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aceofhearts68865 Reasons Fan-Fiction Is Better Than Actual TV Shows
Summary:
Okay, so I may have a problem. the last (Only) thing I wrote was me trying to explain fic to a few of my friends. I Was bored and got to thinking that I've read a lot of articles mentioning fanfic, but they always focus on the negative aspects of it; the weird, disturbing, WTF stories that exist at the edge of sanity. I actually, usually prefer fanfic over most actual shows. So, this is basically me, once again, trying to explain fanfiction to people who, in all likely hood don't really care. It's kinda written like a 5 reasons article like on many sites that I've read. Plus, it's a way to put a lot of links to my favorite stories.
Work Text:
5 Reasons Fan-Fiction Is Better Than Actual TV Shows
- Sex 4.Sex 3.Sex 2.Sex and 1.Sex, end of list…
Kidding, that’s just what most people think of when they hear of fanfiction. Fanfic is NOT just about people boning! I know that’s what most people think, but it’s really not. Yes, there is a lot of sex in fanfic, of course there is. Sex is EVERYWHERE; in every show, book, movie, commercial, everything. It is absolutely permeated into our culture. That is just the world we live in, there is no avoiding it (believe me, I've tried). Saying all fanfic is just sex is like saying all scifi is Star Wars: is it a part of it? Yes; is it a pretty significant part? For many, yes, absolutely; are there people who take it too far? Oh my god, yes. But, at the end of the day, it’s just one element of a huge, expansive universe of possibilities.
It seems like anytime you see anything written about fanfic it’s always about the most cringe-worthy things that they can find. It’s usually about how bad the writing can be, how explicit many scenes can get, or how mindbogglingly insane a story can go. Those exist, no question and there is a reason for that; fanfic is written by the author, and only the author. For many, it’s a look into their minds, a glimpse into their inner-most (darkest, craziest, and yes, sometimes dirtiest,) thoughts. It is a way to express your most private thoughts and fantasies. For some, it's a kind of catharsis; a way to work through some of the confusing, depressing, at times even disturbing, things you're facing in your real life. For others it’s an escape from all that. It’s a way for someone who may, in person, be shy, awkward or somewhat introverted, to express themselves in a way that they simply can’t in real life. Then there are those who simply do it because they are intelligent, kinda quirky, and creative and came up with a unique, interesting story that they wanted to share; that, or they were drunk and it seemed like a good idea at the time.
Okay, rant done, onto my original topic. There are many reasons why some people may prefer fan-fiction to its source material, things like….
- Hate the way a story went? There is a story to fix that:
Fanfics are kinda like apps; there is one for everything. Ever read a book, watched a movie, or finally made it to the end of a series, only to be left underwhelmed, confused or simply with a mental loop of “Seriously!?!” This is why fan fiction exists. So much of fanfics are ‘Fix-it’ fics. Anytime I watch an episode of one of my favorites, only to be disappointed with how it went, I wait about an hour and go to archiveofourown.org. It is almost a certainty that someone (much more creative than me) was also disappointed and wrote something to fix it. Or, when they have the quick stinger for the next episode and you have to wait a week, or month or whole season, and you just don’t have the patience, damnit; there’s a fic for that. Killed off your favorite character? There’s a fic for that. Somewhere, online, they’re still around, even years later, they're still showing up; having adventures and storylines, all happy and healthy and totally not dead (unless they’re like a ghost or vampire or something, fanfic really can go anywhere).
- Find a narrative that speaks to you:
I’ll be honest; all my favorite stories are slash. Slash, to those who don’t know (hi, welcome to the internet, you must be new) is when canon-ly straight characters are written as Gay/Lesbian/Bi (generally Slash is used for male characters, femslash is women, obviously). why is this so common? I don't know, It could be that there are a larger number of well written, interesting male characters. It could be because most shows just have more men on them. Or, as most fanfic writers tend to be female, maybe they think the guys are hot and/or they are just sick of everything revolving around boobs; whatever the reason, there is a LOT of slash out there. My favorite thing about slash is that you get actual story-lines with gay characters as opposed to just ‘gay story-lines.’ Let’s face it, most stories involving gay characters can be summed up as: denial, acceptances, depressing homophobic drama, come out, fade away ( or apparently, in lesbian stories: all that, end up hooking up with random guy, THEN die). Look, I’m fine with coming out stories, I’m good with drama and self-acceptance and all that, really I am. When I’m in the right mood, I may even activelyseekthemout. But, honestly, most of the time I’d take action, fantasy, scifi,lots of humor, sarcasm, and explosions over all that emotional stuff any day. I don’t watch shows or read to be pulled into serious ethical dilemmas or to be depressed, angered or annoyed, I’m watching/reading to escape all that crap for an hour or so! I like cheesy quotes, ridiculous action, and completely off the wall scifi craziness. With slash, I can get all that, only with a little gay twist. See, LGBT characters in stories, to me, are kinda like the romantic subplot. I like it, it makes it interesting and adds depth, sometimes it may even be one of the main draws, but if that’s all it’s about, I’m out. I need more than just that to keep my interest. Again, that is what I look for in a story; you may actuallylikeromance stories. You may only like stories with straight characters. You may like stories that are dark and depressing and make you dissolve into tears. Heck, for all I know you may only like stories where all the characters are anthropomorphic Tetris blocks, I don’t know. And that’s fine. That is one of the best things about fanfic;no matter where your interest lie, no matter how traditional, quirky, or even downright bizarre, you can find something that will appeal to you.
