Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Fanfic Related Why no "Lois moving on" fics?

I am also of the "they should be together" school, but, even so, here are some additional thoughts in the other direction.

Possible scenarios for Lois to lose Clark and move on:

1 - Clark dies. However, he is difficult to kill and death by natural causes isn't likely until he's an old man.

2 - Lois decides that she doesn't love Clark, marries someone else *and* (because "moving on" implies contentment) lives happily ever after. Not likely because we tend to believe that she would eventually come to regret letting Clark get away, which doesn't equal contentment.

3 - Clark leaves Lois. Not something we can really conceive of, with the exception of the NK arc. The entire basis of this fandom is that Clark loves Lois. We can take out the Planet, mess with the superpowers, pretend the Kents didn't exist, or prevent Krypton from blowing up, but a L&C fanfic in which Clark meets Lois (the one from his own universe) and doesn't eventually love her (or in the case of a bad Clark, have a cruel fascination with her) is very, very rare.* So the idea of him leaving her is a very hard concept for a FoLC to swallow.

(*Although one example was pointed out to me: "The Road Taken" - very good story - but even in that one there was an attraction and the future was left open ended. I have hopes that Terry will write a sequel to this one eventually, even if it involves L&C *not* getting together.)

Possible scenarios for Clark to lose Lois and move on:

1 - Lois' death. Much more likely than Clark's death because she is human and has a knack for trouble to boot.

2 - Lois' leaves/rejects Clark and possibly marries someone else, either happily or unhappily. Obviously there is precedent for this.

The two "Clark moves on" scenarios are more plausible in my opinion than the three "Lois moves on" scenarios. So, assuming there are indeed more "Clark moves on" stories, maybe that's why.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
QofC, I like your thoughts. I agree with you (and Tank) that Clark would have a harder time moving on, so I guess there is more to explore there.

I'm of the belief that I wouldnt really be interested in reading a fic where either one of them moves on. I'm one of the hopeless romantics, thats why I fell in love with L&C in the first place. I love the romance, comedy and the action all mixed together. I typically dont read moving on fics, I've galanced over Ad Astra, but I like the happy endings so I wasnt interested. I'm also that way with movies I typically dont watch sad movies because I watch movies and read to escape from reality.

Well, I can't resist.

Lisa wrote:
Unless he's killed on NK.
Also all sorts of ways that Clark could logically be killed - he's saved so often from Kryptonite wounds you have to wonder what the long term damage to his system would be. Or what about K shrapnel that couldn't be removed from his body? Long- term toxic impact of Earth's alien environment? (Yvonne played with this is idea in her excellent Heliophobia, but didn't go the distance and kill him off )
Clark gets rescued 'just in time' from a K encounter so often that you have to wonder whether sooner or later the cavalry's going to be too late. I bet you can get odds in Las Vegas on that.

(Now this doesn't mean I like dead-Clark fics anymore than I like dead-Lois fics. Just that I think writers could kill Clark pretty easily )

Maybe, and yet, if we have this idea in our head that Clark will always be saved from K, then isn't there also a similar thought that Lois will always be rescued? Or does the double standard apply here too - Clark gets to be rescued, Lois doesn't? And if Bernie Klein's always going to come through with the miracle cure for Clark, shouldn't he be doing the same for Lois?

But not on the show. Lois wasn't able to move on with Lex after Superman rejected her - she couldn't even have sex with Luthor, and couldn't marry him because of her love for Clark Kent.

So - what Daisymay said. And QoC, yes about Clark's difficulty with moving on. But, i think, in the series, Lois was presented as emotionally vulnerable as Clark. So many examples, perhaps more than of Clark - but lots for both.

c.

Interesting thread.

I guess I have problems understanding why either one need to be 'punished'. After all, the heart wants what the heart wants.

Take Lois. It was only a few episodes in before Lois seemed to recognize that Clark was a great guy. But there is a huge leap between recognizing that someone is a great guy and wanting to spend the rest of your life with him. I mean, if there wasn't, then why didn't Clark just marry Mayson Drake? After all, she was a great girl. But Clark's heart wanted Lois. Lois' heart, on the other hand, wanted Superman. Why should she be punished for that?

