Canon, Fan Fiction, and Multimedia Franchises
Being someone who reads, writes, watches, and plays material from a ton of multimedia franchises I of course happen to have a rather well-developed opinion of canon. This is particularly true since I'm a large fan of the KOTOR metaseries within the Star Wars franchise (in case you couldn't tell from my current avatar) where so many of the fans are rabidly devoted to one side or other of the "great canon debate." As someone who looks at writing science fiction and fantasy for a living I generally pay attention to this, even when I'm not sure where I stand because I always feel it's a good idea to keep a look out for potential pitfalls.
Canon has always had an uneasy relationship with fan fiction. For one thing the two are mutually exclusive. By definition fan fiction cannot be canonical (though sometimes fan elements are adopted into canon). Another reason for the conflict between the two is the general unease between official, licensed writers for a franchise and the fan writers. By and large the vast majority of science fiction and fantasy writers have a disparaging view of fan fiction and see it as infringing upon their copyright. And some, such as Robin Hobb (whose works I have not read), see fan fiction as a deliberate attack on canon. From their own viewpoint many fans rabidly argue that authors have no right to their universe once they publish it.
I disagree with both viewpoints. I think there can be a route in-between.
And I'm not alone here. Increasingly there has been a push towards the recognition of fan fiction as a generally harmless and fun activity for fans that, by and large, does not steal an author's readership. I know I still read far more official Star Wars fiction than fan fiction and in fact, it was KOTOR and its fan fiction that by and large got me into reading Star Wars novels (previous to this I had been a casual fan towards the universe - a fan nonetheless but thoroughly casual). Among the writers who have come out in support of fan fiction are Joss Whedon (of Buffy and Firefly fame), J.K. Rowling (I don't even have to tell you who that is), and, in spite of the angry fans complaining otherwise, George Lucas and most of the rest of Lucas Licensing.
So at first glance it might seem that the war between official writers and fan writers may be coming to an end. But perhaps not. While the original authors are getting more and more accepting a disappointing number of fans are not reciprocating the gesture. Instead of gratefully acknowledging the recognition that is not their inalienable right but instead based on the grace of the author these fans only help to justify Robin Hobb and others' claim that fan fiction writers want to "correct" the official universe and screw over the writers' original vision. Personally, I don't give a damn if fan fiction writers want to alter the official universe so long as it is done in a loving way. For one thing this is because I don't believe in authorial intention - because as Lucas and Spielberg have demonstrated authorial intention can change over time. What I do care about is when fans alter that universe in a spiteful manner, because they dislike or even hate something the author has done.
And let's be honest here. All of us have been disappointed by our favorite writers from time to time. Lucas revised the Original Trilogy and delivered the disappointing prequels for sure but he's far from the only one. Orson Scott Card's Alvin Maker series is heading nowhere interesting and he recently wrote Empire, a political rant disguised thinly as a novel. Tolkien wrote a series of drab and boring tales that nobody remembers except his most devoted fans. Whedon made Serenity (okay - I know, alot of people don't consider that a disappointment - I do). But let's remember they created the stuff you enjoyed in the first place. Without them, there'd be none of the original stuff - your fan fiction wouldn't exist.
This brings me to the matter of KOTOR (both games) and the canonization of the PC's gender and, in the case of the first game, their moral alignment as well. I know that any number of fans were upset about this. It's hard to tell what the percentage is exactly since KOTOR Fan Media is not exactly an accurate representation of the entire gaming demographic for BioWare and Obsidian's games. But nonetheless there was a huge outrage there and in many of the other forums. Why? Because they felt that LucasArts was telling them their version of the game was wrong. Many went so far as to blame George Lucas personally, indicating that he had a misogynistic agenda.
This is insane.
First of all, a quick lesson in how canon is dealt with throughout various franchises and Star Wars itself. There's essentially four basic ways of doing canon. First off you have the Star Trek method which is to make all the original media material (in Star Trek's case the shows and movies) canon and everything else (with a few exceptions) not. Then there's another method, often used by many Japanese anime or game franchises, which is to give each medium and/or region a different continuity. For instance, the Sonic series has a games continuity, a comics continuity, and an animation continuity and narry shall the three meet. Both of these methods are semi-effective as they require little regulation and let a whole lot of material get made. But they also lack consistency across the mediums and lead to a lot of confusion.
Take Star Trek. The next film is being written by a writer who not only pays attention to the films and TV shows but also some of the novels, causing many of the "purist" fans to rise up in rebellion (metaphorically). This, of course, amuses me since even the official, canonical timeline of Star Trek was so unregulated and inconsistent that it had little to no continuity anyway. But that didn't stop the purists of course, who also were the ones who raged against Enterprise.
