HP Rant, because I haven't in a while...

[lls_mutant]

... and I'm tired, grumpy, and procrastinating taking the trash out and cleaning up the kitchen.

This is a little inspired by a thread I was sort of reading on FAP, but you know, if it ever comes out that Remus had a crush on Lily in canon, I'm going to be very, very disappointed. Why?



1.) What's wrong with platonic?

For all that people yell "the hug was platonic! (I agree, incidentally) friends hug!", as soon as JKR says Remus was "fond" of Lily it means he had a crush on her to a lot of people? Double standard. :P

2.) It would make Lily a total Mary Sue.

I can always believe that one man is in love with the woman. That's fine. I can stretch it to two, no problem. (I pretty firmly believe Snape had a thing for Lily at some point.) But three? That's just nauseating. Sure, Lily can have had other boyfriends/admirers, but not canon characters, okay?

3.) It goes against how I see Remus.

No, I'm not talking about the fact I like him with Sirius. That's the least of it. It's that Remus is SO grateful to have friends, I can't see him liking the one girl his best friend is pining over. And even if he did, he'd never say anything, and doesn't Remus have enough angst without pining for his best friend's wife????

4.) It undermines 1981.

The first war sounds like it was a hard, sad time. If Remus liked Lily and it's revealed, there must be a plot reason for it- most likely having to do with why Remus drifted away from MWPP or why they didn't trust him. I hate this concept. For one, it doesn't make sense. Remus had to have still been close to the Potters to be a likely suspect. Sirius might be impulsive and not think things through, but he would have thought of that. Second, and far more important, it trades something meaningful for something trite. All the ideas of miscommunication and trust go by the wayside for a petty little plot about unrequited love. It's like those fics where Sirius didn't really defy his parents for their views on blood, but because they wouldn't accept Remus as his lover. It undermines the characters- and not just the victim, but those that didn't trust him.

5.) It came from Steve Kloves, who obviously ships Harry/Hermione.

Need I say more?

Comments

[momebie.livejournal.com]

and doesn't Remus have enough angst without pining for his best friend's wife????

I agree. And I'm a queen of angst. :p

I've never really heard that thought brandished around by anyone who was actually inserting it into canon, but I also hate how that would effect the war. There are so many better ways to write that. I'm sure JKR has thought of at least a couple of them.

[lilacsigil.livejournal.com]

I'm very much in favour of a Lily/Remus friendship, but I hate the "there's only one girl so everyone is in lurve with her" plot. Except in Star Wars, that worked out just fine. And I can deal with unrequited Snape/Lily, because Snape has been well and truly established as a man who can't get over what happened to him in high school. A sad and pining crush on Lily (complete with vile insults!) fits in beautifully.

Also, you've articulated something which I felt uncomfortable about but didn't know why: Remus would never, ever get in James' way. This is not necessarily a positive characteristic of Remus', but it is a very strong one.

[dead-sexydexy.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much for saying this. My hubby has said it before. There is a "guy code" amongst true men (rare though they are Remus is one of them *loves*). Remus, even if he didn't love Sirius,would never have gone for Lily because he knew JAMES loved her first. End of Guy Code.

[snorkackcatcher]

Hmm. I agree that Remus/Lily that went anywhere doesn't fit structurally with the books and really should have been mentioned already if it had happened, very like Remus/Sirius in fact :). But I can't see why he couldn't have had a crush on her. Given the way Lily's described -- pretty, smart, sassy, nice -- it would be astonishing if half the boys who knew her didn't have some sort of crush on her. It wouldn't necessarily be something he would expect to go anywhere given how James obviously felt about her. (I do like a Snape/Lily crush -- but I also really like a_t_rain's idea of a Peter having a secret crush on her! Both seem the type to keep quiet about it but have it eat them up. Damn, there's a plotbunny for a drunken Spinner's End fic. :D)

[lupinspatronus.livejournal.com]

I agree very much with your third point. In fact I can't really see Remus pining after any girl (and not just because I see him with Sirius!). Remus strikes me as the kind who, as you said, was firstly already so grateful to have friends, and secondly, probably thought he was too unworthy for any girl and/or believed no one would be interested anyway. Or perhaps he just didn't want to complicate his life further, being wise as he is.

I very much believe, however, that Remus and Lily were close friends. It's a nice idea, and comforting to know that Remus had someone to talk to because he does need a friend like that, and WPP are teenage boys.

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

I saw a couple of people on FAP arguing that Remus being fond of Lily made it canon that Remus had a crush on Lily, which is what set me off.

And yeah, it just tips the angst scale to "unbelieveable" :P I'll have more faith in her on this one, I think!

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

Yeah. The guy code- as related downstream- is in effect.

I'm not even fond of a huge Lily/Remus friendship, just because I've read too many fics where it's played out unrealistically, and because in canon, Remus never really mentions Lily. When he does give backstory, it's James. He sounds like he liked her just fine and they were good friends, but James was the catalyst. (And I agree about Snape. It fits his character a lot more than it fits Remus, but I also don't want it to be a motivator for him.)

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

That's exactly it. Guys are much nicer than girls when it comes to that sort of thing!

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

Well, we know Sirius/Remus isn't canon at this point ;) (Because yeah, if it was, it should have been confirmed in the last book. But it's still compatible, so I'm happy enough these days.)

I can understand a "safe" crush, I guess. But I really don't like the idea of him being in love with her, or having a heavy crush on her. :P Just too much "romantic love" motivation for me.

But yeah, there needs to be a fic with Snape and Peter drunk at Spinner's End and fighting about Lily, who's dead and neither of them ever had a chance with anyway. That would be WAY too funny.

[lls-mutant.livejournal.com]

It's interesting, because I don't favor the early Lily/Remus friendship much at all. Remus was as much a boy as the others, and I think he could talk to WPP as much as he actually chose to, which, being a teenaged boy, wasn't much. But that's just me :)

[shaggydogstail.livejournal.com]

'Peter loved Lily' is the only Lily-crushing theory that doesn't send me into frothing fits of rage. It's the only one that would actually explain things in canon without ridiculous character twisting. Peter asking Voldemort to spare Lily's life makes far more sense than Snape doing it (Peter had leverage, Snape didn't). It could even go some way to explaining why Peter joined the DEs - tactics.

[shaggydogstail.livejournal.com]

You know how much I agree with you on this one, right?

I think my major dislike of Remus/Lily stems from the fact that in fiction (and in the stories I read it's mostly platonic, though there's a disturbingly high number of R/L moments in R/S fic) comes from the fact that they always seem to be a right pair of boring, self-righteous goody-two-shoed girlies. Please, Lily's got more balls than that, even if Remus hasn't.

Besides, if you're going to rape canon by shipping Lily with someone other than James, you may as well do it properly. ;p

[lupinspatronus.livejournal.com]

Hm, that's true too. I suppose it depends how we see Remus the teenager, haha. I do like very much how you portrayed Lily and Remus in AIL, though, that I completely support :)

(and is your icon deliberate? =P)