Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Fun with Polls The Clark Quiz

Sorry about that, Kaylle. It works okay for me now, but perhaps there is some funky glitch.

I spent some time today on another site where the author, Tara LJC O\'Shea , had written some excellent essays on fanfic a few years back that are very applicable to this discussion.

One of essays, titled Reality By Consensus , seemed to pretty much sum up Cindy's concerns about why using fanfic to obtain canon for additional fanfic is not a good idea. In fact, Tara's words were eerily close to the ones Cindy used in her post:

I do agree that taking information presented in fanfic but never confirmed by actual, real canon to *be* new canon can lead to fanfic that moves away from the original, possibly even too far.

But Tara also says that most writers of fanfic don't set out to create fanon:

Speaking for myself, this is exactly the view I take when I write fanfic. I'm not trying to change canon or convince people that my version is more correct than what was presented on the show. I'm simply exploring a what-if scenario that exists only within the parameters of my story. I'm willing to bend canon but I'd never expect it to actually remain bent.

I would guess that most writers in this fandom feel the same way.

Lynn

You know, this is a fascinating discussion, but something has just occurred to me.

The thing is, I must be well out of the loop, because I don't actually recall ever noticing these instances of 'fanon' before.

Does anyone have any specific examples they could post? Seems I've missed all the obvious stuff over the years. I'd be interested in seeing some of what I've been oblivious to. Should be equally interesting. Might even be the case that with my memory jogged I'll recall that I actually was aware of them and they've just slipped my mind over time.


LabRat

Labby, there's a Star Trek example that comes to mind.

T\'Kuht first showed up in one author's fanfics as an explanation for how Spock could be correct when he said, "Vulcan has no moon" -- yet something is seen in Vulcan's sky. It spread to other fanfic, and then to the books.



Oh!!! I know a L&C one too! AFAIK, at no time on the show did they say (or even imply) that Clark dislikes being in planes. However, so many fanfics use this as fact that for a long time I thought it was in episode I hadn't seen.

I used to know this stuff... the one example of "fanon" I can remember is from way back -- Zoomway wrote You Made Me Love You and in it, she portrayed Mayson as xenophobic, as in this exchange:

A lot of people adopted that idea, consciously or not. Actually, I remember being slightly surprised to look back at the show and see that the characterization of her *wasn't* supported there.

The only other one I remember is that someone (Chris Mulder, maybe) created a restaurant called "Angelina's" and it showed up in other stories subsequently; I think some people thought it was the name of the place L&C went in Lucky Leon.

edit: Good example, Rivka, which reminded me of another one (I think) -- the idea that Lois's sofas are incredibly uncomfortable to sit on. I don't think that's from the show, but it sure shows up in a lot of fanfic.

PJ

Yes, but just look at them, Pam! Could you imagine curling up comfortably on them? And, of course, we only ever saw them snuggling on Clark's sofa...

Fascinating discussion! Oh, and I have another example - there are plenty of fics which make reference to Clark being a terrible singer. Not from the series at all! As far as I recall from someone explaining it, that came from Dean Cain apparently not being able to carry a note in a bucket.

Edit: Back with another one. What's Clark's favourite film? The Princess Bride? Um... why? That one's not in the series either. Again, I think Dean Cain might have said once that he liked it, and it's found its way into dozens of fic.

Any more?


Wendy

Well, bucket acoustics being what they are, who can blame him?

Since I'm procrastinating on various things, I thought I'd make a thread regarding Lab's question.

Fanon versus Canon

I'll encourage Rivka, Pam, and Wendy to repeat their wonderful examples over there!

Sara

Just being brief here, as I've replied over on Sara's thread. But just to reiterate that I'm thoroughly enjoying all these examples - I see that you got there first with Angelina's, Pam. <g>

Thanks again, Sara, for starting the thread - it was fun to read the responses there this morning - hope there will be many more. It's fascinating.

LabRat

Post edited because author is not paying attention

Just ignore me. The dancing pixies are very distracting.

Helga

See here for Zoom's response:

http://www.zoomway.net/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=12;t=001138;p=1#000000

And as for fanon, there's also the one where Lois wears cucumber oil... For the record, it's cause Teri wore it when she and Dean were doing love scenes because he liked it.

Laura

I came to this thread kind of late, but I noticed one thing in the definitions Lynn quoted: All of those definitions are the same things I would say to justify writing fanfic that only follows canon. Extending a work or developing new plots is exactly what we did in S5 and S6, while staying entirely within canon. So from those definitions, I think it's possible to find support for either position in this discussion. I think S5 and S6 also showed that it is possible to write in canon without just repeating yourself over and over.

If making a choice (even a choice among crappy choices) defines a character, that may explain why some FoLCs don't like episode rewrites that depend on Lois or Clark making a choice that s/he didn't make in the show. When we already know how a character chose, changing it automatically makes the fanfic choice OOC if the character's past hasn't changed. Otherwise, why would the same person make a different choice in the exact same situation?

Or maybe we feel that the choice from canon was OOC. Or else we really don't think that a person's choices reflect his/her personality or character.

Kaylee...

I giggled for a long time over the image you created with this one. I loved it. Just wanted you to know that.

Sheila, I always tried to get around that by using my authorial powers to change some of the background circumstances -- if you change the context of a character's choice, the choice could change. But that's what we talk about as justifying a character's decision (or not), and some choices do require a lot of justification Those justifications will work for some readers and not for others, obviously.