I guess I just don't get the whole 'punish anyone' idea? Seems odd to me.

Besides, I love both characters too much to want to see them 'punished' - especially for the rest of their lives. Not that I don't want to smack both of them upside the head on occasion and not that I'm not willing to put them through a little angst along the way, but I still want that 'happily ever after' for both of them and I want them to find it with each other.

ML

Like MLT, I find this to be an interesting thread. The thoughts and opinions expressed on these screens are quite revealing and make for excellent consideration for future stories. I, for one, will think hard about all this. Maybe one of my other ideas, currently languishing on my flash drive, will blossom into a finished story before long.

Mrs. Mosley wrote:
Thank you for the quick review! And there is a sequel in the works, one which (in true FOLC tradition) has already spawned another sequel where the story will really be wrapped up. [/end shameless self-plug]

As in this Nancy? As in me? It sounds very familiar, but I can’t find the quote.

I don’t think Lois should be punished, but she was incredibly mean to him in the first season. She didn’t even give Clark the courtesy of treating him like a co-worker should be treated. She treated him like a doormat. She treated him like dirt under her feet. That’s why she should get a dose of her own medicine so she knows how it feels. I had a really hard time coming to terms with the way Lois treated Clark in the first season. And I know I’m not the only one that feels that way because I’ve seen it mentioned in other threads.

I think a quote from a recent fic I read says it well:
Now, mind you, she eventually changed, but it took her a long time, and Clark put up with a lot from her.


No.

No.

No.


Don’t know what you mean.

No. Clark can be pretty stupid at times. (Like the thing he did in Contact where he said he couldn’t be with her because it was dangerous.) But with that and one other exception (when he told Lois not to bother with the robe because he could see through it), he wasn’t mean to her. He didn’t treat her like a doormat. He didn’t treat her like dirt under his feet. It seems to me that I rather more see the idea that Lois can do no wrong, and she gets rewarded regardless of her very bad behavior.

~~
For me, Clark / Superman is the main character. (Don’t hit me, Ann.) As much as some people might want to deny that, that’s evidently what other people believe, too, or we might see more of those Lois moves on fics.

Yvonne evidently agrees:
Perfectly said, Yvonne. I like reading about Clark, too.
~~


Exactly, Lisa. I don’t think she should be punished by remaining alone the rest of her life, but she did treat him horribly, so why should she always get the man of her dreams when she acted that way? (I’m speaking about elseworld fics.)


And sometimes we do lose the love of our lives because of stupidity, but does that mean we can’t go on to find some kind of happiness and love with another?


There’s one that has just been posted to the archive where Clark has moved on with his life and is quite happy. Lois marries Luthor and later finds out he is scum. It leaves Lois with the knowledge that she will never have Clark / Superman because of the way she treated him. (It does leave it open as to whether she will find her own love.) Here it is: It Might Have Been... The author has told me he has no intention of writing another fic where Lois and Clark get together. I rather like to see some elseworld fics that explore these things, but I know I’m in the minority.

It could be that we are harder on our own sex, but when you compare it, Lois was far worse to Clark (at least in my opinion). The only two things I can think of where he treated her really badly was the, ‘Don’t bother, I can see through your gown thing’, and the ‘I can’t be with you because you might be hurt thing’.

I like to see the occasional moving on fics. I know a lot of folks might not admit the same, but there are fics that have been written about both of them moving on and there are fics where both Lois or Clark dies prematurely, so there are folks who want to both read and write them. True, there aren’t as many about Clark dying prematurely, but there are a few. But yes, authors are driven by what their readers want. I found out very quickly that very few folks want to read a story where Lois is dead.

No, I don’t think you would, DJ. The author of It Might Have Been told me that he has gotten a lot of positive feedback.


I’ve never thought that. I think he could move on. He might never again have exactly the same type of instant love that he did with Lois, but I think he could still find love. (Obviously or I wouldn't have written such a fic.)


