non-existent Teyla and Ronon

[tielan]

I don't read very much in the broader fandom, but I'm coming across certain patterns in the fanfic in the sga_santa challenge, and I'm rather terrified by what they're implying about fic across fandom.

Is it common in the broader fandom for Teyla and Ronon to be completely left out of a story? To go unmentioned when there's a crisis in the city? To not even be used as hunters to track someone down when they're in the city trying to get hold of someone eluding capture?

I mean, I knew that 75% of fandom tended to view Teyla or Ronon solely in terms of "hotness factor" and not in terms of operational capability, and another 10% see them only as adjuncts to getting Sheppard and the Chosen Character Of Adoration together, but...is it always this bad? I mean, this is bad. As in, two major characters who have instincts beyond anything the Earth characters possess in canon (let's see you fight and beat someone blindfolded, eh), who are considered so completely useless within the city limits that they're not even worth a mention in genfic, let alone use?

*presses fingers against eyelids*

Comments

[ticklie.livejournal.com]

What I've observed is that they tend to be skipped over in favour of Zelenka and Lorne in most fics. I'm not even going to speculate what the reason for that is.

[ticklie.livejournal.com]

*In most fics I've read recently, I mean. I can't say what's going on in fandom at large.

[tielan]

Easy: they're Rodney!Lite and Sheppard!Lite.

[ryf.livejournal.com]

I think it really is that bad on average. That's because the fandom is strongly leaning towards Rodney and John and so the two other members of the team get left out. With SG1, three of the four team members were frequently used in fanfic and so it wasn't that obvious and Teal'c usually at least gets a couple of lines. I find it strange that SGA fandom is so much more fixated on a set of characters than SG1 fandom when it comes to gen fic.

[tielan]

I can understand the fixation - it's inherent in the show.

I'm not surprised that most of the stories are about John and Rodney - I'm surprised that a lot of times Teyla and Ronon aren't even considered as candidates for helping out in the action, and that their names are nowhere mentioned as being in the universe at all.

It's like there's this psychological black hole in the Stargate universe that's not only sucked them out of sight but has erased all memory of their existence at the same time.

[saeva.livejournal.com]

Personally, I don't think it's even that inherent in the show. John's obvious focus, yes, absolutely, and the show is definitely balanced towards exploring Rodney -- in context of other characters. But this season especially and the majority of the episodes over all seasons in my opinion is really balanced over things like John and Ronon's friendship, the connection between John and Teyla and their obvious concern for each other, John and Elizabeth's struggles at leadership (.... it really is the John show) and they've begun to highlight Lorne and Keller this season a lot too.

When you consider that the show still considers itself primarily an action-adventure show, with dramatic and comedic elements, this really makes sense and it's why I continue watching the show despite a disinterest in the heavy Sheppard&McKay elements from the third season. I was saying all last season that they just needed to hit their stride and I think that, in the fourth season, they really have. What people have chosen to ignore is exactly that: what they've chosen to ignore.

But now you know why I never talk to you about SGA fic because, god, even OT4 fic, which is supposedly inherently team-oriented, is like this. It's just like how people chose not to see Teal'c in SG-1 (and, hey, we all have characters we prefer, myself included, which is why you choose premises that highlight those characters) and I've decided not to dwell too heavily on the why. Mostly because I suspect it'll be a lot like the argument for ignoring female characters, i.e. 'Well, they're all so stereotypical and uninteresting!' *rolls eyes*

[tielan]

I was saying all last season that they just needed to hit their stride and I think that, in the fourth season, they really have. What people have chosen to ignore is exactly that: what they've chosen to ignore.

They're certainly doing better than they were in S3 in terms of using characters. Now if they switch the focus even further along to Teyla and Ronon and what they bring to the expedition in S5, then I think they can bring a whole new element to the show and grow out of the habit of infantilising the aliens.

[unanon.livejournal.com]

Heh. Yeah, I pretty much only dip my toe into SGA fandom via the few sources on my f-list (*clings*) and I've had the same impression.

But you know what your post made me think of? "Tabula Rasa."

So we have an episode in which Teyla and Ronon are the ONLY people immune to the effects of the disease/bacteria/whatever...and it still is a McKay episode! What's up with THAT?!

If SGA ficcers are guilty of neglecting Ronon & Teyla, SGA writers are too. *grumbles*

[tielan]

Rodney's a good comedic character that's useful in situations where a technical solution is required. Unfortunately, the technical solution is always required and Rodney's always the one who both makes the suggestion and carries it out.

