NB: I’m
reasonably certain this is NOT going to happen in the actual movie. This
is the Bad Ending version where things escalate and Tony accidently kills
Steve…. oh, now I made myself sad thinking about it.
Over a decade ago when I first started getting into fanfiction, the term Alpha was used more frequently. A writer had the option of finding either an Alpha or a Beta to help them with their writing.
A Beta is for all the basics like grammar, but when it came to an Alpha, they did so much more. Alphas almost co-wrote the story with you, but not quite, and it was such a fun and interactive process.
What an Alpha Does:
Proofreading (like a beta)
Bouncing Ideas (email, chat, phone ideas back and forth)
Discussion (ideas, plots, problem points, or even just a pick-me-up)
Editor (small and large instances, often marked in red in your document)
Story Structure (does it flow? does it follow the format writer wanted?)
Canon vs Fanon Advice (distinguishing and suggesting)
Consistency (e.g. character has same color hat from beginning to end)
Major Rewrite Suggestions (an entire chapter doesn’t work? help!)
Cheerleading Through an Entire Fic (not just chapter by chapter)
Presentation (help in picking out everything from cover art to the tagline to the finished product structure, maybe even creating the PDF or HTML page for the writer)
And more that I’m not even thinking of right now
An Alpha would get credit for this (most of the time right underneath the author’s name on the cover art and in the story info), and people looked to alphas like they were special, they were very much appreciated, and if you found one, you would do pretty much anything for them.
I’ve been on both ends of this, and I really miss it being a more widespread thing. I’ve got my own alpha in the form of a friend who has been with me from the beginning of Alpha House, and she’s still a HUGE help. It wouldn’t be the fic it is without her, and I wish more writers could experience this.
How Using an Alpha Works
First you find one, and you get their email/chat ID/phone number. You tell them the ENTIRE idea for your fic (spoiling it all), where you want it to go, how you want it to feel, what the characters’ motivations are, etc. Then you send the alpha what you have so far, which can be part or all of the fic.
Once the alpha reads it, they mark in red any suggestions, but instead of just marking mistakes, the document looks like a professional editor from a book publishing company got a hold of it.
You’d either email back and forth or (more often) chat online or talk on the phone with them while you both went over it, each making different suggestions. It wasn’t just a one-day/one-sitting thing, and from then on there’s emails back and forth with cheerleading and ideas and chunks of fic from both the writer and the alpha, so that by the time the fic is done, anywhere from 1% to sometimes 49% of the writing is from the alpha (with your fic in mind, not their own way they wanted the story to go), and the rest of it was at least helped along by the alpha.
It was very rewarding to do this for other writers. I enjoyed it a lot. And having an alpha myself was such a treat. I can’t even explain it to you. It’s an awesome experience, and one I’d love every writer to experience.
What it Does for Beginners
New writers are vulnerable and don’t know their way around. An alpha would take them under their wing and help them along, helping them find where and how to post, how to use warnings, summaries, tags, etc. If a writer got bad feedback, the alpha was there to listen and encourage. If they got good feedback, an alpha was there to celebrate right along with them.
In my opinion, it made for more confident writers, because they were prepared for some of the shit writers get, and alphas stopped them from ever making newbie mistakes in the first place that get some writers flamed and ridiculed. Not that I’m condoning flaming, but the truth is it happens.
All in all, I’d love for the concept of Alphas to come back.
A little fandom lore from back in the day. And helpful writing advice. Not to mention useful for anyone who ever wondered why we calle Beta readers Betas and who the alpha was
“The serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great; bad becomes worse.”
I’ve been thinking about this fantastic post that discusses the scientific effects of the super-soldier serum on Steve Rogers’s brain. It’s based on info from the Avengers exhibit in Times Square, and what it concludes is that after the serum, “Steve just feels more.” Because of the changes to his amygdala, everything Steve felt would have been amplified – joy, pain, loyalty, all of it. What this made me realize is:
The serum would have increased everything Steve felt for Bucky.
