Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Great Buffy Rewatch: Colleen aka redeem

Another of the commenters who was loyal all the way through is Colleen aka redeem, who I first met probably over 10 years ago now as part of Buffy fandom, when we were in the same group, OBAVA (Ontario Buffy/Angel Viewers Association). Since then we see each other a couple of times a year and she's always delightful, as were her posts and comments throughout the year. I asked if she'd like to contribute something, and she said yes: a bit of fanfic!


After discovering Buffy I joined some message boards, but found I was having trouble expressing what I tried to say about the show. I found that if I put the points I wanted to make in the form of fiction, people seemed more receptive to what I was saying. While not new to fan fiction, Buffy inspired me to a whole new level of involvement and in one year I wrote a fic, or chapter of a fic, every day. Later in the series I discovered drabbles, and while they have a few different definitions, I prefer the one that states a drabble is a one hundred word story, no more, no less.

Though fan fiction I made some very close friendships, both with other writers and readers. In 2004 I was proud to be a committee member for the first Whedonverse fan fiction convention, Writercon, held in Las Vegas.

Nikki asked me to write a little something about the finale and I did it my favourite way, in the form of a drabble.

If anyone would like to read any of my other fan fiction, you can find it under redeem147 here.

Thank you for the rewatch Nikki. It's been a truly wonderful experience.

Colleen, waiting to see what Joss gives us next.

She almost couldn't believe it was over. Buffy knew things could have been so much worse. Her sister was safe. Her best friends, not only unscathed, but joking. Relieved. Happy. She had transportation and a bus full of newly-minted Slayers to carry the load. She looked out over the crater that had once been her home. The town had emptied before the devastation so very few lives were lost. But she thought about the sacrifices. So many young women. Amanda. Friends. Anya. More than friends. “Spike.” Yes, she thought, we can rest now. We can rest. And she smiled.

7 comments:

Marebabe said...

Colleen, that was beautiful! And I had a completely wrong idea that all fanfic must be written by teenage girls swooning over dreamy fantasy images of the perfect fairytale wedding of Buffy and Angel. Or something. (In my web surfing, I’ve actually seen “wedding pictures” of Buffy in a huge bridal gown with a skirt “out to there”, holding hands with Angel, saying vows, exiting a church, etc.) I thought of that as visual, Photoshopped fanfic. It was really well done, but I was pretty sure it was a representation of wishful thinking.

But your beautifully crafted drabble flowed with the story in such a natural and organic way, it seemed to me that it originated in Joss Whedon’s script. And if you (or *I*) stop to think about it, it did.

Christina B said...

Argh! Tears! Again!!

LOVE this, Colleen!! Thank you!

Clicking over to read more of your fanfic now...and I plan to bookmark that page. ;)

Colleen/redeem147 said...

Sneaking a comment at work. Yes, I have been able to follow the posts. Yay!

Marebabe, there's a whole world out there of amazing writers. That site on the link is a place to start.
You can also google fan fic award websites, because you know they have the good stuff.

For Spike fans, I recommend All About Spike. It hasn't been active in a while, but the site owner had excellent taste.

Oddly, my verfication word is resterid. As in rest.

Suzanne said...

Colleen, I enjoyed your beautiful fictional writing as much as I have always enjoyed your insightful comments. I will definitely be surfing over to your fanfic page to see more. You captured the emotions on the faces of our characters in that final moment so perfectly that, like Christina said, I feel like I am reading Joss's script.

Dusk said...

Very nice. It feels very show-like.

Blam said...


Your terse, rapid-fire bullet points of observation about each episode, on the non-spoiler and spoiler forums alike, were a consistent highlight of the Rewatch for me, Colleen. Thanks for that!

Blam said...


Marebabe: And I had a completely wrong idea that all fanfic must be written by teenage girls swooning over dreamy fantasy images of the perfect fairytale wedding of Buffy and Angel.

Ha! I've never read much fanfic — read hardly any, nor written any at all, since I started writing about comics and other media professionally in college (at least until I came up with my own ideas for DC Comics' relaunch earlier this year) — but it's not just flights of fancy on what happens next when a beloved story ends or what "should" have happened instead; often it's explorations of the little moments in-between beats we see on screen or on the page, or rationalizations of contradictory points in continuity. Then, y'know, there's lotsa sex stuff, too...

VW: Boxidect — It's ten — ten — boxes in one!