I got a bit sidetracked again (fair warning, if you can’t already tell, I do that a lot). anyways; most fanfic won’t follow cannon. The characters might not be dealing with all the same things as the show, they may not be in the same relationship as the show, they may not even be in the same universe as the show; but who cares? Despite how obsessive some of us can get, none of these shows/characters are real; they’re all just fiction, and, I figure, if it’s all fiction anyway, you may as well follow the narrative that is most interesting to you.
- Expansive, immersive, unique worlds:
Speaking of differentuniverses, one of my absolute favorite things about fanfic are AlternateUniverses. I love these because you can have your favorite characters in completely differentworlds, different genres, different everything. The authors of some of these can build an entire, uniqueworldwith their words and imagery. These can go anywhere from a slightdetour from cannon, to a train, plane, possibly a freaking spaceship trip from where you started, which is why it is so appealing. You can have a character that you love in a type of story that would never get to see otherwise. These can be so creative, unique and expansive, that you almost forget what it’s based on. I have read a Hawaii five-0 story where one of the main characters was a werewolf; there’s a Teen Wolf ( shut up, you can’t look up slash without running into this one, a while ago they were actively encouraging slash) one that is set in a scifi/space type universe , complete with aliens, space battles and a collective of assassins. There’s actually a few Supernatural ones where angels and demons are similar to the show, but they’re aliens or something else instead (like I said, I like scifi). I love it when I find a really well-written AU, where you can get completely absorbed in the story. To me, these kind of stories are kinda like seeing a favorite actors that, no matter what they’re in, they still come off as the same person; Tom Cruise, Steven Seagal, Pierce Brosnan, Charlie Sheen (Wait, bad example, let’s just stick with the firsts three, okay?).
- Stories that are exactly what the author intended:
Okay, cards on the table? This one is a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand; you get the story exactly how it was intended, not deluded, edited or censored; on the other hand you, well, get the story exactly how it was intended, not deluded, edited or censored. These works are all based on the authors’ preference; on their tastes, views and peculiarities. It can be whatever that one particular person thinks up, and, let’s face it, there are some pretty peculiar people out there ( once again, you are on the internet right now, you know this) with some pretty twisted minds, hey, for all I know, you might be one of them. Their view may not appeal to you, it may creep you out, it may disturb you, it may even offend you; but the thing is, you can always stop reading and move onto something else, not every story is written for every audience. It’s not that hard to figure out: read what you want, ignore what you don’t. It really annoys me when I read comments on a fic and someone is complaining about something that was clearly explained in the tags/notes/exc.
This also means that most of the writing is subject to the authors level of skill; I can’t tell you how many times I’ve went to check out a story with a plot that really interested me, only to have it have so many spelling/grammar errors that I couldn’t continue, was a bit too convoluted even for me to follow (which, with me, is saying something) or, simply, veered into a direction that I just didn’t want to follow. I’m not gonna lie, there is a lot of bad writing out there, but, the same can be said about any form of media; you can’t tell me you’ve never read a book or watched a show, got part way through and thought “what the hell is this?”.
See, the thing I most love about fanfiction, is that you do get to see just that one individual’s story. It isn’t a hodgepodge of ideas assembled from a group of writers like most media. It isn’t a story tossed together by focus groups, designed to appeal to the widest audience possible. It’s not about marketing, merchandising and monetary value. It’s just a story that someone came up with and felt that they wanted to share with the world, simply because they could; to me, there is something so absolutly fantastic about that (yeah, yeah that went weirdly sappy for me, but I don’t care.)