I think it would be nice to see an episode where someone else suggests the solution and then Rodney has to come up with a way to implement it. For instance, in Echoes, when John brings Elizabeth into the infirmary then turns to look at Teyla and Ronon. Ronon could have asked where they were, and asked why they didn't take it to the source. Then Ronon's the solution, while John just carries it out.

A little more of that would have done wonders for Teyla and Ronon in S3.

To a large degree, the Stargate Universe has always infantilised the alien characters in order to make Earth (and Americans) look good. And the fandom continues that egotism - consciously or unconsciously - with depressing regularity.

[beanie-j.livejournal.com]

It's just this fandom all over. I love John Sheppard as a character, and I love Joe Flanigan as an actor, but seriously, I get fed up of the lack of service Teyla and Ronon get, both on screen and in fanfic. I'm actually bored with SGA as a fandom for fic - my tolerance for McShep has reached maximum entropy because there is nothing new being produced. It's just the same cake with different icing, so to speak.

The way the characters are treated on the show really bothers me. Everyone on the show, especially Teyla and Jason, but even John to an extent, are secondary to the Chosen Character of Adoration, who for the record I find extremely irritating. How they can take stories which should blatantly be about one character and 90% of the time manage to make them about McKay in the end amazes me. This is actually one of the biggest reasons that for me, CSI:NY and Eureka have pretty much overtaken SGA as my love in terms of story. Shows that manage to service all the main characters without diminishing others in the effort of doing so.

[tielan]

See, my attraction factor to SGA is primarily the characters. Because I do love the characters - all of them - but the ones that I think would have the most interesting stories are the ones that are the most ignored in plot. (And I think that by focusing on Teyla and Ronon, we're less likely to get stories that rehash an SG1 plot, which would be nice.)

even John to an extent, are secondary to the Chosen Character of Adoration,

Several years ago, I remember someone's comment declaring that John didn't really deserve Elizabeth, what with his kirking and disobeying her, but she was so kind and gracious to love him anyway that their love couldn't help but flourish!

I imagine the Rodney fans tend to treat Rodney the same way - with the Mary Sue kid gloves.

[beanie-j.livejournal.com]

First, nice faux pas in my comment...should have been Ronon, not Jason...I think I had some diatribe about lack of material for actors on my mind at the same time as I was writing that.

I would love to see more focus on Teyla and Ronon, because I think there are definitely some great lines of enquiry to be mined there. I love them both as characters but something that didn't infer 'second-class' would be nice. Every time you think there is going to be something good done with their characters, it's ruined by an underlying idea that because they aren't of Earth that they have nothing to offer. Very sad.

The whole John issue for me is just totally down to lack of character development. Even the few eps where they have made him the feature of the ep haven't really given much insight into what makes him tick, more just some fleeting ideas of his history. However, often totally without any reasoning.

[ladyjax.livejournal.com]

I was sitting watching "Childhood's End" and a few other season 1 eps yesterday on Sci-Fi and I was struck again how much things came down to "Whatever works for Atlantis is what's important. Never mind these other people who've lived under the Wraith for 10,000 years."

I want team fic, I want team eps. What I don't want is a repeat of "Miller's Crossing" where we don't mention a teammate *at all.* Not one word of where Teyla is, what she might be doing, why she didn't come along. That made no sense. And quite frankly, Rodney going on and on about how smart he is and then the panic when he makes a huge mistake (huge as in running his mouth about how to enrich Uranium in front of the Genii or changing the Replicator base code and not really considering that they might, *might* figure out how to fix it) - still huge love from the fandom.

Sam, on the other hand: tons of resentfulness about being SG-1's problem solver while everyone ignores each and every time she said, "I don't know" or "There might be some other consequences that come from this."

Oh, and team stories that just turn into an excuse for John and Rodney to get together...

Don't get me started.

[tielan]

I suspect that one of the core issues is overidentification with a character.

It tends to start with Mary Suing the character ("Oh, I know that I write her as a Mary Sue, but it's not harming anyone..."), and usually ends by ignoring all other characters but the Chosen Character Of Adoration and any characters who Are There To Adore The Chosen Character.

Don't get me started.

