from the vaults

[rm]

Since today is Guy Fawkes Day, and since we had all sorts of anti-gay misery go down Tuesday/Wednesday and since I just realized most of you have never seen this because my friendslist was about a third the size it is now when I wrote it:


Title: For wherever you go, I will go
Author: rm
Fandom: V for Vendetta
Pairing: Valerie/Ruth
Rating: R

I should really do a podfic of it, as it is well suited to my voice, but it is a difficult story, and I have not reread it in its entirety since it went live on the Yuletide site.

Comments

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

That was gorgeous.
Thanks for sharing.

V for Vendetta, the book, which I read just before the film came out and saw it not long after I read very possibly affected me, politically, as much as participating in War (not combat, thank god) affected me.

It may be hyperbole to think this way, but I feel that we're reaching that place in history in which the methods of Pleasure in Brave New World will become this dictatorial divide we find in V for Vendetta and 1984.

Gorgeous story. Valerie made the story far more personal than Winston ever could. Not to mention, the imagery of course.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

I first read the comic when I was 17. It's why I'm out, loudly, as a political act.

I saw the film the day before my celiac symptoms manifested in a way that was debilitating and led to my diagnosis. I have an intense medical phobia, and the film was hard for me, and for the first several days of being sick, I was scared it was a psychosomatic reaction to the film and that I would never get better.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

[nods]
It was after reading Valerie's letter (and the scenes in the movie are quite powerful as well, though not as much) that I decided that I couldn't coast through life any more, it took me a while to internalise it, honestly, it's difficult to unlearn so much of what you take for granted... but that last inch, I'll never ever give it up.

I've lost friends over the so-called changes I made in being a political being instead of just a subject.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I thought the movie, which was flawed as regards the source material itself, did a fantastic job with the Valerie plot-line because it made it so central I was really floored that the film took this thing which is really the prequel in the graphic novel and said "okay, here's ten minutes of utter film perfection and we're going to put it right in the middle of the film". Lesbians! In the middle of what turned into sort of an action film, and it just stopped for that story. I was pretty pleased.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Exactly! Valerie very much saved the film. I cried throughout that scene (and still do) and I really, really identified with her on many levels - mainly, I think, because the film version is the same age as I - we were both born in 1985.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I'm actually afraid to see the film again, as I'm scared I'll get sick again, eventhough a concrete medical cause was eventually found for what was happening to me.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Association is a difficult thing to break.
I couldn't listen to Indigo Girls for three years because of my association with their music to the second Lebanon War and the person who hurt me over the fact that I effectively (in her eyes) defected from my duties to my country.
It sounds so silly now (the whole interaction) but I was, and still am, deeply affected by the fact that this "friend" couldn't accept the fact that I had changed.

[tree00faery.livejournal.com]

Sorry to but into your conversation here, but I totally agree. I loved, loved, loved how much weight the movie gave their story. And I think they portrayed it really well too. Makes me cry every time.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

Such a beautiful love story as well, just as a story. In the film it was like this interlude in the midst of all the Action!Explosions!Fascism! and here... as rm said: "Lesbians!" being Lesbians and in love.

Also, you gotta love the alliteration :)

[tree00faery.livejournal.com]

Exactly! When I watched the movie with a friend a while ago, her response was "Gasp! Lesbians!", which I think is pretty accurate. It's always nice when there are adorable lesbians in mainstream (or at least somewhat mainstream) things.

I'm not usually one for action movies, but I actually really like the V for Vendetta movie. It helps that it's very political and also very human. The whole thing is kind of a love story, too.

This is making me want to go watch the movie. ^_^

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

The comic is far less (see, not) a love story, in my mind - it's a very human story (cruel and beautiful, all that) but love is a very cynical concept in the book... until Valerie, that makes it all the more special.

The love that V has for Evey is real no doubt, and as his motivation to set her free it's powerful, but not something us mundanes can really appreciate other than conceptually. We're just not in that mode of thinking any more, imo.

"Valerie" is the kind of love we're used to, the kind of love we want to for ourselves... which makes the comic (and the movie but to a lesser extent) that much more powerful.

[tree00faery.livejournal.com]

Agreed. Though admittedly, I haven't read the comic in years - I lost my copy when my family moved one year, and I never replaced it. I really ought to; I'm sure I'd get even more out of it now.