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

Ah! But isn't that the whole point of fanfic? To explore new territory that wasn't part of the series?

I appreciate your point on characteraztion needing to come from the show. (That's what Lynn was trying to prove, imo, from this poll - see how well we know L&C characterization from the show). But also realize that as we put out favorite characters in new and different situations that we don't have characterization canon for, we need to have a rationalization for how they act and react. For that, we can only speculate and make our best guesses on how they would handle things from what we *do* know of the show. Expand upon that characterization that we do know.

So is fanfic a gross manipulation of characterization (not trying to put words in your mouth )? Yup! That's exactly what it is! But we do the best we can from the foundation we were given.

Sara

Oops... thought of something else.

I'd like to think that what we all consider characterization canon is something not so static. It grows and evolves with every fic we write as a fandom. If author number two agrees with author number one's characterization, why not use it? And if it gets used repeatedly because most everyone agrees with it, that makes it part of what we all consider canon, right? Yes, there are some stories that are grossly out of character and not rationalized, but on the whole, I'd like to think that fanfic authors have created not so much a new canon for characterization, but one that is enhanced from what we were given.

For example, we never saw Clark cry on the show, so we can assume that to be part of the "original" canon - that Clark does not cry. Now, many fanfic authors have brought Clark to tears (and believably so). Does this mean any stories in which Clark cries are out of character? Not really, IMO. Who's to say that Clark wouldn't have cried in season 5? Or that during the parts of the show we didn't see (in between episodes and scenes) he didn't break down and cry, or at least weep? Regardless, it's become a part of the evolved canon.

If we're expanding the L&C universe, why not the characterization too?

Sara (who thinks she's really done now )

That's your view, Cindy, and you're welcome to it. Personally, I thought it was a good introduction. It established the mood and purpose of the poll, which, to me, is largely a question of how much our individual interpretations of the characters are in alignment.

Furthermore, I don't think any of the theories mentioned in that opening paragraph were intended to be advanced as the single correct answer to the rhetorical question "Who is qualified to judge whether or not something is in character?"

"Someone who has read a lot of fic" is a possible answer, but only one among many. It's not one I'd agree with, either.

Then again, whether you'd seen all 88 episodes or only the first 44 wouldn't really matter if you were talking about a situation that takes place before Season 3.

Furthermore, you can't point to the series as the ultimate answer. Not only are there plenty of situations and possibilities which were never covered in the series (which is what makes fic possible in the first place), but individual episodes were written by entirely different people. I don't think many people would disagree with me if I said that Lois, Clark, Perry, Martha, and Jonathan were all acting at least somewhat out of character in "Chi of Steel." It's a real episode. It's in canon. Despite that, however, it's still fairly clear that those characters were behaving in ways which conflict with their established personalities.

I don't see that the poll is offering an answer to the question at all. To me, it's not a question of finding a right answer, but rather a way for me to gauge how closely my understanding of Clark's character lines up with the understanding of the fandom at large. If the majority thinks differently than I do, does that mean I'm wrong? No. Is it something I should take into consideration? Probably.

I agree with you that there were times when, given the choice, I would have picked something that wasn't on the list. As I mentioned in that thread, that happened to me more on the Lois quiz than on this one. (For example, on the first question, there was no option saying that she would return the dress, which is what I finally concluded she'd have done.) The thing is that there are only a finite number of options one can include given this format. Lynn did the best she could to provide good options without including an overwhelming number of choices. Sometimes, that meant that she left out what I or somebody else considered the best option. Maybe she didn't even think of that possibility. Nobody's perfect, and you can't please all of the people all of the time.

I don't think the solution to that is to include an "other" or a "none of the above." As others have stated, doing so is detrimental to the effectiveness of the poll. If there had been an "other" option available, anyone with his or her own idea would have picked that, along with anyone who wanted to choose more than one answer. We'd have been left with the majority choosing "other" on far too many questions, each meaning something else entirely.