LOL. I suspect that you and I, if we got started, could make a bloody swathe through fandom over the rage. :)

Have you noticed the choc_fic prompts are up? There's a bunch of SGA ones that are missing, though - I don't know if it's because the prompts weren't subbed properly, though. Some of the people I tried to recruit apparently didn't read the instructions for subbing.

[therisingmoon.livejournal.com]

*sighs* i've pretty much given up on watching half the episodes now because they don't use teyla or ronon in the episodes and frankly, all the dependence on rodney just makes me not like him and i don't like him.

he's my lest favorite character and by all means, i try not to read a lot of rodney-centric fic but i admit that there are some stories about him that i like. it seems to me that rodney is essentially the most developed character in the whole series because we seem to know more about rodney than we know about john or elizabeth or teyla and ronon. i don't want to know more about rodney, i want to know more about the other people and i want to see teyla and ronon being put to more practical roles in the story.

maybe it's because of the same repeating patterns and fic cliches in the fandom that aside from reading several recced gen and het fics (yours especially) that i've pretty much stopped reading this fandom and moved on to a crazier fandom involving boys in eyeliner, tight pants and canon crackfic.

[tielan]

Giving up has become common among Teyla-fans. There's just not enough to interest them or focus them on the character - and everyone else is too busy loving John and Rodney or saying how the show would be wonderful with Elizabeth and how Sam just isn't interesting/important.

That's actually the reason I stay on. The thing that neither Teyla (nor John/Teyla) needs is one more fan walking away. And there's still so much to write, even if I'm being drowned out by the McShep and Shweir and LizzieLuv.

[renisanz.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm surprised at the lack of Ronon oriented fanfic, actually, more so than Teyla. I can understand it, though, because he seems like a difficult character to write. However, after watching Missing, I was dying to read some good tags to this episode. . . and there were none. So decided to write my own.

I must say, the essay you wrote about writing Teyla was very influential on my decision to finally throw my hat into the fanfic ring. So, thanks for that. I'd really like you to read the story when you get a chance (Save Room (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3935156/1/Save_Room)).

Also, I don't think it's so much that Teyla and Ronon are neglected on the show so much as in general fandom. For example, so far in Season 4 of Atlantis, there have been a lot of good moments involving Teyla and Ronon. Of course, I can never get enough of them, either way. ;)

*I actually had to undelete my livejournal account to post this, so strong was my urge to reply to this topic.*

[tielan]

*I actually had to undelete my livejournal account to post this, so strong was my urge to reply to this topic.*

Well, I'm glad you got up and threw your hat into the ring. I'm about to read your story, so thanks for the link, too!

Incidentally, if you like Ronon, there are quite a few prompts over at the choc_fic community for their February Love-A-Thon. You might like to look into that and join in! :)

[ticklie.livejournal.com]

What I've observed is that they tend to be skipped over in favour of Zelenka and Lorne in most fics. I'm not even going to speculate what the reason for that is.

[ticklie.livejournal.com]

*In most fics I've read recently, I mean. I can't say what's going on in fandom at large.

[tielan]

Easy: they're Rodney!Lite and Sheppard!Lite.

[ryf.livejournal.com]

I think it really is that bad on average. That's because the fandom is strongly leaning towards Rodney and John and so the two other members of the team get left out. With SG1, three of the four team members were frequently used in fanfic and so it wasn't that obvious and Teal'c usually at least gets a couple of lines. I find it strange that SGA fandom is so much more fixated on a set of characters than SG1 fandom when it comes to gen fic.

[tielan]

I can understand the fixation - it's inherent in the show.

I'm not surprised that most of the stories are about John and Rodney - I'm surprised that a lot of times Teyla and Ronon aren't even considered as candidates for helping out in the action, and that their names are nowhere mentioned as being in the universe at all.

It's like there's this psychological black hole in the Stargate universe that's not only sucked them out of sight but has erased all memory of their existence at the same time.

[saeva.livejournal.com]

Personally, I don't think it's even that inherent in the show. John's obvious focus, yes, absolutely, and the show is definitely balanced towards exploring Rodney -- in context of other characters. But this season especially and the majority of the episodes over all seasons in my opinion is really balanced over things like John and Ronon's friendship, the connection between John and Teyla and their obvious concern for each other, John and Elizabeth's struggles at leadership (.... it really is the John show) and they've begun to highlight Lorne and Keller this season a lot too.