Whether you ship the idea of a romantic connection between those two or not, Steve loved Bucky. Bucky was his person, 100%, ‘til the end of the line. They’d spent most of a lifetime developing love and loyalty and friendship. Steve might have had some hero worship going on, because Bucky was everything he wanted to be: strong, able to fight for the little guys, charming, loyal. But once he got hit with Erskine’s serum, everything – every one of those feelings – would have been amped up, magnified. If Bucky was his person before the serum, afterwards, Bucky would have been everything. This is why Steve was willing to risk his life, to disobey orders, to hop in a Jeep and go chasing across Europe by himself to rescue the man. There was never a possibility he could do otherwise, because every bit of love he’d built up over a lifetime was driving him forward.
The serum amplified all of Steve’s feelings, and his love and loyalty for Bucky would have become absolute devotion.
But Bucky got Zola’s version.
Whatever Zola did to Bucky before Steve rescued him, it was already acting upon him in fundamental ways – otherwise, there’s no way Bucky could have survived the fall from the train. But what if Zola’s version tended to increase the negative feelings more? I feel like we see some of this in the bar scene, when Bucky complains, “I’m invisible.” Sure, he’s joking, but he’s being pretty hurtful and taunting about how Steve had been treated in the past.
Maybe Bucky had always been a little envious of Steve, envious of the goodness he saw in Steve that he believed he, himself, didn’t possess. And now Steve has all of that inner perfection but has the outer shell to match; he’s caught up to Bucky in the one area where Bucky ever believed he had even the slightest advantage over Steve. And Bucky’s slight twinge of envy becomes a hot streak of jealousy.
Maybe Bucky isn’t feeling jealous, but possessive. Steve has always been his, exclusively – Bucky’s the only one who ever recognized his value. To Bucky, Steve was like that secret spot you find where you can sit and watch the sunrise in perfect isolation; only suddenly the rest of the world has discovered his secret place. With his feelings amplified, Peggy’s interest in Steve might have hit Bucky like a physical blow, because he’s being forced to share his Steve with everyone, just when he desperately needs him the most. And all Bucky can do is lash out – at Steve, who brought this on by taking the serum.
Or maybe, Bucky is truly angry. Because he’s just been through hell and he’s nowhere near recovered – look at the disheveled uniform, and the fact that he’s sitting alone tossing back drinks while the rest of the Commandos party and sing in the other room. He’s survived torture, and then Captain America sits down and asks him to rejoin the fight. And because of the serum…he can’t say no. His love and loyalty for Steve have always been stronger than fear; he’d take on any challenge to protect Steve. Now, even though the fear has been increased, so have the other feelings. Maybe, with the serum running through his veins, he literally can’t say no. Maybe he tries – his first response is “Hell no,” but he can’t stick with that, because he has to protect Steve. So maybe Bucky is angry – that he can’t make himself walk away – and hurt, that Steve even asked this of him. And all he can do in that moment is try to hurt Steve, too.
But what if it’s not a negative feeling being amped up? Maybe (hello, Stucky shippers!) what we’re seeing is Bucky’s reaction to all the love he feels for Steve being amplified out of control. Because Bucky has always tucked those feelings away; buried anything but brotherly affection, not about to taint Steve with feelings that Bucky has decided are dark and wicked. With the serum, he can’t deny it anymore, can’t hide from what he feels, what he wants. He tries drinking, and it’s not enough. Maybe he’s afraid he’s given himself away, by telling Steve he’ll follow him anywhere. So he tries flirting with Peggy, but it fails, because even she can see how magnificent Steve is, and Bucky’s heart wasn’t really in it anyways. Then Bucky does the only thing that makes sense to him – he tries to be mean, to push Steve away before Steve figures out that Bucky wants so much more from him than he ought to.
It’s heartbreaking to think of Steve and Bucky’s feelings for each other being amplified by the serums they’ve been given.
Because it just makes it that much more painful that Steve has to watch Bucky fall. That Bucky falls knowing he won’t be able to protect Steve any longer. That all of their feelings for each other – love and loyalty and respect and devotion – have been increased, and their ability to feel anguish and loss has increased right along with it. The serums made Steve and Bucky more fully themselves, amplified everything that made them who they were – and at the core, what made these two was each other.
This was like, one of my very first posts in this fandom…not sure why it’s suddenly making the rounds again, but I’m happy to make everyone cry some more. 🙂
The Archery Range 