That's exactly the point, Cindy. The poll was intended to cover situations and aspects which hadn't come up on the show. If it had been constructed otherwise, it wouldn't have been a question of characterization, but rather of trivia knowledge.

Nor was the idea to show a definitive right answer. In fact, Lynn said more than once that she didn't believe there was a definitive right answer.

Actually, looking back on Lynn's introduction, I could just as easily have shortened this entire post by just telling you to go back and read the rest of what she had to say after the paragraph you quoted.

Lynn stated up front that:

• She had intentionally chosen questions about aspects and situations which were not directly addressed on the show.
• We were to choose our answers based on the show's canon. (In other words, not to allow fic to sway our judgement.)
• There were no right or wrong answers.
• No one but Clark himself has ultimate authority to say what he would or would not do.
• There was a real possibility that we would all choose such different answers that the poll would tell us nothing more than that we each have our own interpretations and that none of us is right.
• She did not include an "Other" option because she didn't want to open the question up to that many possibilities. (Since that would defeat the purpose of the poll.)
• Sometimes we just have to agree to disagree.

To me, this is a lot closer to what the poll is all about. The question was "Does Clark believe in God?" There was no answer to that given on the show. You thought about it, about who Clark is, what he does, and what drives him to do that. You concluded that, for his actions to make sense to you, he would have to believe in a higher power.

I chose "yes" to that question for a very different reason. I think it's entirely possible to do what Clark does without needing a higher power for guidance or emotional support. That's because I believe in secular humanism, which includes the belief that human beings (and, presumably, Kryptonians) are capable of doing good for its own sake.

My reason for choosing "yes" to that question was more one of background. From what I know of the US in general and the Midwest in specific, someone born and raised in Kansas is more likely to believe in God than not. It also seems to me that Clark's hopeful and optimistic personality is one that lends itself to some sort of belief.

I think it's interesting to know that, even though we have different views on quite a few things, we came to the same answer on this question, even without any evidence from the show itself. I think it's also interesting that we have such different reasons for choosing that answer.

I also think it's very interesting to see in general how my answers matched up against the majority and also which questions and areas are clearest and which are the most contested. Now I know that (based on a sample of 56, which is a good number for a fandom this size) about 3/4 of FoLCs think that Clark believes in some sort of God, but that we're split 50/50 over whether or not he'd have sex with his wife during business hours.

I also think it's very gratifying to know that my understanding of the character matches up so well with the general fandom's. For the most part, we've chosen the same answers, and on most of the questions when I was torn between two possible answers, it seems that the fandom is similarly split.

To me, this was a very interesting exercise, and I learned a lot.

Paul

Seems to me that one of the benefits of the poll was to find out to what extent fans agree in their understanding of Clark's character.

Of course, as Cindy says, the series itself is the source of all knowledge, but as can be plainly seen from the numerous discussions on characterisation and events from the episodes, fans' interpretation of this information can differ wildly. For example, I remember a long discussion on whether we could see Lois and Clark sinking to the floor behind a floaty curtain at the end of one of the eps, and whether or not we were therefore meant to assume that they slept together - during the Krypton arc, I think. Now, we all watched the same images on the screen. But some of us didn't even notice the vague movement hinting that they'd slid down to the floor (ie, me <g>). Some of us saw the movement and thought nothing of it. And some of us went the whole way and thought they'd slept together - and were utterly surprised that the rest of us didn't think the same.

Now, the above example isn't an issue of characterisation, but I still think it's fair to use it as an illustration of how different fans will take the same information and interpret it in quite different ways. Who can say who was right and who was wrong in the above example? No-one but the series production team.

So you're saying that if Clark is put into a situation which tests an aspect of his character not addressed in the show, then no-one can predict authoritatively what he may or may not do? Or is that twisting your words unfairly?

Yvonne

I was mentally preparing a reply post, then Sara and Paul and Yvonne very eloquently put into words my exact thoughts.

