bitter, I take it Kate remixed you?

Yep. Of course, I didn't know who had done the remix until I got back from vacation. But yes.

Where can we see that version?

Kate's remix will be found at the Remix page, along with a link to bitter's story.

Aren't we SUPPOSED to wait until this shit's been on the Remix site for a while before posting?

Most things like that do ask to hold off on posting for a few weeks.

I'm waiting. I thought it was only polite.

Normally, it's part of the sign up. (Because I did an assload of this shit over the last six months.)

Don't know if Remix Redux spelled it out, though.

I know Slash Advent and Secret Slasha did.

Aren't we SUPPOSED to wait until this shit's been on the Remix site for a while before posting?

It's what I usually assume with a formal, archived challenge.

Aren't we SUPPOSED to wait until this shit's been on the Remix site for a while before posting?

I think that, once the reveal's over, it's open season on posting your remix at your own site. But your remix challenge isn't over yet, right? The deadline was this weekend?

Okay, I read the remix. Edited out my previous comment to explain why I think it's not well done.

It seems to me, the author took a fairly standard premise, the things we do for fame and, instead of presenting it in a new way (as the original did), regurgitated this old cliche. The bite of the previous version, sharp most especially in the voices with no attribution, wallows between mute and invisible here.

The story becomes a standard boy meets LA, boy is beaten by LA, boy is given new hope story with no individual essence. If these weren't famous people, we wouldn't care. So, I don't care because I don't care much about famous people in fiction just because of their fame. It has no other appealing quality.

The unique perspective and distinct voice and characterization of the original have been turned into oatmeal blandness. The immediacy is lost. There is more sexual content and less sexual tension. In fact, there's less of any tension. Case in point, the moment where the hangers on are thrown out. In the original, the focus remains tight on the main characters. The others are colorful detritus, an obstacle to be removed. The tension builds while the character wades through that detritus to explode during the confrontation immediately following. Immediacy is key. In this version, the hangers on are presented as "real" menaces, including "bulges under coats" which I am sure we are intended to view as guns, and feel danger. Unfortunately, the tension is diffused by this focus on things we might already expect and the immediacy is lost. Who doesn't have an image already of a bad Hollywood party? Those things didn't need to be expressed beyond the hints of the original. Expressing them derailed the story, again, into cliche.

The ending is as one might expect. A hopeless character (for whom the reader has no sympathy) is presented with a view of L.A., the sparkling lights of the holy land, from a safe place, a platonic cave, perhaps. Because he has been taken above the tension and distress of his life, he is able to gain a wider perspective and forget the reality that living below reveals. Unfortunately, we are not presented with any proof that the holy land view is real. In fact, it's an obvious lie. It's not the big picture, it's a fairytale picture. It does not present any insight into how to live in the real world. It presents a rarified view of it, returning the reader to the safe, cliched view of L.A. as mecca and denying all the lessons that could have been learned. The characters are not older and wiser now. They've been given back their rose-colored glasses.

Re-edited to say: This is harsh. It's also true. It's also true that I couldn't have done a better job because I don't participate in this particular fandom and wouldn't have known where to begin to remix a story of the superlative quality of the original.

I think that, once the reveal's over, it's open season on posting your remix at your own site. But your remix challenge isn't over yet, right? The deadline was this weekend?

31 March.

Wonder how much of the positive spin is possibly informed by the remixer missing the city itself, and thus having rose-tinted LA shades. But I'm not going to spend too much time thinking about it.

(edited because I made no sense outside of my head.)