affably

Jason Todd... Jason Teague...

Obviously, Jason Blood is next up. Jared can be Etrigan. You know, if Marvel doesn't snatch him up.

So I was watching Aladdin and since I now queerify every story I enjoy as recast with CW actors, I caught myself thinking that this would be easy to write as a J2. Jared could be Aladdin, poor but good-hearted and running around being a riff-raff, and Chad Michael Murray could be his-only-friend Abu (what!), Jensen could be Jas- no, Sandy could be Jasmine, and Jensen could be a ridiculously pretty Genie (bonus points for begrudging shirtlessness) trying to get them together, and —

And then I stopped. Because wait, has someone written this story? Have I read it? Is Tyler my bad dream or am I Tyler's?

I feel like this has to exist. Somehow.

RPF AUs basically do what Hollywood does when it pairs up famous people in movies to attract audiences: cast familiar famous faces and personalities into new roles and see what entertaining combinations come out.

What is Mr. and Mrs. Smith but an RPF story on the screen? Who wants to see Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have sexual chemistry while being secret agents that are trying to kill each other but are actually married? A lot of people, actually. The big draw of the film is not, in fact, that they are secret agents but that it's Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie being secret agents. Their star image submerges the characters, and that's why they are using the stars.

That's what RPS AUs are all about. Because whether we admit it to ourselves or not, celebrities in our culture are characters, and characters that we want to see in different situations but still essentially be themselves. That's why we have actors that are just playing a certain character which we call "themselves" — like Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson — that completely overwhelm our image of them as less than larger-than-life people.

At least in RPS stories the writers are not confusing the actors with their on-screen characters. I have yet to see "Dean" confused as "Jensen", or vice versa beyond maybe some minor acknowledged character bleed characteristics. And while some of the stories that happen are kind of horrifying that they exist that I would like to bleach from my brain or smite from the interwebs, the fact of the matter is celebrities are a constructed fiction. Sorry guys. I know you just wanted to act and maybe do something more fun than just being a pretty teen heartthrob.

Celebrities are almost always trying to either reshape or maintain their star image, but their star image is always a performance as much as "we" try to penetrate their inner lives. That's why reality shows about Paris Hilton's life exists, why there are gossip columns, why the news reports stories of them having children. In any case, RPS is well aware that it is fiction, and is not trying attempting to malign or damage anyone in the process except maybe Chad Michael Murray. Okay, I kid. But even beyond the "lol porn" aspect it is a fascinating phenomenon and evolution of the image of celebrity: if you have any doubt, look at Misha Collins' Twitter, where he LARPs as himself.

In pandarus's RPS AU story Starstruck, she writes in the author's note:

I'm pretty sure that I'm not really doing RPS 'properly', but I don't care. Notwithstanding the fact that I'm appropriating the names and physiognomies of the people in question, this is very much NOT about actual Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Katie Cassidy or anyone else. This is me playing at writing a big gay version of 'Notting Hill', and casting various actors in various roles in my movie. But they're clearly not playing themselves.

Oddly enough, this is exactly what it's all about.

On the whole though, I wish it were a more private enterprise, because these people fandom writes about are adored (well, as characters of their own lives), but I wish that they weren't made uncomfortable so often by their fans, especially in public. I have my doubts that I could enjoy a convention. Fandom is scary.

In conclusion,

Snagged from wanttobeatree. The awkward smile is exactly the same.

I watched Some Kind of Wonderful yesterday, and, as expected, it killed my fucking brain. AU served on a silver platter, freaking a.

Barely avoided falling down and killing myself in the shower this morning when I realized that on the show RPF incest is canon. Emphasis on the "F" for fic in RPF because people aren't aware that it's RPF in the series, but still. WTF Kripke that is so meta of you.

I've also been reading tons and tons of gen pre-series wee!chester stories, and even though the more I read the more pissed at Johnjohn I get, the more I love Dean.* And I love these little gen stories because the love and the angst about simple things, because it's utterly believable that Dean would teach himself to cook because Sammy wanted red beans and rice for dinner instead of take-out. That he might make Sam's lunch every day, even if he'd gotten thrown into a wall the night before. That he'd stop talking after Sam left for Stanford. That John would've made him an emancipated minor so that Dean could be Sam's legal guardian. Basically 600% canon backstory right there.

Delicious delicious angst cake. Show, you never fail to deliver. I hate you, marry me. ♥

* Pretty redundant, actually.