But I do want to weigh in on the following:

The impetus for me to create this poll in the first place was some frustrations I had been feeling over claims that people who write fanfic that deviates from the parameters of the show (and I'm not talking about OOC but rather premises that deviate from what we saw in the show) are not true LnC fans, but rather hybrid fans who use their interest in other incarnations of Superman to...for lack of a better word...infect their stories.

I so strongly disagree with this assertion that it lead me to wonder why it is that some people feel they are better qualified to judge characterisations and appropriate premises than others, to know when a certain story depicts a "Smallville" Clark or a "Christopher Reeves Movie" Clark versus simply an LnC: TNAOS Clark who's been thrown into unsual circumstances. I personally consider everyone who frequents these MBs true LnC: TNAOS fans, all of us experts, and all of us qualified to offer an opinion.

Thus the birth of this poll - to demonstrate how all of us in this little corner of the fandom bring to the table a wide variety of experiences that lead us to assume different things about the characters, despite the fact that we all watched the exact same 88 episodes. And just because we differ in our answers about what Lois or Clark might do in a given situation doesn't make any one person less of a fan of LnC: TNAOS.

Like Paul said, my question as to what it takes to be an "expert" on LnC: TNAOS was purely rhetorical. I don't know the answer to that. Cindy summed up my own feelings on the correct answer perfectly:

The way this poll was constructed was to push everyone out of the comfort zone. If I had asked questions such as "What would Lois do if Lex proposed to her?", we all know the answer or we could all run to our taped copy of BaTP to find out. This poll wasn't set up to confirm things we all saw on the show but rather to see how we would take what we learned about these people on the show and apply it to new situations. Because fanfic is not a rehashing of the show but rather an effort to pull the characters out of the show and put them into new situations. Or at the very least, fanfic twists the circumstances that were presented in a given episode so that the outcome is no longer certain or the road taken to the same end is different.

And since fanfic goes beyond what we were shown in the show, we have to make guesses about what the characters would do, just as this poll asked you to do.

In direct response to Cindy's concern about specific questions:

The question doesn't ask "What does he do immediately." It asks what he does when he gets home. Could be that he spends a few hours or days on a remote cliff somewhere, beating himself up for his failings. But when he finally returns home...

Why is it bogus? Or why is it any more bogus than any hypothetical question? All of these questions are bogus. Every question in every quiz in every magazine or on every website is bogus, right?

I am sorry for some dumb mistakes I made in answer choices - especially the questions about superpowers - because I had honestly forgotten a few of them. That was just a bone-head move on my part.

In the end, this poll did exactly what I'd hoped it would do. It shows that we all have different ideas, and while we all would agree that certain actions can be judged out of character (Clark killing someone - even Hitler), some areas are just too gray for any one action to be claimed the only "in-character" action.

In the end, I believe in Lab's philosophy that any character can do pretty much anything given the proper motivation. IMO, the mark of an excellent story is how well the writer presented that motivation so that when the character does act in a way counter to what I'd expect that I not only understand why he or she did it but see his or her actions as perfectly natural given the situation.

I already know how Lois would react if Lex proposed to her. I want to know how Lois would react if Lex kidnapped her and held her prisoner in fortress buried in the Swiss Alps...

Lynn

LOL--well, we know how ONE fanfic writer thinks she would respond. *thinks it's about time to reread the awesome Masques*

This was a very neat poll--made for some interesting discussion, I can see. Unfortunately, I don't have time to add my own two bits, really, but most people summed up what I would have said already anyhow. Thanks for creating it, Lynn!

Well I thought this was a fun poll! It was interesting to see what got the majority of votes with the exception of 2 I was in the majority. It is interesting how we all see certain aspects of Clark very clrarly. Now do one for Lois! Thank you! Laura

There already is one for Lois, Laura. You'll find it here

Responding to some responses given....

I'd like to start out by saying that it's my own personal belief that the point of fanfic is not to *change* the show or try to make it into what we wish it were, but to supplement the show, to expand on the things that we were presented with. Sometime we play "what-if" with certain things (like revelations), but again, it's done within the framework of the show - what if this had happened just a little bit different at this point, et cetra.

