

This week's prompt questions:

• How did you get into reading/writing K-pop RPF?


• What is your platonic ideal of a K-pop fic (e.g. the elements you usually gravitate towards)?

Comments

[aceaceaceace]

getting into kpop RPF:

I've talked about this a bit before on my journal, I think, but RPF used to be a squick for me. I didn't have any issue with it in theory, but I am very easily put off by hearing about romantic/sexual encounters involving people I know--mainly friends and family, but it also applies to real-life folks that I am somewhat aware of due to interviews and such. I could read about fictional characters having kinky sex no problem, but hearing about my friends' first kisses and such made my skin crawl.

All this is to say that I had to make a conscious and sustained effort to get past my squick feelings to start reading and writing RPF. Which I did because I was between fandoms, wanted to find a fandom with plenty of fic to read (my usual M.O. for getting into a fandom), and diving into kpop fic seemed like the best choice since I was already consuming a lot of kpop content anyway. So I basically just forced myself to read a bunch of fic until finally it didn't squick me anymore lol.

platonic ideal of a K-pop fic:

Basically bleak boy band bingo tropes lmao. I am primarily interested in fics that engage with idols as idols, and I have a great hunger for angst. (I still prefer happy or bittersweet endings over total downers though.) Semi-related: fics that deal with marginalized identities/experiences within the industry (queerness, neurodivergence, working in Korea as a foreigner/part of the Korean diaspora, disability, etc.)

[lachrymosy]

The fiction/real-life distinction is always so interesting! I kind of suspect that the degree to which people perceive RPF characters as truly fictionalized affects how they perceive RPF as a concept? I feel like before I got into kpop, it didn't make sense to me, but afterwards, people were so clearly interacting with these celebrities as fictional characters that I couldn't imagine seeing RPF as otherwise. I also find for me that in kpop specifically, the level of self-consciousness they themselves have about their image/concept is always what intrigues me, like they are aware of and facilitating the fictionalization of themselves.

BBB really did a number on all of us... I am so with you on "engage with idols as idols" and always eager for more of that specifically! I think that goes along with that fictionalization thing because it also questions—what do you know about yourself? How much of yourself is also an image you project into the world, influenced by others' perceptions of you? These are such relatable questions put under such an extreme microscope in kpop! (and lead directly into angst lol)

Anyway your bookmarks/collection of canon fics is a GIFT to the fandom!

[poppyseedheart]

Your platonic ideal of a fic could have been posted by me and I wouldn't even have blinked! For me such a huge draw of kpop fandom is the machine of the industry, how individual idols interact with it, and how fame operates as a concept. Power dynamics! Self-concept! There's so much there and idolverse will always have the top spot in my heart as a result.

[arundels]

You managing to train yourself out of a squick is kinda funny and impressive ngl! I'm glad that we have you in the kpop rpf fandom now :)

And I completely know what you mean about "idols as idols" - as a general rule the fandoms that I get the most invested in are ones where the canon setting/dynamics are inherently interesting to me, and the same is especially true for kpop! The industry is like no other in terms of the way fame and autonomy and the hazy distinction between persona/personality are treated... Like to some extent it's true of all celebrity figures but it's pushed to such an extreme in kpop that it is really a setting unlike no other. It's viewed through this context/lens that the idols often are the most fascinating as well - it's hard to divorce what makes an idol interesting as a character from the way that they navigate their hyper-fame.

Though I like you do prefer stories that end on at least a hopeful note - not necessarily hope for a happy ending but some sort of emotional closure that doesn't just feel sad. Idk, I feel like total bleakness is the easy way out; finding a way to spin something dark in a way that just catches the light - that feels infinitely more satisfying to me.

[celli]

I got into K-pop twice: once back in 2017 when a friend of mine was super into it and I was reading her fic like crazy, but only a few other ones, and again late last year when someone dangled a photo of Jungkook in a business suit in front of me and I said, you have my attention. I dove BACK into the fic, started writing, and now it's my primary fandom and I've written tens of thousands of words in it and read...how many more? Who can say?

