Two Years!

Maximus here. Frea is still on her trip right now and doesn't know I'm doing this. What is this, you may ask? Well, this is the second year anniversary of Frea's neverending story: What Fates Impose. Can you believe it's really been two years since she started writing her wonderful story? I can hardly believe it myself, mainly because that means I've known Frea for almost two years and it just doesn't seem like that.

I'm just going to take a minute and say some quick thoughts about what this story has meant to me. I'm very grateful to have met Frea and Fates was what made that possible. As much as I enjoy the story and have a deep admiration for her talent, getting to know her personally is what I enjoy most about the whole Fates experience. I've learned a lot about being an editor since I started editing for her, as well as learned a lot about writing. She's a pretty good teacher, even if she might not realize it. Most importantly, I'm just glad to be able to call her friend. That's what I value most from the whole experience. And like I said, Fates made befriending Frea possible.

I don't regret it, even if she does let her status as the most(ly) benevolent overlord go to her head sometimes. :P

The Art of Ending

Endings are my weakest area of writing, not surprisingly. I have less experience with them than beginnings (which are the most fun for me) and middle-beginnings (where I find my footing and am still chugging along), and even middle-middles (where things falter as I lose my way). One of my endings actually made my mother come into my room and beat me over the head with the book. Another ending of mine still haunts me for reasons I'm still trying to determine.

Keep all of that in mind when I tell you this: endings are the second thing I come up with when I concept a story.

Wait, what?

Writing is very much a solitary activity. You can share it with everybody (which I do) and you can debate it with everybody, but at the end of the day, it's just going to be you and your notepad struggling over how to make the characters sound and feel on the page like they do in your head. You have to write your vision as you see it, not somebody else's.

Going on a trip

So I'm taking a trip this week, which means something like 20+ hours in a car (which I never mind; I love driving) and I'm a voracious reader while on road trips/really poor from this trip, so I've been chewing through ebooks lately to get my Kindle fully loaded.  I've uploaded the majority of the ebooks I've created to the Downloads page.  Among them, you can find:

• An updated version of Chuck and Sarah vs. the Bunker with a spiffy new cover. This one's got a Table of Contents and everything!
• Chuck vs. the Frontier and Chuck vs. the Sunken Treasure, also by the fabulous ninjaVanish
• That Which is Greater: New Year’s Eve by yours truly.
• Everything that has been posted of A Common Spy Problem by KateMcK.
• Two great new ebooks from the awesome author atlee! Scenes from a Wedding and Chuck vs. Unscripted Programming.
  

Anyway, there will probably be more pouring in as the week draws nearer to Wednesday. I’ve had a request for some Golden Girl. Any others?

Thanks,

Frea

R&J: Engagement in Estonia

Found this in the archives (Romeo and Juliet - Not a Date.doc for those of you wondering).  It's nothing new. I figure it takes place about six months after Chuck and Sarah's first date at the movies in Romeo and Juliet but Without Teenagers or Death...Well, Okay, Some Death.  Just a short little scenelet.

Enjoy!

Frea

Inane Chatter - 5.12-5.13 - Chuck vs. Sarah/Goodbye

Max here, letting you guys know I owe you and our minion Shoe an apology. I got this review from the lovely and talented Shoe days ago, but only now managed to get it up now. So my apologies for that. Also, this is unedited by me, so you guys are fortunate to get Shoe, raw and uncut. ;-)

Here, Shoe provides her thoughts and feelings about the controversial series finale of Chuck.* Click the link to see more.

*As Frea mentioned in her last post, we are still planning to post an mxpw vs. Frea review of the finale soon.

Where'd Frea Go Now

Hey, all,

Wanted to apologize for vanishing on the blog lately. Several people have hit me up on Twitter asking if there will be an mxpw vs. Frea going on about the final two episodes, and I'm happy to say that not only will there be one, there will be two.

