it's also interesting to point out the "cookie-cutter" formulas of some fanfic, where you can pretty much replace the names of the characters in said fic, and maybe change the setting, time, etc, and you'd get a brand new fic for a different fandom
OH IT HAS BEEN DONE. Has it ever! Though the most egregious was rereading a sex-scene and going, okay, I KNOW I've read this before, I KNOW I've read this before... why, yes, yes, I had! Amazing. Not. *snort*
I think, though, that fandom often polices itself (and has a quiet to noisy response to such stories, depending on the fandom and the extent its members overlap with other fandoms, or the extent to which the fandom is active and thus has learned to be picky about what it considers its 'greatest stories'). But that, though, is just one of the hallmarks of a lesser fanfic writer -- the cookie-cutter elements or lack thereof -- versus those fanfic writers we know and adore, who fill in all the blanks and flesh out the characterization so adroitly that we feel as though we're meeting the characters, fresh and new, all over again.
Even more OT than you: I think my favorite, personally, is when I finish a fanfic that has a writer-created detail of backstory, quirk, or sidestory, and I say, that makes perfect sense, and I'd never even thought of that before. Sure, the canon doesn't say X dropped out of school, but is ambiguous, and if X did drop out as writer Y is arguing here, then yeah, that reaction writer Y ascribes is one that fits perfectly with fandom. Woah! That is too cool. It's like a freaking easter egg, unplanned by canon, but hey -- another type of plausible potentiality, I suppose.
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Date: 18 Dec 2009 10:41 pm (UTC)OH IT HAS BEEN DONE. Has it ever! Though the most egregious was rereading a sex-scene and going, okay, I KNOW I've read this before, I KNOW I've read this before... why, yes, yes, I had! Amazing. Not. *snort*
I think, though, that fandom often polices itself (and has a quiet to noisy response to such stories, depending on the fandom and the extent its members overlap with other fandoms, or the extent to which the fandom is active and thus has learned to be picky about what it considers its 'greatest stories'). But that, though, is just one of the hallmarks of a lesser fanfic writer -- the cookie-cutter elements or lack thereof -- versus those fanfic writers we know and adore, who fill in all the blanks and flesh out the characterization so adroitly that we feel as though we're meeting the characters, fresh and new, all over again.
Even more OT than you: I think my favorite, personally, is when I finish a fanfic that has a writer-created detail of backstory, quirk, or sidestory, and I say, that makes perfect sense, and I'd never even thought of that before. Sure, the canon doesn't say X dropped out of school, but is ambiguous, and if X did drop out as writer Y is arguing here, then yeah, that reaction writer Y ascribes is one that fits perfectly with fandom. Woah! That is too cool. It's like a freaking easter egg, unplanned by canon, but hey -- another type of plausible potentiality, I suppose.