And sometimes, we think "yeah, that was a little OOC, but what the heck, it's turning into a really fun story, so I'll suspend disbelief a little bit more than usual."

Everyone's got their own preferences and paradigms. Live and let live, I say. Enjoy the stuff you like, and avoid the stuff you don't -- the presence on the web of stories I can't stand doesn't really hurt me any. This isn't a limited resource, where only so many stories can be shared, so there's lots of room for various interpretations.

PJ

I was fascinated by both polls, Lynn. Thanks so much for your hard work putting them together. The Lois-poll was a bit harder for me to answer, as it depended so much on the season of the show you were talking about. In the end I decided to follow my perception of Lois in S1 (since it's my favourite season, especially as far as Lois's character is concerned).

The answers and following discussion have been equally fascinating for me to read, and so I'll chime in with my .02.

I've always firmly believed that we're free of the choices/decisions we make, and of our behaviour towards ourselves and others. I don't believe in determinism, which means, to me, that what we saw on the show could have been completely different and still stay in character. I mean, in our life, we make decisions and choices every day, sometimes life-altering decisions. Sometimes the choice is obvious to us (then it's not even a choice at all). But when it's not obvious, when we have to think about it, when we hesitate, it would be just as much "in character" for us to make either decision and go either way. The same goes for characters.

Would Clark tell Lois he's Superman before he proposed to her? In the show, he didn't. But I'm convinced, like many of you guys, that he could have. I'm also convinced that he could have waited longer (his fear of her reaction and his habit to keep it a secret could have made him).

Would Lois go ahead and marry Luthor? In the show, she almost did, but in the end she said she couldn't. If it hadn't been for Clark being always on her mind, I'm absolutely sure she would have, for a whole set of reasons I already waffled on many times over the years, so I won't bore you with them again. Others are absolutely sure Lois would never have said "I do" anyway. Are they wrong? Am I wrong? Who am I to say who's wrong and who's right anyway? Lois is not *determined*. She could have gone ahead with the wedding just like she could have left Lex at the altar. Both would have been in character imho.

So I'm a firm believer that characters (just like any of us) can react in opposite ways while still staying in character. Their choices will affect what comes next, but the choice itself doesn't determine their character. It's the way they *feel* and the way they deal with different situations that show who they truly are.

Then again, I believe we can put Lois and Clark in any kind of situation, just like life puts *us* in any kind of situation. And once we introduce new situations for them to deal with, their reactions and their choices will of course sometimes be different from what we saw on the show. Otherwise it'd mean their life is already determined (and that makes things kind of pointless if you ask me).

Also, some FoLCs have very differing opinions on certain episodes being in character or not. I know there's debate on Barbarians at the Planet / The House of Lane. Others (like myself) think that the last few episodes of S4, with Lois wanting children, is out of character. To be honest, it's not so much that I think it's out of character, but that Lois's change of heart towards having children was not justified enough for me to believe it. And that's just the thing with fanfic: if you put Lois and Clark in circumstances where Lois would come around to actually *wanting* children as badly as in the show, you'll convince me.

And the differing opinion issue comes into play for fanfic as well! We all have different views on what the characters truly feel. Canon never showed how they truly feel in that much detail. Fanfic gives us that, but it's all unofficial. Canon shows us decisions and choices. As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't tell us very much about the inner battles the characters fought. That's where we have some freedom of interpretation, and that's what makes fanfic so rich and interesting.

Fanfic, to me, is about exploring the characters and who they truly are.

Kaethel.

Or, in the words of the old Star Trek philosophy, "infinite diversity in infinite combinations." IOW, there's room for all possibilities in any universe.

Part of the sheer fun of fanfic has always been exploring every and any variation on the themes presented to us in a show. This doesn't mean the characters are necessarily warped. Mostly, in episode rewrites it's the circumstances or events which are changed. Sometimes those changes are so great that we call those stories alternate universes. And sometimes they are minuscule, barely noticeable. Even the tiniest change can have a huge impact on how a character would react in any given situation, however. And exploring all those nuances is part of the fascination. Pull one small thread and see how things unravel.

And even if the situation and circumstances are exactly the same as shown in an episode, it's still fun to say, "Hmmmmmm...wonder what would have happened if Lois said yes instead of no there? Or if Clark had decided to take path B instead of path A?" That's not warping character. It's simply exploring all the possible variations of what could have happened.

So I think it's hard to find justification for the theory that an episode rewrite automatically means characters which are OOC. I've read plenty of episode rewrites where I have no difficulty recognising the Lois and Clark we saw on the show. Heck, I'd even claim to have written a few.

LabRat

Who's zoom?

Zoomway, or Zoom for brevity's sake, is a long time FoLC and fanfic writer The link Laura provided is the reply she posted on her L&C boards (she doesn't come here).

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

Huh?

How does she know what to reply to if she doesn't come here? In fact, what question was posted to her that required a reply, anyway?

I didn't understand Laura's original post, and now I'm even more baffled.



Lynn

She seems to read here, but reply there.

I do the same in reverse.

My understanding, Lynn, is that Zoom isn't registered with these boards and therefore can't post a reply here. I don't know whether she checks them out on a regular basis or if she only peeked in because someone had alerted her to the discussion of a couple of her fics re canon/fanon. She felt that there were some misconceptions, and so started a topic on her boards (the link that Laura posted) to air her viewpoint. I owe a response over there, as it turns out, hopefully tomorrow...

Kathy