Must Be a Full Moon

Let's talk about the people who write fan-fiction for a moment.

Now listen, I've been around the internet, and I've come to the conclusion that by and large, these people are completely insane. It's not something I'm against as a concept, you understand, but so much of it is so adamantly wrong-headed that it's bred a firm and undying chunk of contempt in my soul. For example, I've personally thrilled my friends with the aneurysm-inducing scribblings of one "Omega Phallic," whose magnum opus is an incredibly long tale of Rogue and Lady Death being horrendously violated in a charming sports-themed epic called "Slutball." It's even worse than it sounds.

But it's not just the final product that gives me the insight into their mental states. Working where I do, I've run into these folks time and time again, from the regular Warhammer-player who wrote about his adventures in the world of the Tiny Toons to the guy who ground our comics club meeting to a halt by talking about the relevance of Dark Knight Returns to his Plastic Man fan-fiction.

But towering above them all is one customer, known only as Crazy Fan-fiction Lady. Predictably, she really, really likes Gambit and Rogue, and was heard to exclaim "How could they treat Remy like that?!" when she saw Rogue kissing Wolverine on a cover.

Her current project is a Batman/Wonder Woman romp, wherein they get married and Wonder Woman subsequently gets pregnant. This was the one she was telling me about when she explained that the crux of one of her stories was that Ra's al-Ghul finds out Batman's secret identity, completely forgetting that that's Ra's al-Ghul's entire deal already.

There was also a funny bit where she talked about the Joker kidnapping Wonder Woman, which I explained to Scott later that day. He said that was like Alex, Ben's six year-old son, kidnapping one of us. "We might go along with it for a while, but sooner or later it's time to work, and that'll be the end of that."

She's still working on that series, apparently, since she stopped by yesterday to pick up some research material on Wonder Woman's pregnancy.

She was accompanied by her husband, and, of course, her dog. Maybe it's jst me, but I'm really bothered when people bring their dogs into retail establishments. One time there was a very boisterous woman in the store with a chihuahua shoved down the front of her overalls, and the poor thing just looked terrified. Moreso than usual, I mean.

Either way, it's not cool. If you're going to bring a pet into a comic book store, at least make it a badass pet monkey.

But back to the people. They seem like nice enough folks, and they're always polite, but in conversation, they're just slightly... off. She's one of those ladies that giggles uncontrollably while talking about her highly improbably fan-fiction with the same reverence that most people reserve for the works of the Apostles. Her husband, on the other hand, usually carries the dog around. He won't blink for minutes on end, then the floodgates'll open and it's like he's got sand in his eyes. Also, he constantly asks the same question over and over, centering this time on whether or not we carried the novelizations of the Friday the 13th movies.

We don't.

It was when I was helping his wife with her search for issues of The Kingdom that he walked over to me, holding the dog up. It was chewing on one of the rubber corner-caps we keep on the sharp edges of the dollar book tables, and he seemed pretty upset. The guy, not the dog.

"I don't know where he got it," he said, steaming, "It's.. it's so stupid!"

I explained what it was, and his wife went to retrieve it from the dog's mouth, pulling back when it started growling at her.

So there he stood, holding the dog, looking almost frantic.

"Well it's not my problem if he wants to do that," he said. "I mean... he's the one who looks stupid, not me."

After a few tense minutes, we finally made it up to the register, and he started marveling at how good the Star Wars Holiday Special is.

I'm going to say that one more time, in case you missed it: He was marveling at how good the Star Wars Holiday Special is. For the uninitiated among you, I'll just say this: It's got Chewbacca's dad Itchy, his son Lumpy, and there's a cantina musical number sung by Bea Arthur. Bea. Frigg'n. Arthur.

Anyway, that's when Fanfic Lady and her husband got into a little argument. He asked me whose fault it was that it had never been out on DVD--our store's bootleg notwithstanding.

"George Lucas," I said.

"Well to me, that makes George Lucas kind of an asshole."

Even I raised my eyebrows at this.

"You should email him," his wife chimed in.

Then they argued about whether or not Lucas would care about one guy's email about the Star Wars Holiday Special, finally turning to settle it.

"Do you think he'd care if I emailed him?"

"No," I said, "Probably not. I mean, that guy's rich."

"Yeah, you're probably right," he said. "I mean, he makes like... a million dollars a year!"