So some franchises have taken one of two other approaches. There's of course Babylon 5's method of assigning continuity, which is basically that everything is equally canonical unless indicated otherwise. That means that the original show, the novels, the comics, etc. are all part of the universe and any inconsistencies are simply errors that JMS has to fix or readers have to overlook.
And then there's Star Wars' method. Contrary to common belief this isn't either A) The Wild West (which never existed anyway it turns out) or B) a rigid and exclusive license that applies only to the movies and novelizations (as many, again, so-called "purists" would have it). However, it's easy to see why Star Wars' canon is so misunderstand after close examination. It's not a simple in or out system like most. There's layers, as Shrek might say. At the top, you have the films which cannot be overridden by anything except another revision (hence why Greedo had his big miss). Immediately beneath that are the novelizations of the films, which often pay heed to the layers underneath but are under no obligation to. These are actually fairly significant as it was the novelizations that first introduced such key aspects as the Sith, the Mandalorians, Darth Bane, etc. to the universe.
Then beneath the novelizations is the rest of the universe - known as C-Canon, S-Canon, and N-Canon (apocrypha). C-Canon is stuff like the novels, the comics, audiodramas, and most games. They all have a consistent continuity (though it wasn't always so) which binds them together and connects them to the films. Whenever a contradiction is discovered it's generally retconned and corrected. Beneath C-Canon is S-Canon which includes things that otherwise would be C-Canon but which are dependent upon variables. For example, Empire at War, Knights of the Old Republic, and Galaxies are all S-Canon because they either have alternate endings, player-based content, or material that is irreconcilable with canon (like the end of the Empire's campaign in Empire at War).
All of this is overseen only briefly and distantly by George Lucas, who respects and keeps tabs on the canon but isn't well versed in it. In fact, Lucas is only even faintly aware of his protagonist Luke Skywalker's fate as a husband and father. So first off the bat it is easy to dismiss the claim that Lucas has deliberately turned the player character in KOTOR into a canonical male to spite women or for otherwise misogynistic motives. He probably had little or nothing to do with the decision in the first place.
The canon is, in fact, overseen mostly by Leland Chee whose job it is to find and correct all mistakes in canon as well as to provide that information for writers. Leland Chee was the one who approved the PC as a male in KOTOR and then as a female in TSL. The fact that he showed equal treatment towards both genders indicates he was hardly acting out of a misogynistic motive. He said from the start he felt that the Exile in TSL should be a woman and delivered on that belief. While it's possible he was doing it only to placate the women as some claim I suspect this isn't true if for no other reason than that he didn't have to and that if he truly was a misogynist he wouldn't have given a damn.
So what about the next claim - that the canonization means their version of the game wasn't the official one? Well, I hate to tell you, but that was always the case. Fan fiction simply isn't canon - no matter what. Now, that doesn't mean your version isn't "wrong" anymore than an alternate history where the Allies won Gallipoli or the South won Gettysburg is "wrong." It simply isn't factual in the fictional universe. But that doesn't mean you can't write about it. Hardly. In fact, Star Wars has a whole set of stories that are deemed to be "alternate universe" stories like the Infinities series for the Original Trilogy which was a comic revision of ANH, ESB, and ROTJ with different conclusions based on differing events (like Luke dying on Hoth).
So where does this go? Where can we find that compromise. Well, the writers have taken the first step towards a reconciliation and while many still criminalize fan fiction as subversive more and more are approving it. Now fans need to take the next step. They need to show the writers that they do respect the writer's vision and that they are writing not out of a desire to "correct" the universe but out of their love for the fiction. That of course might mean they might leap on "missed" opportunities or "mistakes" the author made (let's be honest here, writers, nobody's perfect) - hence the huge number of slash fics.
But when I see the fan riots about the canonization of KOTOR or the Ginny-Harry relationship (which I wasn't a huge fan of either) I can only shake my head. Come on, people, you have a right to your own visions. But so does the author. Respect that.
While I mostly write fan fiction at the moment I am moving more and more towards transferring over to mainly writing in my own IPs, which are approaching completion. It'll probably be a while before anything is published from those universes that I've spent literally about eight or nine years developing (around there... I've sort of lost count at this point) but when it happens I'd be honored (pay attention writers), yes, honored to have fan fiction written about my universe. But at the same time, as a fan fiction writer currently I can't help but be disappointed at the rabid anger so many fan writers feel towards the writers they claim to be fans of. Feel free to disagree with them, for sure. But don't get riled up just because they made A fall in love with B instead of C or because it turns out G was a girl instead of a boy (or vice versa). Hate only begets hate.