To that end, it is also my belief that some things should be taken as absolutes (or "canon"). These include most of the basic, global concepts presented on the show, the core of which is how the characters are presented. That's why I have to disagree with the following statement:
When that happens, you're no longer writing fanfic about the show, you're writing fanfic about other fanfic. It's like making a copy of a copy on an old Xerox machine - The lines become blurred and eventually you can't even make out the original anymore. Just because everyone seems to like a concept and it appears repeatedly in fanfic doesn't make it "in canon", it just makes it popular. It also makes for boring fic.

I freely admit that there is plenty of gray area as far as the characterization of Clark and Lois go. Plenty of issues were not addressed on the show, and if a fanfic writer wants to tread down a new path to see what the characters would do, fine. But at the same time, there are plenty of areas that WERE covered, and thoroughly at that. There's no excuse for taking a characteristic that was well defined on the show and completely changing it to make the characters react in a way they wouldn't normally in order to try and beat the characters to fit whatever plot you've conceived.

It shows a lack of understanding of the character if you are unable to define the differences between Clark as presented in LnC, Smallville, and the movies. There are such fundamental differences between the three that it's hard to know where to begin. If one has to stretch the character so far to fit their story that the lines between the three are blurred, than it's probably a good bet that Clark won't be considered in character by a good number of people.

And? A skyscraper is built by a whole lot of people, but ultimately it comes together as one building. Different authors contributed different things to their episodes, but that's what gives the series more depth and more flavor. Ultimately, the show is a body of work, and it is the rock that a fanfic should ideally be centered around.

On the poll:
Well, you just proved my point. If the information from the results of the poll influence how you approach the character, then the group has asserted its will upon you. Thus, characterization by committee.

My point is that characterization can't be limited to a small set of (generally unsatifactory or overly simplstic) choices, and trying to make people choose from a list of answers they don't agree with doesn't accomplish anything. It would be interesting to see how many people would vote "other" to some of those questions, and what people would give as an explanation after the fact. That would probably say more about how characterization is approached. Even just generating a list of questions and letting it be discussed in the absence of a poll would work.

That's where we differ, I guess.

AnnN.

While I agree with Cindy that it's absolutely necessary to return to the episodes if we want to consider ourselves able to write in character, I think that the points others are making are also very valid. We don't know how Lois or Clark would react in all situations, because the series didn't consider all situations.

Consider this: are there any scenarios in which Clark would walk out on his (happy) marriage to Lois? Abandon Superman? Divorce Lois and move to another country, eventually starting a new relationship? Well, try Demi's Heaven's Prisoners, in which Clark does exactly that after failing to save Martha and Jonathan. Wonderful story. Very convincing premise.

How about Clark lying to Lois and deceiving her so that he can carry on a sexual relationship with her? One that he would not have if he was honest? I'm not talking here about sleeping with her without telling her that he's Superman (there are several stories where he does that), but deceiving her about something even more fundamental... that he's not her husband. Well, in a classic story, Zoomway's Counter-ClarkWise, he does just that. And it's believable.

Clark doesn't kill? Yeah, I'd go along with that. But has anyone read Raconteur's amazing Burden of Conscience? She convinced me that he could commit a deliberate act of murder, in self-defence.

So I will (almost) never say that it's simply not possible for a character to do X or Y - I'll go by the circumstances of the story and the motivation given by the author for the character's actions.


Wendy (who recently went on a binge and watches several episodes prior to writing a few short stories )

I have to disagree on this point. I know I wrote my first fanfic to *change* what I thought was *wrong* with the show. I despised Family Hour -- I thought that it was an inappropriate ending to a wonderful show. I think that is why a lot of people do episode rewrites. As authors, we have the ability to write what we deem as more appropriate endings to episodes. Actually, this would make an interesting poll. I wonder how many people think fanfic can not change the show into what we want it to be vs. who thinks fanfic's main purpose is to change the show into something we like better while still keeping the characters within the parameters of characterization we saw on the show.