For all of that; for all the typos, quirky spirals, and bizarre porn (I said it wasn’t all of it, never said that isn’t where many end up) that exist in fanfic, there really are some amazing writers in fanfiction that totally make all the rest worth it. Which brings me to…
1.Sometimes the writing is actually better than in the actual show:
I don’t know about you, but when I get a new favorite show, I like it right off the bat; love the characters, premise, story-lines, everything. Then it goes on for a bit and networks just. Can’t. Leave. Well. Enough. Alone. They add more characters, add more twists, kill off your favorites ( to be fair, this isn’t all on the show, sometimes the actors want to leave for whatever reason) or they add in unnecessary romances/ love triangles in an attempt to keep a show ‘fresh’. Note to TV writers STOP DOING THAT. If it works, leave it alone; give me more of the cases, action, bantering, humor and quirkiness that attracted me in the first place because that is why I am watching this show and not some sappy/overdramatic movie on lifetime. Don’t add a random girl just so the main guys have someone to flirt with/sleep with/compete over. Not only is that sexist, but this is not the narrative most of the audience is looking for; I don’t want to see them trying to hook up with or competing over some random woman, I just want to see them; solve cases, fight, make snarky comments and occasionally blow stuff up. Is that really too much to ask?
Sorry, this concludes the TV rant, I'm back. So, have you noticed how, after a show has been on the air a while it just kinda goes downhill? They lean too heavily on random tropes, they do a lot of ‘special’ or ‘themed’ episodes. Yeah, that bugs me too. There are some shows that changed so much that I stopped watching altogether and have switched to just reading fanfic. The reason; some of these writers are absolutelyamazing at writing stories that feel like an actual episode, or an entireSeason , of a show, sometimes even better than most of the actual shows writers.
An example; Psych was one of my favorite shows for quite a while. I loved the first couple of seasons, but as it drug out the stories got more convoluted and random. The premise was fantastic, but it seemed like many of the stories just kinda missed the mark. I get that it was mainly a comedy show, but it was also heavily driven by cases; for me, most of these just kinda fell flat and were forgotten in favor of slapstick comedy and the will they/won’t they relationship between the fake psychic and the junior detective he was usually working with (It’s a guy and a girl, you know they will). There are some amazing stories that are exactly like an actualepisode, complete with the flashbacks and everything, only with more adventure and more compelling cases. These writers can draw you in with the first few words and keep your attention all the way through.
Another of my favorites was Eureka. I actually liked this entire series, but at the end of the 3rd season they killed off one of my favorite characters. I loved the quirkiness of the show, it was funny and interesting with a good mix of scifi, humor and action. There simply wasn’t enough of this show; with fanfic you can get a lot more ‘episodes’, This has also inspired some really great AU’s. they are just as fun, interesting and quirky , as the actual show just, you know, without the commercials.
Look, I know that many people look down on fanfiction; they see it as anything from badly written porn, the ranting of a lunatic, or basic copy write infringement. Those stories are out there, no question, but that is just a part of it. A lot of it is well written, creative narratives that just take an existing idea and run with it; and honestly, how is that much different from any other media? Most of the characters from Star Wars are pretty much lifted from old westerns and samurai films. Every other movie or TV show that seems to be coming out is an homage to, spin-off or gritty reboot of something else. Nearly every story is going to borrow some things from others. Most characters are gonna be inspired by others, wither it’s just a bit or in everything but the name; at least fanfiction writers are honest about where they are borrowing from. Bottom line, a lot of these writers have an amazing ability to weave interesting, creative, imaginative stories better than many who get paid for it; and they’re not doing it for money, fame or other forms of personal success. They just want to tell you a creative, interesting story. They want to entertain, to express themselves, and to give people interesting narratives that they can identify with that they may not be able to find too many other places; or like I said, maybe they were just drunk. Either way, it usually leads to something pretty entertaining.
***
okay so, I went a bit overboard with the links, here is, well, yet another link to a list of all of the stories. It has the Fandom, Pairing, Name of story, with link, and a brief intro to the story. hope it helps some!!
Enjoy!
Baffling, Beautiful
Jack does his part to protects the world
C is for COCKTAILS-
G is for GLITTER-
The Strange Sunday Morning Meanderings of Xander
Ornithology
Flashy lights, Painted Smiles
Beauty and the Beast
Pack Life
Fun and Games
Simon la Exploradora