My favorite fics are AUs. I have a real weakness for magic universes, but I also like "take your job to work" AUs. My favorite tropes are fake relationship and/or marriage of convenience turned love - pining is the name of the game. Also, really good sex scenes, please.

[lachrymosy]

I love how our friends can pull us into fandoms we didn't expect haha! I haven't read much BTS fic myself but it seems like SUCH an active ficdom. That sounds like so much fun for you getting into it again as a writer!

"fake relationship and/or marriage of convenience turned love - pining is the name of the game."—TRULY THE ULTIMATE TROPES!

[aceaceaceace]

AUs aren't my preference, but I can always appreciate a really detailed fic that's clearly based on the author's real-life job. It's such a neat way to peek into other people's careers, especially for fields that I never would've thought about the day-to-day minutiae before. Or jobs that I didn't even know existed!

[arundels]

I also got into kpop twice (though the first time not into rpf)! It's interesting to see how we can cycle in and out of fandoms, and how they can mean different things to us each time around.

Fake relationships YESSSSS truly one of the best tropes. I too really love hyper-specific work/profession AUs, it feels like taking a peek into someone else's life. Even professions that are supposedly boring I think are very fascinating when examined under the microscope like that.

[nagi_schwarz]

Magic AUs and take your fandom to work AUs are ones I love too!

[hitokage]

Got into reading and writing Kpop fic as an extension of being in the Visual Kei RPF fandom (thanks for that, Gackt, you ass) and the streams just crossed themselves. XD

Lately I've been finding my reading happy space mostly in Omegaverse, but even outside that I gravitate strongly towards healthy polyamory and exploring how that can mean different things for different members. I can go both idolverse or AU, but if we're going AU, then give me some level of magic/powers please.

[lachrymosy]

The first time I ever even heard about Visual Kei was because of Kpop (trying to understand what was going on at SM circa 2005 lol), so I think it's so fun that you got into Kpop via Visual Kei!

[aceaceaceace]

If you have any idolverse omegaverse recs, please let me know!!! I am always on the look-out for those, regardless of the fandom.

[celli]

Yes to omegaverse, polyamory, and magic!!!!

[lachrymosy]

My journey into Kpop RPF started back in 2010 when the Wonder Girls went back to Korea for promotions. Up until that point the only Kpop artists I followed were the Wonder Girls and BoA, but between the WG's variety show promos with Super Junior, their reality show/documentary thing with 2PM and 2AM, and Donghae's smile in No Other live performances, I was suddenly pondering what kind of fic there might be. (Also, as an aside, if you weren't in fandom at that time it's hard to explain ficdom's obsession with Heechul lol. If you go back and look through fic prompt memes and such they're all like 75% Heechul.) I remember feeling weird about RPF at first as my fandom experience up until that point never included it, but I couldn't get all these thoughts about fame, self-perception, and mental health out of my head until I wrote them down.

Back then Kpop fic was very much centered on Livejournal (and of course Asianfanfics although I never spent much time there). I really don't remember migrating to AO3 for years; iirc even the big EXO fics circa 2012/2013 were on LJ and then sometime around 2014/2015 more and more people started posting on AO3. I'm really nostalgic for fandom from that time, which is why I started this community! I still talk to people I met from that era of fic; one of my best fandom friends to this day commented on my fic in 2011 and we got to talking on Livejournal! As much as I enjoy fandom as it has evolved on Twitter, appreciate the functionality of Discord, and think AO3 is the best fic platform, the community building on LJ was my favorite.

My platonic ideal of a Kpop fic is always canon/idolverse. There's something about the way writing or reading a canonverse fic feels that compels me. I think it has to do with these cycles of perception and performance inherent to celebrity that I think are part of everyone's lives but so heightened in theirs. I have a canon reclist on my journal if anyone is interested! I'll share some of these as recs in this comm eventually but they are compiled nicely there <3

[andersenmom]

I miss the connectedness we got on LJ, so much. I'm with you there.