-Nivenus
Canon has always had an uneasy relationship with fan fiction. For one thing the two are mutually exclusive. By definition fan fiction cannot be canonical (though sometimes fan elements are adopted into canon). Another reason for the conflict between the two is the general unease between official, licensed writers for a franchise and the fan writers. By and large the vast majority of science fiction and fantasy writers have a disparaging view of fan fiction and see it as infringing upon their copyright. And some, such as Robin Hobb (whose works I have not read), see fan fiction as a deliberate attack on canon. From their own viewpoint many fans rabidly argue that authors have no right to their universe once they publish it.
I disagree with both viewpoints. I think there can be a route in-between.
And I'm not alone here. Increasingly there has been a push towards the recognition of fan fiction as a generally harmless and fun activity for fans that, by and large, does not steal an author's readership. I know I still read far more official Star Wars fiction than fan fiction and in fact, it was KOTOR and its fan fiction that by and large got me into reading Star Wars novels (previous to this I had been a casual fan towards the universe - a fan nonetheless but thoroughly casual). Among the writers who have come out in support of fan fiction are Joss Whedon (of Buffy and Firefly fame), J.K. Rowling (I don't even have to tell you who that is), and, in spite of the angry fans complaining otherwise, George Lucas and most of the rest of Lucas Licensing.
So at first glance it might seem that the war between official writers and fan writers may be coming to an end. But perhaps not. While the original authors are getting more and more accepting a disappointing number of fans are not reciprocating the gesture. Instead of gratefully acknowledging the recognition that is not their inalienable right but instead based on the grace of the author these fans only help to justify Robin Hobb and others' claim that fan fiction writers want to "correct" the official universe and screw over the writers' original vision. Personally, I don't give a damn if fan fiction writers want to alter the official universe so long as it is done in a loving way. For one thing this is because I don't believe in authorial intention - because as Lucas and Spielberg have demonstrated authorial intention can change over time. What I do care about is when fans alter that universe in a spiteful manner, because they dislike or even hate something the author has done.
And let's be honest here. All of us have been disappointed by our favorite writers from time to time. Lucas revised the Original Trilogy and delivered the disappointing prequels for sure but he's far from the only one. Orson Scott Card's Alvin Maker series is heading nowhere interesting and he recently wrote Empire, a political rant disguised thinly as a novel. Tolkien wrote a series of drab and boring tales that nobody remembers except his most devoted fans. Whedon made Serenity (okay - I know, alot of people don't consider that a disappointment - I do). But let's remember they created the stuff you enjoyed in the first place. Without them, there'd be none of the original stuff - your fan fiction wouldn't exist.
This brings me to the matter of KOTOR (both games) and the canonization of the PC's gender and, in the case of the first game, their moral alignment as well. I know that any number of fans were upset about this. It's hard to tell what the percentage is exactly since KOTOR Fan Media is not exactly an accurate representation of the entire gaming demographic for BioWare and Obsidian's games. But nonetheless there was a huge outrage there and in many of the other forums. Why? Because they felt that LucasArts was telling them their version of the game was wrong. Many went so far as to blame George Lucas personally, indicating that he had a misogynistic agenda.
This is insane.
First of all, a quick lesson in how canon is dealt with throughout various franchises and Star Wars itself. There's essentially four basic ways of doing canon. First off you have the Star Trek method which is to make all the original media material (in Star Trek's case the shows and movies) canon and everything else (with a few exceptions) not. Then there's another method, often used by many Japanese anime or game franchises, which is to give each medium and/or region a different continuity. For instance, the Sonic series has a games continuity, a comics continuity, and an animation continuity and narry shall the three meet. Both of these methods are semi-effective as they require little regulation and let a whole lot of material get made. But they also lack consistency across the mediums and lead to a lot of confusion.
Take Star Trek. The next film is being written by a writer who not only pays attention to the films and TV shows but also some of the novels, causing many of the "purist" fans to rise up in rebellion (metaphorically). This, of course, amuses me since even the official, canonical timeline of Star Trek was so unregulated and inconsistent that it had little to no continuity anyway. But that didn't stop the purists of course, who also were the ones who raged against Enterprise.
