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Dec. 11th, 2013 05:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficAs you know, Bob, recently I've started taking commissions, and you may have noticed a few of my recent fics are outside my usual wheelhouse. Which is good for a writer, I think--as much as some people might like me to write nothing but Swan Queen all day, weird sex fanfics make the internet go round. It's sort of like if someone nuked a fic exchange and a kink meme in a microwave together, and I'm sure Warren Ellis is kicking himself for not coming up with it before it actually happened. Take that, futurism! But if you're like me, I have to think you'd be interested in the specifics: what exactly people would pay to have written for them, how I interpret their requests into something that's fun and interesting both to write and read, etc. So I asked one of my clients if I could give you some behind-the-scenes details on this stuff, so you can see how a commission goes from thirty dollars to AO3. I'd strongly urge you to just click the links and read the stories before you get into the director's commentary stuff.
The pitch: -(this next one is based on a scenario used in a defunct-but-occasionally-revived Superstories Addventure thread first authored by Fanfic Fetishist, and is somewhat in involved; if either of these are a problem, skip it)In tn this world, there are (almost) no male superheroes; they are instead replaced by female members of their supporting casts (e.g. Lois Lane is Superwoman, Karen Page is Daredevil, etc.). Many male supervillains have likewise been replaced, albeit not to the same extent; those that remain tend to be less obviously dangerous. For some reason, having superpowers causes women to have incredibly powerful libidoes and to lose their sexual inhibitions; some women who don't have powers also experience this. Society has chosen to accommodate these women by letting them work as prostitutes, a job they carry out with gusto; thus, Avengers Mansion, the Hall of Justice, and other superhero hangouts also function as brothels. The fun and profit of prostitution has caused the majority of villainesses to turn over a new leaf and reform, asides from a handful of female-supremacists, all of whom are currently incarcerated in escape-proof prisons where they sate their lusts on each other. Many of the super-whores give freebies to certain men (usually canonical love interests) and a small, elite group of men are on a "Global Freebie List", able to have any super-hooker they want, at any time (crises permitting) they want, in whatever way they want.
The brainstorming: The initial thought I had was to base this around the Marvel Cinematic Universe, currently the most popular incarnation of the characters, and for mainstream appeal, really press hard on the idea of a world where male and female superheroes have their ratios switched, as that's a pretty popular theme among fangirls. I also wanted to experiment with the subtext of sex workers; the idea that Peter subconsciously holds that it's shameful or wrong for women to get paid to have sex. So there's a long conversation between him and Jane Foster about why a woman would choose that kind of life outside of economic necessity.
I decided to do the common "bringing in the outsider" type story, with the always-fun Tony Stark introducing an "adorkable" unpowered Peter Parker to the world of prostitution. I conceived of an AU where Mary Jane had been bit by the radioactive spider on that fateful field trip, and decided to become Jackpot (the name borrowed from the BND Spider-Man comics). Gwen Stacy would be her girlfriend and Peter Parker would be the guy who developed her webbing. My first thought, porny as it sounds, was for Mary Jane and Gwen to note how emo Peter was getting, try to seduce him into a threesome, and when he was too neurotic even for that, to make him their "plus one" to the superheroine brothel (something usually reserved for the heroines' boyfriends). That thread ended up being very subtle, though I hope to pick it up in future installments. Likewise, the story was meant to end with an encounter between Peter and a similarly nervous Jane Foster, who blows him before an apologetic Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings FTW!) takes over and goes all the way with Peter. But the story ran so far over the limit setting up this very intriguing scenario that I ended up deciding a Darcy scene would be overkill, and ended it on a Peter/Darcy fade to black.
Going back and forth with a good friend of mine who's an old hand with weird comic book porn, he suggested that the brothel had come about because of an unsuccessful scheme of Purple Man's, a peace initiative by Professor X, or Emma Frost running her Hellions as a prostitution ring. I ended up going with a variation on the third, having Peggy Carter (here Captain Britain, a recipient of the Supersoldier Serum who doesn't age and might turn up later) and Rose Bryne's character from X-Men: First Class infiltrate Sebastian Shaw's operation as whores, discovering they liked high-class prostitution, and once Shaw had been defeated, adapting the brothel to the demands of female SHIELD agents and later superheroines. Probably bores the piss out of the people who just want to see Peter Parker fuck some superpowered whores, but I subscribe to the notion that even a pornographic fanfic should feel like a real comic book, even if it's one being published by perverts. And both my friend and I liked the notion of using a gender-flipped world for a bit of gender commentary--as he joked, in this world, Wonder Woman has six movies and Batman hasn't been in any.
2. Tits & Bast
The pitch: -Catwoman and the Black Cat try to steal the same feline-themed ancient artifact. It causes them to go into heat. Bonus points for introducing one or more other feline-themed characters from either DC or Marvel.
