Seriously Geeky Sundays – Moving On

Happy Sunday everyone!

I’m a little late to post this time around, for which I apologise, the dreaded “real life stuff” seems to be taking up a lot of my brain’s processing power at the moment, and I find myself getting less and less writing done!

Nevertheless, it is time for Seriously Geeky Sundays once again, and I’m back this week, once more tackling six exquisitely themed questions from the mind of Heather, proprietor of Just Geeking By, which is one seriously excellent site that, naturally, I recommend you check out!

Anyway, let’s take a look at today’s theme, shall we?

Did you know that May is National Moving month (or that such a thing existed?), nope, neither did I. Moving is a typical plot prompt used in fandoms to start a story, inject new characters or just shake things up a little when they get stale. So this week we’re asking you to think about what happens when characters move in or away in your fandoms.

Question 1 – What was the most recent fandom that started with someone new moving to town?

Going to have to go for WandaVision for this one. The tale of witchy Wanda and her synthazoid husband, living a perfect sitcom life in a cutesy, all-American town was (quite literally) a throwback to the golden years of comedy, riffing heavily on everything from The Dick Van Dyke Show to Malcolm in the Middle. And underneath all of the nostlagic hijinks was another, slow boiling story, asking the question of how Wanda and Vision got there after the events of Infinity War and Endgame (especially Vision!) and what will happen when the bubble bursts, and reality comes crashing down on their heads.

If there’s anyone who enjoyed the MCU’s recent fare and hasn’t watched this yet, get it watched!

And why!?

Question 2 – Tell us about your favourite character who left home to find their fortune.

In terms of those who left a well-ordered life to find a new adventure, you can’t really go wrong with Susan Sto-Helit, from the great Sir Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series of books.

We first run into Susan when she is a student at a rather stuffy boarding school, where she learns that she is able to pass under people’s radars. Not turn invsislbe, as such, just make people forget she’s there at all. After a run in with a talking raven and a tiny skeletal mouse in black robes, we learn that she is actually the grand-daughter of Death himself.

After initially fighting against this ludicrous turn of fate, Susan ends up embracing it, stepping in for the big guy when a fantasy proxy/parody of rock and roll music takes over the world in Soul Music, and then swings into action twice more in Hogfather and Thief of Time as well.

Susan makes for a fantastic protagonist, who was brave enough to leave her safe, familiar life for one of (very strange) adventure!

Question 3 – Sometimes moving to a new place can put a character exactly where they’re supposed to be; who does this make you think of?

When I think of characters who move from place to place, and seem to end up in the exact right place each time, the Man With No Name from Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Western movies comes to mind.

Played by Clint Eastwood, this enigmatic character was the protagonist in A Fistful Of Dollars, A Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. Whilst definitely not a hero, Eastwood’s character tended to do the right thing in the end, and his adventures were always good to watch!

I mean, is he even actually the same character? The mythos of this trilogy always confused the hell out of me…

… now apologise to my mule!

Question 4 – Not all new neighbours are benign, sometimes the devil comes to town (literally). Who was the most interesting villain to come to town?

I was racking my brains for a while with this one, but it has to be Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer! He quite literally drops into town, along with his paramour Drusilla, and causes merry havoc on the town of Sunnydale, resulting in an almost-apocalypse, and him getting his ass handed to him.

Whilst this vampiric badboy spent centuries as a villain, however, he does return in later series, and, after a series of events, regains his soul and becomes one of the good guys… albeit a crotchety and violent one, that doesn’t play well with others.

He does have cool hair though.

Question 5 – Not everyone sticks around; no fandom would be complete without the wandering passerby. Which one stuck in your mind?

Having recently marathoned all of American Dad (far superior to Family Guy and modern day Simpsons), I have to go with Stan’s dad, Jack!

Canon can get rather wild in this oddball series, but any character that starts out as a treacherous secret agent who ran away from his family (occasionally reappearing to abuse Stan’s trust), then later becomes the literal Krampus is always a laugh, even when he becomes a Krampus driving a bus in Baltimore, for some reason. It really highlights just how unrelentlingly weird American Dad can be that, even with Jack around, there’s still much weirder to encounter!

Question 6 – Which character shook things up just a bit too much and made a complete mess of things?

One of the first characters to come to mind here was Mafia‘s Tommy Angelo.

A 1930s cabbie from the fictional city of Lost Heaven (modeled on Chicago, I believe), Tommy is forced to assist two mobsters during an escape attempt from a rival gang and, after some hijinks, ends up being a made man himself. Tomy has it good, getting in with the don due to his bravery and loyalty, and makes a good life for himself and his family in the process.

But, as is always the way with powerful men, the lifestyle isn’t enough, and Tommy ends up betraying the trust of the Family, resulting in his best friend’s death, and his other bestie trying to take him down, disgusted that he would go behind the don’s back. It ends with Tommy going into witness protection when he rats the Salieri family out to the police, though at least he gets a happy life in Empire Bay afterwards.

Until a mission in Mafia 2 sees that game’s protagonist, Vito Scaletta, paying him a visit to deliver a message from an old pal…

And that is this article done, wrapped up, finished! Thanks everyone for reading my humble words, and, as ever, check out the elite squad of other writers under the #SeriouslyGeekySundays hashtag, how else will you find the best content on the internet?

Now, let’s move on, shall we…. hahaha I’m so funny…