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How Did I Get Into SWAT Kats?
The Fateful Day...
I was hooked on SWAT Kats from the minute I stumbled across an episode while flipping through channels back in 1993 (the year the show first aired - though I was several months late to have seen its premiere). It was just my kind of cartoon - science fiction and action. By the third episode, I was in love with T-Bone and Razor as characters. Slowly, that love expanded to include the entire cast. (Well, I've never been a villain fangirl, so my feelings for them were less love and more the feeling that they were interesting villains who made for good conflicts.)
By the time the second season of SWAT Kats was aired the fall after I "found" the show, I had successfully hooked my brother and my dad as well. We watched every episode together and, afterward, I ran off with the video tape (the show was aired on Sunday mornings and, as we attend church, we had to tape it) and paused scenes to draw.
The show stopped airing in the summer of 1995. Two years later, I was sure the show was dead. (With Cartoon Network not part of my cable packge then, I had no idea they were airing it.) I found the Internet fandom in December of 1996 and got involved with it in 1997. That same year, I found a girl hoping to start an RPG on America Online named Rikki Feral. That acquaintance led me into joining the AOL SWAT Kats RPG. I also found the SWAT Kats Fanfiction Archive and fixed up a story I'd written based on the SWAT Kats to be posted there. That was when I realized for the first time that I wrote "fanfic" as they called it. And, I haven't stopped writing since.
Choosing Favorites
As far as favorite SWAT Kats go... I don't have one. I love the two of them and think it was their friendship that made me come to love the show. Now, when votes are taken on forums and other fan communities, since there's rarely a "both" category, I've always voted for T-Bone in the hopes of evening things out since it has traditionally seemed that the fandom swung 80% in Razor's favor. And, I'm a sucker for an underdog... er... underkat. Granted, this trend seems to have reversed itself in some communities over the years. So, maybe I'll start voting for Razor.
Mushy Stuff
I'm not much of a romance fan. I prefer reading and writing about familial and friendly relationships. There are some pairings that I like, but I can list all of those on one hand. And, none of them are in SWAT Kats.* I don't really think romance had much of a place in SWAT Kats' action-based plotlines. But, if we must discuss romance in it, you can probably tell that I have, in the past, leaned toward pairing Chance and Callie. He blatantly flirts with her in "The Giant Bacteria". (Admittedly, rather unsuccessfully.) And, he always seemed to me to be the one most concerned for her safety. Not that Jake wasn't too; Chance just seemed to get more upset. All the same, Mac and Molly Mange are the only couple I view as official within SWAT Kats. I'll defend my Chance/Callie theory as having some validity, but I can see where other pairings could work in the hands of a skilled enough fanfic author.
* If you're curious, the pairings I like are: Inuyasha/Kagome (Inuyasha), Sango/Miroku (Inuyasha), Edward Elric/Winry Rockbell (Fullmetal Alchemist), Roy Mustang /Riza Hawkeye (Fullmetal Alchemist), and Kenshin/Kaoru (Rurouni Kenshin). These are pairings that I actually enjoy and could potentially see myself writing fanfic for, but I generally support all official pairings for any given fandom. My definition of falling in love with a series means loving it as it is, officialized pairings included, even if they don't especially interest me much.
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Disclaimer: SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron is copyright Hanna-Barbera Cartoons Inc. All Rights Reserved. © 1995. All other characters and material within this page are the property of either myself, Kristen Sharpe/T.L. Amos, or their respective creators.