- Laura

Ah... but you see, Cindy, I'd say exactly what you said, but about what you describe as "fanfic about the show." The more times we see the same situations from the show (or close to it), the more it gets old and frankly sometimes boring.

In Textual Poachers (a highly respected book on the subject of fan fiction), Henry Jenkins said: "Fan fiction is a way of the culture repairing the damage done in a system where contemporary myths are owned by corporations instead of owned by the folk."

Couldn't have said it better myself, though I think he made a typo... should be "FoLC".

IMO, fanfic is essentially writers taking the *characters* from the show they like and putting them in new and different situations or putting them in the same situations so that we can fix what we thought was wrong. If we didn't have new and different situations, it *would* be boring, not to mention there'd be no real point in writing fanfic in the first place.

The Xerox example you give is great! Take TOGOM for instance. That single episode has been run through the Xerox machine hundreds of times for re-writes and extensions. The original is still discernable: Lois and Clark, Clark gets shot by Clyde Barrow, angst ensues. And it's that blurring of the lines that makes each story different - *not* boring.

As far as writing fanfic about fanfic...

The point I was trying to make about expanding our idea of canon (or "fanfic canon" if you must ) is not that the same ideas for stories are copied over and over again, but that the characterization is mimicked. This, IMO still falls within the definition of fanfic. We simply use the characters we know and love (with a healthy dose of believable characterization) and away we go!

Though you say:

I can't say I agree with that, especially the part about beating the characters to fit. There's a story I remember (even got a Kerth nom this year!) in which we met Lois and Clark as college students, both alone and a little unsure of themselves... living in different states. Clark has a life changing epiphany and ends up becoming Superman while he was still in college. This is far outside what I consider to be the realm of show canon, but it worked for me and I didn't find that the author had to beat the characters to fit the new and original plot. I really loved "Bolt, From Dubuque." In the same respect, Kevin was not a part of the show. You created an original character, not of Lois and Clark and not of anyone's previous work. Granted, the idea of power transference was from the show, but Kevin was not. Does all this mean that this really isn't fanfic? Or that it's boring fanfic? IMO, I didn't find it boring at all, and I'd certainly classify it as fanfic.

Not necessarily. No one said that the poll results were fast and hard rules of what everyone needed to abide by when considering characterization when writing fanfic. But as Paul said, it's something to take into consideration if your answers don't match up with the results of the poll. That doesn't mean that you can't stray from what the results were.

Sara

Good grief, I can't believe I'm still up <g>. I hate end-of-term...

I did want to respond here, though, to some of the things that have been said.

I don't think that example really works. A skyscraper is built by a lot of people, yes, but all of them are following the very precise plans of an architect somewhere. They're not improvising details here and there or coming up with their own variations. If they were, I don't think the building would stand for very long . IMHO, the same is true of any collaborative work, from construction to music to computer engineering. Programs fail because one programmer used feet and another used meters. When a bunch of people are working together on something and aren't following strict guidelines, you're bound to have a few inconsistencies here and there.

So that said, doesn't each viewer cull through the episodes s/he's seen and select out what s/he feels is "right?"

The other problem with working only with what TPTB give us is that TPTB aren't always interested in doing what's "right" for the show or the characters. They're inhibited by a slew of other factors: Are they attracting the right demographic? Will their contract be renewed? Do the actors want out? If the long-denied romance is resolved, will the show be cancelled (aka the Moonlighting Curse)? And if so, what artificial means can they contrive to keep them apart, no matter how stupid?

