CV Free Talk Parts 1-3

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Murasakisuishou's Free Talk #1


Shi-Ne!  Or...How I ended up a fan of Weiss Kreuz.  

I love to read other writers' anime fanfics, and it is my occasional 
habit to  do random searches for fics on Yahoo, Google, whatever.  One 
day, engaged at my computer in such a search, I came across a group of 
writers who called themselves Team Bonet.  Intrigued, I decided to 
check them out.    

Ah, such fics!  They were enough to make a discouraged writer weep with 
the sheer wondrousness of them.  I was hooked straight away.    

Anyway, on their site I noticed there were several fics based on a 
series called Weiss Kreuz, and I gravitated to them straight off, as 
any series that could spawn so many stories must be something to see.  
I was captivated by the characters in their tales, by the premise, and 
I promptly dispatched myself to the Anipike to learn more.  

And then, I saw Aya for the first time, and I was lost.  A little over 
three years later, and I'm still hopelessly obsessed with him.  He's 
just so beautiful.  If I could get away with wearing short hair, I'd 
even cut mine to look like his.

:coughs sheepishly:  

Then I bought the fansubs from Sachi's, and my love for WK was sealed.  
No, the animation isn't always good, and the story lags until Schwartz 
comes onto the scene--but the characters!  There lies the appeal of 
that anime, and they had wonderful seiyuu to play them as well.  



What this is and how it all got started...

I had longed to find people to rp Weiss Kreuz with, but I never had any 
luck. Every game I joined (and there were quite a few), either didn't 
have very good players, or the storyline would suck.  Well, out of the 
blue one day, a stranger sent me an IM, wanting to rp.  I accepted out 
of boredom, and found myself with someone who wasn't too bad of a 
player.  So when she invited me to join her group, I agreed.  

And, to make a long story short, it was a total flop.  Eventually I got 
bored and fed up and I left amidst a huge row (which I had 
unintentionally fueled by trying to leave a thread my character had 
been abandoned in for over a week).   

But then, I've always known how to make an exit.  :P

Anyway...it was because of my horrible experiences in that rpg that I 
decided to form my own.  I would call it Crushed Violets (after the 
name of a rock band in an original story I once attempted to write) and 
I would play Aya, as he is the character I most love and relate to.  
The only requirements to join was to send a sample of writing, be of or 
over a certain age, and not be offended by extreme violence, yaoi, or 
yuri.  

I got three bites, and only one sent me a writing sample--which was 
horrid (I am very picky about things like that, even with my own work).  

So, armed with a perfectly functioning, snazzily named (if I do say so 
myself) group, I turned to one of my dearest OL friends and favorite 
writers, Aoi-chan.  The poor girl wasn't familiar with WK at that time, 
but I pestered and pestered her with invitations until she broke down.  
We started with Ken and Aya first, as that is my favorite pairing, and 
from there it grew.  The decisions over who played who were really of 
the "flip a coin" sort, as I recall.  I had the character I loved, and 
I wouldn't have to play Omi because Aoi-chan wanted him, so I was 
happy.  

And I still am.  :)


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The Queen of Blueberry Toast, Free Talk #1

i.  Bishonen

I got my first taste of Weiss Kreuz a weeks months after it came out in 
Japan.  My brother sent me a fansubbed sixth generation tape along with 
copies Kodomo no Omocha and all but one episode of Serial Experiments 
Lain.  He's one of those "Mr. Suitcase" otaku who always have *every* 
series *ever* made the moment tapes pop out of anyone's double VCRs, 
and at the time it was very fashionable to say one owned any episodes 
of WK.  When I talked to him on the phone to thank him, he laughed and 
told me "that one" was a bishonen flick he hoped I'd get a kick out of 
because the guys were really cute.   

I alternately watched Lain with episodes of Kodomo no Omocha which gave 
me a curious juxtaposition of the very dark and the very whimsical I 
would try to re-create in stories for years to come (and still am 
working at, actually).  As for WK, it got to spend time on the shelf 
until I was done with both.  I popped it in one afternoon when I was 
bored out of my mind, and to tell you the truth, I didn't like it one 
bit.  Aside from the fact the bad fansubbing made it hard to follow, it 
struck me as hokey, not to mention the fact I was initially annoyed by 
the gratuitous shots of the boys.  

