Is FanFiction Any Less Legitimate Than The Source Material.

[kilenem]

This actually has already occurred in comic books. Comic books is exactly what I'm talking about. While all works are in someway derivative just as everything can be considered derivative when you put it under a microscope Comic especially are. We have in comic books what I'd expect to see be produced from fan fiction in ten to thirty years. Its an established form of fiction that authors add too over the years. Its sort of an amalgam with philosophys being applied to characters and flat out changed over the coarse of years.

When I saw your title I was going to say fan fiction sucks because a lot of it just boils down to who you want to see have sex with what ever character. Then you mentioned comics in your post and I remembered that the teen titans show portrayed women better then the comics. Star Fire is kind of a slut and Terra sleeps with slate in the comics. If that can get be considered cannon or get passed by DC publishing I think any fan work can be considered legitimate as the source material.

 

[Entitled]

But then wouldn't the problem be with the term "original IP"?. Original IP is, for all I care, a financial term.

But so is "fanfiction", as long as we keep defining it for all practical purposes as a catch-all term for creativity inside someone else's IP.

The only reason why 50 shades derivates from that definition, is that the writer was online followed through the process of taking Twilight, writing fanfic stories hardly related to Twilight's plot, and then at last changing the names.

Take away the visibility mutation, and for all the public knows, 50 shades is just a generic erotic novel with no relation to Twilight. It is the epitome of a novel that is not all that close to being fanfiction. It is far less similar to Twilight, than, say, Hunger Games is to Battle Royale. Yet no one calles Hunger Games Battle Royale fanfiction. Imitator at most harshly, and "part of the same genre" at most generously.

And vice versa, let's say that the Hunger Games novels were nominally claimed to take place in the Battle Royal Universe, and now they are called "elsewhere fanfiction". Yet is it suddenly less valuable?

I haven't read any of those you mentioned, but just by looking at them, fuck they're long.

Yeah. Great works tend to be. Or at least I can't think of any one-shot novella that could demonstrate the capabilities of the best fanfic writers.

I'm not saying that length proves greatness, but at least it proves devotion and effort, which is a first step. The worst fanfics that you might be familiar with, are the utterly effortless dreck that someone word-vomited out on a boring summer afternoon, and the best ones are the results of years of hard work.

There's a difference between using historical/biographical data and characters from pre-existing fiction. The former needs an additional step of thinking and work to be translated into fiction, whereas already fictional characters can feel more "pre-chewed".

I would say the latter is more creative. Biographical data is a pre-chewed fact. A fictional source is just something that you may or may not be inspired by in certain ways.

Even poor 50 shades, as many faults as it writing has, took more liberties with it's characterizations to change them since Twilight, than any historical novel would dare to reinterpret puublic figures.

Also, Martin's talking about something specific: young writers. If he thought that should apply to all works he'd be directing the TV series, writing the scripts and applying make-up on every actor.

So, does that make hiss point unrelated to fanfiction's inherent quality? If it's just a specific advice for young writers, with no other value judgement, then it's just like warning young writers against starting with drama writing, or warning them against first person POVs, because it stiffles certain skills, even though the practice itself is otherwise legitimate?

If that's the case, then why bring it up regarding fanfiction's legitimacy?

My bad, I had a brainfart and thought of them as fanfic. I don't think I've seen any comic fanfics. Okay, yeah, the porn ones.

Though that still begs the question of what makes the fundamental difference in quality between licensed and unlicensed works? Why should the same work of art be considered less legitimate, based on whether or not some corporation stamps it's approval on it?

