Superman Star Wars Fanfiction
Laszlo Perry
(Please note this is not a butt-hurt rant about the Star Wars EU being non-canon. It had good stories and bad and I don't feel that strongly about it either way. I'm just using it as a reference point. Please, no one call the wambulance.)
The whole business with the Star Wars EU had me thinking. People have been saying that it was nothing but professional fanfiction all along anyway because the only canon universe is the movies/original stories. But in some ways, the comics we're reading now can be considered fanfiction as well.
Sure you could argue that modern comics are canon because they are still produced by the original publishers of Marvel and DC, but the EU books were allowed to be made under the name Lucasbooks, which is tied directly to Lucasfilm and George Lucas.
If the EU is considered fanfiction because it is an alternate universe that is not in canon with the cinematic Star Wars universe, can't the same also be said the many alternate universes of Marvel and DC are fanfictions then? Things like Superman Red Son or Marvel What if? could certainly seem like fanfiction given that they are not directly tied to the mainstream universes.
And the biggest example of how modern comics could also be fanfiction? Why do some people consider the EU stories fanfiction? Because the only real stories were the movies that were made by the original creator of Star Wars George Lucas. If someone wrote a continuation of Harry Potter, many would not see it as canon because J.K did not write it, even if she gave permission for the person to write it. Same can be said with Lord of the Rings. And the same can technically be said for modern comics, because while they are still produced by the companies that own the characters, they are not being made by the original creators.All modern Marvel and DC comics are re-imaginings and continuations of characters created by someone else and quite often going outside the ideas and development said creator original had for them.
Do you think the creators of Cyclops would have ever have imagined him kill Professor X? Or the creators of the Joker ever having him removing his own face? Or the creators of Red Skull ever imagining that he'd steal a telepath's brain and start a next Axis? Or that Alan Moore had thought up half of what's in Before Watchmen? Probably not.
Modern comics, at least for Marvel and DC, can be technically considered fanfictions because they are stories that are written by people other than the original creators and writing the characters and stories in the way that they think they should go, not how the creators would have wanted them to go. Also, one would hope the writers would actually be fans of some of the comics they write.
So, if modern comics are technically fanfics, does that mean that all modern comics are bad and should not be read? Oh, heck no. This is just something that I thought of the other day and wanted to hear other people's opinions on. So, what do you think?
The problem with this argument is that it ignores the fact that characters created for Marvel and DC are owned by Marvel and DC. Even people who created these characters can't refer to them as their own because they are the publishers' characters. So what ever the publisher decides to do with them is not considered fan fiction. Where as people like George Lucas and J.K. Rowling have direct control over their characters and only they're official work is considered true.
Here's a metaphor for the whole thing. If someone (Stan Lee) gives you (Marvel) a present (Spider-Man) for Christmas, then that is your property, you can do with it whatever you want. And if the person who gave you the present wants it back and says that they were the ones who bought it, then they're really S#it out of luck.
Now if you (George Lucas) owns say a lawnmower (Star Wars), and a friend (EU writers) borrows it to mow their lawn, you still retain ownership of that lawnmower. Even if they mow better than you or use it more often, it is still not theirs. The owner can still ask for it back or take it away at any time.
Of course now George Lucas gave Disney his lawnmower for Christmas, meaning Star Wars is now owned by a company instead of a person, so the EU will be treated like Marvel and DC stuff from this point on I believe.
Madeline Potts is a certified member of Generation Z and in "Potts Shots" she'll be watching older movies she hasn't seen before. This week? Madeline explores a movie based on fanfiction and how it makes her feel as a lover of fanfiction.
There's a lot to unpack in After. From the stereotypical mansplaining of classic books to the way that Tessa just melts in Hardin's arms without a second thought. One second she's defending herself in class and the next she's getting in his car and following him to "his favorite spot in the woods." I mean I know you want adventure Tessa, but did your parents teach you anything about not going into the woods with a man you just met. She even goes so far as to cut ties with her mother (who thinks that Hardin is bad news) and move in with Hardin in the apartment he's watching for a professor. She even begins to give up friendships in exchange for more time with the bad boy she so desperately believes could be good. Even when we get to the end of the movie where Tessa finds out the true reason Hardin pursues her she eventually goes back to him after he writes a letter about how he never experienced love until he met Tessa Young.
So what did I think about the film? I was angry. I grew up with fanfiction but I don't think I realized until now how fanfiction has changed throughout the years. When I was a kid devouring Harry Potter fanfiction it was all about Ginny joining the Harpies and Harry being an Auror and them creating a family together. It wasn't until I was in high school that I started noticing this new genre of fanfiction, the 50 Shades of Grey, bad boy/ good girl genre. I'm sure that it's been around pre 50 shades but the important thing to note here is that THESE STORIES, the stories that show abusive relationship cycles and woman who give up their lives for the opposite gender are the fanfiction's that are being turned into movies that we see on the big screen. And these stories are so detrimental to their target audience, they are telling girls to strive for a relationship like Hardin and Tessa. That finding a boy you can fix is more important than finding a man who can support you and lift you up in your endeavors. They are even, at one point in the film, insinuating that it's okay to cut off ties with your family and friends if it true love. True love with this boy is more important than having a support system around you because this boy is your support system.
Yes these tropes have drama, intrigue, and they are damn sexy but I think that we all need to take a look at the fanfiction's we decide to highlight and think twice. While adults can decipher the difference between a healthy relationship and a bad one, these kids can't. I know that when I was a kid fanfiction was almost more important to me than the original work itself. After is an example in what we shouldn't be putting on the big screen.
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