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why are we together, again?
So, back to shipping…
I have three basic things which turn me shippy:
1) the two of them are enemies
2) one of them can’t say “I love you”
and
3) one person is more invested in the relationship than the other one
Let’s talk about the third one.
Suppose you have two people, who don’t care about each other. At all.*
…it’s kinda boring.
Suppose you have two people, and one of them is madly in love with the other one, while the other one hates them.**
Not so boring. Kind of interesting, in fact, because you’ve immediately got a situation where A keeps pushing B away, while B keeps trying to get closer to A. There’s going to be tension. And if the writers are worth their salt, this can stay fascinating for quite a while.
Suppose one of the people is caught between hating someone and being in love with them.***
Fairly similar to the previous option – only now, most of the tension is happening inside the mind of the person with conflicting opinions. Plus, there’s the potential for lots of interesting mind-changing.
Suppose there are two people who are in love. With each other. ****
…kinda boring again.
You either end up with them gazing into each other’s eyes and whispering passionate nothings for hours on end (which is quite dull to watch), or some kind of external conflict gets introduced to pull the two of them apart. It has to be external conflict, because the relationship itself – not all that interesting.
* like, for instance, Illyria and Oz
** like Buffy and Spike in season 5
*** like Buffy and Spike in season 6
**** like Buffy and Angel
In fact, once two people are actually together in a settled relationship, there’s only so many ways you can keep them interesting.
Like… having one of them more invested in the relationship than the other one is. :)
What relationships am I talking about?
Well, there’s Willow and Kennedy. Willow is, and always will be, much more invested in Tara than she is in Kennedy. And Kennedy knows it.
There’s River Song and the Doctor. She’s way more invested in their relationship – because she remembers them having one.
There’s Amy and Rory – at least at first.
There’s Buffy and Riley (although I take major points off because I find them boring anyway).
And there’s Wesley and Lilah. Wes is more in love with Fred, Lilah knows it – and actually calls him on it - and yet they’re still definitely together.
(The Wes/Lilah relationship actually seems to be my most epically shippy relationship of all time – because it hits all three of my criteria for shippiness. *points up*)
It’s not something that comes up a lot in fiction, but I love it when it does. And I love it when a relationship is that unbalanced and yet they’re still together.
It’s why I never ever write Willow and Kennedy breaking up. Because they’re so fascinating together.
Questions? Comments?
I have three basic things which turn me shippy:
1) the two of them are enemies
2) one of them can’t say “I love you”
and
3) one person is more invested in the relationship than the other one
Let’s talk about the third one.
Suppose you have two people, who don’t care about each other. At all.*
…it’s kinda boring.
Suppose you have two people, and one of them is madly in love with the other one, while the other one hates them.**
Not so boring. Kind of interesting, in fact, because you’ve immediately got a situation where A keeps pushing B away, while B keeps trying to get closer to A. There’s going to be tension. And if the writers are worth their salt, this can stay fascinating for quite a while.
Suppose one of the people is caught between hating someone and being in love with them.***
Fairly similar to the previous option – only now, most of the tension is happening inside the mind of the person with conflicting opinions. Plus, there’s the potential for lots of interesting mind-changing.
Suppose there are two people who are in love. With each other. ****
…kinda boring again.
You either end up with them gazing into each other’s eyes and whispering passionate nothings for hours on end (which is quite dull to watch), or some kind of external conflict gets introduced to pull the two of them apart. It has to be external conflict, because the relationship itself – not all that interesting.
* like, for instance, Illyria and Oz
** like Buffy and Spike in season 5
*** like Buffy and Spike in season 6
**** like Buffy and Angel
In fact, once two people are actually together in a settled relationship, there’s only so many ways you can keep them interesting.
Like… having one of them more invested in the relationship than the other one is. :)
What relationships am I talking about?
Well, there’s Willow and Kennedy. Willow is, and always will be, much more invested in Tara than she is in Kennedy. And Kennedy knows it.
There’s River Song and the Doctor. She’s way more invested in their relationship – because she remembers them having one.
There’s Amy and Rory – at least at first.
There’s Buffy and Riley (although I take major points off because I find them boring anyway).
And there’s Wesley and Lilah. Wes is more in love with Fred, Lilah knows it – and actually calls him on it - and yet they’re still definitely together.
(The Wes/Lilah relationship actually seems to be my most epically shippy relationship of all time – because it hits all three of my criteria for shippiness. *points up*)
It’s not something that comes up a lot in fiction, but I love it when it does. And I love it when a relationship is that unbalanced and yet they’re still together.
It’s why I never ever write Willow and Kennedy breaking up. Because they’re so fascinating together.
Questions? Comments?
no subject
First of all, I find couples who are not in love very intriguing. One of my favorite literary pairs are Henry and Margot from Dumas' La reine Margot. They are in a political marriage and end up being very good friends, covering for each others affairs even.
Of course if the couple is not in love you need other incentives to get them together but it can be highly interesting to me and I have a thing for man/woman friendships.
The other thing is about people being in love. I'm with rahirah here. That's boring if "and they loved each other for ever and ever" is the end, but really love doesn't make problems and tension go away. It can be incredibly hard and complex (=interesting for the reader) to stay together, even if you do love each other.
I think the main point for me is that I need two fully formed characters to fall in love. There can't be one created for the other, if they both have their own lives and motives, they have tension for a livetime.