[jonquilles]

I originally got into K-pop back in 2012 because I was a fan of f(x) and ended up casually following a bunch of other groups, mostly girl groups, as well. I mostly stopped paying attention to K-pop after 2017ish. I actually wasn't into the RPF side of things at the time, though I have been into a bunch of RPF fandoms over the years, starting with bandom back in the day lol. I got back into K-pop a few months after the pandemic started and Seventeen ended up sucking me into the K-pop RPF world! It was actually my first time stanning a boy group lol, and now I have so many boy groups and girl groups I follow....

My fic ideals: a big part of why I like K-pop RPF is because I find being an idol, and the entertainment industry in general, really interesting, so I love a good canon fic! Bonus points if involves examining idolhood/personhood, performing the self, fanservice, all that fun stuff.

[lachrymosy]

I showed a friend the Red Light mv recently and it really held up SO well. f(x) is such an iconic group! Kpop really is the black hole that sucks people back in haha!

"Bonus points if involves examining idolhood/personhood, performing the self, fanservice, all that fun stuff"—YES so agree!

[andersenmom]

When I started writing, it was RPF (Duran Duran, early 80s, before there was an internet or even name for it, in my teenage head). So getting into K-pop RPF wasn't even a problem.

My favorite ideal? Found Family. That's one reason I've always gravitated towards bands and groups, Power Rangers, etc. The idea of having friends you could count on, all of that.... I don't care what form it takes, AU or canon, whatever, I love the idea of a found family.

[arundels]

Found family and kpop rpf make so much sense! In a sense kpop groups are exactly that - and the most successful ones and the ones that do actually feel like a family. I love seeing that found family setting transposed onto AUs as well - show me all the thousand ways these people can find and love each other!

[bluedreaming]

How did you get into reading/writing K-pop RPF?

I got into kpop with tri-angle (came over via classical > Scandinavian meta > jrock/visual kei and lured by Jaejoong, Heechul, Taemin etc.) but with where I was living/no internet etc., I didn't actually perceive fandom (and then immediately fanworks-dom) until I stumbled across this Lu Han & Sehun video edit/vid (to this day it still makes me feel all the sad kinds of nostalgic), read the comments, spiralled out into websearches and started piecing together what this "fanfic" thing was. (I still even have the two sticky notes I started my notes on.)

the two notes

What is your platonic ideal of a K-pop fic (e.g. the elements you usually gravitate towards)?

I don't really have a specific reading one (maybe happy endings, if that counts?) but for writing my brain gets stuck on random rare/crack platonic ships, in the vein of "but what if person a and person b were siblings?" (or sibling-like friends). I don't know why; it's just fun I guess.

[arundels]

Haha starting your journey into rpf via ship video edits...same, same. Those two sticky notes are so cute!! I also love random sibling pairings, especially when someone just finds idols with the same surname and put them in a family, because it's often so random but if it's done well suddenly I'm like well yes this makes pefect sense... In general I love a fic that starts out silly and then makes me go "ah yes I believe this entirely" by the end :)

[breakfirst]

Oh this sounds fun!

My first foray into kpop rpf started in 2009, when I got into super junior and started writing this super dramatic donghae/OC fic on blogspot. Then around 2010 my irl friends made me write... super junior/shinee/self-insert OCs for our eyes only on lj (elmo fire gif). Nothing deep, we just wanted our favourite kpop boys to be in love with us!! That story is still floating around somewhere but pls don't ask me about it.

So I've been writing since I was a wee child and when I discovered a suju writing comm on lj around 2009 it sort of made sense for me to transition over to rpf. Because I'd always created my own characters, they sort of lacked the depth and personality that real people really had, and because idols to me at the time were like these public personas toeing the line between a fictional character and a real human, it was interesting to see how much of the essence of their personalities and character I could inject into a fictional character while also making sure I wasn't writing about that actual idol's life, the human. I used to be very fixated on exploring the duality of idols but these days it only pops up every now and then lol. Now I just think of my fics as movies where the idols are the actors!