When you consider that the show still considers itself primarily an action-adventure show, with dramatic and comedic elements, this really makes sense and it's why I continue watching the show despite a disinterest in the heavy Sheppard&McKay elements from the third season. I was saying all last season that they just needed to hit their stride and I think that, in the fourth season, they really have. What people have chosen to ignore is exactly that: what they've chosen to ignore.

But now you know why I never talk to you about SGA fic because, god, even OT4 fic, which is supposedly inherently team-oriented, is like this. It's just like how people chose not to see Teal'c in SG-1 (and, hey, we all have characters we prefer, myself included, which is why you choose premises that highlight those characters) and I've decided not to dwell too heavily on the why. Mostly because I suspect it'll be a lot like the argument for ignoring female characters, i.e. 'Well, they're all so stereotypical and uninteresting!' *rolls eyes*

[tielan]

I was saying all last season that they just needed to hit their stride and I think that, in the fourth season, they really have. What people have chosen to ignore is exactly that: what they've chosen to ignore.

They're certainly doing better than they were in S3 in terms of using characters. Now if they switch the focus even further along to Teyla and Ronon and what they bring to the expedition in S5, then I think they can bring a whole new element to the show and grow out of the habit of infantilising the aliens.

[unanon.livejournal.com]

Heh. Yeah, I pretty much only dip my toe into SGA fandom via the few sources on my f-list (*clings*) and I've had the same impression.

But you know what your post made me think of? "Tabula Rasa."

So we have an episode in which Teyla and Ronon are the ONLY people immune to the effects of the disease/bacteria/whatever...and it still is a McKay episode! What's up with THAT?!

If SGA ficcers are guilty of neglecting Ronon & Teyla, SGA writers are too. *grumbles*

[tielan]

Rodney's a good comedic character that's useful in situations where a technical solution is required. Unfortunately, the technical solution is always required and Rodney's always the one who both makes the suggestion and carries it out.

I think it would be nice to see an episode where someone else suggests the solution and then Rodney has to come up with a way to implement it. For instance, in Echoes, when John brings Elizabeth into the infirmary then turns to look at Teyla and Ronon. Ronon could have asked where they were, and asked why they didn't take it to the source. Then Ronon's the solution, while John just carries it out.

A little more of that would have done wonders for Teyla and Ronon in S3.

To a large degree, the Stargate Universe has always infantilised the alien characters in order to make Earth (and Americans) look good. And the fandom continues that egotism - consciously or unconsciously - with depressing regularity.

[beanie-j.livejournal.com]

It's just this fandom all over. I love John Sheppard as a character, and I love Joe Flanigan as an actor, but seriously, I get fed up of the lack of service Teyla and Ronon get, both on screen and in fanfic. I'm actually bored with SGA as a fandom for fic - my tolerance for McShep has reached maximum entropy because there is nothing new being produced. It's just the same cake with different icing, so to speak.

The way the characters are treated on the show really bothers me. Everyone on the show, especially Teyla and Jason, but even John to an extent, are secondary to the Chosen Character of Adoration, who for the record I find extremely irritating. How they can take stories which should blatantly be about one character and 90% of the time manage to make them about McKay in the end amazes me. This is actually one of the biggest reasons that for me, CSI:NY and Eureka have pretty much overtaken SGA as my love in terms of story. Shows that manage to service all the main characters without diminishing others in the effort of doing so.

[tielan]

See, my attraction factor to SGA is primarily the characters. Because I do love the characters - all of them - but the ones that I think would have the most interesting stories are the ones that are the most ignored in plot. (And I think that by focusing on Teyla and Ronon, we're less likely to get stories that rehash an SG1 plot, which would be nice.)

even John to an extent, are secondary to the Chosen Character of Adoration,

Several years ago, I remember someone's comment declaring that John didn't really deserve Elizabeth, what with his kirking and disobeying her, but she was so kind and gracious to love him anyway that their love couldn't help but flourish!

I imagine the Rodney fans tend to treat Rodney the same way - with the Mary Sue kid gloves.

[beanie-j.livejournal.com]

First, nice faux pas in my comment...should have been Ronon, not Jason...I think I had some diatribe about lack of material for actors on my mind at the same time as I was writing that.

I would love to see more focus on Teyla and Ronon, because I think there are definitely some great lines of enquiry to be mined there. I love them both as characters but something that didn't infer 'second-class' would be nice. Every time you think there is going to be something good done with their characters, it's ruined by an underlying idea that because they aren't of Earth that they have nothing to offer. Very sad.

