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igenlodeI have almost finished my second notebook, and the Phantom has *finally* made his entry in person on the stage of this story -- I suspect this is probably the only fanfic where almost the entirety of the Masquerade chapter is taken up by something completely unrelated to his sudden appearance! Ironically, the one scene that I actually had planned for Chapter Seven, the 'entracte' chapter, was the image of Hertha accidentally overhearing an angst-filled conversation between Raoul and Christine in the grounds at Beauvais, but because the chapter ran so long I didn't actually fit it in; so we learn about it in flashback -- surprise, surprise -- in the course of Hertha's attendance at the masquerade ball, which is Raoul and Christine's first subsequent encounter. Under the circumstances, they're clearly not talking about a secret engagement and Christine isn't wearing Raoul's ring round her neck. (We don't actually know what they do say, because Hertha can't hear it -- all she gets this time is the body language, which is fraught enough to trigger a flashback for my purposes...)
It turns out to be just as well the chapter is mostly concerned with something else, because I hadn't realised the Phantom's part in the Masquerade was quite so short. Yet again, almost everything I originally had planned turns out to be based on the movie version; this story really, really was intended by my subconscious to be a movie-fic. The movie evidently decided to roll the second 'Notes' scene and the Masquerade into one so that the Phantom can deliver all his taunting and 'instructions' to the characters in person; of course, this raises the question of why anyone would stand around and let him do it, which is why they had to show Raoul running off to get his sword at the Phantom's first appearance -- he gets taunted by fans for 'running away', but he would rightfully be even more taunted for just standing there impotently, letting his rival walk all over everyone and seduce Christine away from his side ;-p
But the result is that we don't get an opportunity for the Phantom to taunt Hertha in Raoul's absence, we don't get a scenario where Raoul is torn between the need to protect Christine and the imperative to shield his pregnant and physically vulnerable wife (maybe that can be moved to the 'Don Juan' sequence?), and in fact the Phantom doesn't taunt anyone: he just emerges from the crowd, throws down his score, makes threats about the chandelier and Christine's ring, and vanishes. (The fact that the movie is saving the chandelier scene for later clearly made it imperative that they put *something* else in there, otherwise it would have been a very short appearance indeed!)
Hertha has turned out to be a lot more resentful towards Christine than I'd anticipated, so I need to negotiate her back towards seeing her as the Phantom's prey as opposed to a marriage-wrecker...
It turns out to be just as well the chapter is mostly concerned with something else, because I hadn't realised the Phantom's part in the Masquerade was quite so short. Yet again, almost everything I originally had planned turns out to be based on the movie version; this story really, really was intended by my subconscious to be a movie-fic. The movie evidently decided to roll the second 'Notes' scene and the Masquerade into one so that the Phantom can deliver all his taunting and 'instructions' to the characters in person; of course, this raises the question of why anyone would stand around and let him do it, which is why they had to show Raoul running off to get his sword at the Phantom's first appearance -- he gets taunted by fans for 'running away', but he would rightfully be even more taunted for just standing there impotently, letting his rival walk all over everyone and seduce Christine away from his side ;-p
But the result is that we don't get an opportunity for the Phantom to taunt Hertha in Raoul's absence, we don't get a scenario where Raoul is torn between the need to protect Christine and the imperative to shield his pregnant and physically vulnerable wife (maybe that can be moved to the 'Don Juan' sequence?), and in fact the Phantom doesn't taunt anyone: he just emerges from the crowd, throws down his score, makes threats about the chandelier and Christine's ring, and vanishes. (The fact that the movie is saving the chandelier scene for later clearly made it imperative that they put *something* else in there, otherwise it would have been a very short appearance indeed!)
Hertha has turned out to be a lot more resentful towards Christine than I'd anticipated, so I need to negotiate her back towards seeing her as the Phantom's prey as opposed to a marriage-wrecker...