In Which Frea Expresses a Bunch of Unpopular Opinions

I think I should write down my thoughts on the ending and everything right now. Warning, there's some profanity ahead.  This isn't replacing mxpw vs. Frea, either. These are just my thoughts.  After the break.

Top 10 20: CHARAH

And here it is, our final Top Ten post. That's right. We've wrapped up an entire week of happy, positive lists...and boy did that take a lot out of us. Thanks to everybody that tagged along for the ride and shared their thoughts. Today's list is special...but only because we couldn't keep it down to 10. Without further ado, we present, in descending order, our top twenty Charah moments!  See you on the other side, homies.

Top 10: Favorite Guest Characters

So Frea and I decided to list our favorite guest characters during the show's run. There will be no pictures accompaning this post. I'm doing this on my own, without the invaluable assitance of the MBO, and she told me I didn't have to tussle with Blogger's photo embedding software. So I will not. Still, I hope you guys enjoy our list and feel free to comment on what you think we got right, what we got wrong, and what we missed.

See the list after the jump!

Top Ten: Hi, Fellas!

All right, so after this morning’s apparently controversial interesting list of the best SWP from the show’s run, some of the concerned lady fans of CI got together. Since we’re all about equal opportunity and showing off pretty people here at Castle Inanity, I am proud to present to you the top ten list of "Hi, Fellas!" moments from five years of Chuck. For those of us wearing glasses, I gotta warn you, it’s about to get steamy in here.

Thanks to Cat for curating this list and making my day 108% less productive!

Top 10: SWP

Frea here. When I gave him this assignment, I do believe mxpw fell to his knees and thanked first the heavens above and then me in that order. Once he was whipped for not fetching me a Dr Pepper before doing so, he immediately set off in a quest to bring you only the purest, best SWP on the planet.

Little did he know that he was about to embark on his own version of Sophie's Choice. But three days later, I went over to his house and found him in the corner, bemoaning the various SWPs he had to leave off of the list. I managed to wrest the list from his hand and have transcribed it thusly. It was a little hard to read with all of the tear stains, but I think this is what Max has reported to be the BEST SWP* of the show.

Enjoy!

*Any SWP is technically the best SWP

Top 10: HELL YEAH moments

So this week Max and I have decided to celebrate the show not in the cynical fashion most would expect, but by revisiting some of the things that made us fall in love with Chuck in the first place. Sure, those things may not be present today, but it’s fun to walk down memory lane and look at the good times (and some of the bad times). I’m kicking off the week with my best 10 "HELL YEAH" moments. What does that mean? These were just my top times on the show where I sat up and went, "HELL YEAH!" And yes, there’s even a moment in here from Season Three for all of you people who think I (rightfully) like Season One and Two more.

So click the link to read more. And remember, these are my opinions and mine alone.  Well, okay, mxpw submitted a few of them.

mxpw vs. Frea - Chuck vs. the Bullet Train

Chuck vs. the Bullet Train
Season 5, Episode 11, original air-date 20 January, 2012

Sarah and Casey stow away in coffins in order to retrieve Chuck from Quinn on a bullet train in Japan. Things go horribly awry when the Intersect in Sarah's head turns out to be the glitchiest of All the Intersects.

Okay, if you don't follow mxpw or me on Twitter, you may not know that neither of us really likes the storyline going on. And I'll say that up front: we hate it. We hate it so hard that there is copious profanity in the review following, plus a lot of ranting, too. This wasn't an awful episode, and neither of us feel that, on its own, it was terrible, but...

Well, you'll have to click the link to see.

Also, the effects were nearly as bad as Masquerade. And keep in mind that Frea is coming into this episode VERY DISAPPOINTED that her little booger spy man that jumps through donuts and skateboards and jetpacks around WAS NOWHERE TO BE FOUND.

mxpw vs. Frea - Chuck vs. Bo

Chuck vs. Bo

Season 5, Episode 10, original air-date 13 January, 2012

When Morgan receives his old Douchersect cell phone and a message that he's hidden something that's in trouble, it's up to the gang to fly to Vail and gas Jeff and Lester a bunch of times with Bazin-Gas, the most convenient joke of all time.

