Coalclaw Adventures

[heavensqueen]

Keep the yulewank spirit alive

Comments

Re: 3 lies and a truth - old TV shows

[(Anonymous)]

I don't really know anything about Forever Knight, and so this is definitely not a fic for me. I didn't realise it was a fix-it until I read the comments. I did, however, feel like it was a whole lot of nothing happening. Like, there was a car accident, that resulted in no case (when she hurried to give them the news about the results, I thought they would be interesting. But nope) And then there was some random guys at the end? No idea if he was the driver in the car accident? Or someone completely new and unrelated? And then there was all those scenes of her personal life which seemed to have no connection to anything else...Idk, I guess I'd have to see the episode it was based on for it to make sense?

Seeing the episode would help in that you'd know which events veered from the canon. But the story is just a list of events--this happened and then this--without any kind of real reactions or emotions from the characters. Given the actual last episode and all that takes place in it, all the drama and emotion, it's surprising.

SPOILERS

In Last Knight, the episode that was to be undone, Natalie's friend commits suicide, which has her reexamining her life and her not-quite-there romance with Nick, a vampire since 1228 (enthusiastic right after, but reluctant and trying to regain his humanity soon after). Tracy, his partner in the final season, dies as a result of something Nick does at the station (she gets shot, and he blames himself, probably rightly so), which has him more guilt-ridden and angsty than usual. In the end, reeling from two deaths, Natalie is tired of her not-affair with Nick going nowhere, and convinces Nick to bite her and drink just a little--a method that worked for Janette, one of the main vampire characters who had a human lover she drank from "just a little at a time," and who was made mortal eventually doing that. Her thing is this--try it, and maybe you can become human and be with me, and if you fuck up and take to much, you can bring me across and I can be a vampire and be with you. She stressed how much she trusted him. But Nick fucks up and nearly drains her, first try.

She lay dying with him freaking out, and LaCroix, Nick's vampire master and nemesis/brother-in-arms (they have an incredibly fucked-up relationship that borders on sexual, so they're a big pairing in the fandom) shows up and tells him it's time to move on, again. Nick won't bring Natalie over to become a vampire because he doesn't want to condemn her to a life he's been trying to escape for hundreds of years, so he's just going to let her die, but he's also ready to die, too. Instead of going with LaCroix, he asks Lacroix to kill him instead.

And Nick is LaCroix's favorite creation, the one he's always fought to keep on his side and to make embrace his vampire nature. So he's pissed and hurt, but the very ending of the shows him raising a stake (a shillelagh, technically) to drive into Nick's back as Nick kneels next to Natalie, holding her hand, ready to die with her.

Which was really a fucking betrayal, since she was ready to live forever with him and had ZERO intention or desire to die right then, but he's all 'maybe we'll be together in the afterlife.' And LaCroix has fought Nick's whole undead life to make him appreciate the gift he was given, so having him be the one to end it (when he's not at all convinced Nick won't burn for eternity) was fucked up in the extreme.

It was a wholly upsetting ending for many of us hardcore fans (I understand the creators were tired of being yanked around after three years, not consecutive, and decided there would be no bringing it back later this way), and much fix-it has been written.

This fix-it story lacks drama, depth and LaCroix, who is massively important in the last episode (and most of the show, period). His needling Nick the entire episode is gone--earlier he's ready to move on and trying to get Nick to come with him, long before Nick screws everything up. It's just Nat's friend doesn't kill herself, Tracy doesn't die, and things just sort of end without any real resolutions. Meh. There's not even any real drama or build-up to the changes, none of the things that typically make a fix-it story exciting and satisfying.

The writer stayed completely at arm's length from everything. No deep Natalie POV, no deep Nick POV, no emotion. All very birds-eye. A strange choice for undoing such an emotional episode. The lack of resolution of any kind is also an odd choice.

Re: 3 lies and a truth - old TV shows

[(Anonymous)]

AYRT

Glad it wasn't just me! As painful as that episode sounds it still seems like it would be more dramatic and interesting than the fic.