My platonic ideal of a kpop fic: AUs! Because I see my own personal version of the idols I write as completely fictional, I prefer seeing them dropped into fictional settings in other people's work. That being said, if a canon is written well I'll read and love it 100%. I guess my actual ideal is just for fics to be written well, I love a fic that has depth and strong themes and characterisation that is true to the person without being overblown.

[arundels]

Haha writing self-insert OCs with your irl friends sounds like so much fun! I definitely had a lot of silly fic adventures with my friends on locked LJs as a teen... (side note but today's teenagers really need more spaces to be silly kids instead of cyberbullying each other on twitter). There is something very fun about rpf exactly because of what you say, taking hints of what they display and using that to build a character that resembles the idol but is also fundamentally a character you've created to tell your story.

I do really like canon fics because I think it's entirely possible to find that balance in canon, and by and large the good canon writers are under no misconception that they're writing about the "real people" or saying anything about their "real lives". But I also love simply transplanting a package of character traits and neuroses into a totally different setting and playing around what that!

[caramarie]

I had no interest in RPF for ages until I happened to give a fic of popliar’s a try, which was an MV-based fic, and then I was like, oh, RPF can be like this?? After which things escalated quickly, haha.

My platonic ideal has to be some kind of alternate reality/timey-wimey business with different versions of the same person. I definitely lean toward the fantasy AU side of things (and especially MV-inspired AUs).

[arundels]

alternate reality/timey-wimey business - yes, so good!! As a general rule I think rpf spaces suffer from a severe lack of science-fiction (or maybe I'm just biased cos I love sci-fi and so I always want more), and there is honestly so much that can be done between the parallels of being a kpop idol versus the alternate reality premise. Calling all sci-fi lovers please write more sci-fi ficssss <3

[arundels]

I got into kpop in 2008 with 2ne1's debut, but the concept of rpf as a fandom didn't even occur to me then (despite how much I shipped GD/CL). I had been reading and writing fanfiction for around 4(?) years by then, but only ever for fictional fandoms. The thing that got me into rpf was getting into 1D around 2013/14 and watching a ship video... my eyes were truly opened to the wonders of rpf. I didn't actually write for 1D but I read a lot of fic. When the band fell apart I then bounced around fandoms casually until finally falling back into BTS around 2017/18 - once again it was a ship video that got me into rpf! I started writing fic, slipping from one kpop fandom to the next, and now here I am.

One thing about me is that I find it hard to stick with one fandom for a long time as I get bored and want new content and characters to gnaw on - and kpop rpf is so ideal for that because there are so many interlocking circles of groups and idol dynamics, it's like a never ending feast! There's so much content that tbh even within one group there are a lot of potential ships to explore, because you can definitely find interactions for almost any combination of people you want, unlike in fictional fandoms where the source material is limited so you typically only have a few viable ships and that's it.

My platonic ideal of a kpop fic involves an umbrella trope that I have distilled after careful examination of my reading and writing preferences: intimacy but not the kind of intimacy we want. I love fics where characters are forced into a form of really intense closeness, but there's still something lacking or a final distance that can't be bridged. Canon fics in general are really good for this because of the inherent intimacy of having your life paths tied to each other, as well as all the fanservice / shipping - but at the same time it's a ripe space for pining because none of that is inherently romantic. But this umbrella trope also covers most of my other favourite tropes: fake relationship, arranged marriage, friends with benefits, soulbond, pacrim/drift partners, etc. My favourite AUs are also the ones that employ this sort of dynamic - heist AUs or space AUs or bandom AUs where the characters are on some sort of a team/crew together come to mind. Or zombie/apocalypse AUs where the characters are desperately reliant on each other to survive and yet still can't cross that line in the sand... so delicious.

I also love it when fics blend canon with one of these AU elements - it just takes everything I love about canon fics and dials it up to 100! I think the blending of canon and AU also involves a lot of creativity and skill, and it's just such a fun reading experience to see how different authors take that and run with it.