The brainstorming: This one I will always love simply for that title. Another case of ambition exceeding word count, it was originally going to be much more involved. Selina and Felicia would go after the same artifact, Selina would try to use sedative lipstick from Poison Ivy to knock Felicia out, but when it didn't work, Felicia would respond to Selina's "come-on" with gusto. However, her eating Selina out would simply dose Selina with her own medicine, and then Felicia would finally succumb to the KO make-up. Then they would have a dream of the Cat-totem represented by the artifact (a piss-take on the Spider-totem from JMS's run on Spider-Man), which would lead to Selina helping Felicia with her new mission: winning back Peter.
Here's where I ended up cutting off the story--Selina would kidnap Peter's current, awful girlfriend, Carlie Cooper, and detain her in bondage gear that Carlie would wind up enjoying very much. Meanwhile, Felicia could recruit Mary Jane and tell Peter they both want to be in a relationship with him, with all that implies. As it turned out the influence of the ancient artifact on Felicia and Selina going into heat wasn't necessary for fun sex scenes, here's where JR's suggestion would come into play. The statuette was a fake and Felicia's entire divine mission was all in their heads (somehow, Felicia and Selina would hear each other talking in their sleep, so that'd pass for them having the same dream. COMICS, EVERYBODY!)
I felt that the sudden introduction of Peter and Mary Jane into the story, and Selina pretty much disappearing except for a running gag of her punishing Carlie and Carlie enjoying it (which I had no idea how to write either), sunk the notion of the second half as a continuation, but it will be coming soon as an independent Peter/MJ/Felicia story called The Gwen Stacy Syndrome. Ask for it by name.
The pitch: -In this world, Polygamy became legal a few years ago, and the superheroes and heroines were bitten by the matrimony bug; marrying canonical love interests (especially if they have multiple ones) and others, especially reformed criminals (for example, Bruce Wayne is married, among others, to Harley and Ivy).
The brainstorming: I have a sort of love-hate relationship with these "in a world" commissions. On the one hand, they give you a lot of freedom to find facets of the pitch that interest you and use characters you like. On the other hand, it can be a bitch to make these scenarios halfway plausible and come up with a compelling story without much to go on. Compared to Do It For Charity, the worldbuilding here is pretty quick and dirty. I went with the idea that DC Comics has had one of their HUGE MEGA CROSSOVERS THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING FOREVER (involving a new supervillain named the Evilutionist, a name so on-the-nose I'm surprised Geoff Johns hasn't used it already), only here instead of killing off a C-list superhero and giving Batman a new costume, the endresult is polygamy being legalized and even encouraged for the survival of humanity (do not check the math or science on any of this; it is comic book logic at its finest). Although the opening press conference scene, which openly states to the reader what the new status quo is, did give me a chance to get in a Lois Lane cameo, everyone's favorite reporter now in a group marriage with Clark and Lana (possibly among others. It's early yet.)
Aside from that, I latched onto the idea of Bruce marrying villainesses to reform them. My client wants Bruce to end up with a sort of harem, but this first chapter is set in the early days of legalized polygamy, with just Harley and Ivy being taken under Bruce's wing. Selina is considered, but given her emphasis on independence, I don't see her settling down with Batman just yet. The rest is a take-off on a holiday episode of the Batman cartoons; Harley and Ivy are only marrying Bruce for his money and intend to kill him as soon as they can find a way that won't raise suspicions, but this time Bruce is ready for them, and as a lot of their killer schemes involve Bruce "going out with a bang," there are lots of opportunities for Bruce to show the ladies he might be more use to them alive than dead.
Not to spoil too much, as I'm still working on this one, but both my friend and I thought it'd be too Mary-Sueish for Bruce to "tame" the girls with just his incredible dick. There's a little self-parody of the idea of Batman as a memetic sex god; though obviously Harley and Ivy really will end up fond of the Dark Knight, it won't be exclusively because of hot dickings. To say more would ruin the surprise, but I did have some fun coming up with jokey hijinx for the ladies to get into with Bruce as their straight man (pun intended). Future chapters will bring more "sister-wives" into the fold; I'm already getting comments asking for Wonder Woman. We'll see if my friend's suggestion of Alfred getting some action comes into play--it's hard to resist a one-liner like "The butler did her."
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specifics
Date: 2013-12-12 02:38 am (UTC)Re: specifics
Date: 2013-12-12 02:42 am (UTC)Re: specifics
Date: 2013-12-15 04:47 am (UTC)Re: specifics
Date: 2013-12-18 06:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 01:30 pm (UTC)As for Marry the Knight, I'm really enjoying it so far, and can't wait for more, especially in regards to Ivy. Harley - well, we've seen how it went down with her. But Ivy will me much tougher. And since you write they'll end up fond of him, I can't wait to see how that happens. Also, could you bring in more of Barbara, Dick and the rest? I really liked their scene in the latest chapter, but I'm not very clear what's going on there - Obviously Dick is married to Barbara, but it seems not to Dinah, but Barbara tells Dick Kory and Dinah are his wives? Are they not her wives as well, or is it only Dick who married the three of them, and they aren't in one single marriage yet? In any case, man Dick lucked out. It must be in the name. And he must need it, with a wife like Kory... which I would love to see.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-13 07:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-12-14 04:13 pm (UTC)Anyway, sounds like an excellent client. I do hope so, though my ability to beta it will be sadly deficient while I am in Officer's Training.