 

[rorychief]

maybe I need to read the good fanfic stuff but what engages and inspires me is creativity and fanfic seems to exist for people who wish to write but don't want to invest time into being creative. I mean anyone can take two characters and put them in a room and imagine what they'd say if they have material to work from. Creating characters that people feel so connected to that they feel they could imagine their reactions outside the story they're featured in is a talent. Writing fanfiction is an exercise to bring yourself closer to realizing that talent. If you can write in an interesting, well paced way but you require preloaded templates to begin I would call that being a good technical writer, but for me the heavy lifting that makes a writer different to the average joe is creativity and the ability to build things, rather than make use of the assets someone else has built to move around the pieces and play dolls house with. Will never be as relevant, remarkable or impressive.

if your fanfiction is so good that it doesn't require the source material to have impact, and someone unfamiliar with the character histories and relationships you're sponging off can agree its a good standalone piece, then you should write your own characters. I don't know one serious writer who isn't constantly overwhelmed with ideas for characters and worlds and themes and events they wish they had the time to dedicate to but don't because the ideas come faster than they can be committed to materiality and refined. It's hard to imagine someone with passion and a real fire in their belly and something to say dedicating any time to fanfiction, it would be such a waste of time when one could be developing an idea that might otherwise never be heard. Who could bear to work within the constraints of someone else's world and characters except someone who likes or needs to have their imagination dictated to them. Fine as an exercise to build confidence or as a parody, but it will never be as legitimate as the original.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

Well, it really depends on what your concept of "legitimacy" is.

"Legitimate" as in comparable, in terms of canon, to the source material? Then no. Not unless it's acknowledged by the creator of the source material.

"Legitimate" as in a valid expression of literary ability? Yes. Of course it is. Some works are even better than the material they're working with, though that's a supremely small fraction of what's out there. The lion's share is pretty bleh or downright awful, but it's still valid as creative expression. The value of said expression is subjective.

Original content is certainly more interesting, as a general rule, but a well written fanfic can be pretty damned awesome in its own right.


I'm not just saying this as a writer of fanfic either. I do original stuff too. Often enough, it's simply "easier" to work with a pre-existing world than it is to build one and, if that helps future writers become confident enough in their ability to expand into their own work?

Sounds perfectly fine to me.

 

[Ratty]

This actually has already occurred in comic books. Comic books is exactly what I'm talking about. While all works are in someway derivative just as everything can be considered derivative when you put it under a microscope Comic especially are. We have in comic books what I'd expect to see be produced from fan fiction in ten to thirty years. Its an established form of fiction that authors add too over the years. Its sort of an amalgam with philosophys being applied to characters and flat out changed over the coarse of years.

When I saw your title I was going to say fan fiction sucks because a lot of it just boils down to who you want to see have sex with what ever character. Then you mentioned comics in your post and I remembered that the teen titans show portrayed women better then the comics. Star Fire is kind of a slut and Terra sleeps with slate in the comics. If that can get be considered cannon or get passed by DC publishing I think any fan work can be considered legitimate as the source material.

Terra was one of the greatest trolls in comic history. Marv Wolfman and George Perez put her in the comic essentially just to fuck with their readers by having a regular character (they kept her on for like 2 or 3 years before the reveal) turn out to be evil for no real reason, then die permanently. The Wolfman/Perez run of Titans was still great though. And as for Starfire yeah it wasn't so much that she was "a slut" but that she came from a species that viewed such relationships differently than we do. Something they obviously had to leave out of the cartoon, though they still did a wonderful job getting across her naivety towards human customs in the show.

Now a lot of the stuff that's been done to Starfire since the Wolfman/Perez run, yeah that's a different (skeevy) story.

 

[Vigormortis]

Your question is a bit vague. In what context are we using "legitimate"?

Are we talking in terms of quality? If so then yes and no. I've read fan-fiction that's vastly superior to the source material. I've also read fan-fiction that was painfully worse than the source material.

Are we talking in terms of canon? If so then it all depends on whether or not the original creators of the source material decide to embrace that bit of fan-fiction.

Are we talking in terms of expansion or reinterpretation of the source material? If so then it's "legitimacy" is dependent on the original creators and the fans accepting the material (as with canon considerations above).

So....depending on context and each individual piece of media, it can be more legitimate, less legitimate, or just as legitimate as the original source.