[celli]

Oh my gosh, I love all those tropes! Do you have any good drift partners recs? I've read one and really liked it.

[nagi_schwarz]

I think I first encountered RPF back in boyband days (we're talking NSYNC and BSB) and I loved both canon fics and also AUs and also weird crossover rarepairs (to the writer who made JC/Eminem WORK, kudos to you, wherever you are), which I think influenced my reading and writing preferences once I started getting into Kpop rpf. I first encountered it back around 2010 because an LJ friend wrote suju rpf, but I was only casually into kpop so I didn't read any of her fics. Then a friend of mine super into MX started dropping MX prompts in a prompt community I wrote in a lot (though mainly for other fandoms), and I figured I'd write a gift for her (I love writing for my friends) and then it just kind of evolved from there.

I think for me the most important part of any fic, be it AU or canon-verse (idol-verse, whatever your terminology may be) is some semblance of character consistency. Like...in Astro most of us know Dongmin, bless his adorable little heart, is a massive scaredy-cat. Jumps at the smallest things. So to have him take the lead and be the brave one in a haunted house would just...totally throw me off. It's also the reason I'm generally hesitant to write in a fandom where I don't feel like I have a good grasp of who the characters are, because I wouldn't want to do the fandom a disservice and have things be totally OOC. Other than that, I'm not super picky about the broad strokes of a fic as far as themes or world-building.

I myself love magic/scifi AUs and also interesting job AUs, and also weird and random crossover pairings (I am the purveyor of the only Shownu/Rocky fic out there I'm pretty sure) if someone makes them work well. I also like interesting character dynamics, and if the fic is mostly a romance, a relationship built most likely on friendship or a long-standing acquaintance. Also I am a sucker for soulmate AUs if they have a cool twist, like "you're colorblind till you meet your soulmate, except one of them is just genetically colorblind and will never see color".

[jonquilles]

Oh, yes about the characterization, and consistency is a really great way of putting it! I know a lot of people who think that since it's all made up anyways, characterization doesn't matter, but I definitely fall more on the side of wanting that consistency. While it's true we don't know them personally, they are presenting parts of themselves to the audience, and I do think it's important! (Also personally, characterization and voice are my favourites things to write lol)

[kat_lair]

1. The RPF/music industry setting was pre-built thanks to years being actively involved in 'Bandom' (FOB, MCR, Panic, Cobra etc), and even before that passively consuming fics in that vein (ah, Savage Garden... I'm also still in mourning for this one U2 fic that has forever disappeared from the interwebs...). So during the pandemic/lockdowns I fell down the BTS rabbit hole (actually am not sure how but...) which in turn opened up a whole massive warren of groups; an experience which massively contributed to my mental health at the time and continues to do so. I've always been a writer and always been multi-fandom and pretty multi-shipper too so it didn't take long for me to start writing in this. Especially as this is a fandom that comes with in-built power dynamics both in terms of the industry and the culture and I am very weak for those. I also dragged one of my best fandom friends down with me and now dreamersdare and I have a distressing amount of co-written WIPs (all SKZ) in addition to my solo writing.

2. Power dynamics are my jam. This goes from the age/role/experience based hierarchies in canon to explicit d/s dynamics. I prefer canon-compliant fics because I like to explore the impact of the setting and being it in the public eye and the whole 'oh it doesn't mean anything, it's just fan service... or is it?' aspect of things. Generally I also love friends to lovers, pining, slow burn, as well as the 'expressing my feelings through an artistic medium' trope ('I wrote this song/choreographed this dance for you' is a concept I'd read a million fics about) all of which the fandom is well set up for. I don't mind AUs if the 'close group of friends' aspects remain, so the university/omg they were roommates type of AUs are usually good for that. My default in writing is in that vein as well, but I am willing and interested in writing darker things than I usually gravitate to when reading (it needs to be an author I know for for that), like the SKZ street gang AU that DD and I are working on where everyone is morally grey and generally fucked up. A classic 'I can dish it out but I can't take it' author :D