Yes, she did.


Great way of putting it. The first two years was ‘punish Clark’.


What’s FWIW mean?


I think that’s true, Tank.


Yes, I think just about everybody knows that I agree with this.


Again, I think he’s quite capable of moving on although not easily. I think it would be pretty hard for him.


Yes, I find the idea of leaving him a difficult concept, but I don’t find the idea difficult that he could move on if Lois was out of his life.




Yes, I find these the more likely scenarios, too.

Well, as I said, I’m pretty sure it’s my quote that CC used, and that’s not what I meant.

Hmm... Very interesting thread.

Well, considering Lois' taste in men - How could she ever fall for Luthor? Or Claude? Scardino certainly would have been the best of the lot! - I don't have any trouble at all seeing her chosing someone else - at least before she knows Clark's secret. And that's not what I'd call 'moving on'.

I don't really know whether she'd move on easily, but the stress is on 'easily' here. I'm sure she'd be able to move on eventually.

The issue is different for Clark. He has eyes only for Lois, so every other relationship would fall under the category 'moving on'. Besides, Clark proves to be a hopeless romantic, and that certainly doesn't make things easier for him. But I'm sure even he could - and would - move on, unless the author gives a very good reason for him not doing so. (As in "She's" and "Time Doesn't Heal", for example.)

My apology here, Nancy. I rechecked and see that it was Sheila who wanted to give Lois "a dose of her own medicine". She didn't sign her post but ended with a quote from you with your name attached, and so... what can I say, very sloppy on my part.

Ah, but i see that you do agree with the quote. You really are hard on first season Lois! Yeah, she was far from perfect - but then neither was Clark. He gave as good as he got. That's what made the first season interesting. And remember too, that there were more times when she made it clear that she respected and cared for Clark in S1 than there were times when she was dismissive of him .

i think we have to take the whole package, the context so to speak, when we interpret Lois. She's not a one-note character.

Which brings me back to one of my initial arguments in this thread - why do some people see only the good in Clark and only the bad in Lois - the "halo effect" thing?

For example, Lois does something despicable - unethical: she steals Clark's story. That's the memory that lingers. At least, that's one example that's often mentioned in mbs discussions. But the rest of the story doesn't get mentioned - she acknowledges that what she's done is wrong, she's dismayed that she's done it (her confession to Lucy).
Then Clark gets his revenge (and notice it's *revenge* he wants here, not to forgive or understand her) - he knows she's Superman crazy, so he contrives to send her to the city dump on a wild goose chase. He sucks her in; she goes, she returns, dishevelled and storyless. So how does she react? She acknowledges his point and we see her respect for him.

or how about when he tossed her in the dumpster?
If Lois at times treated him "like dirt", he treated her like garbage. (not to mention the fact that he'd horned in on her story and had just succeeded in taking it from her, not to mention his use of physical violence...)

Now, we know from day 1 that he's Superman and that he loves her. But *she* knows neither of these things. He's just a new co-worker in a highly competitive industry. But we watch, smitten by the look in Clark Kent's eyes. Not to mention the memory of him in that towel [now enshrined in the nfic Hall of Fame ] How dare she not love him?
But what we forget is all her small gestures - how often she touches him casually, something we don't see her doing with other co-workers.

lots of other examples, too.

But she did know how it felt - she told Superman she was in love with him, and he rejected her.

As well, Clark Kent, not unlike some folcs(?) perhaps, never had much respect, let alone sympathy for Lois's love for Superman. But that love was real to her, and it was there from the beginning. Why do we imagine that she was hurt any less over Superman's blowing hot (well luke warm ) and cold with her than was Clark Kent over her treatment of him? Is it again because we know what Lois did not - that Superman was not a "real" person? So therefore Lois's feelings for him couldn't be real? But they were to her.

Ah, but he did treat her feelings for Superman like that.

For me, there are two main characters - Lois Lane and Clark Kent. Think that was one of the main premises of LCtNAoS. I enjoyed the nuances which the show brought to both characters. I like reading about *both* Lois and Clark. For me, Lois Lane is not expendable, nor is she just a sidekick or another babe on his list. She is as integral to Clark Kent/Superman as he is to her.

