Is FanFiction Any Less Legitimate Than The Source Material.

[DementedSheep]

Legitimate as in?

I assume you don't mean canon since that's pretty clear. Its not canon unless the author or whoever owns the IP says it is. It can be your personally preferred version of events but it's not canon no matter how well it fits and you should not be able to make cash from it without permission.

A legitimate form of writing? I mostly see it as practice writing or for fun TBH. You're building on existing things. You skip over a lot like the the world building and don't necessarily have to come up with all your own characters, tone, style of story ect. Then again I suppose being able to work with character and a world that isn't yours but still managing to keep the feel of the characters and world the same and keep the character consistent (instead of having them do what you would *want* them to do) is a skill on it's own. I still don't know if I would consider it equal to building your own world and characters but it's fun seeing multiple authors play around with same set of character and world can be interesting and fan fiction isn't inherently lower quality to anything original.

 

[Bashfluff]

Derivative works will always take something from someone else. That doesn't mean that they are any less good or worth reading. In the best of cases, good fanfiction can elevate the source material to new heights. Fanfiction has no restriction or deadline. The people who write it can have a level of dedication that the original writers lack--though this is not always the case on either side. Do you have to do less work? That depends on the story. I've written things where I just whipped up a random character based on an archetype and used the real world as a setting.

There comes a point when you have to realize that just about all writing is derivative in some form or another, from its structure to its characters to its setting to its tropes. On top of that, some pieces of writing will require more work to write than others due to the setting. Do we look down on works of writing that take a little less effort because of that? No, of course not. Do we look down on writing for the use of tropes provided it's done well? Of course not. Just look at Star Wars.

What irks me is that people think that fanfic writers put no effort into the world and into the characters. In a story, characters have to change in one way or another. Are you going to tell me that characters are all so original, that worlds are all so unique that using the ones others have made is that huge a leap from what others do and requires no effort? No.

And the best fanfiction elevates a world. It makes it seem bigger. It makes the reader ask questions or brings up new facets about the world that the original works don't have the time to go into.

It seems, then, looking down your nose at fanfiction as a lesser form of art is hypocritical. Good writing is good writing. Do fanfiction writers take shortcuts? Yeah. So do writers of original works. Everyone builds on what came before them and upon established tropes, characters, settings, and themes. What makes a good piece of fanfiction is the same thing that makes a good piece of writing: how you use them!

 

[Sigmund Av Volsung]

A lot of online fan fiction is abysmal. The legitimacy would depend if the story in question uses the source material to explore interesting ideas within that same universe (a la the sequel progression from KoTOR to KoTOR II).

Sherlock Holmes underwent quite a few fan iterations when Doyle decided to axe the series, and I imagine some of them were alright.

Inherently though, no. Fanfiction has no legitimacy because the chaotic nature of whether or not it uses the canon in an interesting manner that more importantly results in a successful venture strips away any inherent value, as it could just as easily be a sycophantic Mary-Sue story about the main character being a stage for the author to project onto.

 

[sumanoskae]

No work of any sort should have it's legitimacy defined by it's source.

All fiction is fan fiction; the hero with a thousand faces has a thousand faces for a reason. The the first artistic muse for humanity was reality, and soon that gave birth to other muses in the form of art itself. But it all traces back to the same source.

Just as human nature has not fundamentally changed, the mirror we hold to it through art remains the same.

Star Wars is an original work, yet it borrows concepts and characters from countless sources. To exalt originality for originality's sake is to willfully ignore the derivative nature of art, and to ignore what makes a work of art powerful; do not forget that some of the most powerful stories ever written are based on real events; they are by definition unorignal. We must first interpret the outside world in order to reflect upon it.

Inspiration is derivative by definition.

We regard works of art with fondness when we can see ourselves within them. Sometimes we see that reflection from a different angle that changes our perception of it, but we are always seeing the same thing.

There is only one concept for a great story; a cast of characters behaving in accordance to human nature within a logically cohesive setting.

Do not chase originality. Originality simply describes an idea not yet experienced; this can promise only novelty. Instead seek truth, seek work that with grace and passion reflects upon the human condition. Seek stories that are told because they were too great, too terrible, or too beautiful to be contained, that were made because their makers were full to bursting, and could not contain their words, be they words never once before spoken or said a thousand times over.

A world where we can no longer marvel at the beauteous sunrise because we have been transfixed by it before would be a grim one indeed.

"In every age, in every place, the deeds of men remain the same" - Legend of Galactic Heroes