i have no idea what the movie is about. i think clocks are involved.

[sideways]

Something something an interesting Twitter conversation I eavesdropped on about the evolving nature of (a) fandom: "early fic (at least what i read) was deeply in conversation with the source. even aus were very connected to the canon. now, fic is in conversation with other fic." 

Something something the current Goncharov phenomenon consuming Tumblr, in which an entire landscape of fanfiction is being written about a source that doesn't actually exist. A wonderful mess of fleshy fan creation with nary a skeleton to drape it on but familiar patterns and expectations and tropes.

It's been very amusing to watch from the fringes, and there has been gorgeous meta written about the "yes, and" nature of Tumblr and the creative power of collective fandom. But there is something a little bittersweet in it too, for me, and I think the Twitter conversation touches on why.

Comments

[sunlit_stone]

Honestly, to each their own, but I often find it pretty—for MDZS especially I've spent a lot of time with the text, and return to it a lot, and I feel like the in-conversation-with-fic genre ends up...they can be good stories? But they're very disconnected from the source, in a way I find frustrating. (Especially when it leads to things getting widely accepted as canon that are in no way canonical! But that's a different bugbear.)

Ah well—can't control how anyone else fans, and don't wish to; I'll just content myself in my corner with my friends, bugbears and all.

[sideways]

The Twitter convo did admirably at remaining neutral but, like you, I can get downright grumpy when I leap eagerly into a new array fandom only to find the exact same collection of Story Types That Rake In Kudos with canon names pasted in like a game of mad-libs. "AU - No Powers" my beloathed.

You're correct though - the most that can be reasonably done is a light grumbling and a retreat into filters.

[sunlit_stone]

(mundane AUs are something that always end up on my DNWs in exchanges. It gets worse when the power's so fundamental to who they are—I always have trouble when fics have Charles Xavier not a telepath!)

Grumbling and retreat into filters... in MDZS I've had some success with writing grumpy posts about how the fanon take I'd inaccurate because of canon points X Y and Z but only very locally in the tumblr Jin Guangyao corner, and even then only because I've been obsessed with him+Lan Xichen enough to write a truly stupid number of words about it.