Snowflake Challenge - Day 11

[flo_nelja]

In your own space, Talk about your favorite trope, cliché, kink, motif, or theme. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

OK, I can't choose, so you will have two of them.

Please give me recs if you want!
Ha ha you can ask for recs for a specific aspect too I guess?



You know, it's been a while since I talked about mind control. It was, to be precise, 14 years ago and maybe I have some things to add?
Tough it was specifically about mind control as porn, and of course I still love this, but it's not the only thing?

So, it's a trope that makes me feel a lot (positively and negatively, it can please me, it can squick me a lot too, especially when played for laughs) and I will just try to talk a bit about it.

I'm often joking mind control is a classic for cheap sci-fi or fantasy tv shows, because 1) it's very scary with high stakes but fully reversible, 2) needs no special effects, only actor skill. So, what do I love in it?

* Horror-wise, I love the loss of control: it can be the loss of yourself, having emotions changed, or the loss of autonomy, being a blind spectator to actions that are not yours

* Angst-wise (and it goes together) the horrific angst and trauma of having done horrible things while you were controlled (the one the MCU refuses to write about). Also the angst of using it to make things better even if it's clearly unethical.

* Plot-wise, I love the plot twists it allows, the betrayal-except-not, the characters choosing to let themselves be brainwashed into reacting to stimuli as part of a plan, the characters still being under mind control and managing to rule lawyer the compulsions or geases they're under.

* Character study-wise, I love, for mind control that can be resisted with great pain, to see what will make the character snap back to themselves. I also love low-level mind control that can only intensify some feelings but not fully control, and see, in this direction, what makes the character crack.

* And yeah, I also love mind control porn. I love super-powers in sex and I love D/s so I guess it isn't very surprising, but well, because of the nature of the kink, it can be hard to find good stories where the characters have a personality that play a role in the story. Sometimes the kink is that the initial personality and emotions don't matter, and not for me? It's a hard balance :D





Or even trying. You know, Orpheus and Eurydice? Very romantic. Though I love even better the Japanese version. In it, Izanagi turns back to see Izanami, but it doesn't magically separate them. He just realizes she's not the same, and runs away from her, and she's angry about it.
Because it's a trope I love, and it goes very well with the "Come back wrong" type, even if it's optional.

Early this month I have seen two shows that used this trope, and it made me examine my feelings about it.

So yeah! Epic quests in the land of the dead are my thing!

You know what else is my thing? People exploring the secrets of resurrection and life after death using magic or science or a mix of both. Probably laughing maniacly while doing it? Let's say it's an option. I love necromancy.

People not knowing the more complicated ways and just begging to be haunted.

Narratively, death having a clear impact, because the character isn't the same, but not having less of the character for this, in the reverse, having other facets of him.

People who aren't whole, who get dependent on who brought them back to life, who can get bitter about it.



Damn also they go well together...

Comments

[cornerofmadness]

You have some fascinating tropes here (trust me, no one picked just one!) I do like the idea of the come back wrong trope myself.

[shipperslist]

*nod nod*

See, this is why I like Clint/Coulson. And other ships as well, but mostly Clint/Coulson.

[flo_nelja]

Yesss do you have some fandoms where you liked how it was done? (I don't mind spoilers)

[flo_nelja]

which part? The mind-control-not-aknowledged-by-canon or the came back wrong part? :D

[shipperslist]

Yes.

[cornerofmadness]

You know what...no I'm not sure I DO! Huh. Okay in the 2003 version of Fullmetal Alchemist that was the source of the villains of the story, the homunculus (they have a different source in the parent manga) but I wouldn't say they were particularly well done.

I'm thinking about all the characters brought back from the dead on Buffy none of them came back that wrong. I guess the closest would have been Buffy herself. Sorry, that's not much help

[flo_nelja]

MCU really are serial offenders about the first part, this was a problem for Hawkeye, Bucky and Carol, and I haven't watched Marvel movies for years.

[flamingsword]

Yup, nice and spooky! I admit that some dub-con power swaps are very sexy and others border on squicking me, and I don’t know what the criteria for that are.

[flo_nelja]

You know I loved the Homunculi in TMA 2003, so I'd say it works for me!

[flo_nelja]

Exactly! It's so hard to define it!
Some recs for the sexy ones?