However, from my experience, most pieces of fan-fiction are not what I'd consider "legitimate". This is not inherently true, of course, as I've come across some incredible bits now and again, but most are.....well....mere shadows of the originals they're based on.

 

[kilenem]

This actually has already occurred in comic books. Comic books is exactly what I'm talking about. While all works are in someway derivative just as everything can be considered derivative when you put it under a microscope Comic especially are. We have in comic books what I'd expect to see be produced from fan fiction in ten to thirty years. Its an established form of fiction that authors add too over the years. Its sort of an amalgam with philosophys being applied to characters and flat out changed over the coarse of years.

And as for Starfire yeah it wasn't so much that she was "a slut" but that she came from a species that viewed such relationships differently than we do.

I kind of want to argue that the cartoon leaving that out wasn't for kids because in the Batman Animated series they kept that in for Poison Ivy. Although Poison ivy is a villain and there aren't to many heroes in animated universe who are promiscuous if any. Even with Hawk Women meeting Hawkman in the Justice league show she doesn't instantly leave John Stewart because there is a suitor more similar to her.

 

[Entitled]

maybe I need to read the good fanfic stuff but what engages and inspires me is creativity and fanfic seems to exist for people who wish to write but don't want to invest time into being creative. I mean anyone can take two characters and put them in a room and imagine what they'd say if they have material to work from. Creating characters that people feel so connected to that they feel they could imagine their reactions outside the story they're featured in is a talent.

I think you got this one wrong.

Any RPG player can weave strings of letters into an "original name", and put together visual descriptors, backstory tropes, and personality types, to form a "new character". But that's not creativity, that's putting together lego blocks.

Taking that character, and actually making it appear interesting through the narrative, is where it becomes a really creative process. And if you can do that, then I really don't care whether you pulled the tempelate from the geneologies at the end of Lord of the Rings, or you put it together yourself. If you can't, then you might be the proud owner of an Original Character, his characterization will stll be clichéd as hell.

Will never be as relevant, remarkable or impressive.

I wouldn't know about that. Tom Stoppard wrote many respected plays, the one that is a fanfiction, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, is still the most famous one with a lasting cultural impact.

I also wouldn't say that Telltale games is being less impressive with their The Walking Dead series, than with The Wolf Among Us.

if your fanfiction is so good that it doesn't require the source material to have impact...

Every story requires the ones before it to have impact, because that's how art works. It's derivative. From the ceiling of the Sistine chapel, to Star Wars's Kurosawa inspiration, and Maleficent's narrative being based on reversing fairy tales, it's all communication towards people with expectations.

Whether you take pre-existing visual styles, locations, characters, or narratives tropes, is a matter of what new idea you want to emphasize.

Stoppard thought that Hamlet's side characters are the best platform for a new, satirical play.

Eliezer Yudkowsky thought that the Harry Potter universe, but with a drastically changed protagonist, is the best platform for communicating transhumanist ideals in Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality.

 

[Ratty]

This actually has already occurred in comic books. Comic books is exactly what I'm talking about. While all works are in someway derivative just as everything can be considered derivative when you put it under a microscope Comic especially are. We have in comic books what I'd expect to see be produced from fan fiction in ten to thirty years. Its an established form of fiction that authors add too over the years. Its sort of an amalgam with philosophys being applied to characters and flat out changed over the coarse of years.

And as for Starfire yeah it wasn't so much that she was "a slut" but that she came from a species that viewed such relationships differently than we do.

I kind of want to argue that the cartoon leaving that out wasn't for kids because in the Batman Animated series they kept that in for Poison Ivy. Although Poison ivy is a villain and there aren't to many heroes in animated universe who are promiscuous if any. Even with Hawk Women meeting Hawkman in the Justice league show she doesn't instantly leave John Stewart because there is a suitor more similar to her.