Wow, Nancy, I'm exhausted. But I get that you really do dislike Lois Lane. Wow!

c.

You really got me thinking with that comment, Caroline - which others have repeated after you - pondering, as it were, the mysteries of life . And here is the way I see it.

I don't think Lois is more likely to die than Clark is or visa versa and here's why. Lois and Clark are fictional characters. So when I write about them, I become God to them. As 'God', I make the decision about who will live and who will die. And as 'God', I can kill off one just as easily as I can kill off the other.

So will Clark outlive Lois... As 'God', it's completely in my hands. So the next time someone knocks off Lois, keep in mind that I can come back and knock off Clark

Hmm... after reading this thread, maybe it is time for me to write a Lois moves on story. Then again, it would break my heart to hurt either of these characters, so probably not.

ML (who is going to go off and contemplate her omnipotence some more )

Whew! I feel so relieved knowing it's all in your capable hands, ML

Of course, you're right - we the writers are in charge, and we could kill either of them any time we wanted, assuming we wanted to make ourselves and our readers miserable. (And sometimes we do ) But we're in Lois's boat - aware of our own mortality. We know that we have, at best, about a hundred years to live, and in most cases less than that. We know that we can be hurt. We can be killed. We can get sick. We know what it's like to be Lois Lane, at least in that regard.

But what Clark has is something different from that. Invulnerability. Enormously increased life span - though just how much we don't really know since canon was rather vague on that point. But it's something we won't ever experience first hand, and I think that makes it something that holds some appeal to writers as an avenue of exploration. What would it be like to outlive everyone you love? What would it be like to stay young and healthy while the woman you love ages? What would it be like to have to move on, even when you might not really want to? (I'm reading Tuck Everlasting to my kids right now, incidentally, which may be why my thoughts are rambling down this road). So if there are more Clark moving on fics, I kind of think it's because we find the idea of an invulnerable man being forced to move on somewhat more interesting than if it were someone just like us. And as you say, we're the writers and we're in charge, so if we find something interesting, we're free to pursue it

Sorry if this veered off-topic, Carol! I know that Clark's potentially long life-span wasn't really what you had in mind when you phrased your original question, but I *do* think it's relevant when considering Clark-moving-on fics.

Interesting topic all the way around.

Caroline

, ML. That cuts to the chase.

Perhaps not L & C canon, though. Time Minear, the writer of Brutal Youth, is on record as stating that he intended that episode to imply that the longevity scale was more or less balanced as a result of Clark having given up some of his 'life force'.

Perhaps, but since that topic has been thoroughly discussed elsewhere i didn't want to address it again. As well, it's quite a separate issue, really, from the question I asked.

Tough book for kids, imo. Not that they shouldn't be exposed to 'tough'
But, you raised some interesting points with respect to exploring the issue of longevity,, Caroline. It's really a very dark concept when you think about it. If you're interested in it, you might like Timothy Findley's novel, Pilgrim, which deals with that theme. He's one of Canada's top writers and it's a very well-written and thoughtful book. That makes it sound boring , but it's definitely not!

c.

Just popping in to say that Minear saying that doesn't make it canon for me. Now, if it had been stated on the show that would be an entirely different matter, but since it wasn't and we got a very vague, wishy-washy "Nobody knows how long they've got" instead , I think Clark's lifespan is open to interpretation.

P.S. I love Lois, warts and all, and don't want to see her punished. To me, she's a more interesting character than Clark and I think of her as just as important as him. So there you go .

Carol said, re: Nancy:

I don't think that conclusion's warranted at all. Nancy may not like Lois Lane as passionately as you do, Carol, but that doesn't mean she *dis*likes her. You can dislike specific behaviors without disliking the whole person.

As for Tim Minear, he also said that the "Family Hour" baby was going to grow up to be a bratty teenager within a few weeks, and I don't think any of us treat *that* as canon (Has anyone ever tried that story, btw, or have we all rolled our eyes and declared it too stupid to bother with?)