Warning: this was a Newman episode. Expect rainbows. But not....those rainbows.  Yeah, right.  Anywhere, review's just beyond. Click to read.

Just for the time being

So Blogger, our platform for CI, is being a pain in the butt. They introduced threaded comments the other day, which is an idea I'm excited to see.  I love Wordpress's threaded comments option, as I feel it leads to more natural conversation.

However, here, Blogger has decided it's going to glitch pretty badly.  So until this problem is resolved, I'm switching from embedded comments to a popup. Sorry for any inconvenience this causes.

I stole the gif from Grace, also known as Miss Couch Potato on Tumblr. If you want some amusing graphics, check her out here.

Thanks!

Frea

Castle Review - 4.12 - Dial M for Mayor

Mayor Robert Weldon, Castle's longtime friend and the Mayor of New York City, used his political clout to allow Castle to partner up with Beckett. But now, when a woman is found dead in a car that traces back to the Mayor's motor pool, that partnership comes under fire as the scandal surrounding the investigation threatens to bring down Weldon's administration.

Click the link to see my thoughts for this episode.

Slightly Drunk And Hopped Up on Sugar

Went to Wal-Mart tonight meaning to buy ice cream.  80 bucks later, I had some Smirnoff and an excellent night in store.  Damn, I wish that hobo hadn't robbed me of 66 bucks in the pasta aisle, but you win some, you lose more.

Anyway, mostly I'm posting because I'm curious about everybody's reactions to the end of Chuck vs...Whatever Episode This Was that Played Tonight.


Seriously, what'd you guys think?  Feel free to give your true opinion, just don't bash other commenters!

Thanks,

Frea

Castle Review - 4.11 - 'Till Death do we Part

When a lothario is killed, Castle and Beckett suspect that the victim's mysterious double life holds the key to his murder. Their investigation leads to a shocking twist that threatens to disrupt Ryan's wedding with Jenny.

So what did I think of this episode? Click on the link to find out!

mxpw vs. Frea — Chuck vs. the Kept Man

Chuck vs. the Kept Man
Season 5, Episode 09, original air-date 6 January, 2012

Gertrude Verbanski is back! Casey chafes at having a well-connected and awesome lady-lover. Chuck's a moron. Sarah wins at everything even though everything is wrong.

Sorry for the graphic, everybody*. Frea got bored. Was she bored with this latest episode, or was the wonderful, wonderful Carrie Ann Moss and the even more delightful Gertrude Verbanski enough to make Frea's entire world feel like it was full of kittens, butterflies, and Dr Pepper?

Hint: that sentence probably answers its own question.

With that said, read on, good readers, read on!

Behind the Scenes Stuff

Just an administrative note to let you know I've updated the What Fates Impose ebook so that it includes all 55 chapters in one place.  You can download that here.

Also, a good friend of mine gave me an invite over to Archive of Our Own, and I've been archiving Fates over the past couple of weeks. I really like the AO3 interface, as it means I can sort the Fatesverse in order as a series...which I've done here.  I have a few one-shots to put up still and then I'll start archiving That Which is Greater in order.

Exciting things coming on Twitter, thanks to a reader/awesome person that shall remain nameless at the moment.  You know who you are, and you're awesome!!!

I've spoken with ninjaVanish, who is deep in HTML coding, prepping Sunken Treasure and Frontier to be made into ebooks so that I can host those here.  I've made covers for both of those already, so I'm excited to be able to add those to the collection.  In addition, I spoke to atlee, one of my favorite authors in the section, and I'll be adding some of those fantastic ebooks to the collection, naturally.

So...exciting things coming up!  Yay!

Frea