Batman TAS and Justice League always aimed for more mature themes and a largely teen/adult audience. I remember reading an interview from when the first run of Teen Titans was on with one of the producers (I think it was) and him saying they were conscientiously skewing younger with the series. Saying something like "If older viewers like the show, that's great! But they're not who we're making this for." Unfortunately this focus would bite the show when parents complained it was "too intense" for the kids and they had to tone down the fighting and "kiddify" it to the extreme in the last few seasons. And now we have "Teen Titans GO!" as a result which uhhh, that's a thing that exists, somehow.

 

[Vault101]

it is in that fanfiction..the unregulated kind is usually worse quality and is more concerned about the authors personal wank fantasy than it is getting the characters or anything else right

on the other hand re interpretations (and yes even literal fan fiction..se Sherlock Holmes) are nothing new, it can be a good way for fans to be "active" around a work and even (yes even) a starting point for "actual" fiction

 

[kilenem]

Batman TAS and Justice League always aimed for more mature themes and a largely teen/adult audience. I remember reading an interview from when the first run of Teen Titans was on with one of the producers (I think it was) and him saying they were conscientiously skewing younger with the series. Saying something like "If older viewers like the show, that's great! But they're not who we're making this for."

You win the argument then. Kind of wonder why TV shows try to aim towards a audience instead of just making a good show. The animated shows I remember as a kid had really dark story lines for Example in the Transformers beat Wars/Beast Machine Series because of CGI was expensive only two characters survived through both series. Also my little pony has a bunch of older people watching it.

 

[Entitled]

it is in that fanfiction..the unregulated kind is usually worse quality and is more concerned about the authors personal wank fantasy than it is getting the characters or anything else right

This is indeed the common end result, but on the other hand, as long as a writer has a personal interest in fulfilling their followers' interests, and putting effort into making it entertaining for them, the most unregulated stories can be the most free, artistically honest, and untainted by industrial interests works since the creation of copyright.

Even apparently whacky Alternate Universe, crossover, or What If stories, can serve as the channels for insightful thought, told in a liberated way that doesn't have to care about selling enough copies for a living, or pandering to the Lowest Common Deniominator, or even appealing to professional critics' expectation of how genres should work like.

 

[Ratty]

Batman TAS and Justice League always aimed for more mature themes and a largely teen/adult audience. I remember reading an interview from when the first run of Teen Titans was on with one of the producers (I think it was) and him saying they were conscientiously skewing younger with the series. Saying something like "If older viewers like the show, that's great! But they're not who we're making this for."

You win the argument then. Kind of wonder why TV shows try to aim towards a audience instead of just making a good show. The animated shows I remember as a kid had really dark story lines for Example in the Transformers beat Wars/Beast Machine Series because of CGI was expensive only two characters survived through both series. Also my little pony has a bunch of older people watching it.

Yeah it's a real shame that parents complained and got Teen Titans toned down in the later seasons. It was a legitimately great show and I think if it ran today it'd have a much larger, more vocal base of older fans.

PS - no argument, just discussing great shows and characters.

 

[rorychief]

I think you got this one wrong.

Any RPG player can weave strings of letters into an "original name", and put together visual descriptors, backstory tropes, and personality types, to form a "new character". But that's not creativity, that's putting together lego blocks.

Taking that character, and actually making it appear interesting through the narrative, is where it becomes a really creative process. And if you can do that, then I really don't care whether you pulled the tempelate from the geneologies at the end of Lord of the Rings, or you put it together yourself. If you can't, then you might be the proud owner of an Original Character, his characterization will stll be clichéd as hell.

Never heard of that Harry Potter fanfic, sounds interesting just from the concept you outlined there. As for the quote, I'm not implying that the goal of creativity is to come up with an arrangement of tired old features in an order that has yet to be seen or popularly recognised, I understand full well the context is everything and the narrative will give cliched characters depth they otherwise wouldn't, I'm saying that I, as of this moment being thus far unconvinced of fanfictions legitimacy, cannot fathom how someone with the talent to weave together circumstances, motives and tone into an expert narrative could bear to be shackled to pre existing characters. It just seems such a contradiction to me, to have the creative drive but to be content to relinquish control in area. If the names and details are irrelevant why not make it your own rather than having it always be in the shadow of the original? Maybe I'm just a control freak. I never work commission because I resent interference.