I mean, look at the X-Files. For eight or nine years, TPTB strung the fans along with Mulder and Scully's will-they-won't-they dance. They dangled hints of "the truth" that was out there, but never let viewers put the pieces together. Ultimately a lot of people got sick of being led around by the nose and stopped watching. When TPTB finally started giving the viewers what they wanted, it was too little too late. I imagine a lot of L&C fans felt the same way about the clone wedding arc. I remember seeing the finale of season 3; after clones, fake weddings, amnesia, etc, L&C still weren't married and Clark was leaving for New Krypton. I remember thinking (and please don't hate me, guys, I did come back to the fold ) that at the rate they were going, I didn't care if the show came back for the fourth season or not. I'd had it with the runaround.

So do I think L&C act out of character sometimes? Yes. Do I think TPTB care? Not always, no. As Sara said, they're a corporation. They don't want nearly the same things we do. So I don't feel particularly bound to play by their rules. We're not making any money here; we write what we want to write.

Now, I'm not advocating that people twist the characters into something unrecognizable, slap them into a plot, and call it L&C. But every writer has to make choices about what to accept and what to ignore. In my opinion, what's important is that the writer stay true to the spirit of the show and the characters, but you can't be exactly right all the time. The show simply didn't provide that many answers. And if we did know how Lois/Clark would react in every situation imaginable, well, fanfic would become rather predictable, wouldn't it?

I mentioned this in the Lois Quiz thread too, but I'll say it again. I think the difficulty of the choices and the absence of a "None of the above" option were kind of the point of the quiz. And if there were a none of the above/other option, the answers would diverge all over the place and we'd never find any sort of common ground. If, as I assume, the point of the poll was to see how other people felt about the characters, seeing a bunch of "none of the above" answers in a spreadsheet doesn't tell you much.

And I don't think anyone was trying to make anyone do anything. If people disagree with the poll, they're free not to take it. And if they disagree with the results, they're free to ignore those too. For some of us, this was a fun and enlightening exercise. If you found it troubling, maybe just take it with a grain of salt and don't worry about it.

Kaylle
(finally off to bed!)

Well, I was going to stir my brain into my own thoughts on this debate - but fortunately Kaylle got here before me and pretty much nailed what was on my mind. And so eloquently too. <g>

My brain thanks you, Kaylle!

So...what she said.

LabRat

Well, I'll say this, Cindy -- it's never dull with you around! It's been a fascinating discussion.

See, this is where we disagree completely -- I think the main point of fanfic is to *fix* the stupid stuff on screen, and make it better. The producers were limited by all sorts of things -- ratings, demographic appeal, time, continuity (by which I mean, a writer couldn't have Lex arrested halfway through season 1 if the rest of the season has him out and unsuspected). We as fanfic writers are *not* limited by these things. We can (and have!) write hundreds of different ways for Lois to realize CK=S, which just isn't possible in the structure of the show. There were many many great things about the show, of course, but also lots of moments that make me cringe It's very satisfying to revisit those moments and make them come out the way *I* wanted them to. That's the thing I love about Persistence of Memory -- Zoom jumps back into *lots* of different moments from the show and gives them a better outcome.

Yes, we should draw from canon, especially in characterization -- but I don't believe we ought to be limited by it. The other day, I was looking over the 40-some stories I've written in the last ten years, and there were very few that didn't change canon in small or large ways. <shrug> That's what's fun about this, for me.

Should we draw on "fan canon"? I think if an author comes up with a new way of looking at things and gives me a new insight, it's fair game to use it in the future. It should be checked back against "real" canon, because the further things divulge the harder they are to justify, but overall I think that enhances the whole body of fanfic, because others will identify things I hadn't thought of.

Will my interpretation work for everyone? Nope, probably not. There are certainly stories out there that I look at and think "who the heck *are* these people?" but there are lots of other readers who see those stories as very compelling and a justifiable extrapolation from canon. Variety, spice of life, etc.

I guess I have a very capitalistic approach to fanfic. Writers write what they want to write. Readers read what they want to read. The challenge is in convincing readers that the changes you're making are plausible under the circumstances. If you write something I dislike or strongly disagree with, you'll lose me as a reader (and I reserve the right to say so and explain why) -- but you might also pick up four other readers somewhere else, so hey, go for it.