WK went back on my shelf and stayed there, where it became a discussion 
piece for the next three years ("Have you seen White Cross?", "Yeah, my 
brother sent me a copy.", "WHAT!?").

The next time my brother way over though, I took him aside and amid 
many a choke and stammer, explained to him I was actually a lesbian.

Now he sends me copies of Cool Devices and F3.


ii.  Purple

The summer of 2001, my faithful computer, nicknamed Spot, bit the dust 
in a big way and cooked all of my data.  Actually, more of scraped my 
data off the spindle so it was declared irretrievable, but that's 
another story.  In the wake of this catastrophe, writing lost all 
enjoyment for me.  I still kept at it of course, and maintained a 
script of steady whining in my Livejournal, which my dear friend 
Murasaki was good enough to read and comment on.  I ran into her on my 
IM one evening, and while we were chatting about bishonen and the 
harrowing nature of their fandoms (because in the years since I'd 
learned to appreciate their aesthetic ^_^) Murasaki mentioned she 
wanted to start a prose RP group on Yahoo for WK.  I wished her luck.

About a month later, while once again having run into each other via IM 
and talking there about Carol Berg, the subject invariably turned to 
fanfic-related pet-peeves (Carol berg is a fanfic-ish kinda writer).  
This time it ended with the remark Murasaki still had no one to RP 
with.  This time, I put my hand up and volunteered to fake it, since it 
was no secret I had only seen four episodes and that being years ago.  
She gave me a plot summary which cleared up the lingering 
misunderstandings (after literal years) and I asked who she wanted me 
to play.  Ken.  Alright.  For reference, I downloaded  a list of all 
the Weiss chaps' stats, and proper name spellings.

Now, at first I thought this was destined for disaster.  I didn't LIKE 
Ken because Ken likes everything I hate.  I had read a few really great 
Aya and ken fics courtesy of, yes, Murasaki! Who was always good enough 
to send me such things (my fave of her recommendations is "Walking Unto 
Lanterns Bright".) Anyway, after awhile, I thought to myself it'd be 
good experience since I had never written for anyone like Ken before, 
besides, I had one of his image episodes.

The next morning, while in the middle of laundry duty, I blew the dust 
off my WK tape and threw it in the VCR.  It no longer bothered me that 
the camera lingered, or that there didn't seem to be any reason for the 
guy with the glasses being able to drop Aya in EP 2, they had "why"s 
now! But what on earth was I going to do with Ken?

Ken who fights with the most illogical weapon of ALL TIME.  Now, in 
what time had passed between the first time I saw WK, and the second, 
I'd also become the world's only dilettante in semiotics.   Which, like 
semiotics is wont to do, brought up the question of why anyone would 
ever in a million years fight with tiger claws.  Not to mention Kaze 
seems awfully cuddly towards him...

The day after that, , I sat down at one of the college library 
computers and banged out the opening scene with Ken in the flower shop.  

Checking my email that evening, I found a reply to it, which was sort 
of a novel thing for me.  I write, someone else writes back.  It kinda 
made me smile. After all, I couldn't remember the last time I'd smiled 
over a piece of writing I was involved in.

So I downloaded them both and put them in the file with everyone's 
names so I could finally have something to look back on.  So it didn't 
look anymore like I had nothing to show for all that time spend typing 
away.  Then, almost over night, I had many somethings.   And I was 
sooooo happy.  


iii.  Schwartz

So I love Ken now.  I think it's a shame he's considered the least 
favorite Weiss boy.  Maybe you kinda have to think about it, and that 
puts some people off (editorial cough) but there's a lot to play with 
when it comes to Ken, lots of deep, scary, tender places to go, issues, 
reasons missing... the good stuff you only see with Aya and Omi these 
days.  And it wasn't long before I ended up as Omi too! Which was fine 
with me.  The Omi rant will come later of course though...