Is wolf among us a fanfiction though? I'm genuinely asking because I was luke warm about the comics and I've heard the game does the concepts far greater justice.

 

[FuzzyRaccoon]

One aspect that will become something of a negative as the medium continues to grow and becomes assimilated by the main culture as this generation and the next slowly comes into their own is that many artist and writers will continue to add to the established making these old concepts more rich but maintaining a status quo that drains originality from the zeitgeist.

From George R.R. Martin's website:

"Q: I want to be a writer. Can you give me any advice?

A: Write. Write every day, even if it is only a page or two. The more you write, the better you?ll get. But don?t write in my universe, or Tolkien?s, or the Marvel universe, or the Star Trek universe, or any other borrowed background. Every writer needs to learn to create his own characters, worlds, and settings. Using someone else?s world is the lazy way out. If you don?t exercise those ?literary muscles,? you?ll never develop them."

I think the problem with fanfic is that it's bad. It really is. And it doesn't promote good writing, 50 Shades being the ultimate proof. I can only think of a few Star Wars comics that were legitimately good. The rest was, is and sadly will be a clusterfuck forever.

This is legitimately the only thing I hate about Martin. He's part of this enormous group that is painting fanfiction in a bad light. Now okay some of it is bad, but some of it isn't. You've got so many writers trying their hand that statistically that's just going to flippin happen.

If you haven't read any fanfiction, especially not those specific stories that are considered cornerstone-reads for every specific fandom how much can you honestly say about how good/bad the writing is? Hell for all the flowery language of the OP there were so many grammatical errors that it actually was hard for me to get through.

You can point to the big ones like Harry Potter or Naruto and mention how many horrible things have come out of there but... well they're juggernauts aren't they? There are so many works in that that it starts to get hard to even find anything that isn't mediocrity. That doesn't mean that all of them are just going to be bad because you assume and say so.

 

[Abomination]

From a legal perspective? If you don't own the rights you can not make a profit from someone else's intellectual property.

So FanFiction is definitely less "legitimate" than the writing produced by the IP holder.

 

[Vault101]

There's a "market" for it? As in people pay money for fan fiction? That surprises me.
.

well...whats the difference between fan fiction and a tie-in/ expanded universe novel? quality and being paid for it...

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

Uh yes? I can't believe that's even posed as a question. Something written by a fan of a certain piece of content will never be as legitimate as the content itself.

Unless you're talking about if it's as legitimate as being writing in general, in which case, I would still say no. Conceiving characters or a world from the ground up is one of the most creatively difficult things to do, and growing and developing them is just as hard. Having either or both of those things done for you makes the writing process marginally easier, so even if you're able to write a story that's of the same caliber as the original you aren't creatively doing the same thing.

 

[Ratty]

Certainly there are people who agree with this view. But there is a market for this kind of writing

There's a "market" for it? As in people pay money for fan fiction? That surprises me.

Yep, depending on how you look at it. The tie-in novel/fiction is a very old phenomenon. Many consider all published derivative works to tv shows/movies/video games to be "published fanfic" or "licensed fanfic". Especially ones that are explicitly non-canonical. Some writers make a career specializing in it like https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/52051.S_D_Perry?from_search=true

There's a "market" for it? As in people pay money for fan fiction? That surprises me.
.

well...whats the difference between fan fiction and a tie-in/ expanded universe novel? quality and being paid for it...

I've read some pretty atrocious tie-in novels. I wouldn't place quality as an automatic difference between them. With licensed tie-ins it's sometimes painfully obvious that the author doesn't know or care about the source material and just wants a paycheck.