PJ

Wasn't there a story from one of the Fifth Season series that explored this, or a similar theme? There was a kid, I seem to remember, that grew up very quickly *and* had superpowers...

Yvonne

Um, perhaps - but Nancy didn't state anything positive at all about Lois but only negatives so it's not an illogical conclusion to have reached. Of course, my interpretation may be wrong - only Nancy can say for sure.

"Passionately"? I'd hoped I was logical, Pam My apologies for sounding passionate. Not my intention. btw, I am as much a fan of Clark Kent as I am of Lois Lane. But Clark has lots of defenders here.

No, of course not. But I think on this particular issue, there is no canon answer.
Still, it wasn't my intention, as I stated when I started this thread to include that particular issue. I was interested in why there were more 'Clark moving on and dead-Lois fics' than the reverse, set when the two were still *young*. I'd hoped to exclude the longevity issue because it's quite different and wanders away from the issue I raised.

c.

Yvonne - I believe you are thinking of "Hypergirl" written by Crystal Wimmer and part of the Season 6 fanfiction. It's the one where Mxytsptlk (did I spell that right? Even close?) uses magic on Lois & Clark's daughter Laura to speed up her growth rate. She grows up and turns into a super-powered rebellious teenager within a few days.

Mxyztplk is spelled the usual way

And yeah, there was Hypergirl -- you'll note, however, that was just for one episode! And technically, it was Laura, not the Family Hour baby; we'd gotten rid of it very early in S5. Any other examples?

Carol, I just thought you'd jumped to a conclusion on inconclusive grounds. Absense of evidence is not evidence of absense, you know -- and I thought Nancy might take exception to you putting words in her mouth.

PJ

lol - very true, Pam.

So only Nancy can say for sure.

c.

I should probably keep my nose out of this, but...

Man of the year



Suppose we were to line up all the men of the world on one side, and all the women of the world on the other side, and then we asked the men and the women to fight each other. Which side would win?

Stupid question. We all know the answer. If the men just stick together, if they stay loyal to each other, they are going to beat the "women's team" every time. Because no matter how much the women are willing to support each other and sacrifice for each other, their collective strength isn't going to be enough to defeat all the men in the world.

Conclusion? Men have something to gain from sticking up for each other. By doing so, men as a group can "defeat" women as a group and force the women to service them. This doesn't mean that each and every man will force his wife, daughters etcetera to service him - but it does mean that men as a group can decree that it's natural that women should support men, and men can pass laws that declare that it is right and natural for women to attend to the needs of men.

So whether or not we are aware of it, our own society as well as all other societies all over the world teach boys to stick up for other boys and men and to side with other men against women. (Not evey individual boy is taught this, and not evey individual boy and man will do this, but most probably will, perhaps without even being fully aware of it.)

Women have so much less to gain from supporting the members of their own gender. Instead, women learn to seek protection from the dangerous world they live in by trying to gain favors from one individual man, the man they fall in love with, the man whose love they try to win for themselves, the man they want to marry, the man they ask to be their protector. This means that women often see other women as rivals. Women know that other women also fight for the love of the limited number of strong men whose ability to protect "their own woman" is so desirable. So, while men tend to stick up for other men in the battle of the sexes, women often side with men in the hopes of gaining the approval of the individual man whose favors they seek.

Conclusion? Well, when it comes to Lois and Clark, it could mean that at least some men identify with Clark's needs because they subconsciously know that a man's needs are more important than a woman's. It could also mean that some women disapprove of Lois because she seems insuffciently grateful for the attentions and favours that Clark Kent, the best potential protector in the world - not to mention the most good-looking one - so graciously bestows on her.

And that could indeed create a situation where both men and women are critical of Lois and supportive of Clark. This could make it tempting to write stories where Lois is punished for dismissing Clark, while Clark is allowed to move on and find happiness with another woman who appreciates him more than Lois did.

Ann

Pam, I don't know why I found this so amusing, but I laughed my head off. It sounds so "underhanded". <g>