[cornerofmadness]

There you go then! Actually it would have been very interesting if the brothers had succeeded in the 2003 FMA or if Maes hadn't stopped Roy.

[profiterole_reads]

Je suis en train de lire The God Key de Simone King (manipulation télépathique) et pour l'instant c'est très bien fait.

[flo_nelja]

Merci ! Ca parle de quoi sinon ?

[snowynight]

I love mind control when the narrative/characters acknowledge the implied creepiness, where it isn't an easy choice even if the character volunteers to be taken over. Mind control for humour doesn't work for me.

Necromancy and coming back wrong are great tropes. I love when the resurrected person is dumbfounded by the change and has to deal with their new identity.

[flo_nelja]

Same for humor! Big, big squick! This is a serious matter!
Do you have recs for good coming back wrong stories?

[snowynight]

Severed is a Warhammer 40k novella starring two necron characters Zahndrekh and Obyronas. (Necron is a species that achieves immortality at the cost of stuck in a robot body. When they revive, most of them end up mindless and the lucky few often have damage in their mind). There are discussion of loss of identity, memory and physical sensation

I wrote a book review here: https://snowynight.dreamwidth.org/200934.html

[flo_nelja]

Thank you! Oooh I need to ask my sister who plays Warhammer, I think she has characters like this. The ones she makes Evangelion jokes about.

[snowynight]

You're welcome! I saw a post about necrons painted with EVA 01 colour scheme: https://www.reddit.com/r/Necrontyr/comments/mwrrvj/my_first_necron_units_painted_starting_with/

[profiterole_reads]

Gabriel est télépathe, Isaac augmente les pouvoirs des autres, et ils sont en couple. Gabriel veut faire le bien, mais comme il manipule les gens pour ça, c'est suspect. M, qui voit dans les rêves/cauchemars, vient prévenir Isaac que ça va mal tourner et ils font croire à Gabriel qu'Isaac est mort. Ca, c'était il y a 5 ans, et l'histoire commence quand Gabriel découvre qu'Isaac est vivant.

[silveradept]

Control tropes can be a mixed bag in execution. When you find someone who does it well, it's great, but if the writer is aiming for different enjoyment than mine, there can be a quick use of the back button.

Came Back Different or someone trying to resurrect another gives powerful motivation to the characters affected and attempting. It's often a great way to display raw emotion.

[flo_nelja]

Yeah, I agree!
(For example, I had so many uncomfortable moments in different canons with love spells used as humor)

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I'm often joking mind control is a classic for cheap sci-fi or fantasy tv shows, because 1) it's very scary with high stakes but fully reversible, <<

It's not always fully reversible. Minds are sticky things. Over in Love Is For Children, I've touched on Loki and Clint. There's a discussion of the causes, effects, and implications in comments under "And You Became Like Coffee."

>>the characters still being under mind control and managing to rule lawyer the compulsions or geases they're under.<<

Always remember that a connection goes between people. Even using a device can only buffer it so much, if the controller is also connected to that device rather than a self-working artifact. A domineering character may have more control but there's still a link that creates a chink in their armor. If you know these things, you can do one hell of a lot of damage to a mental assailant -- especially to someone's reality tunnel -- while they are trying to 'control' you. If you're good enough, you can actually make it backflash, like fire running up a stream of fuel to explode the bottle.

I greatly enjoy stories where attempted mind control blows up in the assailant's face. :D

>> And yeah, I also love mind control porn. <<

It's just a stronger version of gloving where the top controls everything the bottom does, verbally. Cecilia Tan did an anthology of "Telepaths Don't Need Safewords."

>>You know what else is my thing? People exploring the secrets of resurrection and life after death using magic or science or a mix of both. Probably laughing maniacly while doing it? Let's say it's an option. I love necromancy.<<

And 99% of those stories are selfish, with zero regard for what the deceased person may want or need. One of my favorite examples is in Buffy the Vampire Slayer: "I think I was in Heaven." Way to go, assholes, ruin someone's eternal reward because you can't get by without them. But that's a very well-known failure mode of such efforts.

Re: Thoughts

[flo_nelja]

It's not always fully reversible.
Remember the context: I'm specifically talking about cheap shows!

Thanks for the recs!

Way to go, assholes, ruin someone's eternal reward because you can't get by without them.
I must confess this one have too much subtext of "these characters are assholes for... not believing in Christian paradigm" for me to take the aesop seriously.