So some franchises have taken one of two other approaches. There's of course Babylon 5's method of assigning continuity, which is basically that everything is equally canonical unless indicated otherwise. That means that the original show, the novels, the comics, etc. are all part of the universe and any inconsistencies are simply errors that JMS has to fix or readers have to overlook.
And then there's Star Wars' method. Contrary to common belief this isn't either A) The Wild West (which never existed anyway it turns out) or B) a rigid and exclusive license that applies only to the movies and novelizations (as many, again, so-called "purists" would have it). However, it's easy to see why Star Wars' canon is so misunderstand after close examination. It's not a simple in or out system like most. There's layers, as Shrek might say. At the top, you have the films which cannot be overridden by anything except another revision (hence why Greedo had his big miss). Immediately beneath that are the novelizations of the films, which often pay heed to the layers underneath but are under no obligation to. These are actually fairly significant as it was the novelizations that first introduced such key aspects as the Sith, the Mandalorians, Darth Bane, etc. to the universe.
Then beneath the novelizations is the rest of the universe - known as C-Canon, S-Canon, and N-Canon (apocrypha). C-Canon is stuff like the novels, the comics, audiodramas, and most games. They all have a consistent continuity (though it wasn't always so) which binds them together and connects them to the films. Whenever a contradiction is discovered it's generally retconned and corrected. Beneath C-Canon is S-Canon which includes things that otherwise would be C-Canon but which are dependent upon variables. For example, Empire at War, Knights of the Old Republic, and Galaxies are all S-Canon because they either have alternate endings, player-based content, or material that is irreconcilable with canon (like the end of the Empire's campaign in Empire at War).
All of this is overseen only briefly and distantly by George Lucas, who respects and keeps tabs on the canon but isn't well versed in it. In fact, Lucas is only even faintly aware of his protagonist Luke Skywalker's fate as a husband and father. So first off the bat it is easy to dismiss the claim that Lucas has deliberately turned the player character in KOTOR into a canonical male to spite women or for otherwise misogynistic motives. He probably had little or nothing to do with the decision in the first place.
The canon is, in fact, overseen mostly by Leland Chee whose job it is to find and correct all mistakes in canon as well as to provide that information for writers. Leland Chee was the one who approved the PC as a male in KOTOR and then as a female in TSL. The fact that he showed equal treatment towards both genders indicates he was hardly acting out of a misogynistic motive. He said from the start he felt that the Exile in TSL should be a woman and delivered on that belief. While it's possible he was doing it only to placate the women as some claim I suspect this isn't true if for no other reason than that he didn't have to and that if he truly was a misogynist he wouldn't have given a damn.
So what about the next claim - that the canonization means their version of the game wasn't the official one? Well, I hate to tell you, but that was always the case. Fan fiction simply isn't canon - no matter what. Now, that doesn't mean your version isn't "wrong" anymore than an alternate history where the Allies won Gallipoli or the South won Gettysburg is "wrong." It simply isn't factual in the fictional universe. But that doesn't mean you can't write about it. Hardly. In fact, Star Wars has a whole set of stories that are deemed to be "alternate universe" stories like the Infinities series for the Original Trilogy which was a comic revision of ANH, ESB, and ROTJ with different conclusions based on differing events (like Luke dying on Hoth).
So where does this go? Where can we find that compromise. Well, the writers have taken the first step towards a reconciliation and while many still criminalize fan fiction as subversive more and more are approving it. Now fans need to take the next step. They need to show the writers that they do respect the writer's vision and that they are writing not out of a desire to "correct" the universe but out of their love for the fiction. That of course might mean they might leap on "missed" opportunities or "mistakes" the author made (let's be honest here, writers, nobody's perfect) - hence the huge number of slash fics.
But when I see the fan riots about the canonization of KOTOR or the Ginny-Harry relationship (which I wasn't a huge fan of either) I can only shake my head. Come on, people, you have a right to your own visions. But so does the author. Respect that.
While I mostly write fan fiction at the moment I am moving more and more towards transferring over to mainly writing in my own IPs, which are approaching completion. It'll probably be a while before anything is published from those universes that I've spent literally about eight or nine years developing (around there... I've sort of lost count at this point) but when it happens I'd be honored (pay attention writers), yes, honored to have fan fiction written about my universe. But at the same time, as a fan fiction writer currently I can't help but be disappointed at the rabid anger so many fan writers feel towards the writers they claim to be fans of. Feel free to disagree with them, for sure. But don't get riled up just because they made A fall in love with B instead of C or because it turns out G was a girl instead of a boy (or vice versa). Hate only begets hate.
-Nivenus