The whole John issue for me is just totally down to lack of character development. Even the few eps where they have made him the feature of the ep haven't really given much insight into what makes him tick, more just some fleeting ideas of his history. However, often totally without any reasoning.

[ladyjax.livejournal.com]

I was sitting watching "Childhood's End" and a few other season 1 eps yesterday on Sci-Fi and I was struck again how much things came down to "Whatever works for Atlantis is what's important. Never mind these other people who've lived under the Wraith for 10,000 years."

I want team fic, I want team eps. What I don't want is a repeat of "Miller's Crossing" where we don't mention a teammate *at all.* Not one word of where Teyla is, what she might be doing, why she didn't come along. That made no sense. And quite frankly, Rodney going on and on about how smart he is and then the panic when he makes a huge mistake (huge as in running his mouth about how to enrich Uranium in front of the Genii or changing the Replicator base code and not really considering that they might, *might* figure out how to fix it) - still huge love from the fandom.

Sam, on the other hand: tons of resentfulness about being SG-1's problem solver while everyone ignores each and every time she said, "I don't know" or "There might be some other consequences that come from this."

Oh, and team stories that just turn into an excuse for John and Rodney to get together...

Don't get me started.

[tielan]

I suspect that one of the core issues is overidentification with a character.

It tends to start with Mary Suing the character ("Oh, I know that I write her as a Mary Sue, but it's not harming anyone..."), and usually ends by ignoring all other characters but the Chosen Character Of Adoration and any characters who Are There To Adore The Chosen Character.

Don't get me started.

LOL. I suspect that you and I, if we got started, could make a bloody swathe through fandom over the rage. :)

Have you noticed the choc_fic prompts are up? There's a bunch of SGA ones that are missing, though - I don't know if it's because the prompts weren't subbed properly, though. Some of the people I tried to recruit apparently didn't read the instructions for subbing.

[therisingmoon.livejournal.com]

*sighs* i've pretty much given up on watching half the episodes now because they don't use teyla or ronon in the episodes and frankly, all the dependence on rodney just makes me not like him and i don't like him.

he's my lest favorite character and by all means, i try not to read a lot of rodney-centric fic but i admit that there are some stories about him that i like. it seems to me that rodney is essentially the most developed character in the whole series because we seem to know more about rodney than we know about john or elizabeth or teyla and ronon. i don't want to know more about rodney, i want to know more about the other people and i want to see teyla and ronon being put to more practical roles in the story.

maybe it's because of the same repeating patterns and fic cliches in the fandom that aside from reading several recced gen and het fics (yours especially) that i've pretty much stopped reading this fandom and moved on to a crazier fandom involving boys in eyeliner, tight pants and canon crackfic.

[tielan]

Giving up has become common among Teyla-fans. There's just not enough to interest them or focus them on the character - and everyone else is too busy loving John and Rodney or saying how the show would be wonderful with Elizabeth and how Sam just isn't interesting/important.

That's actually the reason I stay on. The thing that neither Teyla (nor John/Teyla) needs is one more fan walking away. And there's still so much to write, even if I'm being drowned out by the McShep and Shweir and LizzieLuv.

[renisanz.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm surprised at the lack of Ronon oriented fanfic, actually, more so than Teyla. I can understand it, though, because he seems like a difficult character to write. However, after watching Missing, I was dying to read some good tags to this episode. . . and there were none. So decided to write my own.

I must say, the essay you wrote about writing Teyla was very influential on my decision to finally throw my hat into the fanfic ring. So, thanks for that. I'd really like you to read the story when you get a chance (Save Room (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3935156/1/Save_Room)).

Also, I don't think it's so much that Teyla and Ronon are neglected on the show so much as in general fandom. For example, so far in Season 4 of Atlantis, there have been a lot of good moments involving Teyla and Ronon. Of course, I can never get enough of them, either way. ;)

*I actually had to undelete my livejournal account to post this, so strong was my urge to reply to this topic.*

[tielan]

*I actually had to undelete my livejournal account to post this, so strong was my urge to reply to this topic.*

Well, I'm glad you got up and threw your hat into the ring. I'm about to read your story, so thanks for the link, too!

Incidentally, if you like Ronon, there are quite a few prompts over at the choc_fic community for their February Love-A-Thon. You might like to look into that and join in! :)