Tolerant, that's me

PJ

[language cop]
cannon means a big gun; canon is an established body of work (of a writer, genre, religion, etc.)
[/language cop]

Cruising around, I found the following definitions:

From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000

From wikipedia.com:
From Writers University:

From Dictionary.com:

Note the common theme in these definitions (yeah, I bolded it)? Fanfic, by definition, is an extension of the original work. Who's to say how far that extension can reach or what sort of extension is acceptable? I certainly wouldn't be so bold.

There is an interesting essay written by Jane Mortimer about fanfic writing. I found the following to be very profound:

And this:

All this to say, there will always be purists in a fandom who are not satisfied with the extensions some writers take. That's fine. Because our fandom is so prolific, there are plenty of stories out there that purists can be satisfied with. The problem comes when purists begin to insist that all others conform to their strict definitions of what is acceptable or not. At which time I start to ask the question of who is qualified to say what is acceptable or not? This poll along with the Lois version demonstrate - to me, anyway - that no one can claim that right. We are all qualified and unqualified equally.

Cindy, I *do* know the difference between a Smallville Clark and a CR Movies Clark and an LnC Clark. My point is just because an LnC Clark does something counter to what we'd expect based on the show (as demonstrated in the examples of successful fanfics referenced by Wendy and Sara in their above posts), this does not mean he is a Smallville Clark or a CR Clark. Same thing with premise. Just because a writer chooses to put LnC Clark into a non-LnC situation - especially a darker situation - does not mean that the writer is channeling Smallville. Or the movies. Or Batman, or anything else.

What I find highly ironic is when those who claim no love of Smallville, those who will not watch the show at all, proport that a given depiction of Clark in an LnC fanfic is a "Smallville" Clark. How would that non-Smallville-fan know?

And this:

Please, feel free to create a poll of your own that corrects this problem. I'm always open to seeing how things can be done better.

Hey, Sara, regarding this:

I found this , so maybe this word works:

Laura, ask and you shall receive.

Lynn

Coming to this thread very late, but hopefully with something new to contribute...

Thing is, does it matter if fanfic changes over time? Okay, so I want my characters to be in character, but fandoms do change and evolve. That's the reality of the situation. (I left the Due South fandom because the fandom -- and the show, for that matter -- developed in directions that I didn't like.)

One of the things that kept me interested in Star Trek for so long was the fanfic. Why? Because the best sort of Star Trek fanfic went so far beyond the original show. The fan writers painted detailed backgrounds for the characters that were sometimes deeply satisfying.

Ditto Man From UNCLE fanfic writers. The show is fun but would never have held my interest on its own. However, I stumbled across some fanzines that are long, involved and far more realistic in tone than the show could ever have dared to be. Out of character? Who knows? Wonderfully satisfying to read? Definitely.

Also, what are we to make of the weirdness of some of the directions other fandoms take? I'm sure I've come across the argument that authors write fanfiction because it gives them scope to put their favourite characters in scenarios that would not have been acceptable to their creators. Experimentation and the ability to twist canon every which way are seen as some of the reasons for fan fiction's existence. Folcdom is positively restrained in comparison.

It seems to me that LnC fanfic stays truer than most fandoms' fanfic to its original canon. (I suspect, in large part, this is because we were given more facts to work with than was the case with other shows. There aren't so many gaps waiting to be filled in.) That's one of the things I personally like about it. But I can't see any reason why writers shouldn't experiment, push the limits. In fact, I think it's healthy. Some attempts will work and work well. Others will be terrible. I don't think any of us, however, have the right to say that nobody should be allowed to try them out.

Chris (stepping off her soap box)

/me is still just trying to get her head around the fact that the word fanfic has made it into dictionaries!

LabRat (who remembers the first stirrings of fandom way back when. Yes, I am that old!)

I just wanted to say that, while I couldn't get Lynn's link to the Jane Mortimer article to work, you can read the essay on the Wayback Machine here. Fascinating stuff!

Kaylle