[bookishdagger]

I actually had a resistance to reading/writing rpf for a very long time, mostly because I didn't understand it as separate from tinhatting, which I still do feel vaguely uncomfortable with (not to say what other people's boundaries should be just--that's a boundary that I have with myself). I got into kpop rpf through twitter aus from BTS accounts I followed for jin content at first lol, then progressed to reading actual fic from there! It took a while from then (late 2019) for me to start writing though, I didn't start writing fic until last fall.
I think the thing that draws me to a fic most of all is characterization/character dynamics. I really like fics where a lot of thought has been put into the world and how the characters fit into it, whether that be idolverse or a really well-crafted fantasy/scifi au or even just hyperspecific industry aus (baking! fashion! in a band but not a kpop band!). I don't like things that are /too/ bleak or /too/ mean, I'm a romantic at heart and I want to believe things will turn out okay in the end lol....
Also, this is more group-specific, but any fic that explores Joshua/Vernon/Minghao/Jun feelings about home and where is home anyways and who am I etc etc.....catnip to me always.
Oh! I think I'm drawn to stories that are tonally pretty upbeat and humorous, lots of ensemble antics, but also thematically rich and not afraid to get deep/emotional/sad

[blackcatofmisery]

I honestly had to Google tinhatting, and I can understand the nerves with it. There's a delicate approach; I think with fic, there's no product to sell or money to make, but with media like TV, they are selling a product or service using misleading imagery (that's also of a marginalized community of people). That ain't cool.

hyperspecific industry aus (baking! fashion! in a band but not a kpop band!) 😘👌 I love when it's obvious that the writer has experience with the industry they're writing. It adds depth. Really cements the setting for the action.

=^..^=~

[moriendum]

first of all, love reading the comments here, not only for the RPF journeys but for the chance to see what everyone likes in fic <3 I can relate to so much of it!

I've been aware of fic since forever thanks to the harry potter fics I used to read as kid, so I think I just sort of accepted fic as part of any fandom experience? I can't remember if I ever had any issues with RPF; as soon as I got into suju in 2010, I started reading/writing kpop fic. my asianfanfics account was created in jan/2011, and I was using LJ and language-specific fic sites during that time too.

as for the ideal kpop fic, the appeal of RPF to me is characterization, so characterization that's based on what we know about the person is my favorite thing. I'll never get tired of canonverse because it tends to incorporate some stuff I love: found family, friends to lovers, self-discovery, roommates/living together, angst... but I love a good AU too, especially vampire AU and media fusion. (give me all the MV/book/movie-inspired fics!!!)

[nagi_schwarz]

I love book and movie fusion AUs! Also I am with you on characterization and seeing how people interpret what bits of “canon” they’ve seen or watched heard.

[blackcatofmisery]

I honestly can't remember how I got into writing Kpop RPF. I know I was listening to Kpop, just as music, for a while before delving into fandom. It may have been a friend who was also into Kpop and wrote fic, and once I started reading theirs I wanted to write my own, and from the groups my friend wrote I kinda branched out on my own...

But I really don't know. It's been too long, and my memory doesn't go that far back. Just know I'm here, back again, after many months of general "blah" and listening to metal and jazz.

Browsing replies here, though, I noticed a few who approach RPF cautiously. These are real people with real lives, obviously, and they deserve respect. I don't think I've appreciated that until seeing how some people will seem to stake a claims on the idols' lives, really treating them like a video game character or doll. Those negative instances are what have made me fall back from Kpop as a fandom. It was just so obvious to me that what I read or come up with myself has no bearing at all on the idol it's borrowing an image from.

So kinda in that vein, I prefer AUs. More distinction between the fact and fantasy, maybe. That said, regardless of setting, I am a sucker for simple slice-of-life stories. No fuss, no muss. Going shopping? Fantastic. Joining up with buddies for a meal? Better describe that food. Being an antisocial slob for a weekend and not leaving the house? Ideal. 👌 I like happy, or at least hopeful endings.

=^..^=~