So, the time came to divide up Schwartz! And if I knew nothing about 
Weiss, I guess I was a vacuum destroying knowledge about Schwartz- 
there were only vague recollections from fansites.  Very vague...  In 
lieu of this, I asked Murasaki which ones she fancied, since it was her 
game and she should get first pick, especially after I usurped Omi... 
anyway, she said to me, Nagi, Brad and Schu.  And that made me quite 
happy, because I really wanted to play Farf as odd as it sounds.  I 
hadn't written for anyone completely off it in ever so long and I kinda 
missed it.  Madmen are just fun!

But left me to choose one of the remaining three... it was like a beauty 
contest in my mind, or maybe one of those dating shows on MTV.  

Behind door #1 is Bradley Crawford (who for some reason I thought was 
named Brian for the longest time).  He can see the future and throw Aya 
around; is cool and suave, not to mention on my WK DVD right now as I 
am typing this, and "in charge" of Schwartz.  Past not included.

Door #2- Naoe Nagi who looks like a baby-doll and can blow things up 
with his mind.  Likes... nothing at all.  Past included.  

And finally door #3! The red-headed telepath no one can quite make up 
their minds on the sanity off.  I couldn't spell his name for beans... 
Shc... Sch... Scher... ?  

You can see where I was having trouble making up my mind... Finally 
though, after many moments of pondering, there was one image I couldn't 
seem to shake, and that was of the Tokyo Sling screenshots team Bonet 
used to have on their Schuldich page- the one where his hair is down 
and he looks all contemplative.  So that's why I chose Schuldich, my 
whim, my weakness for redheads.

I spent the next two hours barraging Murasaki with questions regarding 
him (averting typing his name as much as I could) during which I was 
able to, through her good graces, ascertain that I had a piece of Swiss 
cheese to work with, which I suppose is what every fanficcer really 
wants if they ask themselves.  He didn't even have a name.  She said 
the magic words to me then... “It's just us two...play Schuldig as you 
like, play farf as insane as you like.”

And that kinda got me thinking... about a lot of things.  Namely this: if 
Schuldich can't seem to block out other people's thoughts, then why the 
hell is he still sane...? I mean, if someone wants to go mad, that's 
about the fastest way, and there's probably a lot of mud involved.  Or 
irony.


iv.  Saffie (And Irony)

I love irony.  In chatrooms and on IM's, I often hold up signs that say 
"will work for irony".  I blame my seventh grade english teacher, who 
also loved irony and provided a lot of it by preaching tolerance to all 
people down to the day one of the kids caught him with a copy of "How 
to Hide Your Homosexuality".  

Outside of the story, Saffie takes two forms, rather like she does 
within the framework of the plot... sorta... anyway, Savil the Herald 
existed long before I even decided to play Schuldich, and only because 
I love the notion of crafty underage girls interacting with older men 
(blame Nabocov for that one...).   She had blond hair and blue eyes only 
because most of my other Evil Little Girls deliberately veered from 
these traits.  She was a bit part there to do the leading if leading 
was needed- after all, Savil is Vanyel's wise and cantankerous aunt in 
the Last Herald Mage books.

The other form alone had no name, it was merely a sneaky idea conceived 
with the soundtrack to Key the Metal Idol blaring in the background.  
The train of thought went pretty much like this... why is Schuldich still 
sane? He's sane because he has something.  That something isn't Brad 
[angst here].  That something is dark and will make things darker than 
they already are.  That something is him.  That something is a sister 
because it is ironic the man who kidnapped Aya's sister would have one 
of his own that he adores.  She must be little- that would explain why 
Weiss has never seen her.  I bet she doesn't look like him.  

And gee, wouldn't it just suck-diddly-uck if she and Savil were the 
same person! 

The scene where Aya "finds out" is one of my favorites.

So, she wasn't added with any thought to annoying the audience or 
taking up anyone's time.  She was a plot device and nothing more, but 
I'm kinda fond of her, and Brad is kinda fond of her (one of the most 
pleasant surprises for me in the story), and I honestly hope you're all 
fond of her too! ^_^V