On Fri, 26 Apr 1996, PhoneyNT wrote:

but speaking of lemon, i'm thinkin' about giving up The Attractiveness 
Factor. these last 2 fics i write something cool and then screwed up 
majorly. don't wanna do that for the third.

I don't think so...I liked the continuations for both series.  Especially 
for Ryouga's Big F'ing Gun.

Ryouga's Big F'ing Gun is turning into a lot of fun, in kind of a "Pulp 
Fiction" way (or at least I imagine, having never seen "Pulp Fiction" ^_^)
Chasing after him with high-powered firearms, but keeping thing from 
getting dark, and staying in the Ranma formula.  Very cool.  The reaction 
of Kasumi and Akane to Ryouga in the bath was very amusing, if somewhat 
juvenile.  I hope you stay with the feel...it's everything *but* a 
lemon.  I hope what you do with the series is stick even closer to the 
Ranma series, but include even more sexual innuendoes and especially 
violence.

My opinion: sometimes you make things a mind-fuck for the characters when
it'd be more interesting if it was made a mind-fuck for the reader. 
That's especially true in the "Weird Chronicles", where no matter how
weird things got, you usually had an explanation.  Like...Ranma acting
differently was explained away as an effect of Kodachi's poison, and
Shampoo's sexual desire for Ranma was kind of expected.  IMHO, it's kind
of fun to play off the fanfic formula.  Don't explain anything, but keep
it close enough to the formula that things are understandable.  "Weird 
Chronicles" would have been a lot weirder if the reason Ranma did bad 
things went unexplained or made no sense (used garlic powder instead of 
salt, or something). 

And the Attractiveness Factor: Yeah, I can see not wanting to continue 
the series.  It's a fun first chapter, but it really doesn't have 
anywhere to go except turn into a lemon, which would probably be dumb to 
write.  Just my opinion, but I would either:

- Re-write it into a one-parter which ends just after the reader realizes 
  there's nowhere for things to go except turn into a lemon (ala my 
  short, "Junk") 
- Turn it into a kind of comedy, where you play off the blatant 
  non-sexuality of Ranma in the series.  Perhaps Akane and Shampoo are 
  coming on to him like mad, but even as he imagines himself a 
  mack, he's unable to realize they're coming on to him/unable to deal 
  with it.
- Make Akane fall in the spring of Drowned Octupus.  This would limit 
  Akane to having sex only eight times in her life (once for each arm). 

Jeff

****jdrutsch@ucdavis.edu***********************Jeff Rutsch************* 
"Ranma's not a boy...he's a girl!"
"Akane is MY fiancee!  You TOUCH her, and I'll KILL you!"
"Ranma, change back into a boy while I buy you some time."
"But if I seem to act unkind/it's only me, it's not my mind."
"Ranma [sic],/give your heart to Akane [sic]. /Soon,/right away."
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